‘Judging Freedom’ resumes on youtube.com: today’s chat with Judge Andrew Napolitano

After spending a week in the ‘penalty box,’ Judging Freedom is now once again back on youtube.com and is operating at full power, as anyone looking at their outstanding list of interviewees today will understand at once.  I am pleased to present the link to my own half-hour with The Judge in a discussion that focuses on the Kursk Operation, otherwise known in Russia as the NATO invasion of their country.

See

The to-and-fro of this discussion was very useful to elucidate features of the ongoing fighting in Kursk that surely confuse many consumers of major media reporting, as well as consumers of alternative media reporting. I have in mind such questions as why the Russians did not anticipate the invasion and protect themselves better against it; whether the United States was the guiding hand behind the Ukrainian forces move into Kursk or was it, for example, the United Kingdom; were the 200,000 Russians who have had to leave their homes in the territory of Kursk now occupied by Ukrainians ‘expelled’ or ‘evacuated’ by their government in consideration of the methods it will use to vanquish the Ukrainians; and how long it will take before the Ukrainian invasion is totally quelled by Russian armed forces.

I used the opportunity to express my disagreement with the confident remarks of some of my peers in the Opposition, who insist that President Putin would never use tactical nuclear weapons first against the Ukrainians or NATO countries however many ‘red lines’ they cross.

Transcription below by a reader

Judge Andrew Napolitano: 0:33
Hi, everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, August 22nd, 2024. Professor Gilbert Doctorow will be here in just a moment on who or what invaded Russia.

2:04
Professor Doctorow, my dear friend, welcome back to the show. Who or what invaded Russia at Kursk?

Doctorow:
I think I understand your question to be: is it Ukrainians alone? Is it, as the Russians are saying, a NATO invasion of their country? And yes--

Napolitano:
And just to add a third part to that question for your very smart brain, was the United States behind it?

That is also a subject of conjecture. I think there is a significant feeling among expert commentators that the lead has been taken by the United Kingdom. And so although the United States would be in the background, I think in the foreground you have UK. And the new Labour government has been particularly active to demonstrate its key leadership position in the global West. They're not just acting as lapdogs following what the United States tells them to do, they're running well ahead of what the United States would do by itself. And there may be a conflict in the background between the British and the Americans because this latest move, which I understand also from Russian analysis, who also point a finger at the United Kingdom, that the possible blowback in terms of the United States is very real.

3:49
The Russians consider this an invasion. And that has changed the nature of the war, the psychology within Russia has changed by that fact. "It's not simply that we're fighting on a new 160-kilometer line of confrontation with the Ukrainians, but we're fighting it on our own territory." And Russia has been, as the major media have said, has not experienced a foreign invasion of its territory since World War II. So this is a new situation. The proxy war is a very thin fig leaf for the presence of NATO advisors, both in the background by remote control of operations in Kursk, and on the ground in terms of advisors and trainers and technicians who are operating some of the more sophisticated equipment. All of these different facets of the Kursk operation changed the nature of the war as seen from Moscow.

Napolitano: 5:02
What actually happened? I mean, can you describe what took place? Do we know how many Western troops entered the country and how did they get there? I mean, stated differently, was this a Ukrainian invasion or a Russian failure?

Dotorow:
That's very difficult to answer. Of course, there are open questions why the Russians didn't see this coming. Or, I think, let's refine that a little bit. I understand that the Russian military intelligence did see this coming. It was, it is said to have been a decision at the top level, at the head of their Joint chiefs of staff, that the decision was taken that this was not a serious threat, it was a rumor, it was-- or it was such a cockeyed idea, that it was not credible. And there's no reason to make special provisions for it.

6:03
Whatever the actual thinking, a complete failure of military intelligence can be ruled out. It is a failure of judgment on the part of the very apex of the military command. And that means General Gerasimov. How long he will survive this bad judgment remains to be seen. I think the Russians, like most any other political and military leadership, are averse to removing key military commanders in the midst of operations. But I think that he is in the doghouse. The command of the Kursk operation was transferred from Gerasimov to a man who is described with some ridicule as Putin's former main bodyguard or head of his security detail. But this is a man with considerable experience and considerable, not just loyalty of his boss, but experience in administration. And this seems to have been administrative failure, that they did not act on proper intelligence. We'll see where this goes.

Napolitano: 7:22
I would like you to respond to Larry Johnson's argument. And his argument goes like this. American intel planned this along with Ukrainian intel, American equipment was used, manned by American technicians, American ammunition was used to kill Russian soldiers, and we believe American human beings set foot into Russia as part of this incursion. Therefore, Larry concludes, America, the United States of America invaded Russia. Now as incendiary as that sounds, there's nothing in the press about it. What does Gilbert Doctorow think about that?

Doctorow: 8:12
Look, there's plenty of room for divergent opinions among experts because this is the fog of war. And let me just give you one little counter-argument. When I said the British are leads, some of the most fancy equipment that is being used are the Challenger 2 tanks from Britain. The British Prime Minister boasted about this a couple of days ago, that yes, we've sent in [these] wonderful game-changing tanks. That is probably the single biggest innovation in terms of equipment on the ground in this Kursk operation, compared to other places on the line of confrontation between Russia and Ukraine.

8:59
So-- then another factor. Yes, American military [is] there, but I think the largest contingent out of what's talked about as 2,000 foreign troops, mercenaries, whether they are actually members of the armed forces of NATO countries or they are-- that have been seconded to Ukraine-- whatever their actual technical situation is, we understand something like 2,000 out of the 11 or 12,000 men who have been deployed in the Kursk operation are, in fact, foreigners. And of that, I believe, the single biggest contingent is not Americans, not Brits, Poles. Poles and French. So--

Napolitano: 9:50
Are there Americans among that contingent, whether they're intelligence agents, contractors, American military in somebody else's uniform?

Doctorow:
Without a doubt. If the Russians were intent on declaring war on the United States, they have a casus belli. That we can assume. But it is not in the interest of the Kremlin at this point to do that. In point of fact, the present situation is being described in Kursk, is being described by major media as a war of attrition. Well, here we go. The war, the main battlefield is a war of attrition. And guess what? What the present standoff or fierce fighting, in fact, in Kursk is played out as a war of attrition.

10:46
The single biggest factor operating against the Ukrainians is they have no air cover. They're doing what is normally done under NATO practice with air domination. Quite the contrary. These forces that are being sent in, all these wonderful Challenger 2 tanks and Bradleys and all the lovely armored cars for personnel that the United States has supplied, all of this is subject to helicopter attacks, not just artillery and not just drones, but helicopter attacks. Not to mention the use of these multi-tonne glide bombs that are being delivered by Russian bombers on the Ukrainian positions on the Ukrainian side of the border, on the Sumy [oblast] side of the border.

11:45
So, the situation that they have put themselves in is dire. If the West were to rush in all kinds of assistance tomorrow, then perhaps they could sustain themselves. But in the present conditions where significant support, either in men and materiel from the West to assist the operation in Kursk is not very likely.

Napolitano: 12:12
Are the invaders isolated? Have the Russians cut off their supply routes, whether it's human beings, food, ammunition, from Ukraine?

Doctorow:
The single most important cutoff has been of fuel. One reader of my articles-- because this is something I've mentioned in recent days in my blog pages-- and one reader in the comments said, "Oh, but they can always use the gas stations that are in this, the Russian side of the border." Well, I suppose if they have the right credit cards, if you know what I mean. That's not going to take them very far. Fuel is a big issue.

Other supplies, of course. It is reasonable to assume that there is chaos on the Ukrainian side of the border because of the heavy bombing and heavy artillery strikes on all of their positions by the Russian forces from within the Russian Federation.

Napolitano: 13:19
And what strategic objectives might NATO have had by concocting and executing this incursion into Russian real estate?

Doctorow:
Well, the story has changed day by day as to what the real mission was. Mr. Zelensky has changed his storyline in several different explanations, each of which has been contrary to the realities on the ground, which make a mockery of his intentions. The latest one is whether it's to – "We don't want to keep this territory; we want to use it as a bargaining chip for negotiations."

14:02
But as we know, the Kremlin has specifically ruled out any negotiations of any kind, because it considers this latest operation by what they call the neo-Nazi regime in Kiev to have crossed the final red line and to make this regime a party that they do not want to deal with. They want to see the regime change in Kiev before they open discussion with anybody.

Napolitano: 14:38
How has this, if at all, affected the movement, western movement towards the west of the main Russian military approaching the Dnieper River?

Doctorow:
Well, there's some distance from the Dnieper River, at least in the area in the north. and they're near the Dnieper River in the southwest. Kherson is on the Dnieper River. But the action is not taking around, is not going on in the south at Kherson. The main action remains in the Donetsk region, and that is nowhere near the Dnieper. Nonetheless, your point is very important. By depriving the defenders of the thousand-kilometer-long line of confrontation between Ukraine and Russia, of their best elite forces, their most war-experienced soldiers and most advanced equipment they received from the West-- by depriving the line of confrontation at Donetsk of those very elements, they have weakened substantially their possibilities of resistance. And they have had no ability to dig in and to provide secure positions of defense as they are facing ever more ferocious Russian attackers in the Donetsk area. And precisely around the biggest fighting is over Pokrovsk. If you go back six months to a year every town in Ukraine that was under siege or under attack by the Russians was declared to be of no particular value and was only another example of the Russians supposedly throwing waves of soldiers to their deaths for the sake of gathering a few more square inches, if not meters, from the enemy.

16:44
That storyline has disappeared. You won't see it anywhere in discussions of Kursk or of the present conflict as it is in Donetsk. Instead, we hear correctly in major media that Pokrovsk is a very important transportation nexus for Ukrainian supplies going from the west of Ukraine, from the main Ukraine territory to supply their front lines. So, the Russian conquest of Pokrovsk, which is probably a matter of some days from now, will be dealing a devastating blow to the logistics of supply for the whole Ukrainian army along that 1,000-kilometer-long frontier.

Napolitano: 17:34
Tell us, Professor Doctorow, about Russian media and how it is treating this. I think the Kremlin called it a CTO in English, a Counter Terrorist Operation. So what is a Counter Terrorist Operation? What is the media saying about it? I'm sorry for the triple question. And is there pressure on President Putin to come down with a heavy hand against the invaders?

Doctorow: 18:08
Let's start with the last one, pressure. this question of what kind of pressure Mr. Putin is under in general from the Russian nation, from the Russian public to put a quick end to the war with Ukraine, I'd just like to dissect that. I think we're talking about the chattering classes, we're talking about politically engaged people, as there are in Russian society, as there are in every democratic country. That is not the whole people. The people at large are, I believe, are not as engaged, are not as focused on the day-to-day battle results, or on having revenge against the invaders.

19:07
So the pressure on Mr. Putin is from his circles in the Kremlin and in greater Moscow. That is where the influential people, politically influential people, are voicing on major media because they appear as guests. Who would I mean, "they appear"? That is to say, the heads of Duma committees, like Defense Committee, who happens to be a Communist, by the way, a Russian Communist Party of the Russian Federation. They appear on programs, or the two of them, that are most important for this. Either it's Vladimir Solovyov's "Evenings with [Solovyov]", or it is "The Great Game" that has three presenters, the most significant of which is one Duma member, Vyacheslav Nikonov.

20:05
They have guests from the Duma, and not just rank-and-file Duma members, but of Duma committee chairmen, and particularly chairmen related to defense or other state security.

Napolitano:
Is there a consensus amongst this elite as to what they want President Putin to do?

Doctorow:
Consensus, no. Other than there is a certain discussion, which has been quite lively, over whether the they should have a nuclear strike against NATO forces. I've mentioned this in the past, whether or not F-16 bases, for example in Moldova, should be bombed. Should they bomb in Romania? Should they bomb in Germany, Wiesbaden, the new coordination center for all European military aid to Ukraine is about to be coordinated.

21:00
These questions are openly discussed, which is a very big move forward from a year ago when that type of talk was only among a very few ultra-nationalists. Now it is common currency among the more level-headed but strategically thinking Russian expert elites and politicians in the Duma. Whether or not this exerts pressure on Mr. Putin that he cannot resist, whether it in fact goes contrary to his gradualist approach or "softly, softly" approach, it's too early to say.

21:46
But I reserve one point, and this is, I take a stand a bit different from some of my colleagues who say, "Ah, Mr. Putin would never do something violent. He would never do something like a nuclear strike." I don't agree. The Russian behavior throughout this war has been dictated by Western behavior. And if Russia senses an existential threat to its existence, which nuclear weapons or potentially nuclear-carrying missiles supplied to Ukraine by the United States would present them, as they say in Washington, all options are on the table, even for the very calm and rational and humane Mr. Putin.

Napolitano: 22:43
I don't get it why the invaders are still there. Haven't they actually expelled a few hundred thousand Russians from their homes and villages?

Doctorow:
"Expelled" is only partially true. Yes, there are some people who left under duress. There were some people who left their villages when Ukrainian and mercenary forces went down their streets firing machine guns at anything that moved. And so they, at the opportune moment, they got out of those towns and headed for safety. But the largest part of these refugees, or displaced persons, who are numbering as much as 200,000, they were evacuated, not expelled. There's a difference there.

Napolitano:
Okay.

Doctorow:
They were-- yes, they took their dogs and cats.

Napolitano:
But the invasion precipitated their involuntary removal from their homes and businesses, and the invaders are still there, so that's why I'm scratching my head.

Doctorow: 23:51
Again, this is more complicated than you're presenting it. They were evacuated because the Russian government wanted to evacuate them, meaning that it's not just they were pushed out, but it has something to say with how the Russians expect to deal with the invaders. [There] will be massive destruction, which is not tolerable if civilians were still in the area. So, as I say, it's a little bit more subtle than that. The net result is, as you say, these people have been forced out, but partly forced out by their government for the sake of the way it's going to conduct its counter-offensive.

Napolitano: 24:32
Are Zelensky's people crazy enough to attack Russian nuclear facilities?

Doctorow::
If they have the ability, yes. That is, of course, questionable. They already have. They caused a fire at one of the cooling towers of the nuclear power plant in Kursk province. So they have done a little bit. There was a sign. It was more symbolic than actually threatening the viability of that nuclear power plant.

25:06
Let's go back to this question. What would trigger a violent reaction from Putin, including the use of nuclear arms? An attack on a nuclear power plant is one of them. Further demonstration of what the Russians are calling terrorism, that is to say if these marauders-- who call themselves Ukrainian soldiers and who are now in the Kursk region-- if they were to kill a significant number of civilians or if they were to stage some bombing either in Kursk or elsewhere in Russia that caused many civilian casualties, then you can anticipate that Mr. Putin's calm and reserve will be history, and we will see some massive destruction. Whether this means massive destruction of Kiev, it's unlikely for reasons as some of my colleagues have explained, however, removing the rada--

Napolitano: 26:18
Yeah, we seem to have lost him. All right, you're back with us. Removing--

Doctorow:
Removing critical decision-making institutions and personalities cannot be excluded. I think it is doing our cause as a voice of reason and opposition to this war that's being waged by NATO on Russia. I think it's in our interests not to dismiss the Russians' ability and willingness to escalate on their own if they are provoked in a way that is not symbolic but is genuinely perceived as threatening them.

I don't think that we on our part should be saying that the Russians did not protect or ... defend themselves when their red lines are crossed, because we're doing ourselves a disservice in saying that. We don't know, none of us knows, exactly what the Russians will do next, what-- none of us has a microphone under Mr Putin's pillow.

Napolitano: 27:28
So if I were to ask you if the invaders will still be there when you are next on this show about a week from now, you're unable to answer that. No one is.

Doctorow:
No one is. I think some of us-- There will be, again to come back to the question you posed before, there are no big concentrations of Ukrainian infantry or other armed forces in Kursk for the obvious reason, because they would then be subjected to these glide bombs and to artillery attacks, and they would be devastated. So the whole force, the 10,000 men, is not concentrated in any identifiable way. They are in groups, in small groups.

28:14
And certainly, even if large numbers are destroyed-- and we hear that more than 3,500 have been killed or so wounded that they are no longer battle worthy-- even if there are remaining small groups, yes, the area will not be liberated until it is finally fully flushed out. The Russian Ministry of Defense does not declare any city in Donetsk as being in their possession until they have sent through their troops that cover every inch of the ground. So, a similar thing will be true of Kursk. I think a week from now it's safe to say there will still not be an end to the Kursk conflict.

Napolitano: 29:05
Professor Doctorow, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for joining us. Thanks for your insight. We look forward to seeing you again next week.

Doctorow:
Well, thank you so much for having me.

Napolitano:
Of course. Coming up later today at 12 noon Eastern, Ambassador Charles Freeman; at 2 o'clock Eastern, Scott Ritter; at 3 o'clock Eastern, Professor John Mearsheimer; and at 4 o'clock Eastern, Professor Jeffrey Sachs.