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February 25, 2022 - 12:00pm
Following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army, pundits from mainstream and alternative media platforms across the political spectrum have been left eating humble pie.
Predictions of Russia’s next move as troops built up on the border have ranged from blaming hawkish Americans for hyping up a non-existent threat, to claims that Putin was using the standoff to make himself an international talking point.
Now that it is clear that Putin is done with talking and intends to take action, we are left wondering: who can we trust on Ukraine?
To puzzle out this question, Freddie Sayers sat down for an emergency episode with Konstantin Kisin, host of the Triggernometry podcast and YouTube channel.
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Subscribe3 decades after the fall of the Berlin wall, it’s all starting all over again. The last few years of activist hysteria have blinded Western leaders, the media and the people to the point where a peaceful demonstration in Ottawa is crushed by a political party and leader who have been brainwashed by stupid ideas and have lost all good common sense to boot. The real threats are ignored and then everyone is surprised when something like this happens. History repeats itself again and again.
Brilliant interview, thank you. Lots of what was discussed here matches what my other half and I discussed over our lunch today. Big, uncomfortable questions that we’ll be forced into answering very soon, and all boiling down to this: what is the West, today? What are our shared values? Do we still believe in them, and therefore in ourselves? And how much pain are we willing to bear to defend them, and therefore the West’s continued dominance?
You raise excellent questions!
Excellent questions. I think back to the great, and not so great, leaders of the past and wonder what they thought about the existential threats that were on the table during history. (Not that this such) At least, it seems, they had a fairly common understanding of right and wrong, a more cohesive populace and a sense of duty. I’m afraid that is severely lacking in today’s society, where so many have no clue as to history and how today’s geopolitical world was formed. We seem more interested in gender disphoria, wearing a mask at the beach and attempting to silence half of the population because we disagree with them.
what shared values, indeed what values do the West have anymore, except to cancel everything and propagandize the rest
Deep thanks for Konstantin for being brutally and uncompromisingly honest. It’s time we all took a long look at ourselves in the mirror.
One thing I know is no man in the world can catch a chicken with his hands once it is loose. You can sometime get within inches by acting all casual – but make your grab and it is just air you catch….
Freddy and Konstantin reminded me of this. A couple times I thought Freddy had him and Konstantin was actually going to tell us what is/may be, going on – but then, no, just air…. (he did say a few things – like the Refugees, but mostly I was as mystified at the end as at the beginning.)
My position has been, Oh, Well….nothing we can do which will not just make it worse, this is out of our sphere of control.
So if one accepts nothing to do about it – then the question is what will this mean for the world. I see it as causing a very likely global economic ‘tipping point.
The long lines of dominoes laid out since the GFC (great financial collapse) of 2008, of great Mal-Fiscal practices, then two years of Insane covid Madness and Debt created, like only ever seen before in a World War, makes for just one nudge, and the entire set goes cascading down to a Great Depression……The current economic state of the world is weirder than it has been in history, and this Ukraine situation could be it…
That is what I would like to hear of more. What is being done, what are the issues, is there any way out of impending economic disaster? I think Freddy needs to interview the mad investor Peter Schiff, and put some real fear in the Unherd followers. ‘The end is Neigh’ stuff; it is time to hear it.
I think we are victims of history here. When we read of history, it is with the luxury of the rear view mirror. When living in the moment, it is clear that no one really knows what will happen, nor did anyone in the past. The “experts” will bloviate about what happened well after it happens.
“History” is the discipline that supplies critical thought with the substance to shape current and future decision making. It’s probably the most important discipline required to enable human society and its institutions to develop “conscience” or a dependable moral compass in the persuit of progress.
Excellent discussion!
Really good, thanks.
I just would have liked some discussion of how deeply the West is divided against itself and weak for that reason as well as on account of spineless leaders (as Putin sems to be only too aware).
I believe that the US is–literally–on the brink of Civil War, a shooting war as opposed to the cultural war that has been going on for decades, with a somewhat rational majority losing ground to an increasingly vocal minority of nutters, i.e. BLM.
I think this is a perfect time for China to move on Taiwan and/or HK.
Stay tuned.
I like Kisin on his own podcast, but I think this was rather weak and unoriginal. It doesn’t stray away very far from the mainstream Marvel fantasy world of good vs evil, ‘our’ values and ‘their’ values, ‘them’ hating ‘our’ freedom because ‘they’ have an ideology.
I’m very happy for pundits and media to finally have their spectacle after weeks, months and years of begging and screaming for it. But is it simply because Putin is a psychopath, or because China and Russia want to do stuff like this for the best interests of their people? Or is it because transnational corporations and oligarchs (ie concentrated wealth) have something to gain? Would Russia have invaded if the EU and US/NATO had backed off with their meddling in Ukraine? What about Ukrainian extremists, like those of the Azov battalion? Etc, etc.
When (mostly) glossing over or ignoring these questions, you end up with a rather childish view of affairs that secondary schoolers get from their simplistic history books of great men and ideologies. We live in a post-ideological world and Kisin’s thinking (‘I want the west to dominate, because western values are the best’ (for successful people like him that have a great life in consumer culture)) simply isn’t constructive, or above average, frankly. In my opinion.
I hope future guests will have more insightful insights.
“We live in a post-ideological world and Kisin’s thinking (‘I want the west to dominate, because western values are the best)’”
The world is heading to disaster exactly because people who believe like you, that the world is post-ideological.
It is not fully that yet. The Truckers Convoy shows us that. The current one is doubling every day with thousands waving flags on every overpass it crosses, cheering freedom on.
I have seen a good bit of the world – and almost all of it but the West is horrible by my standards, Totalitarian or corrupt. Western Values ARE The Best. They are the most precious thing we have, and are not lost yet, but are under very heavy internal attack from the hard Left, and the Liberal Postmodernists.
“Western values are the best… but are under heavy attack from the hard Left and Liberal Postmodernists”
The values of the woke & militant are a logical extension of western values, especially of liberalism. This is true even though they are extended to the point of absurdity and self-contradiction! Enlightened secular political philosophy has no self-limiting principle, as shown by the extremism of the Jacobins. The answer, of course, is not to lapse into this or that rival ideology but to dispel our fascination with ideology per se. This requires our reconsideration of modernity, which divides humanity from nature, mind from body, and feeling from reason.
I agree, I was also wondering what Kisin meant by “our values are the best” “Putin and Xi want what we have in the west “
Er…..no ……
I don’t think either of them give a toss about our values or the power in the west, they probably despise our values. They just don’t want them creeping into their own domain. And I don’t see either them or us as evil or good. They are different. Yes – they believe in one strong leader who will shape the destiny of their countries, we here are shaping ( or sometimes misshaping) ours through our beliefs of democracy and freedom. Putin simply saw an opportunity, was brewing a reason, gave it as a reason, felt the weakness of the west ( due to idiotic covid policies and safetyism gone mad and a weakened economy) and thought like a general.
He has now burdened Americans and the west with whether they are ACTUALLY going to sacrifice their people or are they going to keep them ultra safe away from the Ukrainian/ Russian border? He is calling the west out in a game of chicken and he knows that the western leaders are/were NOT ready for any real self sacrifice yet.
The last time Russia was at war was in Afghanistan – a distant memory. The West has just pulled out with a humiliating defeat in Afghanistan. They are not ready to engage in another war. Putin kind of … knows that.
Very disappointed in the caliber of this interview. Freddie did his best to politely correct some of the points made by the guest, but it was a below par conversation compared to the usual topnotch Freddie talks. I’m glad to hear there will be additional interviews over the next week on this topic- someone other than this very confident but not very erudite commentator.
Freddie usually does a good job, but I’m always intrigued when commentators go against the herd and raise valid criticisms.
I will re-watch with an eye toward the points you make.
Wow. What a disturbingly penetrative conversation spoken with passion. No real answers and I can see why not as the whole situation is in flux but the basic point that we, the West, has been forced to consider just what do we do, is spot on. The English-speaking West’s decadent obsession with insane causes, best considered as an example of the collapse of society (wokeness etc) has shown us to be uncomprehending. The ‘safe’ bubble so many institutions are nurturing is unreal and dystopian.
Will this be a wake-up call? Will the West along with its Trudeaus and Aherns and others tremble a little? Will we pull reality back to the front of stage? The times they are a changin and this conversation certainly alerts us to quite how are we going to manage.
The contentious issue was Ukraine joining NATO, and thus Russia having a hostile military force on its border.
But would European countries have endorsed Ukraine’s application to join NATO?
If the answer to that is “No” then there could have been meaningful negotiations before death and destruction was inflicted on that country by both sides – Russia invading and NATO sending lethal weapons to intensify the conflict.
I feel sure that neutrality will be the end result but that could have been achieved at the outset, if the will had been there,
I write as a pacifist but nevertheless the interview was extremely interesting and many points that were raised were new to me.
I await a follow-up in anticipation of further revelations and ideas..
I suspect that the population of Eastern Ukraine region by native Russians was an important secondary objective. I have not been able to understand NATO’s persistence in considering Ukraine membership to be non-negotiable.