00:05Finally, President Trump has put some real pressure on the Kremlin.
00:09But this was modulated pressure.
00:11Going after Luke Oyl and Ross Neft is important, but not a crushing economic blow.
00:17At the same time, he's reduced restrictions on the use of weapons with American components.
00:23That's also a modulated step, because at the same time, he was saying, no tomahawks, at
00:27least for a long while.
00:29Welcome.
00:30But this will only start.
00:31This is only the start of an effort if we want to force Putin to make peace in a reasonable
00:37way.
00:38So what would a crushing economic force look like?
00:40Would they come in the form of secondary sanctions?
00:42Well, it's a variety of things.
00:45It would be going after the Russian economic institutions, the financial institutions,
00:49which were not sanctioned in earlier sanctions efforts.
00:54It would involve going after the Russian ghost fleet of tankers for oil in a more significant
01:01way than we are right now.
01:04And of course, something that was not raised today, it would be using American prestige
01:09and American influence to push hard for getting the use of the frozen Russian state assets to Ukraine.
01:16We know that US lawmakers, including Republicans, are waiting for a go ahead on the White House to vote on a bill that would enforce certain sanctions against Russia and target other countries that are using Russian oil.
01:32Where is that at and how important could that step be if that bill passes?
01:37That bill has been ready to go in Congress for months.
01:41They've been waiting for an OK from the White House.
01:44So I think it would be wonderful if that OK was given and this bill was enacted because the sanctions in this bill are stronger, notably stronger than what happened today.
01:56But I suspect for the reason, the same reason that today's sanctions were, again, a step in the right direction, adding pressure, but not a crushing step.
02:04We're not going to see the White House OK for this in the next week or two.
02:09Over time, though, I expect there'll be more.
02:11Please.
02:11John, when when we last spoke, you tipped that this meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump would not go ahead.
02:18That has since come to fruition.
02:21So where does it leave relations with the US and Russia and the US's ability to pressure Russia to come to some sort of agreement, at least the table to discuss peace in the region?
02:34We have extraordinary ability to pressure Russia.
02:37As President Trump said, we have the world's strongest economy and the world's greatest military.
02:43If we were to use that pressure, it would make it extremely difficult for the Russian economy to to proceed to.
02:51Actually, the Russian economy is stumbling.
02:53It could be a perhaps crushing blow to the economy.
02:55I don't predict that.
02:56But a substantial blow and we can make it much harder for Putin to continue the war and have any prospect of picking up any more territory in Ukraine.
03:06That is very much an American interest to do that.
03:08President Trump has given Putin many opportunities to offer a reasonable approach towards peace.
03:14Putin has rejected every single one.
03:16This is a step in the right direction.
03:19I expect there will be more steps in the right direction because President Trump's reputation and his, I think, sincere desire to achieve a durable peace are at stake.
03:28If we don't ramp up the pressure a good bit more than we have today, Trump will not achieve that objective.
03:34We know that these sanctions have been announced just this morning, our time here.
03:39But it comes while the NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, is at the White House to discuss the very idea of peace.
03:47He was expected to live to deliver a 12 point plan.
03:51Where does that leave that?
03:54I think there was more hype about that plan than news,
04:00because every element in that plan has been discussed and advocated before by many of our European allies, by Ukraine.
04:09And, you know, they include things like, you know, more weapons to Ukraine, harsher sanctions on Russia,
04:15use of those frozen assets that I referred to.
04:18And, of course, the Trump idea, which was true, a Trump idea even before he was elected,
04:26of essentially a freeze in the fighting along the current lines of the two forces.
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