0:00

Everyone, John Heilemann and welcome to Helen

0:02

High Water in my podcast about politics and culture

0:04

on the edge of Armageddon. 2

0:06

determined if dubious committed

0:09

if Kukui for cocoa puffs often

0:11

wrong, but rarely in doubt exercise in

0:14

elevated gas baggery. Than

0:16

neither rain nor snow nor heat nor gloom

0:18

of night nor the toxic

0:20

rantings of the not house right, a

0:22

president attempting to invalidate legitimate

0:24

election and stage in auto coup complete

0:26

with an armed disruption of the United States capital,

0:29

nor more broadly and arguably

0:31

even more disturbingly. The capture

0:33

of a decent sized chunk of our political, social,

0:35

and civic spheres by a cadre of

0:37

incoherent, insidious, conspiracy

0:40

addled, autocracy craving, authoritarian

0:43

worshiping lunatics, hustlers, grookerters,

0:45

nihilists, and nint camp boops. None of it.

0:47

None of it. Has kept us from

0:49

our duly sworn duty and obligations,

0:52

giving you, our listeners, a fresh

0:54

episode of this podcast week after week

0:56

after week after week Maybe

0:58

not without fail because,

1:01

you know, hashtag epic fail

1:03

is one of our many models around here,

1:05

but certainly without a pause. We're

1:08

doing that for more than two years.

1:10

Haven't had a break. All of

1:12

which is to say that I

1:14

am plumb shagged

1:17

out and desperately in need of

1:19

some R and R. And with the midterm

1:21

election now comfortably in the rear

1:23

view mirror, in our democracy amazingly,

1:26

if I will admit a little unexpectedly, still

1:29

intact. It seems like a suitable

1:32

time for the Heilemann Water home

1:34

office to give itself a fucking

1:36

break. And so for the next few weeks,

1:38

that is exactly what we are 2 do.

1:41

And we'll see you back here on the other side of the holidays.

1:43

Tanned, rested, refreshed, revitalized, and

1:46

raring to go. Ready to

1:48

get back to cranking out more,

1:50

tasty content. In the meantime,

1:53

don't despair. We're not leaving

1:55

you entirely in the lurch for these

1:57

weeks. 2 the contrary. Every

1:59

Tuesday morning, per usual, you

2:01

will find a hopefully unfamiliar

2:04

episode of the podcast doing

2:06

the backstroke in your feed drop

2:08

there by the Abel AI fact totems

2:11

who'll be mining the store while we're away.

2:13

And while these episodes come

2:15

over the next few weeks, may not be fresh, or

2:18

strictly speaking new, they will

2:20

be piping hot, a carefully curated

2:22

series of hot and hot water golden oldies

2:25

which those of you who've been around from the start

2:28

may remember, I hope

2:30

fondly. And those of you who came along sometime

2:32

later may never have encountered at all.

2:35

Given our focus on politics these past few

2:37

months and our desire not to take a dump

2:39

on your mood of holiday inspired good cheer,

2:41

we've decided these encore presentations will

2:43

avoid that topic like the plague. And focuses

2:46

dead on culture, entertainment, technology, and such

2:48

with a run of some of our most favorite guests in those

2:50

realms over the past two years, including

2:52

this beauty right here, which

2:55

whether or not you've heard it before, you will

2:57

not want to miss. And so with that,

2:59

we leave it to it with a hearty and heartfelt

3:02

Nalaste. Hey,

3:17

everyone. John Heilemann here, and welcome to part two

3:19

of our special 2 part episode with foreign policy

3:22

guru, nuclear strategies, Savant,

3:24

top shelf nutritionist and expert on

3:26

all things Russia. Longtime US Naval

3:28

War College Kuba and author

3:31

Tom Nichols. If you haven't listened to part

3:33

one of this podcast, you really, really ought

3:35

to hit pause right now on this part

3:37

two and go back and

3:39

do that now, which is to say listen to part

3:41

one. So you can hear Tom and I discuss Ukraine's

3:44

remarkable resistance, Zelensky's Tour

3:46

de Force performance on the world's stage last week

3:48

in his genius for navigating a

3:50

post modern media landscape that's not quite

3:53

as treacherous as when he's facing in

3:55

the bunker, but still pretty damn for bidding.

3:57

The miscalculations and manias of Vladimir Putin,

3:59

and I was become the John Gotti of super power

4:01

politics. And then the highlights

4:04

of Tom's career and the lowlights of

4:06

his playlist. Today however,

4:09

we have a whole different agenda. We're gonna be

4:11

talking about Joe Biden, his

4:13

leadership of the Western Alliance, the rejuvenation

4:15

of NATO, the possibility that Putin might turn

4:17

to chemical or even nuclear weapons, and

4:19

whether we are on the brink of world war free

4:22

or maybe just maybe we are already

4:24

in it, but just haven't realized it

4:26

yet. Tom, thank God doesn't think

4:28

that's true, but he admits that he could be wrong.

4:31

That we may just think we're lazily floating

4:33

downstream on a sunny spring day. When

4:35

in 2, we're about to go around a bend and

4:37

run smack into Heilemann

4:39

High So,

4:47

Tom, the one topic that we haven't gotten to yet in

4:49

terms of, like, the three big dramatic personae

4:52

on the world stage right now in terms of the Russia

4:54

Ukraine conflict. Talked about Putin. We talked about

4:56

Zelensky, but we haven't talked about Joe Biden yet. And

4:58

obviously, he's a a very big player

5:00

as the leader of the Western Alliance. Like, I was holding

5:02

it all together in a lot ways with NATO. So

5:05

I wanna do that now and spend some

5:07

time on it. Let's take a listen to

5:09

some sound from last week, the same

5:11

day that Zelensky gave his big speech to congress.

5:14

This was Biden. He was always

5:16

planning to give a speech kind of in response to Zelensky.

5:19

She said some things. And then he

5:21

got asked a question by a reporter on a rope

5:23

line. So let's listen to a little of that speech

5:26

and then what happened

5:27

unprompted, unscripted on

5:30

the rope line. Together with our allies and

5:32

partners, we will keep up the

5:34

pressure on Putin's crumbling economy,

5:37

isolating him on the global

5:39

stays. That's our goal. Make

5:42

Putin pay the price, weaken his position

5:44

while strengthening the hand of the Ukrainians on

5:46

the battlefield at the negotiating table.

5:54

I think he is worker. So

5:56

here's Joe Biden. Leader of the west

5:58

ostensibly, and and I think probably you and

6:00

I agree in fact in this crisis, but I 2

6:02

hear your views about it. The speech was a carefully

6:05

calibrated speech in which he was basically doing. He was trying to

6:07

do, which essentially say, world decided the Ukrainians.

6:09

We wanna help Zelensky. We wanna help those people. We

6:11

wanna beat back Vladimir Putin. But

6:13

We also 2 to be the in the room and we do not

6:15

want to spark World War three. And then, you

6:17

know, being Joe Biden, he gets asked a question on

6:19

a rope line and he's like, oh, of course he's a warm

6:21

criminal. Don't even got coverage for that day.

6:23

I don't know how much that matters. But do you

6:25

think it's in any way consequential that he

6:27

said it? And then more broadly,

6:30

what's your assessment of how Biden has

6:32

done through this entire crisis. And he doubled

6:34

down on it later because somebody said --

6:35

Yeah. -- he's a dog. He's a murderer. And Biden's like, yeah. course

6:37

he is. You know, I wrestled with that a little bit

6:39

because I think Biden really was made for this

6:42

moment. I think he's doing a great job. I think

6:44

he's making the right decisions. And that

6:46

was a classic Biden being Biden moment.

6:48

Right? The guy has no inner monologue about

6:51

some of these things. Right. But on the other

6:53

hand, I think what Putin's done

6:55

is a point of no return with

6:57

the rest of the world. Like there was once

6:59

a time where you'd say listen don't call the guy at

7:01

war criminal. You're gonna have to talk to him about

7:03

some stuff. We'll figure this out. You

7:06

know, we'll muddle through the way American foreign policy

7:08

always does. I think Biden just set out

7:10

loud the truth that it's almost gonna

7:12

be impossible to unwind this

7:15

unless something dramatic happens that

7:17

either Putin is willing to make a deal

7:19

or he leaves power or whatever it

7:21

is that happens And by the

7:23

way, what Biden said was not nearly as stupid

7:25

as what Lindsey Graham said, you know, which

7:27

was the dumbest goddamn thing I've

7:30

ever seen. I wanna be just really glad. My point is

7:32

not that he's 2, and I think it's self evidently

7:34

it's self evidently

7:35

true. Right. He stepped on his own. Right. He's got

7:37

a bunch of people who saying, be careful.

7:39

Right. Was it something you wanna say when

7:41

you're you're

7:42

trying to unravel this problem? Yeah. Because

7:44

my first reaction was to, you know, my old cold

7:46

war instinct. No. You still gotta remember you gotta

7:48

meet the guy and

7:49

go to summit and all that stuff. On the other hand,

7:51

I'm trying to think of what happens

7:53

if Joe Biden is at,

7:55

you know, Vienna or something shaking

7:57

hands with Vladimir Putin after all

8:00

this. Is that really

8:01

possible? Right. And I think for, you know,

8:03

it's not I mean, it's

8:04

hard to imagine. You know, it's very hard to

8:06

imagine. And I think in this sense,

8:08

you wanted to stay out of trouble earlier comparing Zelensky

8:11

to Trump. I wanna stay out of trouble comparing

8:13

Biden to Reagan -- Mhmm. -- who I think

8:16

gave great speeches in their early eighties. But if you

8:18

remember, the first thing Reagan ever said got

8:20

him into trouble when he said you know, what do

8:22

you think of the Soviet leaders? Although, why they cheat?

8:24

They steal? They'll do anything? They're monsters? You know,

8:26

and people freaked out about

8:28

dealing with Reagan. And the

8:31

the reaction among the Cognizantia

8:33

of that day was the Soviets are gonna make Reagan

8:36

pay for this and we're never gonna get past it.

8:38

And yet somehow we did. I don't know

8:40

how Putin gets past this, and I'm

8:42

not sure that it was that big a deal --

8:44

Right. -- providing to say it odd because Putin's proving every

8:46

day now. It's like, oh, you know what? Like, you want

8:49

you to learn about Biden saying he's

8:51

war criminal. That new cycle has already

8:53

passed because you're talking about Biden bombing

8:55

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA actor in Maripul. That says

8:57

children on

8:58

it. I think

8:59

you mean Putin and Bami.

9:00

Putin and Bami. I'm part of it. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

9:02

I don't wanna make sure. That was the exact same

9:04

thing. Beautiful. I agree with that. Look, any

9:06

morally sensate person with a pair of eyes that

9:08

function better than your ears do when it comes to music is

9:10

looking at what's happening on television every day and saying, these are

9:12

war crimes. They're like, like, I don't even care what the

9:14

legal definition is, you know, bombing hospitals

9:17

and and civilians

9:18

indiscriminately. You know, if that's not war crime,

9:20

there is no war crime. Right? Right. Just in

9:22

a way that you might have been able to finesse

9:25

in earlier go arounds with Putin

9:27

where he could say, up, Georgia, mistakes were made.

9:29

Alevo, you know, the Austrians and the Russians.

9:32

But, you

9:32

know, this is in the heart of Europe, and

9:34

they are intentionally committing atrocities.

9:37

Yeah.

9:37

Totally. On

9:38

a daily basis. So on that, I think it's

9:40

different. think it is completely different.

9:42

Although, I would say that some of the weapons that were used

9:44

in the Lip Bu and Grozny are, like, like, I think

9:46

it should be definitely shouldn't be war crimes

9:48

also. But you could have convinced yourself

9:50

to say -- Yes. -- I'm not gonna say it for the sake of

9:52

bigger fish to fry here. Right. So so

9:54

here's so I so I think it's it's it's noise

9:56

not signal. Is the Biden thing got a lot of attention

9:58

and and it showed again Biden's Biden. He can't see

10:00

our message. Okay. Fair enough. I just wanna be

10:03

to see this through a skeptical eye, which

10:05

is Biden and the administration got

10:07

a lot of credit. I mean, the buildup to the war

10:09

by publicizing all the intel and basically

10:11

saying, we're gonna strip them of the ability, them,

10:13

the Russians, the ability of making any kind of

10:16

false claims about provocations. We're just gonna

10:18

publish everything we know. This is a new way we're gonna do this.

10:20

We learn from twenty fourteen. We're doing it different.

10:22

And he gets a lot of praise for

10:24

holding the lines together. I said, you

10:27

know, the other day that I think that NATO is maybe more important

10:29

than it's been, you know, in

10:31

at least thirty years, thirty five years. Reasserted

10:34

itself in this profound way. Everyone in Europe wants to

10:36

get in. Formerly neutral countries have never wanted

10:38

to be in military alliance if we're

10:39

like, I need that NATO membership card. Let me

10:41

They a couple of weeks ago if Putin keeps up this way. Polar

10:43

bears are gonna be in NATO. hundred percent.

10:45

So, you know, he gets a lot of credit for all of that.

10:48

And yet, there is a question which

10:50

is, all the stuff we did,

10:52

we, the Americans and We NATO, did 2 try to

10:54

deter Putin from invading, did not

10:56

work. He invaded. And

10:58

so far, all the stuff we've done in terms of sanctions

11:00

and all the other things we talked about before have

11:02

not gotten them to stop indiscriminately bombing

11:05

Ukraine. And again, I don't mean to say that

11:07

I think that obviously means that it's wrong to

11:09

say that Biden's done a good job. What I mean is it asks the

11:11

question, like, what's the metric by

11:13

which we judge the leadership of

11:15

an alliance. It's a defensive alliance,

11:18

but you would have thought in in Ukraine

11:20

is not part of it. But what would have been a clear

11:22

success is that Putin pulled up short and didn't even

11:24

though he was planning And what it would have been equally

11:26

clear success is he hightailed it out there soon.

11:28

Neither one of those things happened, and neither one of those is

11:30

much more prospective than happening anytime soon.

11:32

So, like, how do we judge

11:33

it? I'm not saying this because

11:35

I have any particular brief or Biden. I'm gonna

11:38

say this as this passionately as I can, that

11:40

the three things I would judge Biden. First,

11:43

he inherited a bad situation. He was dealt

11:45

a bad hand. This was gonna happen I

11:48

think if it didn't happen in Trump's second term,

11:50

it was gonna happen in whoever followed on Trump

11:52

that Putin had just settled on this a lot

11:54

earlier than even last year, and he's been

11:57

prepping the ground for it. You're gonna talk

11:59

about that this became Biden's kind of

12:01

kobiyashi maruoud test. Right? His no

12:03

wind scenario, you have to put a

12:05

lot of that burden back on Donald Trump and

12:07

I'm sorry to say on Barack Obama for

12:10

reactions even earlier. And George w

12:12

Bush for that matter, you know, looking into soul and

12:14

all of that. Yeah. So that's one is that

12:16

Biden just got dealt a bad hand. Another

12:18

metric here is seeing it coming, doing

12:21

what we could to prepare the Ukrainians, the fact

12:23

that Putin didn't

12:25

achieve anything he tried to achieve

12:27

in that first week is not just because

12:29

of gigantic intelligence failures

12:31

in Moscow, although it is. But also

12:33

because of groundwork we've been

12:35

doing with Ukrainians for a long time.

12:38

I mean, the Russians kind of dashing themselves

12:40

on the rocks of on the hills of

12:42

Kyiv. And also, apparently, Ignatius

12:44

is just breaking news, saw a report that

12:46

said the Russians may be giving up on assaulting

12:48

Odessa, which would be really something

12:50

-- Huge.

12:51

-- that's true. If true. Right? That's one

12:52

of them. Huge. If true. If true. If stipulate. Can't

12:55

vouch for it. The third thing I'd say

12:57

is if you're the head of a defensive alliance

13:00

and a major war is raging

13:02

and your alliance has not been attacked,

13:04

and your alliance is still intact and

13:07

doing very active things, that's

13:09

pretty good. There have been times in

13:11

the past where we have had to plead with NATO

13:14

to do far less with

13:16

a lot more energy. People thought it was

13:18

amazing that Bill Clinton and I give

13:20

Clinton all credit for this, you know, got

13:22

nineteen NATO nations back then 2 agree

13:25

to do the Kosovo operation. That

13:27

was hard thing to get done. But Kosovo compared

13:29

to this was like minutes skeletal risk.

13:32

Port Gerald Ford had to go to Brussels in

13:34

nineteen seventy five and

13:36

plead with the alliance to stay together

13:38

after Vietnam when you had guys

13:41

like Callahan, the British prime minister saying,

13:43

well, my job is basically to help manage decline

13:46

and, you know, the end of NATO and all

13:48

of

13:48

that. Stuff. I mean --

13:49

Yeah. -- you know, for this war to be raging

13:51

and you have thirty countries from Greece

13:53

and Turkey all the way out to the

13:55

newer members and Poland under direct

13:57

threat, 2 keep that together and

14:00

so far 2 protected your

14:03

alliance from further Russian attack.

14:05

That's not nothing. Yes. That's considerable

14:07

achievement. Now, If it turns to war tomorrow

14:10

and NATO has to fight, then we'll

14:12

see what kind of a wartime president Joe Biden

14:14

really is leading a coalition. I don't

14:16

think that's what the Russians think some

14:18

Russians don't want that. I've gotten a lot of

14:20

heat for a piece I wrote recently where I said I think

14:22

Putin would rather lose the NATO if he

14:25

has to lose it all and that he wants to kind of draw

14:27

NATO into this in some way 2 prove

14:29

that he can kind of split NATO and get everybody's

14:31

attention off the war crimes. But I think, you

14:33

know, so far, the Americans have put

14:36

Putin in a lot of bad situations and

14:38

revealing that intelligence that you just mentioned

14:40

a second

14:40

ago. Yeah.

14:41

That's a big deal. As Joe Biden himself

14:43

would say, John's a big fucking deal. I like

14:45

to like it when the point, I guess, she was profanity. Like, because

14:47

I like answer so much. The

14:48

president said it. So I think that Oh, yeah. You

14:50

feel okay about something. Okay. Look, there's a number of

14:52

factors that had brought NATO together in the way they brought it

14:54

together. Putin's obviously a big factor. Biden's

14:56

helped the alliance come together. There's so that's

14:59

one thing to do. Alliance is incredibly united abroad.

15:01

And Joe Biden's in terms of what he's tried to get

15:03

done, sanctions, arms, all the stuff, you know.

15:06

Looks like he's done pretty good job. Now there's one set

15:08

of people even though there's all this by partisan support

15:10

now for Zelensky and for broadly

15:12

for Biden, you know, the Republican party more

15:14

or less come around, there is this other undercurrent

15:17

McConnell after praising Zelensky the

15:19

other day, kind of trashed Biden and was kind of like,

15:21

you know, went through a whole laundry list of things that he thought

15:23

Biden should have done more of. And then on Space Nation,

15:26

on the Sunday, he's, you know, basically they said,

15:28

we are making a mistake. The Biden

15:30

administration has dragged its speed and

15:33

has not done enough on a number

15:35

of fronts. But right now, what it's

15:37

not doing enough on is

15:39

sharing the assumption that the Ukrainians can win

15:41

and doing everything possible to make

15:44

it possible for them to do that. We can have

15:46

a no fly zone, but we can help him as they

15:48

want to close the skies through

15:50

the migs, the jets, or the

15:52

the service to air, missiles, the drone technology,

15:54

whatever. Just, like, give me everything they want.

15:56

And that seems to be the Republican that

15:59

I believe McConnell said He's done

16:01

a pretty good job, but here, let me go to

16:03

this thing. There is on the right at least among

16:05

Republicans who have awkwardly come to the notion

16:07

that in wartime, you have to be with Joe Biden, and he's doing

16:09

a pretty decent job. That this is the thing

16:11

they've seized on. So I ask you, hey, do you think it's

16:13

fair? That they should be doing more?

16:15

Could be doing more? Is that a fair criticism

16:17

that they haven't done

16:18

enough? And is it if the right prescription for what we should do

16:20

I don't think it's fair and I don't think it's good faith

16:22

because think the dilemma for the elected

16:24

Republicans is that they

16:27

realize that the hearts

16:29

of most rank and file Republicans are

16:31

now kind of with the Ukrainians

16:34

and against the Russians. And I think it's Charlie

16:36

Sykes who calls it the entertainment wing

16:38

of the GOP, which is still, you know, Zelensky's

16:40

bad and, you know, so they're trying to thread

16:42

this weird needle of saying, okay, fine. Biden's

16:45

doing okay. But I have to find something

16:47

to piss on. We went from,

16:49

we shouldn't get involved in these crazy foreign adventures

16:51

to Biden's not doing enough to get us more involved

16:53

in these crazy foreign adventures. With that

16:56

said, could we do more? It

16:58

bothers me when people say, okay, fine. We can't

17:00

do no fly zone, but let's kind of do

17:02

one. Because these are very indeterminate.

17:04

Let's do a partial no fly zone, whatever the hell

17:07

that is. I love that one. Let's do partial

17:09

no fly zone. Let's kind of draw this line in the

17:11

sky and the Russians will just respect it. We've

17:13

tried, for example, I think, again, just today,

17:15

did the Turks say they're not gonna provide the s

17:17

four hundreds. But, you know, we've tried. We're

17:19

we're reaching out and saying, look, you

17:21

know, what can our allies provide? And

17:24

that's a difficult question because a lot of

17:26

that has to be Soviet era or

17:28

Soviet designed equipment. The

17:31

mix thing in particular, which

17:33

people I think kinda jumped on Biden

17:35

about, the problem with the mix

17:37

thing was that we talked about it too much.

17:40

And it became an issue. Right. If you're

17:42

gonna transfer the migs, do it quietly,

17:44

get them there somehow, and then

17:47

once they're flying, say, well, you know, there

17:49

they are. Instead it was well, so it Heilemann

17:51

maybe if we go to Ramsden and then we'll transfer

17:53

them. First rule of covert

17:55

operations clubs is you don't talk about covert operations.

17:58

It's like fight club. Yeah. Yeah. It's like

18:00

it's like fight club. First rule of this kind

18:02

of thing is you don't talk about this kind of thing. Right. And

18:04

you certainly don't talk it to death. I do

18:06

think there is sometimes a tendency to do.

18:08

I think the Biden administration, understanding

18:11

how explosive dangerous

18:13

this situation is, has

18:15

the tenancy of the wonky Washington

18:18

blob 2, you know, we're gonna turn

18:20

the knobs to a tenth of a degree

18:23

because the Russians will understand that

18:25

this knob goes to eleven, but we're gonna turn

18:27

it to ten for now. Yeah. You know,

18:30

so maybe that's a mistake. It

18:32

may be that the Russians don't care about

18:34

that. On the other hand, it's good

18:36

that we've done things like establish a deconfriction

18:39

channel with the Russians. It's good

18:41

that we still have contacts at lower

18:43

levels below the principles. It's

18:46

good that we're leaving some stuff that

18:48

we can take off the Russian agenda

18:51

for coming after us about talking

18:54

about a friend with this on social media. He's

18:56

like, well, why shouldn't we just do an air campaign

18:58

if they're gonna blame us for it anyway. And I'm like,

19:00

you don't have to give them the actual material

19:02

Mhmm. -- to do that. Because even Putin realizes

19:05

there is a limit to line. They can't say things

19:07

in his own people they can finesse

19:09

a lot. They can kind of buy that we've always been at

19:11

war with East Asia kind of stuff, but they're

19:13

not just gonna believe things, at

19:15

least many of them won't believe things that have absolutely

19:17

no basic

19:18

game. The the fact that he's still trying to double down on

19:20

Nazis --

19:21

Yes. -- tells you that he kinda gets

19:23

at the people in Russia are going. And that's

19:25

not really what you're doing.

19:27

Alright. We're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back

19:29

with more Tom Nichols on Heilemann high water.

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20:37

Welcome

20:44

back to Howater. I

20:51

gave you the McConnell critique. And there are some Democrats

20:53

who can share that and think that there the arms efforts

20:55

is even though we keep spending more money, there's

20:57

a lot of arms going across border from NATO

20:59

countries. Some of them we see, a lot of it, we don't.

21:01

There's some of its bad faith. I agree with you. There

21:04

are others who are democrats who I think, and and some Republicans

21:06

maybe who are just generally thinking gosh, we should

21:08

be doing more and, you know, whatever. That's a reason. It's not

21:10

an totally unreasonable posture.

21:12

There is one posture, it seems to

21:14

me, that is alive and well and kicking

21:16

and making a lot of noise in our

21:19

political discourse. I don't know if this bad

21:21

faith is the right way to put it, but it's gotten

21:23

a lot of attention and we 2 ask about which

21:25

is the crazy

21:28

pro Putin right. And let's note

21:30

first in that moment right before the war when

21:32

Trump was praising Putin and Pompeo was

21:34

praising Putin and JD Vance and other

21:36

people, it looked like it was gonna be bigger deal,

21:38

you know. And a lot of them, maybe at least

21:41

maybe only tactically and maybe insensiorally, and

21:43

maybe just to save their own hide, suddenly

21:46

got the picture that, man, we can't be on Putin's

21:48

side at least not publicly, at least not now.

21:50

I don't know what that'll turn into. What

21:52

happened then was Tucker Carlson

21:54

remained and a few other people. I played

21:57

the Tucker Carlson sound now simply

21:59

for the purpose of being able 2 or comment

22:01

on this

22:02

matter. Last night, we told you that the Biden administration

22:04

is funding a number of secretive bio labs

22:06

in Ukraine, labs that are conducting

22:09

experiments on highly dangerous pathogens.

22:11

Now that's not a story as we told you we wanted

22:13

to do. In fact, we didn't think

22:15

it could be true. It's so over the

22:17

top and bizarre And in any

22:19

case, the administration had repeatedly and

22:21

very aggressively denied that they were

22:23

doing anything like this. And

22:26

then they attacked anyone who asked questions about

22:28

it as a tool of Russia. Once

22:30

again, not for the first time, what had seemed like

22:32

a nutty conspiracy theory turned

22:34

out to be

22:35

true. You know, it's straight

22:37

up rushing this information. Well,

22:39

it's not I was thinking about this when you kind of went

22:41

through that kind of rogue's gallery if people were talking

22:43

about here. What unites all of these people,

22:45

it seems to me, is that they have

22:47

become so partisan, not

22:49

just that they're hyper partisan, but that they're fundamentally

22:52

unserious. A serious

22:54

person knows that there comes a time to

22:56

not talk, not spread

22:59

Russian disinformation, or talk about what a great

23:01

guy Putin is. But for these

23:03

chumps and opportunists, it's

23:05

like, well, I'm just in the business of live boning

23:08

and nothing I say could really have any

23:10

serious consequence in the world. Because

23:12

nothing has any consequences in the world. You

23:14

know, all that matters is winning elections and

23:16

getting the job and being

23:18

on TV. I mean, every time I hear Tucker Carlson

23:20

always think of David Frum's point about him.

23:22

He says, look, Tucker Carlson likes money and he likes being

23:24

on TV. And that the rest of it

23:26

is just kind of servicing these goals. Think

23:29

all of them are just about the

23:31

business of saying, I am here

23:34

to kind of like be the high school

23:36

debate bully that can always

23:39

win against these other guys because someone

23:41

will break up this fight. Nothing is really

23:43

serious. Right. My supportive Putin won't

23:45

get Heilemann of people killed. You

23:47

asked me earlier about something that, you

23:49

know, in the book or I blamed

23:51

kind of both sides and

23:53

a bipartisan problem. think this

23:56

lack of seriousness is going

23:58

to get us all killed. But I think the

24:00

people on the right who have become this kind

24:02

of pro Putin wing of the GOP.

24:04

There really is a tremendous lack

24:07

of seriousness, a lack of thinking

24:09

about consequences in it, that I find

24:11

just appalling. At some point, you just

24:13

2 turn these people and say, isn't there enough

24:16

money in the world? Are you so empty

24:18

of spirit that you have to do this? Now for

24:20

this one last time, you

24:21

know, Trump rated. You know, people wanna watch

24:23

it on Trump on TV. A lot of people did. You know, I didn't

24:26

particularly, but a lot people did. And I understood

24:28

Trump was good for business, for Tucker Carlson, and for

24:30

Sean Hannity, and for Lori Ingram, and for Sinclair

24:32

Broadcasting, and for NewsMax, and for, you know,

24:36

Cooten is not good for business. In terms

24:38

of ratings, he's

24:39

not. Putin doesn't rate, you know, right now.

24:41

Insperacy theories are. Well, I guess

24:43

they they guess 2 come out of my question, which is

24:45

You know, you're Tucker Carlson and if all you

24:48

care about is making money and being influential

24:50

and having a voice. It just seems like

24:52

the idea that you're gonna be pro Vladimir

24:55

Putin right now is pretty fucking unpopular in

24:57

America across the political

24:58

spectrum. Unless you're talking

25:00

about bad shit crazy conspiracy

25:02

theories, I think somebody like Lorenger is

25:04

just a fundamentally bad. I think that these are all

25:06

bad people, but think sometimes it does come from place

25:08

where they're just fundamentally bad people. Yeah. But there's

25:11

also this kind of psychic income, this

25:13

gratification of saying, I'm gonna keep

25:15

your eyeballs on me. And the way I'm gonna do that is I'm

25:17

gonna tell you about secret stuff like

25:19

BIOLabs. Because I know the Putin

25:21

thing's played out. So I'm gonna go to the next thing

25:24

that's gonna keep you tuning in, that's gonna

25:26

make both of us feel really important and

25:28

like we're part of some special

25:30

club that knows the stuff that the sheep

25:33

will don't. Every now and then I'll

25:35

watch Fox for a whole evening because I'm a political

25:37

scientist. I wanna know what my fellow citizens are

25:39

watching. So I consider it part of the job,

25:41

you know? And it's I think

25:42

it's nice that you've heard of those people as your fellow citizens.

25:44

That's a

25:44

very It's a very impressive job. There are other voters

25:47

what did that weigh to

25:48

Yes. They're they're definitely human beings who live within

25:50

the same geographic

25:51

And they thought the

25:52

geographic confines of the United States and they've been here. And

25:54

I just find myself saying this whole thing

25:56

by the time you're done with four hours of

25:58

prime time fox, you are not only

26:00

angry. You're paranoid. Yeah. I mean,

26:02

you're freaked out and paranoid, but that is

26:05

symbiotic relationship between the viewer

26:07

and the host of saying, we're important. We

26:09

know the real stuff. That's

26:11

interesting. You know, again, what what kind

26:13

of poverty of spirit? What kind of

26:15

emptiness do you have to have to say, if

26:17

this is how I stay on TV, then that's

26:19

how I stay on TV. If that is

26:21

what they kind of the end state of

26:23

modern America has become them. We we really

26:25

went wrong somewhere that millions of people 2

26:28

do that.

26:28

So at the heart of the Tucker Cross and that disinformation

26:31

story, which is the claim that pumped

26:33

out by Russian media in

26:35

the classic fashion, you know, first in social,

26:37

then eventually it makes its way, gradually migrates

26:40

towards the mainstream and then eventually gets 2

26:42

by Tucker Carlson. This notion that

26:45

there are bioweAPNS and chemical weapons in

26:47

Ukraine and there are somehow they're either Ukraine

26:49

or they're American or somehow it's all we're all part

26:51

of it. Right? That conspiracy theory. He

26:54

enunciates it. It's a ludicrous. It's

26:56

ludicrous thing. It's a useful idiot

26:58

talk. And you're doing the bidding of the

27:00

Kremlin that the Kremlin puts out a memo basically

27:02

says, hey, we gotta get Tucker more on our ear.

27:05

You see Tucker on RT all the time now because

27:07

they love Tucker on them. He's literally is like

27:09

they pump the information and out, they get

27:11

America's most watched cable host 2 repeat

27:13

it on air, and then they take his audio and

27:15

they put it back Tucker's not an idiot. He sees

27:18

what's going on here. Right? Of course. But what that game

27:20

is about Tom is in addition to all the fucked

27:22

upness of the Russian disinformation and the corruptness

27:24

of Tucker Carlson, and the traitorousness, I

27:26

would say, the seditious kind of impulse

27:29

of Tucker Carlson and his cohort, is

27:31

Vladimir Putin's has a game here he wants to play.

27:34

So discord the United States, but also more particularly

27:36

right now, we all think this is the pretext for

27:38

launching a chemical attack. And it leads

27:40

us into that discussion of like what comes

27:42

next, where you know, where

27:45

he's waiting for the chemical attacks to potentially

27:47

start out waiting for it. But, you know, I mean, fearing that that's

27:49

where we're gonna go. And of course, there's a nuclear

27:51

discussion which you raised earlier. These are the

27:53

things where, although we're not drawing red lines

27:55

right now, these are the things that risk

27:58

the thing everyone's worried about and that Biden's

28:00

trying to keep them happening. We end up going up

28:02

the escalation ladder and it becomes irresistible

28:04

because either and I there's obviously possibility

28:06

of accidents, but some provocation --

28:09

Right. -- either accidental or on purpose. And

28:11

I guess want you to assess, you

28:13

know, this is a master's thesis or a PhD thesis,

28:15

but just at the moment assess like where do you think we

28:17

are on that? How likely do you think either chemical or

28:19

nuclear will come into play? How much

28:22

should we be fearful that

28:24

those are plausible

28:25

scenarios? I know they're different scenarios, but I want you

28:27

to speak to both of them. Yeah.

28:28

The I think the nuclear scenario is a lot

28:31

lower. Yeah. That's orders of

28:32

magnitude. Thank god. Thank god. Because

28:34

remember that every foreign policy begins

28:37

with a decision by somebody

28:39

inside a capital. So 2 is

28:41

not for all the joking we do about it. He's not blow

28:43

felt. He doesn't have a row of buttons and one says,

28:45

you know, chemical and then nuclear

28:48

and then, you know, the rabbit

28:50

bats or whatever it is. And

28:52

I think inside the Kremlin, even

28:55

with his grip on the Kremlin the way it is

28:57

now. Talking about nuclear weapons is gonna

28:59

produce a different dynamic. I mean, I'm

29:01

maybe I'm saying that more as a prayer and I

29:03

hope, but I I still think that's

29:06

true. The interesting thing about

29:08

interesting, I shouldn't say this so compassionately.

29:10

The terrifying thing, the horrible thing,

29:12

about thinking about a chemical scenario

29:15

is that fees become more

29:17

likely the worse Putin

29:19

does, if that makes sense.

29:22

That

29:22

he feels cornered. He feels like he has

29:24

nothing to lose. Right. That actually, what

29:27

would have been far safer is if somehow

29:29

the and I don't this is one of those

29:31

things or a clip taken out of

29:33

context. He would be probably

29:35

less dangerous if he thought he were doing

29:37

better on the battlefield.

29:39

Right. You know, that's the way I'm

29:40

gonna put it.

29:41

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So now think

29:43

about how much damage he's

29:45

done, and there may be moments If

29:48

he has a soul, it's had to have had a dark

29:50

night already. He's had to think, okay.

29:52

Right. All this globalized stuff

29:54

that I thought was all bullshit and that I could just divide

29:57

nations. This globalized economy and international

29:59

institutions pretty much turned out the lights

30:01

on the Russian economy in about ninety six

30:03

hours. Which is amazing. NATO

30:07

that I hate with a passion, I

30:09

am now the patron saint of a

30:11

reunified NATO that one day

30:13

could include Finland or

30:15

Sweden. Yeah. You know,

30:17

like, if we all get through this thing, NATO's

30:20

gonna have, like, our founder portrait

30:22

of Vladimir Putin sitting in Brussels

30:24

because he did this to himself. Right.

30:27

He has revitalized the notion

30:29

that liberal democracy is something worth

30:31

dying and fighting for and dying for.

30:34

So, you know, there there may come a

30:36

point where he says, what can

30:38

I do? That so scrambles

30:41

the status quo and freaks

30:43

everyone out to kind of

30:45

end this minor era of good

30:47

feeling, you know, with Zelensky on TikToks

30:50

and talking to the Congress and Biden

30:52

called me to work. I'm not maybe I need to do

30:54

something so atrocious. That

30:56

thirty countries have to go into a huddle

30:59

and say, how willing are we really to go to

31:01

work against this guy? I think part of

31:03

it is a Pooten would

31:06

love to say to the Russian people, seeing

31:08

it was always about NATO. I warned

31:10

you, I told you that this was what it was about.

31:12

And then his hope would be

31:15

that at the first real sign of trouble

31:17

NATO fractures. And then he comes

31:19

out of it. He partitions Ukraine NATO

31:21

is in disarray. He's gotten

31:24

away with being the assad of of Europe

31:27

and lives to fight another day. And

31:29

by having proven that NATO is a paper tiger.

31:31

Man, I hated even spinning out this scenario because

31:33

it's so awful. But,

31:35

you know, you have to think about scenarios

31:37

like that. Again, I'm hoping that if he says,

31:39

let's use chemicals. Somebody in Moscow

31:41

says, wait a minute. First of all, our guys are there.

31:45

The wind blows you know -- Yeah. -- and also

31:47

that what happened to that whole

31:49

thing? These are our people. These are brothers and sisters.

31:51

They were supposed to be liberating them. Yeah. I

31:54

guess, you know, it sucks to be the the

31:56

most powerful country on Earth that always has in

31:58

a way because this thing I referred to earlier, the

32:00

moral clarity of Zelensky and the clarity

32:02

of objectives and demands. The moral clarity

32:05

of different shade in a Putin and

32:07

you're Joe Biden and you're constantly balancing acts.

32:09

The United States in general, you're constantly balancing

32:11

equities and balancing, and you're gonna have

32:14

2, in the end, if you want the bloodshot

32:16

2 sudden stop and you'll end avoid nuclear war,

32:18

you have to say no to a lot of things that aren't fun to

32:20

say no to. And have to make a bunch of compromises that

32:22

suck, and they're called compromise for a reason. They're not

32:24

satisfying outcomes, but it is

32:26

like the burden of this. Right? And I think you've made

32:28

this point on Twitter, which is the burden of being

32:31

whether you like it or not the world's policeman or at

32:33

least the captain of the precinct if you've got a full

32:35

precinct. End of being the president. Because,

32:37

you know, you raised the point already done when you said,

32:39

you know, see even crats in congress. You know,

32:41

I worked on the legislative side. It's easy for

32:43

legislators to say, you know what they ought to do? You know

32:45

what the president ought to do? They don't have to give the

32:48

order. Yeah. And there's a story

32:50

in the years I taught at the War College. We

32:52

talk about this moment in late

32:54

sixty five when the joint chiefs went to

32:57

LVJ. And they said, well, you know, I'm president, if you're

32:59

gonna do this thing with the Vietnamese, you're

33:01

gonna have to really get in there, you're gonna have to bomb

33:03

hanoi, and you're gonna have to do all this

33:06

Chris Johnson at that point was still in the

33:08

well, we seek no wider war mode. And apparently

33:10

-- Right. -- and this

33:11

was a Marine General who wrote this as a

33:13

memoir later in people dispute whether

33:15

this is boggling or not. But I think it was John

33:17

Cooper who said, LBJ exploded

33:21

basically saying you cannot imagine the

33:23

responsibility I have year. You

33:25

know, you can recommend this stuff all day

33:27

long. And and he went to each of these generals and

33:29

said, what would you do? And and each of

33:31

these generals said, sir, I'm not the president. And,

33:33

you know, that was basically the point. Right.

33:36

So to be the president, and I do

33:38

not say this as a partisan whether you're

33:40

Donald Trump having to decide to strike

33:42

Syrian airfields or Barack

33:44

Obama in Libya or George

33:46

Bush in Iraq 2 be the president

33:49

is to make decisions that no other

33:51

person on earth. Can

33:54

make. And you have to take responsibility for

33:57

something bigger than the situation you're

33:59

in at that moment because you're not just the

34:01

custodian. It was during when Zelensky

34:03

said, I want you to be the president of the world. I want

34:05

you to be the president for

34:06

peace. While being president of the world carries

34:09

a lot of freight with it and

34:11

requires making some pretty

34:12

ugly decisions at some point. You

34:15

know, Putin never invades Ukraine if he doesn't have

34:17

nuclear weapons. Right? The reality is that The

34:19

nuclear threat has been central to a

34:21

lot of his strategy. The one thing that is genuinely

34:23

out there. Right? I mean, the all the things he talks about nuclear

34:26

all the time, and people say he's posturing or

34:28

maybe people don't think he's posturing or that people have different

34:30

interpretations. No one really knows the fucking thing about Putin,

34:32

but he raises a lot. And it's

34:34

the sort of damocles that's hanging above.

34:36

When Lavrov says, we see those truck convoys

34:39

coming in, you know, where you might have to do something

34:41

And if we do that, they better not come and start

34:43

a full scale war with us. You know why they better not start

34:45

a full scale war with us because we know NATO kick the shit

34:47

out of us. Bob, but we've got those we've

34:49

got those tactical nukes, and we've got those battlefield

34:51

nukes, and we've got some ICBM

34:53

still, I guess. I don't know. There those existing

34:55

ones. We we send this to them.

34:57

Yes. Back during the cold war, we said, look,

34:59

if you invade Right. -- you're gonna win

35:01

and you understand that has consequences.

35:03

Right? Yes. Right. I mean,

35:05

that sort of gets to the question which is,

35:08

do you not think that, like, if you're Iran

35:11

or other states in proliferation game

35:13

that you're looking at this and going, man,

35:15

it turns out the nuclear weapons are pretty I mean, I know but

35:18

countries already know that there's power in nuclear

35:20

weapons, but that this is an illustration for

35:22

a lot of potential nuclear powers

35:24

2, like, It

35:25

could, but they the value of them has risen

35:28

in some ways by looking at what's happening here. Let

35:30

me make two quick points about nuclear weapons. This

35:32

is the problem, and you're talking about escalation. Is

35:34

why I keep coming back to the nineteen fourteen thing.

35:36

You asked if Putin would have invaded Ukraine without

35:38

nuclear weapons. He might have

35:40

because the mistake and the thing that can

35:42

lead you into a terrible nuclear crisis

35:45

is that he thought it would be over already.

35:47

So he might have said, hey, I don't need nuclear weapons.

35:49

I'm just gonna seize Ukraine and then it's

35:51

done. Look, Britain's nuclear

35:53

weapons did not stop the Argentinians from

35:55

trying to jump into the Falklands and say, oh,

35:57

now they're the MOVINUS, it's over. And

36:00

they didn't think that Britain would nuke them.

36:02

But on the other hand, they thought, yeah, you can mess

36:04

with the nuclear power as long as you do it quickly

36:06

and bring it to a quick conclusion. The

36:08

other problem, though, about nuclear weapons is

36:10

the problem, and I I teach this

36:13

now in my other teaching gigs

36:15

about asymmetrical deterrence. It's a

36:17

very political science y term. But, you know,

36:19

we drew a lot of the wrong lessons from the

36:21

cold war. What kept the peace in the

36:23

cold war? We said if World War three comes, it's gonna

36:25

be completely symmetrical balancing

36:28

metros. Like Lenin said in nineteen

36:30

twenty two, a funeral dirge will

36:32

be sung either over capitalism or

36:34

socialism. And we knew that if we

36:36

went into it, it was for all the marbles, they

36:39

were totally invested. We were all in.

36:41

What happens if there's an asymmetry

36:43

of interest? What happens if the North Korean say,

36:45

look, for this thing that

36:47

we've done that you don't like, whatever

36:49

it is, whether they've menaced soccer, for

36:52

us, it's existential. For you, it's

36:54

a big problem. For the Iranians.

36:56

For us, it's existential. For you, it's

36:58

a foreign policy problem. What happens

37:00

when the small nuclear power

37:03

say, listen, we need a thousand weapons

37:05

to deter the United States. All we need is

37:07

one or two or three

37:09

because no matter what it is, it's not

37:12

worth losing Miami or

37:14

Seattle or whatever we can hit. I

37:16

think that is a stupid calculation

37:18

to make because the one thing that author

37:20

terrarian systems don't understand about democracies

37:23

is that we push away and push away and push

37:25

away and then when we decide to

37:27

fight, we are awful.

37:30

Heilemann, the Japanese learned this the hard way.

37:32

The Germans learned it the hard way. And so I think

37:34

that the Iranians and the North Koreans may

37:37

be drawing the wrong lesson about that, but

37:39

it is at least I don't wanna use a term

37:41

like rational, but it is understandable that

37:43

they would say, look, the Americans aren't gonna

37:45

risk a nuclear strike from us because the thing

37:47

that's at issue is vastly

37:50

more important to us than it possibly could

37:52

be to them. And I think Putin's thinking that

37:54

right now. Yeah. I think Putin's saying, yeah.

37:57

I I just don't think Ukraine is worth

37:59

world war three to

38:00

you. We're gonna say one more break and we'll be back with

38:02

more Tom Nichols on Heilemann high water.

38:12

And we are back with Nichols for the last

38:14

part of this two part episode of Helen High Water.

38:16

I'm gonna last piece of sand,

38:18

then it's gonna lead to one question because I 2

38:21

come back to the man of the moment, the person I

38:23

really think you know, a bit almost endlessly

38:25

fascinating is Zelensky, and this is a the dev

38:27

piece of video from when he did this interview with Lester

38:29

Holt last week. Where he talks about world

38:31

war three, but a lesser old ass him, do you think that

38:33

we're headed for world war three, and this is Zelensky's answer?

38:36

It may have already started

38:39

It's very hard to say. And

38:42

we've seen this eighty years

38:44

ago when the second

38:46

world war has started. And

38:48

there were similar tragedies in history,

38:50

and nobody would be able to predict

38:53

when the full scale war would start

38:55

and how it will end. Now we have

38:58

different technologies, nuclear weapons.

39:01

In this case, we have the whole

39:03

civilization at stake So

39:05

that Zelensky asked the question. Scratch

39:07

on everybody's mind, Tom. I found myself saying

39:09

it on the surface the other day. I was like, you know,

39:11

is world war three coming? Or are we already

39:13

in it? Just don't know it. And, you know, that's the story

39:15

-- Right. -- more of world war one than world war 2, that

39:18

this the war started before people realized that it were

39:20

actually in it at that point. Right? And so

39:22

I ask, I guess, conjoined concluding

39:25

questions. One of which is what

39:28

you think about that I mean, the stakes are

39:30

gargantuan. We all recognize them. But these these these stakes

39:32

are large maybe larger for Western Europe

39:34

and for Europe than they are for the States right now, but

39:36

they're global and they're epochal. But

39:38

is it possible that we were actually in the middle of the

39:40

thing that will be written about historically as the beginning

39:42

of World War three? And as we

39:44

watch it now, it's hard to say what will happen in the future,

39:47

but I want you to talk about Zen as a

39:49

a world historical figure, do you think it

39:51

he really merits in the end

39:53

the kinds of rhetoric that's being heaped upon

39:55

him? I do. But I'm curious

39:58

whether you think he's someone who it really is.

40:00

His extraordinaryness is I

40:02

mean, almost unprecedented in my lifetime, actually.

40:04

Take the second question first and say, most of the

40:06

people that have risen to that kind of moment of heroism,

40:08

people like Churchill and others, they had a lifetime

40:11

of preparing for it. You know, they were in government,

40:13

they had been through wars. I think what's most

40:15

astonishing about Zelensky is this

40:17

gigantic war whether we call it world war three or nine,

40:19

I'll get to in a second, but this gigantic

40:21

war breaks out, and it's almost like you just walked down the street

40:24

and said, hey, random guy. Let's

40:26

see how you do. You know, and

40:28

turns out the guy is churchilliant that

40:30

he somehow is able to do this.

40:32

And I think that does I think

40:34

it says something really great about

40:37

Zielinski and about kind of the human

40:39

spirit that you don't need to spend a lifetime

40:42

being Winston Churchill or being Dwight

40:44

Eisenhower to prepare for the residency

40:46

or for d day, that there is something in

40:48

the human spirit that recognizes the importance

40:51

of the moment. And maybe that'll be the thing

40:53

that we remember long in the

40:54

future. God willing that things work out.

40:56

Okay? You know, that we recognize about Zelensky.

40:59

Is there a

40:59

way he can fuck it up? Yeah.

41:01

Sure. I mean, if he if he gets killed, he's

41:03

a martyr and will be valorized forever. If

41:05

he keeps doing what he's doing, he will also be

41:07

heroic and valorized. But there's something he could do,

41:10

deal he could make, the kind of deal that we've been talking

41:12

about. Like, to save his people's

41:14

lives, many people with thousands of lives, he goes

41:16

through the negotiated table with Putin and and he cuts 2 deal

41:18

with partition Ukraine makes a bunch of nasty,

41:20

ugly necessary compromises. Is

41:23

this public image in some way?

41:25

No. I think, you know, when you said, is there

41:27

a way he could fuck it up? And I think, yeah, the answer to

41:29

that is yes. But not by making a deal. I don't think

41:32

there's anybody in the world that would blame

41:34

Zelensky for making any deal he has to

41:36

make to put a stop to, you

41:38

know, this barbarism. And if there is anybody

41:41

out there and criticize him for it, shame on

41:43

you. The only time I think he gets close

41:45

to problems is when he starts lashing out

41:48

at the United States or NATO allies.

41:50

Even as the war was building up,

41:53

and then in the first week, so every time they lash

41:55

out and say, well, you know, you don't care about and you you're

41:57

willing to just kind of, you know, put us on the

41:59

it's like, come on, man. I I feel like I'm doing

42:01

Biden here. Come on, man. And I don't criticize

42:03

him for any of that because I'm not in a bunker

42:06

trying to stay alive against a Russian

42:07

onslaught.

42:08

Sure. But if you're asking where do I think things

42:10

could go wrong is if you start kind

42:12

of lashing out your allies and

42:14

saying, listen, you know, the

42:16

fact that you're not coming in here and kind of suicidally

42:19

trick

42:19

-- Yeah. --

42:20

holocaust is pissing me off, that doesn't

42:22

really play well. And it's worth saying that,

42:24

you know, there was a lot of concern among a lot

42:26

of people that when he came with his speech to congress

42:28

that he would put pressure on the Biden administration's gonna ask

42:30

for a no fly zone and they're gonna be you know, the pressure's gonna

42:33

be they're gonna have to deal with the pressure of the moral clarity

42:35

of Zelensky. And then he he did the political

42:37

thing savvy political thing, which was close

42:39

the skies, not enough fly zone. Right.

42:41

Different matter. Close the skies, which gives the Biden

42:44

all kinds of maneuvering It was a smart

42:46

savvy political

42:47

play. Don't wanna try 2 use your our my most important

42:49

ally. I don't want to put you a Biden in a bind. I need

42:51

that guy. Right. And that again speaks to to Zelensky's

42:54

in addition to his crowd communication

42:56

skills And that

42:56

there are people who are advising him who understands

42:59

Stand in. Yes. Totally. So yeah. Give me

43:01

the to World War three question, we'll let you get out of your

43:03

blog. I'll tell you their answer is either gonna send everybody,

43:05

you're gonna say, yes, we are actually in World War three I'm

43:07

gonna have to go kill myself, or you're gonna have a show as a way

43:09

out of the

43:10

darkness. You know, it's become a thing

43:12

on Twitter where ask me if it's okay to panic

43:14

now, and the answer is

43:15

no. So no panicking yet. I'll be the first

43:18

to let you know. Mhmm.

43:18

But, no, I don't like the talking point.

43:21

That we're already in World War three.

43:23

And I think it was Barry McAfee, I hope I'm not

43:25

mis attributing this, but I think it was Barry McAfee who

43:27

was asked that question. He said, you'll know you're

43:30

not in world war three if world war three breaks

43:32

out and you're gonna see just how different it really

43:34

is. This notion of world world

43:36

war three has already begun, Yes.

43:38

I understand that president Zelensky blown

43:41

up Russian tanks and dealing with Russian bombers.

43:43

That's again, I can't criticize him for saying

43:45

that. But for Americans, if you

43:47

think we're in World War three, you're sitting

43:49

around having a beer, you're watching this on cable

43:52

TV. If World War three happens,

43:54

you're gonna know it. And I don't in terms of

43:56

a nuclear war. I mean, you will

43:58

have the largest military

44:01

alliance in history fighting

44:04

a gigantic country that covers

44:06

eleven time zones that will spread

44:08

from the Atlantic to the Pacific. On

44:11

land and sea and air. And

44:13

people have to remember that. I think we've

44:15

been a unipolar power

44:18

so long so well, world war three, that's

44:21

just started when we're in it, and let's kick some ass.

44:23

I'm sorry. But if world war three you will be

44:25

watching the news every night about what kind of actions are

44:27

we fighting in the Pacific, which

44:29

countries are under attack around

44:32

Ukraine. There's four NATO countries that border

44:34

Ukraine. I have no doubt, John,

44:36

that as you say, you know, we would and I

44:38

took a lot of static for saying this five

44:40

or six years ago, when I said if Putin

44:43

never tries to trigger conventional tornado, he

44:45

will lose. But this notion that while

44:47

it's already happening, the rest

44:49

of the world right now is at peace. There

44:51

is a monstrous atrocity

44:54

and a crime against humanity happening

44:56

in in Ukraine. But the notion that

44:58

this is just kind of the opening shot of World

45:00

War three, I think is again

45:02

kind of an unserious approach to

45:04

what World War three would really look like. What

45:06

you said though and what

45:08

I I have to leave people with some residual anxiety.

45:11

So I guess I'll say, if World War

45:13

three does finally break out,

45:15

God forbid from all of this, yeah, I think

45:17

you could call it the the spring twenty twenty

45:19

two crisis that eventually led down

45:22

the line to this. But I think people really need to

45:24

be careful about saying, well, it's already world

45:26

war three. Because the next thing that comes from that

45:28

is a call to action and say, well, we're already in world

45:30

war three. So we might as well just start flying the

45:32

missions and blowing stuff up and

45:34

doing all the things that you would do as a country at

45:36

war. And I think that is really precipitous

45:39

and unwise right now. So my friend

45:41

Tom Nichols comes on. He provides us with brilliance

45:43

and insight and good humor and and he takes

45:45

a metric ton shit for me for his various transgressions.

45:48

He gets good taste when he comes to music. You

45:50

can't say enough times that Tom is a brilliant

45:52

guy. He also can't say enough times that, like all of us,

45:54

it's always a good reminder that we're all fallible

45:56

back in December of just last year. When

45:59

you were writing about Zelensky in the Atlantic.

46:01

World War three was the question mark for the Atlantic

46:03

and there was a moment where you're talking about Zelensky and kind of how he

46:05

seemed like he was in ever his head like a lot of people thought.

46:07

A lot of people thought it I did. There was a there was

46:09

a little speculative thing in there where you the the

46:11

the favorite sentence of the piece, kind of imagining

46:14

what might happen if there was a invasion from Russia.

46:16

You say out of options, with the morgues filling

46:18

up in his military and retreat, Zelensky

46:20

resigns or is hounded out of office. Mhmm.

46:22

And I think what we can now say is that it proves

46:24

that, like, even the most brilliant men with

46:27

the most questionable taste of music. Don't get

46:29

everything right all the time. So if there's things that Tom said today

46:31

that you disagree with or that you think are too pessimistic,

46:33

You can just be like, yeah, it's Tom. Nickel sees bullshit.

46:36

He gets all the important stuff wrong all the time.

46:38

I wouldn't encourage that, but a man who writes as much

46:40

as you do and talks as much as you do about these complicated

46:42

objects. It's helpful for those lesser mortals of

46:44

us to know that you're fallible to. That's why I claimed

46:46

the music thing, Tom, because it's

46:47

like, we got such a big brain. You're so smart about

46:49

everything. I'm like, thank god there's one thing that I'm

46:51

better at than him. You know, I I when we're talking

46:53

about when we're talking about music, I thought of it and

46:55

I'm glad you're running me this because the analogy I thought of

46:57

is you know, for a lot of people, like, I happen

47:00

to like escargot. Right? I really

47:02

like French cuisine. I love escargot.

47:04

There are people that would not touch escargot And

47:06

if you gave them a big mac, they

47:08

will eat it every time instead of

47:11

touch that plate of

47:11

escargot. I personally think that's nuts.

47:14

Yeah. And, again, another place where you're just fuckakeda

47:16

because, like, eating a snail as opposed to a big macular

47:18

with you, man. What's wrong with

47:19

you? I'm sorry, John. But if you had a more educated

47:22

palate, you would understand this. I'm

47:24

waiting all day to say

47:25

that. The classic thing of

47:26

the Snob, which is like I know it tastes like

47:28

shit, but it's just because your palate's not a bowl. Well,

47:30

that's how I think about when you to me about velvet

47:32

underground. It's like, I think this is terrible music, but

47:34

you seem to think it's important. But

47:37

think about getting stuff wrong. And I think, you

47:39

know, that that is a lesson in humility for everybody.

47:41

I mean, I will actually add to that stuff

47:44

I got wrong. I could never have predicted

47:46

the astonishing underperformance of,

47:48

you know, the Russian air forces. I mean, if you

47:50

had to me. And I think most of us who

47:52

follow Russian military developments, if you had

47:55

said, could they be this bad?

47:57

You've been like, yeah, I guess on their worst

47:59

day, if everything went

48:01

wrong in the same twenty four hours, I

48:03

could never have imagined four

48:05

straight weeks of staggering

48:08

military incompetence. They still, you

48:10

know, Russian tanks going down closed street

48:12

and it's like, how many times are you guys gonna

48:14

do this free realize this is bad? Yes.

48:17

So, yeah, I guess I made the same mistake

48:19

Putin did. I thought they're gonna invade.

48:22

There's gonna be huge casualties. Zelensky

48:24

is not gonna be able to cope with that. The rush army's

48:26

gonna do what the Russian army does, and and it would be

48:28

over. So this is one of the reasons

48:30

I think most of us ought to stay away from the

48:32

prediction game, but it's also when something

48:34

like this happens, it's it's a temptation

48:37

we all we all give

48:38

into. On the scale of the cosmically

48:40

and shockingly bad, we have

48:42

the bread at the top of the blood performance of

48:44

the Russian military, followed by and number

48:47

two, Tom Nichols' tweet about the goodbye

48:49

girl in March of twenty

48:50

twenty. Alex, and these are like

48:52

It's a fair item. Those are the things of twenty twenty

48:54

two that things we'll remember as, like, the worst shockingly

48:56

bad things that we've

48:57

encountered. Alright, Tom. Thank you for doing this,

48:59

and this is a delight.

49:01

My pleasure, John. was great hanging with you. Heilemann

49:03

High Water is a podcast from the recount. Thanks

49:05

again to Tom Nichols for being here for this special

49:07

two part episode. If you like part one and

49:09

part two or if you like just part one or

49:11

just part 2, if you liked any part of this two part

49:13

episode, please subscribe to Helen High Water and

49:16

share us and rate us and review us on whatever app you happen

49:18

to use. To basket the splendor of

49:20

the podcast universe. I'm your host, and

49:22

the executive editor of the recount, John Heilemann,

49:24

Grace Weinstein is a co creator of Helen

49:26

High water, PRBNMA, engineer

49:28

the podcast, Justin Chirmel handles the research.

49:31

Margo Grey is our assistant producer, Stephanie

49:33

Stender, our post producer and the one

49:35

in all way, the great and the good.

49:37

Marshall Eisen, he's our executive producer.