Is Ukraine too corrupt to join NATO? Escalation management still holds sway.
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Jon Sweet is an accomplished intelligence professional who served for 30 years within the Defence and Intelligence sector as an U.S. Army Military Intelligence Officer. He is now a freelance author, contributor and columnist for The Hill, The Messenger, Washington Examiner, Kyiv Post and FOX News. He provides an experienced military perspective on current world events.
Mark Toth is a retired economist, historian and entrepreneur and has lived in US diplomatic and military communities around the world. Mark writes on issues of National Security and Foreign Policy and is a regular contributor to The Hill, BBC, Washington Examiner, Fox News, Kyiv Post and The Messenger.
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LINKS:
https://x.com/MCTothSTL
https://x.com/JESweet2022
https://nationalsecuritynews.com/author/mark-toth/
https://nationalsecuritynews.com/author/jon-sweet/
https://muckrack.com/mark-toth-1
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ARTICLES:
https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4679167-ukraines-fate-is-in-bidens-hands-will-he-once-again-make-the-wrong-choice/
https://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/33025
https://tvpworld.com/76770888/nato-needs-to-take-on-a-more-global-role-security-expert-for-tvp-world
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13172981/sweden-nato-membership-blow-putin-toth-sweet.html
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/2578283/putins-nuclear-messaging-to-the-west/
https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4346078-ukraines-window-of-opportunity-is-closing/
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12742647/How-Hamas-aiding-Putin-Xis-ideological-war-against-West-UK-Israel-Ukraine-global-conflict-Russia-China-achieve-economic-military-domination.html
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SUPPORT THE CHANNEL:
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https://www.patreon.com/siliconcurtain
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TRUSTED CHARITIES ON THE GROUND:
Save Ukraine
https://www.saveukraineua.org/
Superhumans – Hospital for war traumas
https://superhumans.com/en/
UNBROKEN – Treatment. Prosthesis. Rehabilitation for Ukrainians in Ukraine
https://unbroken.org.ua/
Come Back Alive
https://savelife.in.ua/en/
Chefs For Ukraine – World Central Kitchen
https://wck.org/relief/activation-chefs-for-ukraine
UNITED24 – An initiative of President Zelenskyy
https://u24.gov.ua/
Serhiy Prytula Charity Foundation
https://prytulafoundation.org
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Thank you, Jonathan. Very interesting, highly informative.
Together you've got a Sweet Toth
Happy 75th Birthday to NATO from war criminal Putin today: laughing in the US and the EU's face as it goes on destroying children's hospitals in Europe and killing children with cancer in Kyiv. Too many NATO members, the US and the EU remain too weak, too cowardly and too deterred to defeat fascist imperialism in Europe. Putin knows it and proves it every day. "Strongest defence alliance in the world" my arse. They leave Ukraine to do all the fighting alone. The only democracy in the world fighting against fascist imperialism. NATO is all words and no action. So far, we have not shown to be the strongest defence alliance in the world at all. NATO has only shown to be a slow, deterred and uncoordinated military supplier, without a proper strategy or ability to lead ahead of the enemy. NATO today is just weak, deterred and pathetic. Xi and Putin know it, so they will continue to escalate while NATO members sit on the side-lines watching like cowardly ducks.
Western countries are all very corrupted.
I remember as a teen watching the iron curtain fall and thinking the world was going to be free and peaceful, and now here we are
My husband and I were fortunate enough to be able to pay off our mortgage early. We were both still working, and took the payment amount that we had been using to pay off our mortgage faster and we put it straight into investments. We were able to retire early because of almost 7 years of putting away what would have been our mortgage payment as well as maxing out our 401K/403B plans. Thankfully we were taught by both of our parents the value of living within our means. Thank you for your advice. I know it will help people. we are interested in investments that could set me up for retirement , I mean I've heard of people that netted hundreds of thousands during these crash, I listened to someone on a podcastwho earned over $650K in less than a year, what's the strategy behind such returns?
BRILLIANT ANALYSIS! / / ∆ 🇬🇧⚔️🏹⛓️🏥⛑️🚒🏰⚒️🔐🎯⚖️
Great analytical analysis ! Mark and John has cleared up my foggy brain about the current situations in Ukraine. The beauty of this analytical discussion is that an ordinary man without higher education degree could understand and assimilate. So simple, clear and succint! Your analytical explanations have allowed me to see further deep into the situation!
Jonathan you have done a great job! Keep presenting episodes like this!
Thank you Jonathan! Thank you Mark and John! You help us a lot in time of turbulance especially in a moment when Russian propaganda machine is quite active.
Slava Ukraine!
Maybe Biden sees trump making votes from being negative to Ukraine and wanted the same?
Good conversation to have… But after 42 min in, you do realize these guys are either delusional or so in the gaslighting that they even believe some of their own lies?
Kadyrov and Prigozhin (Wagner) are disgusting associates, but Putin is obviously highly disciplined and politely rational (almost like an AI or mildly autistic!)
Why do we have these "old men kids" as 'prolific' professional talkers/writers, when they can't even represent different viewpoints accurately? What an anticlimax to a potentially deeply thoughtful analysis of how to put Ukrainians' interests first, instead of the US/UK/Russian security services using their lives as a manipulative weapon. As Jon said, Ukrainian have agency, they're not to be used as a pawn for our (fools') narratives💔🇺🇦💔
I think if they publicly state an outcome it means they’re more tied to provision of goods!
Up!
I’m worried about UK recent election. It’s not just Labours initial attack on Israel by saying we will not let them have any weapons. We’ve had a number of new MPs coming out of a coalition of independent members based almost entirely on protecting Gaza by denying the acceptance of Israel. This is a potentially very difficult shift in UK. Driven of course by Arab nation immigrants receiving Al Jazeera propaganda all day. The same phrases are used by American students. I know this is not Ukraine but we can see both conflicts as desirable by BRICS. Starmer looks very good with his promises of weapons and support to Ukraine. Made Rishi Sunak look mean!
Sorry. Went off topic
Of course the Biden Administration says Ukraine is corrupt. 😂
Think Butisma Energy & Hunter Biden.
Long live the West! SLAVA UKRAINE! From Italy ❤❤
Problem is that Sullivan is a Lawyer and thinks like Lawyer in an environment of srrategic geo-politics!!
❤❤❤❤❤ 🇺🇦 🇺🇦 🇺🇦 ❤❤❤❤
More corruption in USA than ever in Ukraine. Just a sad Yankee excuse to sit on the sidelines…
Great discussion Jonathan, as usual. If only the US could get their crap together, deal with their own corruption and stop with the constraints on Ukraine. Slava Ukraini!
👍👍👍
How can he say they're in the same position they were 18 months ago when their entire power grid has been eliminated! It's just is too compartmentalized to be realistic
It's costing them a lot of civilians! Do you think it's just a few? I can't believe how little they take into account how is civilian deaths and all the deaths are affecting the psychology of the ukrainians in as much as how much they want to fight
Biden's faction kicking and screaming helps Russia. They could have quietly done all this without his egotistical insistence
It's apaulling how Ukrainians are being treated. It's like they are not human beings. This is war, where Russia has the right to do anything while Ukraine is restricted. This war no a play ground. Who is more corrupt than the Kremlin and republicans in the us. Russia just bomb children's hospital appalling. People of the world wake up and defend each other. It's Ukraine today it'll be another country tomorrow. Russia fear no one why is the whole world frightened of putin.
It hasnt been clear what US objectivescwere or are in any military endeavor since WW2 EXCEPT FOR gulf War 1.
Which is why the West is where it is today and the US military has again devolved into a less capable over bureaucratized mess that hardly anyone wants to join.
I doubt Ukraine's government is any more or less corrupt than any average government, including my own. They've also been making clear strides to clean up corruption. If the US was sending UA piles of cash, then maybe there would be a very thin argument there, but we're not. In my opinion, the topic of corruption is completely irrelevant to sending aid to Ukraine.
A copy of this episode should be sent to Biden!
Great guests who see the full picture.
Thoroughly enjoyed it 👌
Thanks Jonathan 😊
Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦
“What are the Western leaders protecting by not clarifying their foreign policy re Ukraine and/or Israel wars?”. Answer: their own incompetence,lack of vision, and most importantly their own inadequacy as political leaders, effectively betraying trust of those who elected them to do just that.
America describing Ukraine as corrupt is like the pot calling the kettle black. Where did the Afghan warlords get the money from for their luxurious mansions? The US taxpayer sent billions to buy their influence.
The Ukrainians mean nothing, zero, zip, Nadal to the west, they are merely being sacrificed by the west, to be used as a battering ram on Russia and Putin.
Now the west is upset that they have invested so much money and military hardware into Ukraine in their proxy war on Russia, and now Russia's military might is stronger than ever.
The Ukraine will never be a Nato nation, and just as well, as Putin has stated that's a red line for Russia, as they want to protect their boarders, and not have Nato on Russia's boarders bullying Russia.
Spineless, hypocritical USA
As if their behaviour is lily white & without any wrongdoing in their own country.
Pathetic, there must be an unknown agenda
Agency. It sounds like that means Ukrainian sovereignty, self direction vs being a vassal or tool of others, especially for Russia.
Part of sovereignty is generating your own arms, which Ukraine is doing. If the west supplies arms, there are always strings attached. It’s been the sea drones which were most effective, with short range FPV drones coming second. And long range drones striking oil refineries. If they double and triple production while diligently innovating, that’s a show of sovereignty. The west can help with that. They say teach a man to fish.
I keep coming back to the idea of communications skills. We depend on leaders being competent at this but it’s hard to see or measure so we often say I know it when I see it. Joe Biden, we say, had a disastrous presidential debate because he sucked at communicating. What I saw was the first presidential debate that got everyone talking about Biden, not Trump, poised Biden as the underdog, paraded Trump’s nonstop vomit of lies, and contrasted a range of candidates that could replace Biden vs the FORTY close associates, including the VP who publicly declare they oppose Trump. All that aside, where does the average Ukrainian score on communication skills? None of them are currently campaigning to be president of a powerful country so maybe it doesn’t matter so much about how the average Ukrainian communicates. And right now since they have a lot of actual fighting to do, it would make sense to save charm school for after the war. Right? Maybe.
Skill at communicating gives us situational and political awareness. Street sense. It helps us form bonds with family and coworkers and fellow students. It can give us more resilience in hard times, to reduce PTSD. People are more willing to do difficult things and things like conscription are not as necessary.