RADIOFebruary 25, 2022

Is THIS Putin’s long-term goal for Russia by invading Ukraine?

President Vladimir Putin took both Glenn and his head researcher, Jason Buttrill, ‘by surprise’ when he invaded Ukraine on Thursday — just as U.S. intelligence had predicted. So, where do we go from here? What kind of US sanctions on Russia should we expect from President Biden? What is Ukraine’s strategy militarily, will this escalate into a full ground war, and WHAT could Putin possibly gain from this? Jason and Glenn break down Putin’s possible, long-term goal & more…

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

I want to bring in Jason Buttrill who is with us now.

Hi, Jason.

JASON: Hi, Glenn.

GLENN: You and I have been talking about this for a long time.

We have spent a year on Ukraine. And this takes both of us by surprise. I have to hand it to the intelligence community. Although, I don't feel comfortable. Something is not right here.

But the intelligence community and the Biden administration said, this is what he was going to do.

And he's done it.

JASON: Yeah. I agree.

It's really crazy. Because when you study geopolitics. You learn to analyze and look at these things from that lens.

You're taught that, you know, geopolitics is a study of maps. Its demographic numbers. You know, it's interest. Hard-lined interest.

When someone starts acting emotionally, like Putin has been doing for the past year plus, you learn to put that away. And you say, okay. Well, he's obviously after something else.

Which I still think there's something else involved, just like you said. So when the Biden administration was kind of saying, this is happening. Full-scale invasion. All of that.

I didn't think anything was happening. I didn't. I was looking for something behind what was going on. Because this all seemed so irrational. But I think the intelligence community was spot-on.

I've seen reports they can't be it actually, the intelligence community coming out that false flag attacks would happen. That would be the preempt to them doing a full-on invasion.

They were exactly right. And the reports that said it delayed Putin's invasion by possibly a week. Like, they wanted to do this last week, not this week.

So the intelligence community and Biden administration were exactly right on this. Now, there's ways to criticize other things, which we can get through later. What they've done.

Just a quick recap. The media sort of reporting last night, that the invasion was going to commence around 4:00 a.m. Kyiv time.

And pretty much, that was spot-on. It happened around 4:10, 4:15 Kyiv time.

And it's very, very conventional from what I've been noticing all night. This is not like Crimea in 2014 with unconventional warfare. This is a very conventional invasion. What we saw commencing around 4:00 a.m. Kyiv time.

Was airstrikes that tried to command systems. That went as far as Kyiv. And it's a three-pronged attack, coming from Belarus. Coming from Crimea in the South, and from mainland Russia in the East.

Now, we do not bank how far they want to push this, but it is a conventional invasion. It looks as if they will probably go further than eastern Ukraine. Question in you is how far they will go. And how far tensions will rise, especially with NATO gathering troops all along the border with Ukraine.

GLENN: Okay. So let's -- it looks as though he was using conventional warfare.

To cut off the troops, as they were kind of gathered, at the borders of -- of the two districts, that President Putin said he was going to take. They went behind those lines. And kind of cut them off. So they can't fall back. To -- to defend could he have. Correct? is

JASON: Yes, that's correct. Because they know Ukraine's strategy here is they will get overwhelmed. Their main strategy is in the east, guarding those two territories, as you said.

Their strategy is to do a tactical retreat back into the urban areas of Ukraine. Then it turns into both a hybrid guerilla warfare, and heavy urban warfare in the large Ukrainian cities. That is very, very bloody. That is very, very dangerous to the Russian military. As well as civilians. Russia is does not want to kill too many Ukrainian civilians.

Because that will be very, very unpopular in mainland Russia. Ukraine strategy here, as I said, is get into the cities, and to turn it into an urban conference, draw it out for as long as possible. Russia wants to stop that. That explains why they dropped in behind the troops there.

GLENN: Can they take the whole country just by air, and cutting it all off?

JASON: They absolutely can take the whole country in the short-term. It depends on how effective their air assets are, and that's what we're seeing right now is the bomb from the air.

We're seeing cruise missile strikes. So cutting off command and control, all over the country, and crippling Ukraine. So they can eventually roll into the capitol.

That will happen, is my guess. Unless somebody else intervenes. Which I kind of highly doubt.

But a short-term victory is really all Russia can hope for here. And that's a really puzzling thing.

Because I can't imagine they will win in the long-term.

In the long-term, it will be too damaging politically for Russia. It's catastrophic in the short-term.

In the long-term, I don't see how they win in this, unless there's some other grander strategy, that we just don't even know about. Which would be scarier, actually

GLENN: Yeah, I think so too.

All right. Let me take a one-minute break. And then we will come back and discuss this.

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So we have some -- some puzzling things. First of all, Putin said, he wants to de-Nazify Ukraine.

Any idea what's that about?

JASON: Same writer since he's been using since 2014. And it's directed more to the people of Russia, not anyone else in the world, or Ukraine.

But he's been using that World War II sentiment. To get public support, to do what he's now doing.

But that will continue. And no doubt, he will provide some air quote evidence, you know, that they're taking out some Nazi -- but he's drawing on World War II nationalism.

GLENN: Well, he said that there's been an ongoing genocide in Ukraine.

That he's trying to stop.

I mean, this is crazy.

JASON: And that's what makes it so hard for me, when I was looking at this before. To really think that he was going to go through with it. Putin is not a crazy guy. He may be now, but in the past, he's not been.

He's been very cold and calculating. Geopolitical and interests has always been forefront in his mind.

GLENN: He's not a -- he's not a psychopath. I mean, well, he might be. But he doesn't -- he's not somebody driven by rage.

He is cold and calculating.

JASON: Yeah.

GLENN: And when -- I mean, he's out and out evil. He is a bloodthirsty killer, who has spent a lifetime killing people.

But he's logical in it. He's very calculated in it.

And the rhetoric, I mean, I think the Nazi stuff, the religious stuff. That's all -- that's -- that's Dugin kind of language.

JASON: Yeah. And that's a very, very powerful weapon for Russians. Because they're very much willing to suffer, and to -- you know, to -- to basically take it, on the chin.

If they have to. If that means that their country, you know, will eventually reign supreme.

It's interesting, if you go and take a tour of the Kremlin, the red tour in Russia, which I've done many times. You'll be very surprised, to see that the former Soviet Union, the capital, in their red square. Probably 80 percent churches. There's multiple churches.

There weren't religious during the Soviet Union. But historically, during the Russian empire, they were very religious. Orthodoxy is very, very pivotal to Russian nationalism.

And even the Soviets would turn that up, when they needed to. But that's exactly what Putin has done under Dugin, especially in that speech he gave last week. That was very, very telling, to a lot of us that had been looking at this. People like you and me, Glenn.

That okay. Now we know exactly what he's doing.

He's turning up that dial of nationalism, to justify doing, you know, what he's doing. And possibly even more. Which is scary.

GLENN: Okay. Would you agree with me -- and I would like you to explore this a minute.

There is no real obvious win for Putin. His stock market has crashed. This is going to be horrible. They are in the oil business.

They just made a deal with China. But that's years down the road. They're going to shut down all the oil exports into any western country. Because of this.

So his oil is going to crash, which funds his government, and his country. The stock market is down. Business is going to be cut off.

It's already in shambles, in Russia.

What does he have to gain here? Can you think of anything, that he has to gain?

JASON: I've always thought from the beginning of this, especially when I didn't think invasion would happen. I thought he was playing a game, to divide and conquer NATO. That's what I thought. And I still think that's a major part of his plan. Taking Ukraine is also very, very important, strategically for Russia. To get a strategic death.

It's always been their plan, was to have some buffer, so they could have their capital in Moscow.

GLENN: Yeah, but also the warm water port.

JASON: Exactly. When he's talking about heart of Russia, that's true. I don't think that really guides him. I think that's the excuse he uses to get support from home.

GLENN: Right.

JASON: But I think -- and it's very irritating I think that -- we're talked about, Putin is not a psychopath. I think he's very spiteful. I think that the Russian election interference, which I don't think did anything. I don't want to say it did. But their election interference thing is a direct response to Hillary Clinton, and what they did to his election.

I think that a lot of what we're doing now, is a direct response to how the Obama administration and all his foreign policy elites handled 2014 Ukrainian revolution.

I think he responded to these people, directly in kind. That's also the reason why he was willing to back off of this when Trump was there. He knew that's not how they operated. And they weren't the ones directly responsible for what happened. And I think it's ridiculous, that NATO wouldn't respond. Wouldn't say, hey, we will not admit Ukraine into NATO. Why couldn't they say that?

NATO was irrelevant. And the irony of this is now that Putin is responding to that, it's making NATO relevant again. I think eventually his goal is to play the long game.

Eventually, there will be NATO countries. Like Germany will not want to attack. They won't want to send troops. That will cause a divide in NATO. That's going to cause a divide between the UK and France. They won't want to attack either.

And, eventually, this will play out, where NATO will do what he wanted. He wanted NATO to do a draw. That benefits China and everybody else on Russia's side.

His ultimate goal is the long game. Divide NATO. Possibly the end of NATO. And get strategic deaths with Ukraine.

GLENN: Okay. Thank you very much, Jason. I appreciate it.

I will give you another perspective, when we come back.

Because I -- I just don't think -- I mean, I agreed with, he's trying to break up NATO. But not anymore.

This is costing him too high of a price at home.

What could he be angling for?

I'll throw a couple of ideas your way, next.

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Deep State NGO CAUGHT trying to restart opium trade in Taliban-run Afghanistan

Was an NGO with deep government ties trying to RESTART the opium trade in Taliban-run Afghanistan while former Taliban members were on its payroll...only to be caught DESTROYING the evidence?! The State Department's Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy Darren Beattie joins Glenn Beck to expose what he found when he was made Acting President of the United States Institute of Peace. Plus, he debunks ProPublica’s claim that DOGE “targeted” an “Afghan scholar who fled the Taliban.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Darren, welcome to the program. How are you? Darren, are you there? Is he there?

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: Okay. Check if he's there. Is he? Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney.

STU: Trying to shut him down. They don't want peace. They don't want peace.

GLENN: They don't. They don't.

He is -- he is a big-time anti-globalist. I've got to tell you, what we're doing with the State Department. I absolutely love. The State Department has been a big problem for this country for a very long time. It's what's gotten us into these global wars. These endless wars, and everything he is.

And, I mean, I don't know what happened to Marco rube, but he is tremendous.

And the way president Trump is appointing different people like Darren, it's fantastic. Darren, are you there? Darren.

STU: Something must be wrong with the lines. Because we are talking to him offline on the phone here. And it does seem to be working, but not coming through our broadcast board here for whatever reason.

GLENN: Well, let's see if we can get that fixed, and maybe let me just talk here for five, six minutes on something else. Then we'll take a break and come back and see if we can get him.

There's something else that I really want to talk about. And that is this flag-burning thing. Now, it's not an amendment.

This is something that the president is putting up in an executive order and has very little teeth to it.

But I -- I -- look, I understand. As a guy putting an enormous flagpole up at my house today.

I mean, an enormous flagpole.

I love the flag. I love it!

And there are a few things that make me more angry than see somebody you set our flag on fire.

For a lot of people, that's a punch in the gut, especially our military people. And it has been planted on distant battlefields. It's raced after victory. Saluted in the morning, or should be in our schools and folded and given to the hands of grieving families. It feels like spitting on every sacrifice, that ever made this nation possible. And the argument against flag burning is really simple: It dishonors the idea of all of that. Okay?

And it defends millions of people, including me. It disrespects, I think the veterans that bled. The families who mourned. The dream that binds us together.

However, here's the hard truth: Symbols only mean something, in a land where freedom is alive.

If you outlaw the burning of a flag, the you have placed the cloth above the Constitution that it represents. You have made the flag an idol.

We don't worship idols. If you can only praise the flag and never protest it, it just stops being a symbol of freedom. And starts being an idol of obedience.

Now, that's the argument for allowing it. At least to me.

Because the real strength of a free nation is -- is to -- it's -- it's how we protect, not the speech we love, but how we endure the speech we hate!

And the Supreme Court has already ruled on this. And, you know, they -- the line they drew wasn't an easy one. Freedom of speech, stops where it directly -- directly insights violence. And that's it same thing, kind of, in this executive order.

You can burn the flag. But if I'm not mistaken, but if it incites violence, then you're in trouble.

And that's true. But the bar of inciting violence is so incredibly high. And it's -- it doesn't have anything to do with speech that offends. It's not speech that stirs anger. Not speech that wants you to punch the speaker in the mouth. It's speech only, that provokes imminent and specific violence.

And unless it's that be with the government doesn't have any right to -- to get into the business of silencing speech. Ever. Ever. Ever.

It is a hard line. And that standard is really hard. It's painfully hard.

Because what our citizenship requires, this is civics. What our citizenships require, is that we defend -- oh, I hate this.

We defend the right of your opponent to mock everything that we hold sacred.

Now, I want you to think of this. You can burn a Bible. You can burn the Word of God. But some want to make it illegal to burn a flag. Where are our priorities? You can burn the Constitution. The words that actually are the ones that stir us into action. But you can't burn a flag.

You can't burn a Koran. Can't burn them. Can't. Can't.

You will -- you will quickly come to a quick end, not legally. But you will come to a quick end. I don't ever want to be like that. Ever!

You burn a Bible. I think you're a monster. What is wrong with you? What is wrong with you?

But you have a right to do it. Why are we drawing a line around the flag? It -- the reason is -- is because we feel things so passionately. And that is really a good thing, to feel love of country so passionately. But then we have to temper that. My father used to tell me, that I think this country needs to hear over and over again, every day. My father -- we would talk to somebody. And we would walk away. And he would go, I so disagree with everything that man just said. But, Glenn, son, he would say. I will fight to the death for his right to say it. He used to say that to me all the time. Which now lees me to believe, I know where I've got my strong opinions from. Because dad apparently would disagree with a lot of people all the time.

But that was the essence of freedom. That is the essence of what sets us apart. Standing for universal, eternal rights like free speech. It's not easy. It means you have to take the size of those people that offend you. It means -- it doesn't mean you have to disagree with it. You can fight against it. You can argue back and forth.

But you -- can you tolerate the insults to the things that you love most. That is so hard, and that is why most of the world does not have freedom of speech. It's too hard! But our Founders believed people are better than that. Our citizens can rule themselves!

And the only way you can rule yourself is if you don't have limits on freedom of speech. So the question is, do we want to remain free? Or do we want to just feel good? It really is that simple. It's why no one else has freedom of speech. It's too hard! I think we're up to the task. Okay. Give me 60 seconds. And then we will try again.

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All right. Let me -- let me bring Darren in. Darren, are you there now?

DARREN: Yes!
GLENN: Oh, God. Thank goodness.
Thank you for putting up with us. I don't know what happened with the phone system. But, first of all, tell me what the US Institute of Peace is. I've never even heard of it.

DARREN: That is a fantastic question. And I'll try to give the abbreviated answer, because I know we don't have several hours.

GLENN: Good. I know.

DARREN: But US Institute of Peace is one of lesser known, but quite important member of the NGO archipelago, that was created in the '80s. It belongs to the same cohorts as national endowments for democracy.

GLENN: Oh.

DARREN: And some other -- some other better known NGOs that really in the broad context of things. In kind of the sweep of things, was created as a kind of reorganization of the government structure in the aftermath of the church type committee hearings that expose a lot of the dirty dealings of government agencies such as the CIA, and so sort of a broader response to that government lie was to create this NGO layer of governance, with an armed distant plausible deniability, a kind of chameleon character of not exactly being government, not exactly being private, in order to fulfill some of those more sensitive functions that had been exposed in the course of the church hearings.

And so US Institute of Peace is one of those NGOs that had particular focus on conflict regions. But, of course, as I think you -- you suggested earlier, peace requires at the very least, an asterisk. Because there involves a lot of things, that conventional, most American citizens would not think should belong as part of the portfolio of something calling itself an institute of peace.

GLENN: So what was the thing with the -- with this Taliban member that was getting money from us?

DARREN: Right. So this is an interesting case. So there's a whole saga of a takeover of the US institute of peace under -- under DOGE.

And that's really a fascinating story unto itself. Just to give you a sense of what these characters were like. They barricaded themselves in the offices.

They sabotaged the physical infrastructure of the building. There were reports of there being loaded guns within the offices.

GLENN: Wow!

DARREN: There was one, like, hostage situation where they held a security guard under basically kind of a false imprisonment type situation. It was extremely intense.

Far more so than the better known story of USAID. And in the course of all of that, they tried to delete a terabyte of data, of accounting information that would indicate what kind of stuff they were up to.

What kind of people they were paying. And in the course of that, DOGE found that one of the people on their payroll. Was this curious figure, who had a prominent role in the Taliban government. And then seemed to kind of play a bunch of angles across each other.

Sort of one of these sixer types in the middle of Afghanistan.

The question is, what the heck is an organization like this, having an individual, who is a former Taliban member on their payroll.

It underscores how incredibly bizarre the whole arrangement is. And to just reinforce that. I think even more bizarre than having this former Taliban guy on the payroll is the kind of schizophrenic posture exhibited by the chief -- one truly bizarre thing is that one of the US Institute of Peace's main kind of policy agendas was basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade had dissipated under Taliban leadership. They had multiple reports coming out, basically saying, this is horrible, that the opium trade is diminished under the Taliban. Meaning, finding some way to restore it. How bizarre is that!

GLENN: What was their thinking?

DARREN: Well, it's -- it's very strange, and it depends on what kind of rabbit holes you want to go down. But the whole story of opium and Afghanistan and its connection to, you know, government entities, is a -- is a very intricate and delicate and fascinating one. But it seems very clear that the US Institute of Peace was involved in that story to some degree because their public reports. They had a full-the time guy of basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade dissipated under the Taliban. And, meanwhile, they're funding this former Taliban guy.

GLENN: Unbelievable. Now, ProPublica got this. And you have released the statement on it. And ProPublica just completely white-washed this -- said this guy was a victim, and his family was taken hostage. Was his family ever taken hostage because he was exposed?

And correct the ProPublica story, would you?

DARREN: Yeah, I mean, the ProPublica thing, as usual and as expected was a total joke.

GLENN: Yes.

DARREN: I mean, this guy, I'm not an expert on this particular person's history. But what's very clear is he was a former Taliban guy, and he was probably one of these people, who was playing all sides, made a lot of enemies. I know that there were several kind of attempts on his life by the Taliban, in the course of various -- various decades.

This has nothing to do with -- with DOGE.

I mean, he's a known quantity in the region.

And somebody who has made a lot of enemies.

And he was not -- he was on the payroll of the US institute of peace.

And nobody is expecting something like that. So then, and, again, there's this sort of hostile takeover situation.

Where the people are barricading he themselves in. Trying to delete all this data.

And sure enough, what's in the data, is stuff like this.

These random former Taliban guy, making his contract with $130,000.

GLENN: You know, this is the -- this is the real Deep State stuff, that I think bothers people so much.

Look, we expect our CIA to do stuff, we don't necessarily want to do it. We expect it.

When it's in the State Department.

When every department is pushing out money to NGOs to overthrow governments and everything else.

It's out of control!

It's just completely out of control.

And who is overseeing all of that.

DARREN: That's a great question.

I think part of the NGO -- UCEF was almost a cutout of a cutout.

A fourth of its money came from USAID.

In many ways, it was a cutout of USAID. Which itself was a cutout.

So there are many layers of distance. Plausible deniability.

And UCEF, I think institutionally really perfected this chameleon structure of being able to plausibly present itself as government. When that was convenient for what they were doing.

And also to present itself as a private organization, when that was convenient.

It's a very intricate setup that they had, that was truly optimized for this chameleon character of plausible denial operations. In conflict zones. Doing God knows what, with American taxpayer money.

And it's just an absolute hornet's nest.

We have recovered that terabyte that they tried to delete. And once we get things settled in the building itself, I intend to do a kind of transparency effort, whereby we release all of this material to the public.

GLENN: Good. Good.

DARREN: Just like I'm doing at the State Department. I'm currently acting as secretary at the State Department. And doing a transparency effort here. After I eliminated the global engagement center, which was sort of the internal censorship office within the State Department, decided, we've got to -- we've got to air this out to the public.

So within the next couple of weeks.

We'll have our next tranche of helps you of thousands of emails, documenting what this were doing.

GLENN: I would love you to go back on, through those emails.

I think you guys in the State Department are doing an amazing job. Thanks for being on.