president biden is expected to quickly
sign into law a new 40 billion dollar
aid package for ukraine the senate
overwhelmingly approved the measure
yesterday with an 86 to 11 vote it is
the largest foreign aid package passed
by congress in at least two decades
separately the us also is sending 100
million dollars in additional military
equipment to ukraine the package
includes howitzers tactical vehicles and
counter artillery radars also ukraine's
foreign minister is criticizing nato for
what he says is a lack of support for
his country last night during a
nationwide telethon to raise funds for
ukraine dimitro caleb said in part could
you name at least one consensus decision
made by nato over the past three months
that would benefit and help ukraine he
continued yes it is true that the
alliance members individually or small
groups are really doing awesome and
important work providing vital
assistance but nato as an institution
has done nothing during this time joe
let's bring in right now retired
four-star united states army general and
former cia director david petraeus
general thank you so much for being with
us we appreciate it so much why don't we
begin with that statement from the
foreign minister what what would your
response be
well my response would be that he's
under enormous pressure as is his
president uh president zielinski uh
they're all feeling again this month's
long
tension as they've first held back the
russians won the battles of kiev and
sumi and trinity but now also
kharkiv in the east but as you're
reporting covered correctly
there's a big battle brewing down in
luhansk um they are again under enormous
pressure and no commander's ever had
enough
uh troops uh money uh bandwidth uh
nowadays or drones
uh and you know i never felt that i did
even in the surge in iraq um you always
need more uh you're always under
pressure and i think that was
essentially
uh an expression of a manifestation of
that enormous pressure that they've been
under now for two and a half months
since this invasion began
so general before we we we go deep into
russia let's first talk about where the
president is right now in asia we've
been talking for some time as a nation
since barack obama was president about
that that shift uh to asia that focus on
asia which we have not done i'm curious
how how is the united states doing right
now uh challenging an aggressive china
even in its weakened state uh are we are
we starting to line our allies up
effectively and what are our biggest
challenges moving forward
well i think we are joe as you noted uh
since the second term of the obama
administration we've been trying to do a
rebalance to asia now the indo-pacific
as it is termed the trump administration
of course continued that very much
changed the conversation
on china and this administration came in
intending immediately to focus again on
the indo-pacific region but first it was
afghanistan then it was ukraine and
they're trying to get back
onto their strategic glide path and it's
been difficult but i think the the asean
summit that was held a number of other
initiatives the first meeting of all of
the quad that was held earlier all of
this again trying to get back to what
they believe and i agree is the main
effort for our country
there's a lot to be done in every
different respect i think the big intent
in this particular trip is to lay out
the economic vision
because the glaring absence in the
overarching strategy of the united
states and its allies and partners is
the absence of a trade component we
pulled out of the trans-pacific
partnership we haven't figured out how
to get back into that so there'll be
pieces and parts of again what might
look like elements of a trade agreement
of an economic initiative that's the
most important component of all of this
indeed as the pentagon and all of our
other
departments and agencies make that
change in focus and that is very much
ongoing and really has been
since it was announced back in the days
of the the second part of the obama
administration
general petraeus good morning it's great
to have you on the show we have been a
chance to speak with you in some time so
we'd love to just get your general view
of what's happened in ukraine over the
last three months or so what has
surprised you perhaps about the
ineptitude of the russian military the
strength of the ukrainian military the
will of the people there the leadership
of zelinski and the rallying led by
president biden of the west what's your
overall view of what we've seen here
well i think the biggest of the big
ideas is that putin set out to make
russia great again
but what he's really done is make nato
great again and of course you see now
the accession of finland and sweden then
we'll work through these issues with
president erdogan of turkey i think
they're resolvable
and frankly he's made america great
again
after the withdrawal from afghanistan
there was there were countries around
the world that said you can't depend on
the americans anymore
there are great power and decline and
what we've shown is that is not the case
we still can lead the world and do lead
the world when it really matters to us
and this is just one of those cases
certainly i think everyone has been
reassessing what is the realm of the
possible in ukraine since the beginning
i did not ever say in fact i said that
russia would not be able to take keeve
and certainly would never be able to
control it that said even i was
astounded at what you rightly termed the
ineptitude in virtually every category
by which you might evaluate a military
force
and having been part of an invasion of a
country i have a little bit of a
reference uh in fact to do to do that
and then the ukrainians have been
extraordinary now i was there not long
after president zielinski was elected i
went down to the donbass went to heart
keith and other cities
and i had a sense that these guys are
ready to fight if it comes to it
and obviously they have been what i
think has been so amazing is the
resourcefulness
uh not just of the military forces but
of an entire nation at war the entire
country has mobilized behind their men
and women who are actually doing the
fighting but everybody is engaged in
some way
in the way they have taken this massive
amount of arms and ammunition that we
above all have provided but other
countries as well and uk deserve special
mention here
uh the way they've taken those and just
shoved them right into the front lines
and made great use of them is really
very very impressive the key i think
right now willie over the next few weeks
is to see if russia succeeds in that
offensive that you mentioned down in the
far southeast
to see if the ukrainians can capitalize
on the momentum they achieved around
harkief in the east and can roll up the
russian flank from the north but then
what may happen is the russians may say
okay this is about as much as we're
going to get we're going to harden the
front lines we're going to make it very
difficult for them to take this back
we're going to build it around urban
areas just as the ukrainians have built
their defenses around them and we're
going to declare this part of russian
federation we're going to annex it and
we may even throw the nuclear umbrella
over top of that and say if you try to
take this back you're really tempting
fate
so this is something that is going to
stretch out i fear for quite some time
uh i don't see president zielinski able
to accept uh any kind of russian gain
that has been made since 24 february and
maybe not even the ones that were made
back in 2014 at the end of the day given
what's transpired and the sacrifices
that they've made
and president putin is going to see how
much more they can get and then try to
hang on to all of that so i think we
have the prospect of what could be a
drawn-out affair unless the one
possibility we need to watch to see if
it happens is the possible collapse of
russian forces
if they start to crumble obviously their
morale has been very poor their
discipline has been non-existent their
capabilities have been underwhelming but
they still have a lot of artillery
rockets missiles and bombs they're
making those
used in a variety of different places
making that weight felt
uh nonetheless it's possible that they
could at some point start to crumble and
it's very hard to predict that having
been in some fights where the enemy
crumbled at a certain point but you
couldn't predict it right up until the
moment that that happened and so
we should be watching for indicators of
that possibility but that would be i
think the the best case uh for ukraine
uh the more likely case again i think is
that russia hardens this and nexus it
and says this is ours and you try to
take it and you'll pay a heavy price
as you say general if you go back to
january february all the chess thumping
by vladimir putin and the russian
military that they were going to roll
into keeve and take the capital and have
a victory parade and install a puppet
government seems like a lifetime ago now
when you see how the dynamics of this
war have changed
do you believe general in your
assessment that ukraine can win this war
whatever that may mean to you i mean
certainly the united states is placing
very big bets 40 billion dollars worth
most recently
on a side that it believes can win
well again it always depends on how you
define winning because the truth is that
there's been enormous destruction and
loss
in ukraine already needless to say and
it's going to take probably decades to
rebuild
to re-establish various elements of
their economy some of this is
irreparable by the way so is some of the
damage to russia's economy financial
system putin's inner circle and business
community
so i think everyone is losing who's
actually directly participating in this
ironically
of course it is nato that emerges from
this much stronger with two additional
very capable countries that will
surround the baltic it's now completely
controlled by nato and add two very
important countries to what is going to
be a a struggle of the future maybe not
a battleground but certainly a
competitive zone of the future which is
the arctic
certainly ukraine can push back farther
hopefully with the additional arms and
ammunition that we're providing
it would be
fantastic if they could regain
everything that's been taken since 24
february um it remains to be seen though
and again urban fighting which they've
in in a sense done as defenders
is difficult when you're on the offense
and they're going to have to retake some
some built up areas that the russians
now control if the russians can
demonstrate some aptitude
at defending those areas this could be a
very tough fight and it could stretch
out for quite some time with a lot of
loss
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