Counter-Currents
1,709 words
Do you remember when people were saying that Tucker Carlson was finished? He had been fired from FOX News, and although he appeared to enjoy a triumphant return on X, within a few months the excitement of his reappearance had worn off. Rather than creating must-see episodes, Tucker was interviewing weirdos with dirt on Barack Obama’s sex life and other nobodies. Well . . . you can’t cuck the Tuck, as they say. He has once again caught the world’s attention by scoring an interview with, depending on your perspective, the villain of the twenty-first century or the greatest champion of traditional values in a world gone mad: Vladimir Putin.
The interview was aired on February 9, in the earliest of the morning hours for those of us living in Europe. Now that several hours have passed and the dust has settled, we can take stock of what transpired. The consensus seems to be, “Is that . . . is that it?” Like the impatient judges who cast their verdicts on Tucker’s career without giving him time to adapt to his new home on alternative media, many were quick to declare the interview with Putin a total flop as well, passing their judgements well before it was possible for them to have seen the full two-hour-long conversation. In all honesty, though, the interview was underwhelming right from the start.
In response to the very first question, Putin made a petty dig at Carlson (“Are we going to have a serious conversation or not?”) and then launched into a lecture on the entire history of Russia than took up roughly an hour. Even for someone who enjoys learning about history, in particular the fascinating and influential history of Russia, it was a bit much. At one point, Tucker had to interrupt Vladimir and say, “I beg your pardon. Can you tell us what period? I’m losing track of where in history we are.” “The thirteenth century,” came Putin’s reply. Phew! Only some 700 years more to go! Now, please, Mr. Carlson, be serious and stop interrupting.
Before getting into the interview itself, Tucker gave a brief introduction to set the stage during which he said that, when the conversation had been taking place between the two, he and his team thought Putin was “filibustering” with his hour-long monologue covering over 1,000 years of Russian history. It was easy to see why Carlson would have felt annoyed. In fact, one of his few truly incisive questions was never answered. If Putin believes that Russia has a 1,200-year-old claim to the lands called Ukraine, why did he wait during 22 years of his presidency to do something about it? Why now? Putin ignored this question and carried on with the history lesson.
Almost everyone will be disappointed with the interview, especially given the hype that preceded it. Those who were hoping for Putin to chastise the West for its hypocrisy, its loony liberalism, its false promises to Ukraine, will be disappointed. Those who were hoping for the prevention of World War III thanks to a cordial conversation between a journalist who ostensibly is trying to foment understanding and peace between two superpowers and the leader of one of those superpowers, will be disappointed. Those who simply wanted an entertaining and spicy interview with Vladolf Putler will be disappointed. Perhaps the only people not disappointed are those who have been saying for years that Putin has his own interests, and his interests have nothing to do with saving Western Civilization from the Woke Mob or the Globalists. In fact, Putin’s vision for Russia is clearly a species of civic nationalist imperialism. It’s “globalism,” but with a shot of vodka and fewer rainbow flags.
Putin explained it all himself. He put on full display his hatred of nationalism. He whined about Nazis. Along with Russia’s 1,200-year-old claim to Ukrainian territory as justification for his “Special Military Operation,” Putin went on to cite his other justification: denazification. Putin invaded Ukraine because, in his view, it is Russia’s duty to fumigate Ukraine and cleanse it of its “Nazi” infestation. Like someone who watches Alex Jones all day, Putin believes that the West, too, is ruled by crypto-Nazis, and Putin’s idea of a “Nazi” is a 90-year-old Second World War veteran who defended his homeland from Bolshevik invaders. When Putin brought up Yaroslav Hunka, my eyes nearly rolled entirely backwards. It was just more of the same retarded, tiresome, and downright boring discourse with which we are all so familiar. “You’re a Nazi!” “No, you’re a Nazi!” For an interview that was supposed to break the Internet, nothing especially insightful was said.
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Putin may be sincere in his belief that Ukraine is rife with “Nazis” and that it is his duty to purge them, but I do suspect that Putin is also playing this denazification thing as a way to appeal to Westerners and sugar-coat his invasion. “Why’d ya do it, Vlad?” asks the world. “I’m just fighting the Nazis,” Putin shrugs. “Don’t you want me to fight the Nazis?”
Many a MAGA-hat-wearing boomer conservative supports Putin precisely because they think he is taking on the crypto-Nazis who control the world, and Putin does nothing to disabuse them of this notion. He encourages it. And even if he were sincere, so what? People who defend Putin’s denazification quest, even people who are not supporters of Putin, will say that, well, as a Russian, Putin has understandable animosity towards Nazis and National Socialist ideology. With all due respect, I don’t care. I live in a world where hammers-and-sickles fly with impunity, where former members of Marxist-Leninist youth parties become chancellors of Germany and then go on to enact arguably the most disastrous policies of the twenty-first century by flooding the country with over a million “refugees” from the Third World. We have understandable reasons to hold a grudge against Communists, yet rather than decommiefying our countries, we permit their presence even in the uppermost levels of power, and to add insult to injury, we are told these ex-Communists are actually Nazis.
Furthermore, as Tucker Carlson himself pointed out to Putin, “Hitler’s been dead for 80 years,” and what business is it of yours, anyway, what goes on in a country — like Ukraine — which you do not govern? “You want to extinguish or at least control Ukrainian nationalism,” Tucker said, “but how? How do you do that?” To Tucker’s credit, he pressed this question. “What is denazification? What does that mean? How do you go about doing that in a country you don’t control?”
This was one of the few enlightening moments of the whole interview, and certainly the first hour or so of it. What was rather troubling about Putin’s answer — which did not do much to explain what denazification is, how Russia will go about it, or why Putin feels that Russia has the right to do it — is that he clearly believes the job of denazifying Ukraine is nowhere near finished. This stance undermines, or at least reduces to irrelevance, the idea that Russia invaded Ukraine because it felt encroached upon by NATO. Indeed, Putin did mention the “five waves of NATO expansion” several times during the interview, and I was hoping he would make a sincere case against NATO’s actions and explain how all this bloodshed and upheaval could have been avoided were it not for the behavior of the Western powers. Putin did do this, to an extent. He confirmed, if you’re willing to believe him, that Boris Johnson sabotaged peace negotiations in Istanbul. He confirmed that he ordered the withdrawal of Russian troops from Kiev as a sign of Russia’s willingness to negotiate without holding a knife to Ukraine’s throat, only for Ukraine to go back on its promises to sue for peace. He repeated the claim that the decision to launch the Special Military Operation was caused by a 2014 “coup” in Ukraine which was backed the CIA. He lamented betrayal and broken promises on the part of Germany, Poland, and France. He recalled the attacks on Crimea and the Donbas. In that moment, he made a genuine case for Russia’s cause and his actions. Importantly, he denied that Russia wants to fight a global war and stated that he would only engage in a conflict with Poland, for example, if Poland attacks Russia. While it is good to hear this rejection of expansionist aims, one can understand why Ukrainians might not believe him.
Whatever the truth is, none of it matters if what Putin really wants is to reclaim lands he believes belong to Russia. Some who is neutral could sympathize with that reason, especially if the people of those lands feel Russian and want to be part of Russia, but even that reason fails to matter if, as Putin said, he wants to “uproot” the “seedlings” of Ukrainian nationalism. His justifications for this are comically hypocritical. In Putin’s opinion — and a frighteningly weighty opinion it is — if Ukrainians see themselves as a separate people, that’s fine, but they cannot see themselves as a separate people within a “Nazi” mindset. That’s a no-no. That requires a Russian military intervention. How is this any different than the liberal “Atlantic” powers going around the world bombarding liberal democracy onto everyone, whether they want it or not? Listen, Libya, you can be a sovereign country, just not that way.
It’s laughable that European Union stooges such as Guy Verhofstadt and mainstream media organizations such as CNN are clutching their pearls, bemoaning a propaganda victory for Putin that threatens to kill democracy. In the end, the interview was a shambles if you’re a Putin supporter. For over an hour, he came across as rambling and resentful, motivated by revanchism and imperialism. Tucker Carlson didn’t cover himself in glory, either. While he did manage to ask a few rapier questions, he could not wrangle Putin under control and get him to answer. It’s a pity, really. I can’t help but think that if such an interview had taken place in a time when IQs were higher and statesmen were rather more dignified, this meeting would have been historic, indeed. Instead, it was just “content” for reactosphere hot-take hustling — which I suppose this article itself is guilty of participating in — and will be forgotten by the next news cycle.
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28 comments
Good sum up.
Whilst I am at it. Would it be possible to pass on to the editor that sometimes, for weeks at a time, I cannot get access to the Counter-Currents site.
@Philippe Régniez : J’ai eu des soucis comparables pendant quelques jours avec plusieurs sites “normaux”. Suggestions en vrac : autre navigateur, changement de D.N.S., ou VPN (même symbolique). Pas impossible que les fournisseurs d’accès fassent des tests aléatoires.
(Not in English because probably not applicable to U.S. visitors.)
I’ve been having the same issue on apple products only.
Je recevais des messages “access denied”
I had this on an iphone and Macbook using Wifi only. Cellular internet was all right. A 127.0.0.1 or similar message was displayed. It’s now resolved.
Your title is a Mandela Effect, it should be Interview with THE Vladpire.
Good summary though!
Putin did bring up two points of interest in the first half.
He mentioned a talk with Bush and his high level reps agreeing to something and returning the next day saying they could not go through with it. This led Putin to wonder who really controls US foreign policy.
Putin also said that Bolsheviks originating in Ukraine were in favor of some degree of independence for the Ukraine in the early days after the revolution. It is worth further research to see if these early Bolsheviks were Jewish and interested in a future Khazaria or some sort of autonomous zone for themselves. This might be a stretch, but worth investigating.
It is worth further research to see if these early Bolsheviks were Jewish and interested in a future Khazaria or some sort of autonomous zone for themselves.
Some were Jews, some were not. In 1918 and 1919 in Ukraine, just like in other non-Russian lands, like the Caucasus, Edil-Ural, Steppe, Central Asia, Siberia, Far East, the Bolsheviks created seemingly “independent” ultra-Left movements to fight against local anti-communist and nationalist forces and to apply to local natives to get them on the side of the Reds. This was something like proxy-war. After the anti-Communist forces were defeated, Stalin and Co. have annihilated all those nationalist Bolsheviks with even a little independent ideas.
This is an unfortunate lost opportunity. Volodya had his chance to make his case before the American public, and then blew it.
I am not sure if this was real Pu, and not one of his Doppelgaengers.
The great political failure of Russia is that the Russians have identified Anglo-Saxons as the enemy group and Slavs as the friend group. Identification of Slavs as friendlies is at least partly true but Anglo-Saxons are not the enemy. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Victoria Nuland, and Antony Blinken are not Anglo-Saxons.
(For that matter, neither is Rishi Sunak an Anglo-Saxon. He’s part of the brown and Black horde that has been brought in to replace and destroy the White British nations.)
Failure to make a true friend and enemy distinction is a bad political failure. This is not a trivial lapse like failing to impress in an interview. This is fundamental.
We must stop being friendly and servile to enemies who are driving us to destruction, and we must stop seeing ethnic parts of our own White race as the true enemy, or we’re not going to survive as a race.
For that matter, neither is Rishi Sunak an Anglo-Saxon
Neither is Boris Johnson, a Circassian Türk.
Carlson in his introduction (just after 1 minute) said «western Ukraine» when the topic at hand was obviously «eastern Ukraine».
Not strange to me that he could make a mistake like that but I am really surprised that it got past the people he must have around to avoid blunders like that.
Putin confused Shukhevych, leader of Ukrainian national-liberation guerrilla in 1940’s, with Shushkevich, a Belorussian politician of 1990’s. He is not a historian at all, and during his lecture about history, Carlson should simply said, “Mr. President, if I want to learn something about Russian and Ukrainian history, I would better ask some professor of slavistic in some good university, so let’s come back into the 21st century.”
Do you remember when people were saying that Tucker Carlson was finished?
I don’t. I remember everyone wondering what he’ll do next.
Takes 2 to tango. Putin clearly states his attack was driven by his right to control Ukraine inside Russian borders. The west refused to provide guarantees of not bringing NATO (U.S.) military presence into Ukraine with emphasis also on the entry of the western market. The battle started with manipulation of Ukraine’s elections and appointed leadership. Surely both east and west (predominantly U.S.) were aggressive and intrusive. I believe in Ukraine’s independence from both sides, unfortunately it has become a chip in a greater poker game. I do know that we had the opportunity to make Russia a limited partner in NATO when the wall came down, we elected to violate agreements by incorporating many ex Warsaw pact nations or eastern Europe into NATO (we now occupy their old bases), which was considered a new threat to Russia along with our new market presence, and to create new military contracts for those nations in the hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars. My destiny was to partake in the meetings which involved certain policy reorientation’s in these new member nations some which took place in Chiemsee, Germany.
Well, the Maidan in 2013-2014 started as an absolutely internal Ukrainian matter, but later was someway internationalized under influence from both Russia and West. But the role of the US is exaggerated by both Russian and Western propaganda. The EU’s role was much more important in those events.
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by incorporating many ex Warsaw pact nations or eastern Europe into NATO
Just note, that the former Warsaw Pact nations all were FORCED into the Warsaw Pact and when they wanted to go out like Hungarians in 1956 and Czechs in 1968 they were crushed by Russian tanks. But to the NATO they joined more or less voluntarily. If they want to get out, I do not think that in such case the B52’s would bomb them or the 82nd Airborne would land and kill them. The French left the Military organization of the NATO in 1966, and there were economical and political pressing, but no military intervention. The Greeks left the Military organization of the NATO in 1974 and were “out” untill 1980. Nobody bombed them.
It is true that we used a more gentle policy of “incorporation” and that Russia practiced and still practices a brutal policy.
We still do compete for expansion; and our conquests – primarily economic, have also been with military might (Manifest destiny, Philippines, Iraq to name a few). Economically we use boycotts, embargoes, (Cuba, Venezuela, etc) and bribes (Pakistan recently, [Khan’s refusal and ousting]). In the last century we used this strategy with most equatorial and southern hemisphere regions after the Spanish American war. In Iran Churchill wanted a coup of the Iranian leader Mohammad Mosaddegh who became an obstacle for the British Petroleum’s consolidation of Iran’s oil resources and we gave it to him (The start of our conflict, and Gaza is now a serious turning point in our history of just empire).
(Others included Patrice Lumumba of Congo brutally murdered (western mining companies) and Jacobo Arbenz Guzman of Guatemala (United Fruit Company now Chiquita). President Sukarno of Indonesia was also targeted by the CIA for independent industrialization and there are in all probability many more, historically Cuba (sugar), to later include Chavez of Venezuela (oil), etc.) [Guzziferno].
In the case with the eastern Europe, a lot of money deal coercion took place behind the scenes. Studies on the effects of health and death rate among young men increased after we pushed out their socialized systems and gentrified those countries with our economic political system allowing many middle class people to fall into poverty. Europe witnessed a wave of these people in desperation selling everything they had in their streets.
Russia is very uncomfortable with the idea of our forces on her border, and our controlling forces of finance are too impatient to be tactful. I remember JFK also would not live with a Russian military presence on our Caribbean border despite freedom to sail international waters. Unfortunately, a picture from space would show one nation with the largest military footprint on most of the globe. Our Statecraft Polity is very questionable from a moral standpoint.
Russia is militarily much stronger than the USA. And China stands behind Russia with all its military and economic power, and with the pro-Chinese fifth columns in ALL Western countries and in the Third World, which is simply in the Chinese vassality.
Monkey see, monkey do
Russia and China (through its propaganda outlets) seem to love calling the America and the west “racist.” And western media calls Russia “white supremacist” and has warned that certain criticism of Chinese influence runs the risk of crossing the line into “racism.” It has gotten so ridiculous that it’s hard to know which leaders sincerely believe that “racism” is the ultimate sin or whether they’re just using the “racist” insult as part of a cynical tactic to try to gain a moral high ground.
There is a good new book about China’s and Russia’s cyberwarfare, BATTLEFIELD CYBER, by Michael McLaughlin and William Holstein, with a whole part dedicated to psychological warfare, waged by RU and CHN in Internet. They apply to different groups of Westerners, for one they criticize the West as racist and fascist, for another one as leftist, ultraliberal, LGBT+infested, etc. Sometimes the same persons under different nicknames write in the Web comments with one content, than with another.
Yes, racist is used as “A cynical tactic to try and gain a moral high ground” (despite the guilt all around), as with the use of political titles to redefine good and evil while forgetting their principle concepts and only reflecting on how they were misused.
It’s striking how Asiatic Putin looks in his old age.
Nobody can say for sure if this was Pu or his Doppelgaenger.
The ethnical background of real Pu is mysterious. Some say he is a Veps, Tver Karelian, some say that he is an Udmurt, some say his biological father was a Georgian. Nobody knows.
It’s funny that the great Pu was dissatisfied with this interview with Carlson. Allegedly, he expected Tucker to ask him pointed and sharp questions, but he didn’t. Maybe The Great himself shouldn’t have spent a quarter of the interview time on a history lecture since the troglodytes.
“What is denazification? What does that mean? How do you go about doing that in a country you don’t control?”
Well, I CAN explain this to Mr. Tucker Carlson, instead of Putin. The denazification means, that thousands Ukrainians with national conscience and even nationalist views went to the Ukrainian Army, and then were killed and wounded by Russian soldiers. Now Ukraine has not enough “nationalists”, however more than enough “philisters”, for whom it does not matter in what country they live and who rules over them. They would welcome a new pro-Russian government, and maybe even the Russian occupation, only when this would go without violence and the war will be over. In such case Putin has succesfully reached his aims, Ukraine is already denazified, and for the further denazification he does not need to control the rest of the country. Nationalists are dead and wounded, their wives and children have emigrated to the West, the rest of civilians wants only the war to stop, is desillusioned about the West and Europe, they are afraid of mobilization, do not want to fight for reconquest of the Dumbass, and openly (as far as this is possible under a dictatorship) say that they do not want to die for Jews and Britons. All they want is peace, under any conditions. Putin has won this war, not so much militarily, but politically.
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