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“There will be a hot war between the US and Russia next year”
Tucker Carlson. Image: YouTube screenshot.
Aug. 30th, 2023.
A reader sent me this video of a new Tucker Carlson interview.
Tucker says: “There will be a hot war between the US and Russia in the next year.”
He’ll even bet his house on it, he says.
Our good reader asked me to comment. I’d be happy to. Thank you for asking.
The relevant part starts around 38 min. and lasts a couple of minutes.
Tucker says, “lying is always unsustainable. You’re always found out in the end.”
Fair enough. We shall see if we find some lies.
Side note: It’s important to remember that Tucker can trust that his viewers don’t know anything about the war. He can say whatever he wants. Facts don’t matter, because he’s spinning a narrative.
I want to make three points:
1. “The US wants a hot war with Russia”
“There will be a hot war between the US and Russia… Of course. They want it anyway.”
No, Tucker… They don’t want a hot war with Russia.
a) The US and Western media spent 4 months leading up to the war warning that Russia will invade. To expose Russia’s attack on Ukraine before it happened, in order to discourage it.
If the US wanted an excuse to go to war, surely they would have kept the secret… not try to discourage the invasion. Were they trying to sabotage their own pretext for war?
b) Even after Russia invaded, the US didn’t send any significant aid to Ukraine for months. They waited a long time. The US thought Ukraine would fold in short time, so they didn’t send weapons at first. They were hardly eager to get involved.
c) Right before the invasion, Biden basically gave Russia a war guarantee. “If you invade, we won’t step in”, was the message. Biden made clear the US would not send troops even to rescue American citizens.
The US does not want a hot war with Russia. More likely, the US will just stop sending military aid to Ukraine at some point… and that will be the end of their involvement. (Of course, that’s just speculation.)
2. This one takes a bit of chutzpah
Tucker says that the US will fake an incident to get a pretext for war.
“I think we could ‘Tonkin Gulf’ our way into it. All of a sudden missiles land in Poland – the Russians did it – our NATO ally has been attacked, we’re going to war! I can see that happen very easily.”
Really? Have you forgotten this happened already, about a year ago?
(Tucker can trust the rubes watching him have forgotten all about it, so he can keep pushing his narrative.)
Have you forgotten that the immediate response from the Biden gov was to downplay the event, while the media was hyping it?
If the US wanted a pretext for war, they had it. But they didn’t take it. They actively pushed it away.
Because the US does not want war with Russia.
3. “The US can ‘force a peace’ whenever it wants”
“The US can force a peace in Ukraine tonight”, Tucker says.
I know Tucker has this navel-gazing view where the US is the center of the universe, “the greatest country in the world” for whatever reason, and at the same time the Great Satan that’s bullying poor, innocent Russia.
(It doesn’t make sense and it doesn’t have to. It’s just TV, after all.)
I’m sorry to hurt your pride in Murrica, World Police, Tucker – but the US isn’t Superman. The US can’t just snap its fingers and make other countries dance. Especially not Russia.
Russia started the war. Russia is continuing the war. And Russia decides when the war is over. The US will not force any peace on Russia.
Right now, no peace is likely, because the parties are too far from each other.
Ukraine wants to take back Crimea and Russia wants to take Kiev (and all of Ukraine). Those are incompatible goals – nowhere near a starting point for negotiations. Allowing Russia to occupy all of Ukraine is not just unacceptable for Ukraine, but for all of Europe, for obvious reasons. That is not a realistic option.
Putin clearly and repeatedly says that he does not consider Ukraine a legitimate state.
As former Russian President Medvedev (currently Deputy Chair of the Russian Security Council) has made clear, Russia considers all of Ukraine disputed territory.
As Alexander Dugin has explained, Russia wants to get rid of Ukraine completely through this war. They’re not looking to settle any time soon.
Former Russian President Medvedev, current Deputy Chair of the Russian Security Council, posting on his official state Twitter account. Screenshot.
LAW AND ORDER – LAW AND ORDER
Tucker’s “force peace now” rant is as stupid as Trump’s tweets about LAW AND ORDER.
Yes, you can say it, but it’s an empty statement. For there to be peace, there would have to be terms. (Not in Tucker’s Q-anon world, but in reality.)
And what are the terms, Tucker? Nothing? America should just magically end the war? Sounds like a good solution.
They say truth is the first casualty of war. Obviously so. The commentary has been laughable from day 1.
It’s irresponsible to keep hyping nuclear war, but, of course, drama sells.
Tucker has turned into a slightly more mainstream version of Alex Jones. Or maybe that’s what he always was.
Fróði
P.S.
This was originally published as a blog post for members.
7 comments
The same fear-mongering was used against Trump: (www.nbcnews.com/news/military/milley-acted-prevent-trump-misusing-nuclear-weapons-war-china-book-n1279187).
Trump’s team and Tucker surely remember it and they perhaps try to settle the score.
Both are completely unreal.
On the question of peace, America should simply tell Kiev:
“-Forget about NATO or any other military alliance with us, we don’t want it.
-We advise you to abandon the ‘Zelensky Peace Plan’ and invite the Russians for serious negotiations on the basis of you accepting the loss of the territories that Russia has annexed and also accepting caps and size limits on your armed forces going into the future.
And if Russia asks for two or three more regions, like Kharkov or Odessa, we would advice you to give those up also.
-If you don’t make those compromises we will restrict our support to humanitarian-only and you can go on fighting the war by yourselves for whatever better outcome you hope to achieve.
-If you make those compromises but Russia rejects them asking for even more then we will, of course, keep up the military support until the Russians come to their senses and accept your peace terms. ”
Everything the Russians have said indicates that they would be happy with such an arrangement and as for the Ukrainians I don’t see how they could refuse it.
The slaughter ends and a stable peace takes hold, it’s really very simple.
(Of course it would have been infinitely better if Ukraine had agreed to conclude the peace negotiations that commenced at the same time as the invasion and culminated in the Istanbul peace summit, instead of abandoning them in April 2022 and resolving to fight a war for the recapture of every inch of its territory including Crimea.
An immeasurable amount of death and suffering would have been avoided and Ukraine would be in possession of all its territory minus Crimea and Donbas.
For that matter, it would have been even better if Ukraine had agreed to implement the Minsk agreement at any time between 2015 and 2022. No war would have taken place and Ukraine would now be in possession of its entire territory minus Crimea.
Or, heaven forbid, Ukraine might never had resolved to enter NATO or it could abandon this plan at any time between 2008 and 2014. Ukraine today would still be in possession of Crimea.
Unfortunately those alternative paths were not followed by the Kiev regime because although they very much suited Ukraine, they didn’t suit the United States.)
The problem is, there is no indication Russia just wants Crimea and the areas they are currently occupying (if that is all they want, the ’22 invasion makes no sense at all). They want all of Ukraine. This blood is all on Russia’s hands and no one else’s.
Still, I can’t discern what your political stance is on the war.
Is it the same as mine, the one about withholding support for Kiev and forcing it to make compromises (for whatever chance there is that Russia will settle – besides, even if your assessment of its original intentions is true, military realities on the ground may have changed its mood by now – and if it doesn’t, nothing is lost, at least the whole world including the RF citizens will know who is the one condemning thousands of people to death) ?
Or you are in agreement with the current western policy of keep pumping an uncompromising Ukraine with weapons and organizing offensives until Russia abandons every inch of Ukrainian territory, pay compensations, deliver Putin to the international criminal court and fulfill all the other conditions of the ‘Zelensky Peace Plan’ ?
As for responsibility for the war, it’s on America and Ukraine. Every RF move has been in restrained self defense with ample warnings given and with off-ramps provided, going back to the beginning of the conflict in 2014 and further back to the 2008 NATO summit.
Russia acted in self-defense as much as the US acted in self-defense when attacking Iraq. Ukraine posed absolutely no threat to Russia. Was obviously in no position to attack Russia.
“at least the whole world including the RF citizens will know who is the one condemning thousands of people to death” – the whole world knows that already. Do you think the Fox Mulder Putinist true believers will look at the facts then if they haven’t so far?
Russia invaded Ukraine (first 9 years ago and again last year) which has caused 500,000 casualties, mostly Russian. It’s clear cut.
I have said repeatedly that I hope for negotiations as soon as possible, but unfortunately I don’t think it’s likely until something more decisive happens. I’m afraid this war will drag on. I have also said that I expect the US and the West to abandon ship sooner or later, so a drawn-out war is probably not a good thing for Ukrainian interests (for more reasons than the immediate damage).
I know that you want to see the war end.
By ‘political stance’ I meant a policy proposal in the sense of “What do you want/ask/demand from the western governments to do? (and/or for that matter, what do you ask from the Kremlin to do? ”
*Do you think the Fox Mulder Putinist true believers will look at the facts then if they haven’t so far?
No they won’t. Their support for Russia is fundamentally irrational and driven by resentment and hostility towards the American Empire, equally disengaged from the facts and prone to bad faith, deceptive argumentation as the other side’s.
The DR has completely failed to acquire any analytical understanding of the war, let alone politically exploit it; it never looked so incompetent and hopeless as a movement. (I am talking about the pro-Russia DR, the pro-Ukraine is in a state of epistemic and political vertigo).
What do I want Western governments to do? – This is wishful thinking since both Russia and the US are acting in bad faith. But I would like to see the Western govs pressure Russia into some sort of peace negotiations. I certainly would not like to see them tolerate Russian aggression against Ukraine (and by extension, Europe).
We agree then about the Western “Right’s” reaction to the war.
The pro-Ukrainian side has mostly failed by not presenting a serious case (I simply have been too busy with other things to write something coherent, but I am working on it). Not that I am “pro-Ukrainian” as much as I am completely opposed to Russian aggression against Europe. Most of all, I object to the collapse of the Right in response to the war (it looks like “meme-magic” doesn’t cut it when it comes to understanding actual conflicts).
The pro-Russian side mostly looks insane and embarrassing, like flat-earthers, driven entirely by spite against their own (US and UK) governments and no knowledge at all about the actual conflict (which has been my complaint about them from the start). The bizarre Russia-simping meant essentially the sudden collapse of credibility for the Anglo-Right in the last 1.5 yrs. It’s really a sorry sight.
This is what the framework of an actual peace plan would look like:
berliner-zeitung.de/politik-gesellschaft/ending-the-war-by-a-negotiated-peace-li.41790
The West should put forward something similar and ‘convince’ Kiev to accept it.
*We agree (…) war.
But it would be wrong and counterproductive to direct criticism at individuals.
The problem is the structural character of the DR being a random patchwork of micro-communities.
*I simply (…)working on it.
It’s trying to square the circle. Nobody can present a coherent pro-Ukraine case because there isn’t one.