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[00:00:00] or be it attacks against you know
[00:00:01] in infrastructure inside Russia and that would be interesting to see if they choose
[00:00:05] that that sort of course of events if they choose the latter then well Trump has
[00:00:09] quite a few quite a few means to apply
[00:00:12] of pressure and to
[00:00:13] of punish uh anyone well in Ukraine for
[00:00:15] a in Ukraine and Europe for disobedience starting with the most obvious options
[00:00:19] like cutting intelligence sharing and switching off the starlink you
[00:00:22] dishes all right there's our correspon right now wrapping up
[00:00:26] this live hour from moscow on RT international from me Suche and the
[00:00:30] entire news team here, thank you for sharing your time with us. All
[00:00:34] of our stories continuing online and the next program comes to air in
[00:00:38] about 28 minutes, hope you can join us
[00:00:41] there.
[00:00:46] of
[00:00:54] of
[00:00:58] of
[00:01:02] of
[00:01:06] Welcome to Crosstock Bullhorns where all things are considered on Peter Level. With
[00:01:10] Ukraine on the ropes and its infrastructure being destroyed, the American
[00:01:13] administration makes an energy deal with Russia. Meanwhile,
[00:01:17] NATO Brass gathers in Kiev to assess the damage they have brought
[00:01:21] about. Also, can the Mecca defense Alliance
[00:01:24] of save the House of Saad? Is new order coming about in the Middle
[00:01:28] East? To discuss these. issues and more, I'm joined by my guest
[00:01:32] George Samueli in Budapest, he's a podcast for the gaggle, which be found on YouTube in
[00:01:36] Locals and here in Moscow, we cross to Mark Laboda, he's an international
[00:01:39] relations and security analyst. All right, gentlemen, crossstock
[00:01:43] of rules and effect, that means you can jump any time you want, and I always appreciate it. All right, let's
[00:01:46] kick it off with Mark here in Moscow, um, let's start with the breaking
[00:01:50] news, um, an energy deal to bring
[00:01:54] of Russian diesel to the United States has been
[00:01:57] of announced, um, the shagrin
[00:01:58] of the Ukrainian. and Europeans is obvious, it
[00:02:02] is
[00:02:03] in a major
[00:02:05] of of reversal of sorts, um, if anything it's a campaign gimic uh, it will
[00:02:09] have any kind of impact on diesel prices
[00:02:13] worldwide or in the United States remains to be unseen, by
[00:02:17] my estimation, looking at the numbers, maximum, I
[00:02:20] mean going
[00:02:21] of into next year, would basically cover about
[00:02:25] of nine days of US consumption, now maybe on the
[00:02:28] margins it might help, It's not a solution, the solution is dam
[00:02:32] of this conflict, but that's where we are, Mark, your thoughts
[00:02:35] here, yeah, so obviously this deal has been
[00:02:38] of in the works for some time, um, after the CIA
[00:02:42] director
[00:02:44] of Daniel came to Moscow with threats, it was followed
[00:02:48] up by the Chuckle Brothers of Whitkov and
[00:02:51] Kushner who came to Moscow and uh asked for
[00:02:55] an energy
[00:02:57] ce a cease fire and Russia said no, and then... well how about an
[00:03:00] energy cease fire and Russia said no,
[00:03:03] in well how about letting some debel diesel onto the global
[00:03:06] markets, that that would play well with Trump's voters back
[00:03:10] home, and uh, Putin said, tell me
[00:03:13] more, um, so that appears to be what
[00:03:17] of has happened.
[00:03:18] in Trump is primarily concerned here with his political survival
[00:03:21] in the US, going into these mid-term elections. If the
[00:03:25] of democrats win, he could be facing impeachment battles for the next two
[00:03:29] years of his. administration and he's rightly terrified
[00:03:33] of that, so um, he needs
[00:03:36] of to ameliate,
[00:03:38] of or at least appear to amuliorate the sharp rise
[00:03:42] in diesel prices in the US, which is leading to
[00:03:45] prices of general inflation across the US
[00:03:49] economy, of course, Europe is being hit even harder
[00:03:52] of by all of this, um, and Russia historically,
[00:03:57] of and in fact earlier this year, was still the second. largest
[00:04:00] exporter of diesel to the world, but because of
[00:04:04] kiev regime CIA attacks on Russia's oil
[00:04:08] refineries, Russia felt the need
[00:04:11] to ban exports of diesel
[00:04:15] of for several months to make sure they had enough for their own domestic
[00:04:18] uses going into harvest season and of course for the special
[00:04:22] military operation, but
[00:04:25] now uh with Trump's request that
[00:04:29] of Putin has se to Russia has agreed to
[00:04:31] of partially lift that
[00:04:33] of ban. of I agree, it's most of this, diesel is not going
[00:04:37] to go to the US, it's going to be released to the global markets,
[00:04:40] this is for optics, this is for
[00:04:41] optics, but what's the
[00:04:45] quid pro, what did what did the Russians get out of it, George?
[00:04:49] Well, it's very hard to say, I mean, I, I think one
[00:04:52] obvious uh, win for the Russians is
[00:04:56] Trump's real fury and uh director.
[00:05:00] first to against Ukraine in
[00:05:04] of of general and Zelensky in particular, but also against the Europeans, because exactly are
[00:05:08] looking really very foolish, uh,
[00:05:10] you know, they say sanction, sanction got to... put more pressure on
[00:05:14] Putin, you
[00:05:15] no, it's the only way we can get Putin on the negotiating table and so on. I
[00:05:18] remember just few weeks ago they were all rejoicing
[00:05:22] over the uh the passage the Lindsay sanctions
[00:05:26] bill, well this kind of makes that
[00:05:29] look absurd, so that I think is very much a
[00:05:33] part of it, in other words with um if Zelensky
[00:05:37] immediately announced that he will continue to
[00:05:40] attack refineries. "now it was clear during the
[00:05:44] meeting that Zelensky and the Europeans had had in
[00:05:48] Miami with Kuschner and
[00:05:51] Witkov is that they Zelensky was
[00:05:55] told don't hit refineries and and and and
[00:05:59] Trump then said this, we've said that we've told Zelensky over and over
[00:06:02] again, don't hit the refiners, six times, George, I think
[00:06:06] six times, six times and and then yes of course it is
[00:06:10] true that it was Trump who initiated." thought this would be a
[00:06:14] wizard idea to hit refineries in Russia, that was back in
[00:06:17] 2025, he he he was
[00:06:19] the he personally gave the go ahead, but now he he he needs
[00:06:23] some kind of a break. now the real question, what do the Russians get out of it? well,
[00:06:27] if this antagonism between the US and
[00:06:31] Ukraine continues, then they may get something
[00:06:35] out of this,
[00:06:35] that that I mean that is that this is a little different from what happened
[00:06:38] in February of 2025 following that.
[00:06:43] over office meeting, this time that Trump is his back is
[00:06:47] against the wall, then he was kind of exuberent returning
[00:06:51] to office, his back is against the wall, he may actually, at
[00:06:55] least that's the Russian calculation, he may decide finally to bring
[00:06:59] this thing to an end, and and the key
[00:07:02] part, end the intelligence sharing with Ukraine, that is,
[00:07:06] that came up, that came up in the meetings a threat to
[00:07:09] Zelensky, knock it off, all the...
[00:07:13] be any intelligence sharing, my take, Mark,
[00:07:15] at the end the day is the number one, the Ukrainians are
[00:07:19] humiliated, the Europeans are
[00:07:22] humiliated, and the administ American administration is
[00:07:25] humiliated, because can Donald Trump tell CIA
[00:07:29] to stop helping the Ukrainians, it looks like me like
[00:07:33] there's there's only one winner on all of this, and I don't
[00:07:37] know, according to some reports and we are living in the fog of
[00:07:41] war of so much fake. news right now, a tanker already suddenly arrived in
[00:07:45] the United States,
[00:07:45] I don't know if that's true, but I tend to think by this time next week
[00:07:49] we're not even going to be talking about this, Mark. Yeah, the
[00:07:53] whole thing smacks of rather maliforous political
[00:07:57] theater to me, and for exactly the reasons you pointed
[00:08:01] out, because if Trump is really
[00:08:05] furious, over continued
[00:08:08] you, low level, but but still annoying attacks.
[00:08:12] Russia's oil refineries, including one on Rostof Nadano
[00:08:16] since uh this um uh deal was
[00:08:20] announced, he ought to be furious at Trump,
[00:08:23] because the the K regime simply it lacks the military and
[00:08:27] technical capabilities to carry out these attacks without
[00:08:31] active CIA help, and we know that because the CIA under
[00:08:35] Trump has bragged about it on the front pages the New York Times and the
[00:08:39] Washington Post on multiple occasions about how
[00:08:42] they are not only providing intelligence, but directing
[00:08:46] these attacks down to the point of directing which
[00:08:50] part the refineries the drones attack to cause
[00:08:54] the maximum amount of downtime before Russians uh
[00:08:58] repair it, so I i think Trump ought to really be
[00:09:02] furious at himself, or at least at his director the
[00:09:05] CIA, and you raise the question, does Trump
[00:09:09] actually have power within the... united states
[00:09:13] government to change us for
[00:09:15] he did in his first administration, we all know that and it's well
[00:09:18] documented, you know george, another story that
[00:09:22] didn't get in much much air time because there's so much going on right
[00:09:26] now, but um the military heads
[00:09:29] of every single NATO country, i don't know if the us
[00:09:32] participateduh went went to kiev, what would they talk
[00:09:36] about, mean this is like four and a half, almost five years in,
[00:09:39] mean wouldn't you think they'd do that in the beginning the? conflict
[00:09:43] and what expertise do any these
[00:09:46] generals have in fighting a war? i don't think
[00:09:50] anything right now, mean what a waste of taxpayer
[00:09:53] money, which is probably the calling card of this entire conflict in the west,
[00:09:57] george, well i think they're trying to express
[00:10:01] solidarity, mean that's what
[00:10:04] that does, yeah that's all
[00:10:08] they do, and of course that's how the
[00:10:10] european - responded to Trump's
[00:10:14] announcement the the diesel deal,
[00:10:18] enraged comments from Andy Burnham
[00:10:22] from from the EU, Kaya Halas. and
[00:10:25] said, well, their responses, we're going even intensify the
[00:10:29] sanctions, we're going to meet on Monday and we're going to you, hit
[00:10:33] Russia with the harshest sanctions ever, every every sanction
[00:10:37] package is the harshest ever, so it's all of
[00:10:40] this is is expecial solidarity, but to go going back to Mark's
[00:10:44] point,
[00:10:45] I i think that is very good question, how much control does
[00:10:49] Trump have over his own administration, he says over and over
[00:10:53] again, and he's been saying it for a long time, no strikes on
[00:10:55] refineries and then they continue, i would assume trump
[00:10:59] does want to stop the attacks on refineries because the diesel
[00:11:03] prices are hurting him, mean no question, they are really
[00:11:06] hurting america's farmers, he says he says this in
[00:11:10] truth the truth, our farmers and ranches are are
[00:11:14] in pain, so therefore you assume he wants this
[00:11:17] stop, but he obviously he doesn't have the power to do so, or
[00:11:21] he may be afraid, he may be afraid of '
[00:11:25] buying um the the the the hidden state or
[00:11:29] the the deep state because otherwise you
[00:11:31] know
[00:11:33] mean it is case if you want to stop these refineries you have to get Radciff
[00:11:37] into your office and tell him don't do it or you're fired
[00:11:40] but trump doesn't want to do that yeah mark mean if
[00:11:44] if uh the united states and and Russia can come to deal
[00:11:48] on diesel why can't they come to deal on other things i
[00:11:51] mean there's a precedent here right now
[00:11:55] I mean, I thought this war was supposed to be over before Trump was
[00:11:58] inaugurated for the second time. I mean, it it, it just,
[00:12:02] it just shows an enormous inability of leadership, Mark.
[00:12:06] Yeah, I, I don't, I think actually the US president always has
[00:12:09] very limited bandwith agency
[00:12:13] and power over US foreign and military policy. It's largely
[00:12:17] written in the orthodoxy the institutions
[00:12:21] that comprise the US government. If you don't
[00:12:23] want to call it the deep state, you want
[00:12:24] to call it. the blob as ben roads did or the purement of
[00:12:28] bureaucracy, that's fine, but at the end the day John Bolton
[00:12:32] was very clear about how Trump is manipulated and
[00:12:35] controlled on such things in his memoirs of his time in the first
[00:12:39] administration, you come and you present set of policy
[00:12:43] options that aren't really very different from each other, and you say
[00:12:47] you choose ABC and D, none the above is not an
[00:12:51] option, and that's that's the way you control, let's face it.
[00:12:55] rather ignorant president uh in particular uh who gets his
[00:12:59] news from Fox News uh like Donald Trump, but as for the NATO
[00:13:03] generals, their big expertise is as dogs
[00:13:07] uh, they are there as a symbolic to urinate and
[00:13:10] mark over Ukraine as their territory, we
[00:13:14] flipped this country in 2014 and you're not going to get
[00:13:18] it back, they said immediately after the Russian foreign
[00:13:21] ministry
[00:13:24] um um put out de declaration for the second time that
[00:13:27] western and well all foreign diplomatic missions should leave Kiev
[00:13:31] because it's no longer safe, that was their show of defiance and
[00:13:35] symbolic support that Ukraine is de facto NATO
[00:13:38] territory, but we'll see about that. And
[00:13:42] George, to finish up on this topic, um, there's no
[00:13:46] denying that Ukraine is being pumbled right
[00:13:49] now, night after night after night. Again, I why did these NATO
[00:13:53] generals code there, I mean? um, they can
[00:13:57] call it theirs, but they can't defend it, I mean it, it's a force
[00:14:01] on so many different levels, finish up, Mark, George, go
[00:14:04] ahead, but
[00:14:05] it is being pummaled, and you would think the the rational thing
[00:14:09] to do would be bring this thing to an end, um,
[00:14:13] because it is Ukrainians who are getting killed, but that's not the
[00:14:17] way they're thinking, they want this to continue, they they, and that's why you know
[00:14:21] with all their blustery statements that come out of...
[00:14:25] is we
[00:14:26] need to keep this going
[00:14:28] for for you indefinitely without ever
[00:14:32] presenting any coherent peace plan or anything at all
[00:14:36] other than well Russia must essentially
[00:14:40] call for immediate cfy in other words a capitulation
[00:14:43] so but Georgia don't you think also I mean to finish off here I mean
[00:14:47] it's very interesting this the European position is to spite
[00:14:51] the Russians and equally spite the president the United States.
[00:14:55] I cannot see how that's a winning strategy. All right, gentlemen, I'm going to interrupt
[00:14:59] myself, we're going to go to a short break, and after that short break, we'll continue our discussion on some
[00:15:03] real news today with
[00:15:04] RT.
[00:16:14] Welcome back to Cross Talk Bullhorns where all things are considered on Peter we're
[00:16:17] discussing some real news and Mark that real news is what the heck is
[00:16:21] going on with Saudi Arabia because as you and I noted
[00:16:25] before uh we convene here today there's an enormous amount of conflicting
[00:16:28] information and I must say from some sources that I tended
[00:16:32] to trust and now trust a lot less because
[00:16:36] there there seems to um
[00:16:39] um um top dollars out there when it comes to uh trying to
[00:16:43] um manipulate um how people perceive the the conflict, the
[00:16:47] multiple conflicts going on now in Saudi Arabia, Yemen and of
[00:16:51] course the US and Israeli war against Tran, what
[00:16:54] is going on here and do the Mecca Alliance pact here have
[00:16:58] any meaning whatsoever, is that just more fog of war?
[00:17:02] Mark yeah um Saudi Arabia is getting pummeled
[00:17:05] too um by the Ansar Allah movement, the
[00:17:08] hoothies and Saudi infrastructure and Saudi
[00:17:12] airports uh have been hit repeatedly uh
[00:17:16] over the last two weeks and most recently
[00:17:20] the east-west uh oil pipeline uh to
[00:17:24] the red sea uh that is Saudi Arabia's
[00:17:27] bypass uh uh over the straight of 4
[00:17:31] moves um that has been hit for the second time taking out another uh
[00:17:35] pumping station and stopping of that pipeline again for the
[00:17:39] second time uh a month uh and
[00:17:43] the refineries have been hit again and again uh also on the
[00:17:47] ground the hoothis continue to press and
[00:17:50] take uh uh territory uh from the saudi
[00:17:54] proxy regime uh in Yemen. now this war
[00:17:58] has history right uh it's been going on for over decade,
[00:18:02] it entered into a frozen phase uh and it has now
[00:18:06] reignited after so...
[00:18:07] the arabia's attack on uh Yemen's airport in
[00:18:11] Sana, but it's best understood now in the context of a
[00:18:15] subset the US-Israeli war on
[00:18:18] Iran right, because Saudi Arabia, a proxy the United States
[00:18:22] and the Hufis here if you want to call
[00:18:24] them a a proxy of Iran uh, but Saudi Arab, the US
[00:18:28] can't defend Saudi Arabia just like it can't
[00:18:31] defend uh Kiev uh from these long distance
[00:18:35] attacks because it has... kille's heel has always been air
[00:18:39] defense um so the saudis have looked
[00:18:43] really everywhere right, they've been trying to bring in the French have promised to send
[00:18:46] troops, now they're turning to their new mecca defense alliance with
[00:18:50] Pakistan and Turkey and it's
[00:18:53] unclear,
[00:18:54] um both them have sent troops to Saudi Arabia to stand around
[00:18:58] and pretend to um uh provide air
[00:19:02] defense, well let me let me run let me run with that, let me run with that buse I agree with
[00:19:06] you uh we do have uh turkish and and making
[00:19:10] a lot of noise about this pact, but my
[00:19:13] theory the case is it's not necessarily to
[00:19:17] protect Saudi Arabia, it is to protect NBS and the
[00:19:21] Royal Family, that's what their mission is, it's defensive, and
[00:19:25] Mark and I again before we convene here
[00:19:28] commenting on um the reports that
[00:19:31] Pakistan was using its air force against the ansara law, which
[00:19:35] I alarm bells one off with... with me and I said no, that's
[00:19:39] not possible, it looks like it's not here, their mission is
[00:19:43] um to protect the existing order in Saudi Arabia,
[00:19:47] which depending on who you want to ask, Chaz Friedman, former
[00:19:51] ambassador to Saudi Arabia, and I thought it was an
[00:19:54] interesting insight, he said, um, people have been predicting the end of
[00:19:58] Saudi Arabia since 1934, so we should keep that into
[00:20:02] perspective, but then nonetheless the the the current
[00:20:05] royal family is not necessarily... the the the favorite topic the month in
[00:20:09] Saudi Arabia itself, if you can't defend the country, what right do you have to
[00:20:13] rule, george? well, I think it is very good point that
[00:20:17] Saudi Arabia's demise has been predicted many, many
[00:20:21] times, I mean it's it's uh, it it just seems
[00:20:24] like such an unstable uh structure,
[00:20:28] what is remarkable though is that Saudi Arabia
[00:20:32] actually has very powerful military, it has very large armed
[00:20:35] forces, it's been train. for years and years by
[00:20:39] western military advisers, pakistan has
[00:20:43] been present in Saudi Arabia really for decades, I mean
[00:20:47] this going back to the 1960s. "in fact, I think there are some
[00:20:51] Pakistanis who are serving in the uh the Saudi armed forces, well isn't
[00:20:55] that just the point, George, it's a for foreigners fighting for Saudi Arabia, but
[00:20:59] it's far, well that that's right, and and but you see in terms
[00:21:03] the numbers, you think, well that's quite a quite sizable army that
[00:21:06] Saudi Arabia has and it has up to date very
[00:21:10] sophisticated military equipment, I
[00:21:12] mean it's getting military equipment from the United States,
[00:21:14] it gets military equipment from Britain, from France, it is
[00:21:17] very large, very well equipped.
[00:21:20] military,
[00:21:22] you get there's an image that is still in my mind,
[00:21:26] Mark is a Anthoraf fighter wearing
[00:21:29] sandals with one arm firing
[00:21:32] at at Saudi forces, I mean these people seem indominable, okay,
[00:21:36] I'm not, I'm not trying to glorify this here, but my point is, I'm not going to
[00:21:40] dismiss how much money Saudi Arabia spends on military, of course they do, they
[00:21:44] actually pay a premium, um, but Mark, at the end the
[00:21:48] day, that's what's got inside. be out of trouble as always they can pay
[00:21:52] somebody off, they've always got money to to um to
[00:21:56] to right away its worries, that's not the case now, and
[00:21:59] they're not getting any cash, and as matter of fact, they're looking for
[00:22:02] international loans, so money isn't going to buy them out of this
[00:22:06] problem, mark? yeah, i'll glorify the
[00:22:09] answer, i don't have a problem with that, right? i'll i'll, i'll hail
[00:22:13] the fighters the fremmen the middle east, Saudi Arabia couldn't defeat
[00:22:17] uh, the the you know the the fl whether they've got. flip flops or not,
[00:22:21] the lucky ones do, I guess, they couldn't defeat them in more than decade, and I
[00:22:25] don't think they can defeat them now, and you're right, their money can't buy them out
[00:22:28] of that. It's true that on paper, Saudi Arabia
[00:22:32] has rather powerful military with lots of hardware from the
[00:22:36] US and other western countries, but in reality
[00:22:39] corruption is rife uh, and the saudi
[00:22:43] military tends to be a place where uh,
[00:22:47] Saudi uh, shall we say, nobility gets to...
[00:22:50] reside uh in places of semi uh
[00:22:53] importance, but but don't really have any military command,
[00:22:57] authority or experience. i think the saudi military lacks
[00:23:01] a warrior ethos and certainly lacks any real
[00:23:05] experience. uh, so i have some real questions, which
[00:23:09] is why they've relied mostly on mercenaries uh in
[00:23:13] Yemen for more than decade that do not perform well uh,
[00:23:16] and why they're now looking outside if the U.S. can no
[00:23:20] longer provide security them, they're trying to learn to
[00:23:24] other other actors, and it's true, they've long had a strategic
[00:23:27] partnership with Pakistan. It's widely rumored that they
[00:23:31] financed uh Pakistan's nuclear program and that Pakistan keeps
[00:23:35] some nukes in reserve for them. Uh, and there's an
[00:23:38] open question of whether Pakistan is participating in this or not, the New
[00:23:42] York Times reported they were, and then they took back the story when the
[00:23:46] Pakistan government vociferously denied it. uh so
[00:23:50] as far as we know they're just standing around in Saudi Arabia along with the
[00:23:54] Turks pretending to provide air defense, which they're not
[00:23:58] capable of doing anymore than the Americans, but
[00:24:01] Erdogan in Turkey, the cunning beast uh, while
[00:24:05] he has said he will not participate uh attacks
[00:24:09] on Ansar Alah, which is
[00:24:11] you know where the real fighting is, I mean this is a war in Yemen
[00:24:15] with Yemen taking some strikes back against Saudi
[00:24:18] Arabia, uh... on evidently has been
[00:24:21] calling on and the saudies as well on uh uh
[00:24:25] Erdouan's pet al-qaeda leader ruling over the ruins
[00:24:29] of Syria al-gilani al-sharah and he's got another
[00:24:33] 10 or 20 thousand spare jihadi headchoppers that he could
[00:24:37] send off uh to fight the hoothies and I think that's what's being
[00:24:40] negotiated yeah but you're what you're talking about is the horizontal
[00:24:44] expansion of this war and George remarkably remarkably
[00:24:48] Donald Trump very upset about the the um the attacks
[00:24:52] on Saudi Arabia's airports and uh he's um
[00:24:56] pondering whether what to do meaning getting involved
[00:25:00] itself. I mean we had that with the b administration, we had that
[00:25:04] in the beginning the Trump administration and they want to do it
[00:25:07] again. I mean, I, I, I've expressed
[00:25:11] to both of you gentlemen, you know, I mean, when there's a, if there's
[00:25:15] a choice, why consistently the worst choices are
[00:25:18] made consistent? instantly over and over again, it's I'm
[00:25:22] baffled by it, George. Well, Trump has already twice
[00:25:26] said no to Saudi entreaties to bomb
[00:25:30] the hoothies. He mumbled that he may get
[00:25:33] involved after the the attack on the Riyad airport, but
[00:25:37] it was just mumble and he just he said, yeah, maybe we'll think about it,
[00:25:41] didn't sound like a commitment to do anything, so I have my doubts that
[00:25:45] he is actually going to do something, um, but I think the the case with...
[00:25:50] Turkey and Pakistan is, they have made absolutely clear
[00:25:53] everyone, to to the soudis, we are here
[00:25:57] defensively, and others, we will defend you here
[00:26:01] in Saudi Arabia, we are not. going to engage any kind
[00:26:04] of uh armed combat against the hoothies, we're not going to do that,
[00:26:08] so what's the point of being there? mean,
[00:26:11] well then,
[00:26:15] no,
[00:26:15] or maybe as you said at the beginning that it's all about trying to
[00:26:19] protect uh MBS and the the government in Riad,
[00:26:22] but in the case of Turkey, I mean they've said, well, first of all,
[00:26:26] the uh, the Mecca defense back hasn't yet been ratified
[00:26:30] by the the parliament, have you read it? have you seen it?
[00:26:33] does anybody read it? does anybody know what's in it? i don't think
[00:26:37] so, i think it's been released. yeah, no, that's right, and so so
[00:26:41] therefore, and turkey, turkey really does not want to get into
[00:26:45] any kind of offensive war, they don't want to
[00:26:48] entagonize Iran, they made clear that they don't want to antagonize
[00:26:52] iran. also, turkey is rival of Saudi Arabias
[00:26:55] in as leader the Islamic world, I mean that
[00:26:59] is very much Erdogan's program that it's... turkey, not
[00:27:03] Saudi Arabia, that's the leader the Islamic world,
[00:27:05] so there's no love loss between Turkey and Saudi Arabia, he's not going to
[00:27:09] antagonize Iran uh for the sake of
[00:27:13] this the government in Riad, and Pakistan is just
[00:27:17] says, we're not really going much beyond what we do here, which is we're going to
[00:27:20] station some forces in in Saudi Arabia,
[00:27:24] but we're not going to send them into any kind of combat role, you
[00:27:27] you
[00:27:29] can the the kingdom of Saudi Arabia is just very much unloved in the world is?
[00:27:34] I it doesn't have many friends, it has lots of
[00:27:38] customers, um, in fact you could argue, you could
[00:27:42] make you the argument that Russia has really one the best
[00:27:46] business-like relationships uh, despite long
[00:27:49] geopolitical differences in Syria, and their
[00:27:52] cooperation on OPEC plus has
[00:27:55] continued and performed much better than most of
[00:27:59] the critics uh said it was, but I agree with with
[00:28:03] George, that the real problem here is the
[00:28:06] horizontal expansion of this conflict, always
[00:28:10] spreading outside Iran and bringing in more and more
[00:28:14] players, whatever their specific role, it also makes it much
[00:28:17] harder to end, because Pakistan has been serving as
[00:28:21] a supposed mediator right um the
[00:28:24] US and Iran now how and the US
[00:28:28] has also attempted to subvert Oman over the past few months.
[00:28:32] which was also playing mediating role. now how can there be
[00:28:36] mediation between the US and Iran to end this conflict
[00:28:39] if both of those countries are being drawn into the
[00:28:43] conflict, which makes the ending of it even more
[00:28:47] difficult and improbable? well,
[00:28:51] again, we go back to the the origin story on
[00:28:54] February 28th, could any one, well, I think the if we were
[00:28:58] asked um, what would be the implications of it? I think we would have said, well...
[00:29:02] It could easily spread, okay? It could bring a lot of
[00:29:06] people, and you would be very difficult to control, if not
[00:29:10] nearly impossible to end, but that's where we are, gentlemen,
[00:29:14] plenty, plenty of can and voter for us to go over in the weeks
[00:29:17] ahead. I want to thank my guests here in Moscow and in Budapest, and of course I want to thank our
[00:29:21] viewers for watching us here in RT, see you next time, remember Crossock
[00:29:25] rules.
[00:30:22] He is eager to seize upon any words, initiatives or ideas
[00:30:26] entering the public discourse, so he can push for some breathing room.
[00:30:30] Russia's foreign minister dismissed." Vladimir Zelensky's
[00:30:34] ceasefire calls as a ploy to re-group
[00:30:37] Ukraine's forces. That's after Keyev demand it the guns
[00:30:41] fall silent for 60 days to allow for
[00:30:44] elections. The more we help Ukraine, the
[00:30:48] sooner the war will be over. Brussels adopts yet another package of
[00:30:52] anti-Russian sanctions with the EU hoping its 22nd
[00:30:56] round of restrictions will do what the previous 21 have failed to do.