JD Vance: 'You Have To Try To Understand Where The Other Side Is Coming To End Russia-Ukraine War

Forbes Breaking News

In remarks at a Munich Security Conference event in Washington, D.C., Vice President JD Vance discussed the Russia-Ukraine War.

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00:00be here great thank you so much uh and i think the message has arrived in europe that we need to

00:07carry a significantly larger share sure of the burden as you know we are all trying to spend

00:13more some are spending really a lot more others are lagging behind a little bit but we're moving

00:19in the right direction i think um let me let me turn to a really concrete urgent issue ukraine

00:27the trump administration from what we have seen in the media etc seems to agree with most of us in

00:39europe that unfortunately russia does not seem to be really willing to end this military confrontation

00:49if that's the assessment if that if that's our collective assessment could you talk a little

00:55bit about u.s strategy going forward we we all want this war to end and and let me say as a very

01:02personal comment i think the trump administration did the right thing by starting this process of

01:09talking to the ukrainians talking to the russians but the russians seem not to be interested in the

01:16kind of quote unquote deal that could be offered to them so talk to us a little bit about how you see

01:23the next steps yeah so so let me say a couple of things about this first of all i appreciate your

01:29kind words about the administration obviously i think it was the right thing to do for us to start

01:33the process of negotiation i think for too long the the russians the ukrainians have been fighting

01:39obviously there's been a lot of people dying on both sides have been a lot of innocent loss of life

01:43and our view is it's absurd that you've had this war go on for so long and the two sides aren't even

01:49talking constructively about what would be necessary for them to end the conflict and i think

01:54that um you know one of the things that the president trump has always been very good at and

01:59he's gotten a lot of criticism unfair criticism in my view from both the american and some of the

02:04european press is is what i would call a strategic realism or a strategic insight in other words you

02:11don't have to agree with the russian justification for the war and certainly both the president and i have

02:17criticized the full-scale invasion but you have to try to understand where the other side is coming

02:22from to end the conflict and i think that's what president trump has been very deliberate about

02:26is actually forcing the russians to say here is what we would like in order to end the conflict and

02:32and again you don't have to agree with it you can think that the request is too significant and

02:38certainly the first peace offer that the russians put on the table our reaction to it was

02:42you're asking for too much but this is how negotiations unfold and i wouldn't say i'm

02:48not yet that pessimistic on this i wouldn't say that the russians are uninterested in bringing this

02:54thing to a resolution what i would say is right now the russians are asking for a certain set of

02:59requirements a certain set of concessions in order to end the conflict we think they're asking for too

03:06much okay and then obviously uh the ukrainians matter a lot they're the other side they're the other

03:11party at least to the direct conflict and we have to ask what is the ukrainian what do they need in

03:17order um to bring this conflict to a successful completion and we're going to continue to have

03:22that conversation now what the president has said is that he will walk away if he thinks he's not making

03:28progress and i think that you know about once every four or five weeks you will hear some american

03:34official or sometimes multiple american officials say this is a week where we need to make another step

03:40and in particular the step that we would like to make right now is we would like both the russians

03:45and the ukrainians to actually agree on some basic guidelines for sitting down and talking to one

03:51another obviously the united states is happy to participate in those conversations but it's very

03:56important for the russians and the ukrainians to start talking to one another we think that is the next

04:02big step that we would like to take and why does that matter the reason it matters is because again i

04:08mentioned the russians but also the ukrainians have also been sort of they they've put a piece

04:12of paper in our hands that says this is what we would need in order to bring this conflict to a

04:18successful resolution from our perspective and there's a big gulf predictably between where the

04:23russians and the ukrainians are and we think the next step in negotiation is to try to close that

04:28gulf we think it's probably impossible for us to mediate this entirely without at least some direct

04:34negotiation between the two and so that's what we focus on but i'm i'm not yet a pessimist on this

04:40i mean obviously you know the russians and the ukrainians are not there yet because the fighting

04:45is still going on you know the ukrainians have have said they would agree to a ceasefire a 30-day ceasefire

04:52we appreciate that what the russians have said again you don't have to disagree with it but it's

04:56important to understand where the other side is coming from what the russians have said is a 30-day

05:01ceasefire is not in our strategic interest so we've tried to move beyond the obsession with the

05:0730-day ceasefire and more on the what would the long-term settlement look like and we've tried to

05:12consistently advance the ball one final point i'd make about this i think it's probably wouldn't

05:16surprise anybody in the room but there are a lot of people watching who are not in the room

05:21is is a frustration that we've had frankly with both sides is that they hate each other so much that if

05:29you have an hour conversation with either side the first 30 minutes are just them complaining about

05:34some historical grievance from four years ago or five years ago or 10 years ago look i understand it

05:40i understand that people don't fight wars against each other without a lot of grievance and a lot of

05:45problem but we're trying to as much as we can play a constructive role in advancing the peace

05:51conversation forward what i'll say just to echo something that president trump has said many times but

05:56i think it bears repeating is our strong view is that the continuation of this conflict is bad for

06:02us it's bad for europe it's bad for russia and it's bad for ukraine we think that if cool heads prevail

06:10here we can bring this thing to a durable peace that will be economically beneficial for both the

06:15ukrainians and the russians and most importantly will stop the end of the of the destruction of human

06:21lives i think people under appreciate this about our president here in the united states is he has a

06:27genuine humanitarian impulse about this he hates innocent people losing their lives he hates even

06:34soldiers losing their lives in unnecessary conflicts he just wants the killing to stop and that will

06:40that will continue to be america's policy but obviously as all of you have seen we'll navigate that

06:45policy and react as the parties bring their grievances to us great

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