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So, About That “Solved In One Day” Plan

• Michele McAloon • Season 4 • Episode 153

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Article by Adam Entous of the New York Times

The Separation: Inside the Unraveling U.S.-Ukraine Partnership

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/12/30/world/europe/ukraine-war-us-russia.html

We trace Ukraine’s war from early U.S.–Ukraine partnership to a fragile “separation,” where support is uneven, Europe scales up late, and a DMZ-style end state competes with continued attrition. Adam Entous of the New York Times lays out the battlefield, the backchannels, and the choices that could lock in peace—or prolong risk.

• The shift from artillery dominance to drone warfare and frozen lines
• Why Donetsk and Luhansk are strategic, not just symbolic
• Security guarantees as deterrence architecture short of NATO
• Sanctions and Ukrainian drone strikes targeting Russian refineries
• U.S. policy splits: munitions for Ukraine vs Indo-Pacific stockpiles
• The Whitkoff–Kushner channel and Russia’s “inevitability” narrative
• Europe’s rearmament and the slow ramp of 155 mm production
• Russian incompetence vs Ukrainian resilience on the ground
• What a DMZ-style settlement might require to hold

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Miichele mcAloon:

Hello folks, you're listening across where cultural clues lead to the truth of the word. And my name is Michele Mcaloon. I'd like to wish everybody a happy new year. As we start a great new reading year, we have a lot of great books coming up with 2026 being a the 250th year anniversary. So we'll have a lot of books around that, that theme. And we have we just have a lot of great books. It is actually golden time of literature in the United States. People are publishing and reading more than ever, which is always encouraging. If there's a book out there you would like me to feature, a nonfiction book, or even a good historical fiction book, please don't hesitate to call me. Please tell your friends about my show. The best way that my show gets out is through word of mouth. And I really, really appreciate my listeners and the people that have stayed with me for almost four or five years. Let's keep reading, let's keep talking. You can find out more about me on bookclues.com. Thanks, guys. God bless. Welcome, folks. We are here today with Adam Intus of the New York Times. Adam Entous, we interviewed earlier this year, where he wrote a fabulous article. And if you have not read it, go back and read it. What date was it, Adam?

Adam Entous:

Well, I was going to correct you. It was last year. Last year, yes, excuse.

Miichele mcAloon:

There we go. Happy New Year, Adam.

Adam Entous:

Thank you. Yeah, it was in March, late March of last year.

Miichele mcAloon:

Late March. And it's the secret history of the war in Ukraine. And it's actually a long, extensive article, and it's really interesting about the cooperation between Ukraine and the U.S. But today we're here to speak with Adam about his recent article. I think it was on December 30th. And it's well worth the read. And it's basically how the U What is the title of it again, Adam?

Adam Entous:

We called it the separation. So the other one was the partnership, and this one is the separation. There was a debate internally, should we, should it, is it the breakup? Is it the divorce? What exactly is it? And uh we came with the uh with the separation. So it's it's sort of what happens when a partnership is uh heading to divorce and and the couples agree to a separation. So yeah, we you know, we don't really know where the partnership is heading, right? If if they do manage to agree to a ceasefire or some sort of a deal, then the partnership will endure, but in a very different capacity, in the form of potentially security guarantees and things like that. If the war goes on, you know, we don't know. This could head to uh a breakup for real, you know.

Miichele mcAloon:

Disaster. Well, Adam conducted more than 300 interviews over more than a year with government, military, and intelligence officials in Ukraine, United States, Britain, Belgium, Germany, Estonia, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Turkey. The man does his research. And he is, I think he is one of a group of reporters, Adam. You with Sean Walker over the telegraph, with Simon Schuster over at The Atlantic. These are really, really good investigative reporters that do the research, that don't rely on ideology and show why investigative journalism is still so important to our culture, our society, and our understanding of the world. And Adam, you lead the pack on that. So, Adam, let's bring our audience up to where we are. We had the invasion in February 2022. This war is now grinding on. We have, I think, estimated of up to almost a million men and women dead or maimed, injured, with, I mean, just thousands and thousands of lives lost in a it's a very cruel and barbaric war. Where are we right now? What where is, and I know that's I'm asking for you for a big sweep of time, but if you could just kind of bring us through a couple of the little highlights so we can position your story.

Adam Entous:

So yeah, so I think, you know, kind of in the summer of 2022 uh and the fall of 2022, the the partnership was at its its its high water mark, if you will, where there was uh the Americans were introducing capabilities on the battlefield to help the Ukrainians uh push the Russians back. These would be M777s, uh howitzers, and, you know, anti-tank javelins, stingers, and critically HIMARS systems. And so this was at a period when the Russians were really on their back feet, they weren't prepared, and suddenly the Americans helped basically lift the Ukrainian game with the help of people like C. D. Donahue at that stage and the CIA working very closely with him, helping the Ukrainians really push the Russians back. And you saw the big successes that took place in the fall of 2022 with the counteroffensive. Basically, after that, everything's sort of the wheels start to come off the bus, if you will. Not much really changes on the battlefield, actually, shockingly little. The type of warfare changes dramatically from artillery battles to uh drone battles between these parties. But the actual line of contact is really largely frozen. But beginning in that period in the in the winter of uh 2023, through the failed counteroffensive of 2023, and then particularly after that, the Russians begin to regain their momentum, albeit in an incredibly uh slow way, with you know, Adifka falling in the winter of 2024, and then maybe Pokrovsk now falling or in the process of slowly falling. But if you actually put them on the map, uh Adivka and Pokrovsk, and you actually, you know, see how the distance, it's just it's a tiny amount of distance, really, in the scheme of things to give you a sense of how little actually things have changed. The Ukrainians have not addressed their manpower issues during all this period. In fact, they've just made it worse and worse by not wanting to address it. And at the same time, the U.S. military has pulled back beginning in the winter of 2024 with the first freeze in military support to Ukraine. That was inspired by Donald Trump and his supporters in Congress that put that on. That's during the 2024 campaign. And then Trump wins the election. And after that, we're what we see is sort of greater and greater instability in the support that the U.S. in particular is providing to Ukraine, kind of undermining further and further their ability to hold their lines. Again, nothing is catastrophic. Nothing is kind of on its own a game changer, but it's kind of a slow grinding deterioration in the consistency of our support. And the Ukrainians have very cleverly, very ingeniously come up with workarounds for some of these things. They've developed their own long-range capabilities. They're not nearly as precise, not nearly as capable as the things that we had been providing to them, such as attackums, which we don't have enough of to support them. Uh, but they've come up with these other systems. They've come up with, they're using drones in ways that are just remarkable, that are revolutionary, and we want to learn from those techniques that they're using. And the Russians have also come a long way, but on the ground, they're they're still incompetent. And, you know, I think incompetent is sort of the best way to describe them. They're not using their best uh forces. The people that they're throwing into this battle are untrained. Many of them are injured. They're just basically throwing them into this meat grinder. That's allowed the Ukrainians, that's sort of like the secret weapon for the Ukrainians, is the Russian incompetence here. That's prevented this from being as catastrophic this pullback by the United States as it might have been otherwise. And now we're entering a period of greater risk for the Ukrainians as the negotiations are sort of bogging down, or I don't know, maybe progressing, maybe not, who knows? We're in the winter. This is sort of a different when the Ukrainians are so reliant on drones. Uh, this is a time of year when the clouds are uh making it more difficult. The weather is making it more difficult for those drones to this is a deep, this is a very uncertain period. But at the same time, like the Ukrainians are just over and over again proving how resilient they are in the face of all these challenges, whether it's political challenges because of the corruption investigation inside of Ukraine, whether it's the political challenges because of Trump's constant wavering in his position, or whether it's these battlefield challenges, they always kind of remarkably find ways to kind of muddle through. And so that I think that brings us to where we are today, where the Ukrainians know they really cannot count on us.

unknown:

Right.

Adam Entous:

And we're there under tremendous pressure to bring this war to some sort of hiatus of some kind or some sort of end of some kind. Maybe something more like what happened in 2014, with it we get to another pause, if you will, kind of it goes to sort of a instead of the hot war to more of a, you know, kind of a shadow war, if you will, and the lines stabilize for a period of time. I I don't know what's gonna happen. I have a hard enough time figuring out what just happened to figure out what's going to happen.

Miichele mcAloon:

What's gonna happen, right? But do do the Ukrainians really believe that? Because they're really, really pushing hard for security guarantees. If you're really pushing hard for security guarantees, you're not thinking that the it's gonna go, it's just gonna freeze on its own.

Adam Entous:

Well, I think you know, they're trying to lock in as many of these potential benefits that they could get out of this uh as they can. Security guarantees is huge, right? If if they if they're real, right? And everyone tells me that they are real. I I have not seen the fine print of the you know secret classified annex that is gonna lay all this out, right? But that's what they're in the process right now of negotiating. And the idea is, is they'll get all this together, and then Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner will go to Moscow and have that meeting to see if Putin is gonna put his John Hancock on that document. You know, who knows actually what he's gonna do, right? And so I think the I the strategy of the Ukrainians, which is a smart strategy, which is sort of lining everything up with Trump and with the Europeans, and then the ball is gonna be passed to the Russians to see what they're gonna do with this.

Miichele mcAloon:

Well, okay, let's talk a little bit about geography. What we say in the army, the long pole in the tent, the real sticking point has been, and it is about geography, has been the Donask reaching, the Lukans. Why is that so important to the Ukrainians? Why are they so loath to one? I know that that many of their men and women have died for that territory, but why are they so loath to give that over to the Russians? And plus it's 20% of their territory, too. So you can understand that, but that really is a sticking point.

Adam Entous:

On the situation when you talk about geography, obviously there's incredible emotional uh investment, uh psychological investment. You know, when you've been fighting for a decade for something and you've lost so many lives and so many families have been destroyed by this, it's obviously very difficult to imagine compromising on this, right? So that's not the geography part of this equation. Uh, on the geography question, I mean, you have some big rivers, you have some big physical barriers, natural barriers on the battlefield. You have the Osko River Valley, which is further that basically cuts through on the northeast side, which creates a natural barrier, and it's hard for the Russians to plow through that, and then further to the south, you basically have the Dnipro River, which cuts through Kurs towards Kursan is on one side of it. For the Russians to cross that physical barrier would be an enormously risky height and costly operation. In the meanwhile, there's this like gap between these physical barriers that runs right through basically where this battle is right now. Across you have this flat area here that is largely free of those physical barriers, major rivers, major barriers on the ground. And so it's it would be very easy, or much easier, I shouldn't say very easy, but easier for the Russians once they took Donetsk, the entirety of Donetsk, from there, they can turn to the right and head up to, you know, the north, and they can turn to the left and head down to take Khursan, or they can continue straight ahead and take Kyiv. And so over the time since 2014, the Ukrainians have built up these major defenses in this region. And to allow the Russians to basically go on the other side of those, on the western side of those defenses, would expose all these population centers in Ukraine to direct attack by the Russians. And the idea is, is if the Russians take Kherson, then they would take Odessa. And once they took Odessa, they would be able to strangle the Ukrainian economy by cutting off their access to the Black Sea. And if they go north, it's the same sort of situation, different, but it's very risky. And so what the Americans are really asking the Ukrainians to do is they're asked saying, like, this is what Russia wants. Like, if you want to end this, this is what we got to do. And so the Americans are saying, well, we'll help you build a DMZ, the equivalent of a DMZ that will run the stretch from if regardless of what happens in Donetsk, whether Ukraine keeps it or Russia keeps it, the idea is sort of some sort of demilitarized zone. Maybe both sides can claim it as being their territory. And there would be the equivalent of like a DMZ, a very, very strong sort of defensive line, offensive, defensive capabilities attached to it, that would be a deterrence. And the this would basically be the Berlin Wall of today, if you will. And, you know, on one side of it will be the Russians, and on the other side of it will be the Ukrainians plus the Europeans, right? And the Americans to a certain extent. And that's sort of like the best case scenario, I think, for the Ukrainians. The worst case scenario is continuing what we're doing and then continuing to be ground down as the Americans continue to take these resources that they need and send them to other priorities that Trump has identified or Heg Seth has identified, such as, you know, defending Taiwan or as we see recently, Venezuela, or other things that they want to do. Greenland, who knows, you know?

Miichele mcAloon:

Yo, gosh. Okay. Well, all right. So Trump rolls into office two years ago. Is it really been two years ago?

Adam Entous:

No, no, one year ago.

Miichele mcAloon:

One year ago. Yeah. One year ago. I mean, he's very ambivalent about Russia. Actually, he's not ambivalent. He says I can solve that in a day, right? Because all US presidents think they're more charming than they are. And all US presidents have made that mistake that they think they can charm Russian leaders in for at least the last 30 years, since at least George Bush. They think they can charm them. I would suggest to them that they read a little Napoleonic history to understand the charm of how charm is limited with Russian dictators. But he comes in, he brings a stab that comes in, the JD Vance, the Pete Hagseth, that they are willing to really do his bidding of trying to pull back. I I you had a great quote in your article, Death by a Thousand Cuts, and that's exactly what it has been, as they've pulled back 155 millimeter artillery shells, if they've pulled back other equipment. What and I know to this is a big question to ask, but what do you think really is in the heart of this administration's thinking when it comes to Ukraine and to Russia and to what they think they can truly affect?

Adam Entous:

So Trump, right? Let's just put him in his own category. He, you know, he just wants to get credit for ending the war, right? I think he genuinely does want to end the fighting, right? I think that's a genuine desire on his part. He wants the credit for it as well, right? He doesn't make a secret about that. And and I think he's less interested in the details, right? He just wants it to end, period. Right. Then you have these other people that are that he populated his administration with. You have Keith Kellogg, who he appointed to be the envoy, special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, the guy who was named in during the transition to basically run this portfolio of trying to end this war and manage this. He thinks Putin is a thug. He thinks Zelensky's a hero. And he thinks we should have continued support to Ukraine, including delivery of those shells, those 155s. And we would only penalize under his plan, we would only penalize the Ukrainians if Zelensky refused to negotiate. And then his plan was to put pressure on Putin to basically increase sanctions and to use frozen Russian assets and European banking system to basically arm Ukraine. That was the plan. Right? Now, there were other people who didn't agree with Keith Kellogg. They saw him as a kind of a Cold War relic. He's a former Army Special Forces guy. But there are people like J.D. Vance and Eldridge Colby at the Pentagon, and other people that uh Vance helped to put in different positions at the State Department and at the Pentagon. They took really the opposite view. They saw Ukraine as a sinking ship, right? They believed that Russian victory was inevitable, that there was nothing we could do to shore up the Ukrainians. They believed that those resources, those limited resources that we have in our arsenal needed to be hoarded either for ourselves to deter China from doing Taiwan or for training or for whatever, America first, right? And so they they didn't think it was worth sending it to the Ukrainians. I really do think it's really, I know this is an oversimplification, but like Keith Kellogg hates Putin and loves the Ukrainians, right? Right, okay. JD Vance and his acolytes, they don't love Putin or anything like that, right? But they don't think Putin is like the devil. Right. And they do not love Ukraine. They really don't really care that much about it, right? And so it really comes down to like what you actually care about. And those guys, the previous team, Austin, Biden, they cared about Ukraine. Did they do enough for Ukraine? No. No, they didn't. But they cared. They cared. This team just doesn't Keith Kellogg cared, right? And he's gone now after he he just left the job. But the others just don't care. They don't think it's that important. And so this ambivalence, if you will, they don't care. Like, you know, withholding the shells they see as from Ukraine. They don't see it as so bad because they see it as a way to force the people that they really dislike, which is the Europeans, to step up. And so they think the Europeans are basically deadbeats, right? And there's a great magazine cover from like the early 70s. I can't remember the name of the magazine, National Harpoon or something. Anyways, it was a and it had a dog, a cute dog on the cover. Right and there was a gun at The head of the dog, and underneath it said, if you don't want us to shoot the dog, buy the magazine.

unknown:

Right.

Adam Entous:

And that's basically the strategy here.

Miichele mcAloon:

Okay.

Adam Entous:

Okay. The dog is Ukraine. And the message they're trying to sell the magazine to the Europeans. If you love the dog, you better step up. Because otherwise the dog's gonna die. That's basically the message that they're sending. Boiling it down, but that's really what it comes down to.

Miichele mcAloon:

Adam, I just don't I tell you, I don't see how they don't I understand maybe they didn't spend enough semesters at sea or semesters abroad or something, how they don't see the importance of Europe, how they don't see Ukraine in Europe, because really that fight with Ukraine is really about Russia taking Europe.

Adam Entous:

And I mean They're not wrong about Europe underinvesting since the end of the Ukraine. They are they were not wrong. They were absolutely not wrong. And so this that's what's sort of like interesting about this, is they're not wrong that we have these shortages of munitions. They're not wrong that Trump in his first term, Biden in his term, and now Trump have failed miserably to get the defense industrial base to address the shortages of munitions. Right. It's just staggering to think that we only produce 50 plus, you know, Pac-3 MSEs, you know, uh patriot bat patriot missiles that can intercept a ballistic missile a month. Think about that. So they're not wrong that our defense industrial base is woefully inadequate. They're not wrong that the Europeans talk a lot and don't do a lot. Yeah, they are and so but so they're not wrong about these things. These are actually really tough issues to address, right? These are tough issues. But the again, it comes down to like how important do you think Ukraine is? The previous team thought that Ukraine was very important. This team doesn't believe that. Now, I I think you believe that that is not a good position to have. I agree with you a lot that that I think Ukraine is very important, but I these are really hard issues. They're not completely wrong. Should they do it the way they've been doing it? I mean, this is a these are really tough issues. I don't want to oversimplify.

Miichele mcAloon:

Right, I know. And I I mean, to me, it's just the history of, you know, of I mean, here we go. If it's not even about Ukraine, it's about Europe. Do we really want the Russians to take Europe? Do we really want the uh Russia to threaten Europe? And yes, Europe has been wrong. Yes, they also they have not involved their industrial complex. I'm sitting here in Germany, and let me tell you, they just had their uh gross national product last year, gross domestic GDP was 0.7%. They're not doing well, right? There, I mean, it's it's a problem here. You actually make me see that and you make the audience understand that that, you know what, there are decisions to be made. But one of the things, one of our most vulnerable points is we haven't started the defense industrial capacity. I was just talking to someone about making 155 shells. You know what, there's still no market for 155 shells. We're still at only 50,000. Government's not making more, the government's not buying more. We're still not there. And if we had had initiated more in the defense, our defense capacity, then you know what? We probably wouldn't have to be making these hard decisions right now either. If the decisions would probably be a lot easier to make. So, I mean, you know what? Bad decisions, bad outcomes. And I think this is what it is. Sorry, get off my soapbox.

unknown:

Okay.

Adam Entous:

Yeah, I don't want to oversimplify it. The Trump team is facing a munitions crisis that really does exist. That's where it comes down to like what's what's more important? Is it more important to take those shells that are coming off those production lines and stick them in a warehouse somewhere in Hawaii or something to be used to deter China if one day it decides to invade Taiwan, right? Or does it make more sense to use those shells to shore up the Ukrainian lines in Pokrovsk? Now, I think there's like a genuine debate that can be had about what is the more useful, what what makes the most sense. It's it's hard, I think, for people who've, I mean, and including myself, you know, to separate one's emotions from this, but these are really genuine questions. And yet both administrations, that both the Biden administration and the Trump administration are dealing with the same problem, their answer to it is very unsatisfying for basically everybody, right? Which is to deny the resources to the Ukrainians that they need to stop this Russian advance. And frankly, to help Trump achieve his objective, which is ending the war. If Putin thinks he's going to stroll to Donet through Donetsk, what incentive does he have to take this agreement, right? And so the strategy of the Pentagon in withholding these shells to make it harder for the Ukrainians to hold their lines seems to me to be undermining Trump's goal of convincing Putin that he could achieve more in the negotiation than he would achieve on the battlefield, right? And so that there is that lack of like strategic, they're not really thinking through, I think, some of this stuff because different parts of the bureaucracy are sort of kind of doing their own thing, right? That's sort of what's going on here.

Miichele mcAloon:

Yeah, it's definitely not coordinated. And that's what your article really shows that this is not a coordinated response. This isn't an orchestra. This is the different little factions kind of uh staking out turf in the ground. Let's talk about Steve Whitkoff and Jared Kushner. I mean, this is this has been really kind of wild to watch. And this has sort of been going on, I guess, since early fall, crescendoing in late October, November. Talk to us a little bit about that.

Adam Entous:

So initially, the envoy that was supposed to be doing all this was Keith Kellogg, right? He was tapped to do the job. He has a very particular worldview, which is very consistent, frankly, with the worldview of somebody like uh uh of General Cavoli, some of the others, which is Ukraine is important, it deserves these shells, it's really important to prevent Russia from threatening Europe. Ukraine deserves our support, right? It's worth taking the risk of dipping into our stocks of munitions in order to support them. And then you had these other people who didn't agree with Kellogg and were pushing in the other direction. Meanwhile, this guy, Steve Whitkoff, who's a real estate guy, who's very close to Trump. They're very close friends. He was basically working on the Russian side of the portfolio. The Russians made it clear early on they weren't going to deal with Keith Kellogg. Keith Kellogg's views of Putin were, you know, not conducive to him serving as intermediary between the administration, the Trump administration, and Putin. So uh Whitkoff sort of comes in initially on this just handling the Russian side. Keith Kellogg was handling the Ukrainian side. But gradually over the course of the year, Kellogg was pushed out, was pushed further and further to the fringes of the administration. He was he was too supportive of Ukraine for the general, you know, uh advisors to Trump. And so he was sort of marginalized, and Whitkoff moved in to fill this vacuum, this void as the intermediary, not only to the Russians, but now also to the Ukrainians. And he very much has the president's ear. He very much can tell the president what he thinks he should believe. And the president clearly listens to Steve Whitkop, right? And Steve Whitkoff's views, you know, I would say maybe evolve a little bit over time. It's really hard for me to tell for sure. But he said things early on that certain certainly made it seem like he really believed some of the Putin's talking points. He appeared on Tucker Carlson's show shortly after visiting with uh Putin in Moscow, and he repeats things like the people that live in these four oblasts or regions on the East, they voted in a in a referendum, according to Putin, that favored Russian control. Now, everybody, including the U.S. government, including the international community, does not view those referendum as being legitimate. They believed that they that they were not legitimate. Basically, they were fake, right? Right. But in that appearance on Tucker Carlson, Whitkoff seemed to accept it as those are legitimate, right? And so you you had him, his main intermediary was Putin and people around Putin, like Dmitriev, Kyrill Dmitriev, one of his economic advisors. He was getting his information largely from the Russian side. And the Russian side was trying to convince Whitkov and Trump, through Whitkov, and also directly Trump, that it was inevitable that the Russians were going to win. And if if they could convince Trump that Russian victory was inevitable, Trump would feel like he should force Zelensky and Ukraine to basically give up what Putin wants because he was going to get it anyways. That was the argument that the Russians were basically making. And this was this largely worked, this strategy of Russia. Trump sort of viewed, I think this was a quote that was cut out of the story. He sees big country, Russia, big country, you know, defeated Hitler, defeated Napoleon. Of course they're going to win. It's inevitable. And in May, when there's the big victory day parade that Putin puts on, Trump watches some of the footage and he says to his aides, look, look how invincible they look. Something along these lines. Right, right, right. Meanwhile, you know, the Ukrainians are doing things like Spider's Web, which was a very audacious, creative, effective operation using drones to take out strategic bombers, Russian strategic bombers, deep inside of Russia. Zelensky sends a delegation to Washington after that, which is very shortly after the Victory Day parade. And their message is, you know, we're not losing, we're winning, we're winning, right? So both sides are fighting this war within the war to try to convince Trump and his advisors that Ukraine is worth the investment, right? And Putin is trying to make the case that it's inevitable that they're going to win, therefore, Ukraine is not worth the investment. Trump should force Ukraine to give up Donetsk and the rest of Luhansk, Crimea, and everything basically east of the current line of contact in the two other oblasts, Kurzon and Zaporizia. And Zelensky is trying to make the case that's not true. They can stop the Russians in at the current line of contact, make the price of Russians advancing so high and bleed the Russian economy at the same time that he will run out of resources to fund the war. And then basically what will happen is the war will stop at the current line of contact. Right? But and so it's been this constant battle to shape Trump. And Witkoff largely believes in the Russian perspective here that it's that it is inevitable that Donetsk will fall sooner rather than later, even though the intelligence assessment has changed a bit. Right. In September, it was uh th up to 30 months, and now the assessment is about 20 months, so they shaved almost a year off the assessment.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Adam Entous:

So, but it still is a long time. And really what's going on here is that the Russians are running out of money to fund the war, and the Ukrainians are running out of soldiers and munitions to maintain the lines. So it's kind of like what's gonna happen first? Are the Ukrainians gonna run out of soldiers and men, soldiers and munitions, or is Russia gonna run out of the money? And, you know, nobody really knows what's gonna happen. And there's a race, so much pressure on Ukraine, mostly on Ukraine, to basically agree to what Russia is asking for. And that's what's going on now with the talks in Paris that Whitkoff and Jared Kushner are expected to participate in. And Witkoff is leading that push. And but they're also, I don't, I also don't want to mislead the the viewers here. There is also pressure on Russia. Sanctions were belatedly applied to the large energy companies inside of Russia. And at the same time, the CIA and the military are sort of supercharging a Ukrainian drone campaign that has been targeting the Russian refineries deep inside of Russia with great impact, as well as the ghost, the shadow fleet, they call it, the Russian ships that are used to export oil to help, you know, evade sanctions. So Trump, even though he mostly seems to change his position every two days, there is pressure being applied, very much with Trump's blessing. I don't want to give him too much credit. It was actually Biden that initiated these programs. But Trump has allowed those programs to continue under his watch, and they have grown thanks to some ingenuity on the part of some CIA experts and some military experts who have helped the Ukrainians kind of focus those efforts to try to maximize the damage they're inflicting on the Russian economy, to try to reduce the amount of money that Russia has to basically continue the campaign. Again, we don't know what's going to be successful, more successful, the Ukrainian efforts to hold their lines or Russian efforts to maintain the pressure.

Miichele mcAloon:

Right. You just look at this and you wonder why didn't we cut those sanctions a year ago? Why didn't we cut them two years ago? Why didn't we start do that stepped-up drone campaign that we're doing now that being led by Dan Dreskel, who is the secretary of the army, right? And matter of fact, he goes into Ukraine with a 10,000 drone program or something like that to try to beef up the uh drone program. Why we didn't do this two years ago? Because again, woulda, coulda, shoulda, we would be in a much different place right now if, I mean, it the battlefield would be different.

Adam Entous:

Well, this goes back to kind of the Biden administration while their heart was in the right place. They were still nervous about the potential implications of some of these decisions. They were facing the same conundrum that Trump's facing. They looked at the stocks of attackums, right? These are these long-range munitions, and they realized our production lines had largely been phased out because we're waiting for the new variant, the new version of it to come to be produced. So the production line had had atrophied. They started a production line, they gave a very large number. I think it's if I remember right, it's more than 500 attackums to Ukraine in 2024, which they used in Crimea, they used some of it in Kursk, but then they basically ran out of them. And the Trump administration hasn't uh replenished those stocks, right? And not that we have them in our own stores. So I don't want to give the impression that we have like huge numbers of them that we're withholding. I think then I think if the number was public, we'd all be embarrassed and shocked by how low the number was, right? And the Chinese would be, oh my God, like, you know, that's crazy, right?

Miichele mcAloon:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Adam Entous:

So, so, you know, the the the emperor has no clothes is sort of the the realization here. And it's gonna take time for us to come out of this trough when we're slowly coming out of the trough. Meanwhile, though, I don't want to like give a totally bleak picture. The Europeans have stepped up more than I think they get credit for from the Trump administration. There are Rheinmetall, you know, this is a German manufacturer that that can produce more 155s than I believe we can produce. Production lines are going, or are some of them are going, others are being brought online next year. So that should start to alleviate, you know, reduce some of this pressure. Again, giving the credit where the credit's due here to the Ukrainians for somehow withstanding all this, you know, waffling on the part of the United States. And again, Russian incompetence, the two greatest factors here are Ukrainian uh resilience and Russian incompetence. Not that this has been handled in any way admirably by anybody, really, right? Right, right. The Ukrainians have managed to largely maintain the line. Yes, they're losing Pokrovsk slowly, very, very slowly, but no catastrophic breakthrough. Dnipro and other cities in that area are not under imminent threat, as best I could tell. And these other capabilities that the Ukrainians have been investing in, in some cases with European assistance, with European money, are going to beginning to begin to come online next year. They might be able to land the plane in a way that isn't as it's like breaking apart in the air, you know, um, they they they might actually be able to land the plane. So anyway, I don't want to paint such a dark picture of where things are, because it's shockingly not as dark as it could have been, honestly. Um but that is not because of goodwill on the part of the United States or I mean, some of it, maybe a little bit of it is, but in some quarters, the CIA in particular, and some things that UCOM has been allowed to do. The the Ukrainians, with the help of the Europeans, are they trying, they're they're trying. And again, Russian incompetence should not be understated here.

Miichele mcAloon:

Right, absolutely. My husband always says they're not 10 feet tall, but they're not 10 inches tall either. So, I mean, we have to have a realistic view of them. The really the long straw here is Putin hasn't agreed to anything at any point. And they can try to strangle them economically, uh flood the market with oil, which would hurt us economically, but would also hurt them economically. But Putin really, what incentive does he have to stop the fight? And there he really, I haven't seen one yet.

Adam Entous:

You know, those energy strikes that we mentioned that are going against the refineries, the oil refineries, by one, and according to one intelligence estimate, it's costing the Russian economy $75 million a day. $75 million a day is $750 million every 10 days. That's a lot of money. I don't want to overstate the impact of that, but that is not insignificant. So I think what is the main incentive for Putin to pull the plug on this is maybe he's realizing that his commanders have been full of shit when it comes to when it comes to their ability. Look, they started the war, they started their campaign to take Pokrovsk in July of 2024, right? Yes. So from going they took a Divka in the winter of 2024, they start the campaign to Pokrovsk in July of 2024. Here we are in January 2026. And they still don't have it. They still don't have it. I mean, they're close, but they don't have it.

Speaker 1:

Right, right, right.

Adam Entous:

If the US military was responsible for such an anemic performance, everyone would be fired and court-martialed for this. Even though the U the Russians are slowly winning here, it is really nothing to be proud of here. Right. The Russian generals kept on telling Putin give me more time, we'll take Pokrovsk. Give me more time, we'll take Donetsk. And maybe Putin is starting to realize that the Ukrainians are the same thing we're talking about here, which is that they're not, it's not going to be easy. These Ukrainians. Are tenacious. They are tenacious people. They are really, really tenacious. Unlike the soldiers that Putin is throwing in this battle who are doing it for a paycheck or whatever, to get out of prison early or whatever, these people really do actually care. They're exhausted. There are not nearly enough of them. But they really care. And they're smart and they're tenacious people. And like you said, like your husband says, not 10 feet tall, not 10 inches taller. There's something to be said for believing that you're fighting for the for something that really matters, right? And and the Ukrainians, despite being exhausted and despite all this, all the problems that they have, they they really are just incredibly resilient and tenacious. And I'm sure Putin, I mean, he won't admit it, but he should have a lot of respect for them after this.

Miichele mcAloon:

He should. And I tell you, folks, I've talked to numerous uh Ukrainians and Ukrainian soldiers, and they're clear-eyed. They're absolutely clear-eyed. They they know what they're doing. You know, yeah, they have problems, they're tired, they're exhausted, they're frustrated, they're mad, they're angry, but they are clear-eyed and they're they are focused and in their goal.

Adam Entous:

So I mean, and and think about like when you when you talk to Heg Sath or when you talk to his advisors in February of this year, what did they say? They basically were saying in private meetings that they're about to collapse, that the Ukrainians are about to collapse. I've heard that. They were saying this in February, right? They were saying this is gonna go Afghanistan 2021, this is gonna go Iraq 2014, I guess, right? This they thought it was the exact same thing. There was a French trained brigade that collapsed in during the transition in January of last year, a year ago. There was a French trained brigade that got all the best equipment from the French and NATO and it collapsed. And they thought that that was what was gonna happen to all these units. Now, those units these units are incredibly undermanned. The fact that they haven't collapsed is actually quite remarkable. Right, right. But they their going in belief was that they were all gonna collapse. They were just completely wrong about this, right? They were. And so I think they've learned actually during the course of the year how wrong they were. And I think they have a new, a new appreciation for how tenacious and stubborn these Ukrainians are, right? And respect. I think they do have respect for them. They but they didn't have it to begin with, I can tell you that. But now I think they realize that they misjudged that. And as we're entering now the second year of Trump, obviously they want to get this peace deal or whatever. They're gonna try to get it, you know, later this month, next month, next few months. But I think they do have an appreciation that the fall is not gonna fall out on the Ukrainian side. As uh and the Europeans are actually doing. They're not wrong that that pressure they applied, that dog, that that gun that they put to the head of the dog, it actually did get the Europeans to step up. Again, they talk a lot, but actually they're putting up the money now.

Miichele mcAloon:

They are, and you know what? And Trump, I gotta tell you, Trump, he uh has the credit for a lot of this of really pushing them to get up to 5%. So that is good. Okay, one last question. And I know you're not a Venezuela expert, but how much do you think this Venezuela, do you think that had any kind of influence into this whole situation? Or I mean, as it I mean, it's still an ongoing operation. We don't know everything that's happened during this operation, but do you think maybe at this point of time with the oil and gas industry, do you think that was kind of a sideways glance at Putin and in the current situation? Or do you think we're talking two different things here?

Adam Entous:

I'm I honestly I don't know. You know, one can interpret it that way. Honestly, I don't know in Trump's mind, you know, if he saw this as a way to basically say to Putin, like, we're gonna take over this little satellite that you thought you had here, right? Is he saying to Putin, like, we're gonna take care of everyone in our hemisphere, and you are entitled to do anything you want in Europe? I don't believe that's what his message was. I think it was they came up with a daring operation, not unlike the bombing of Fourdeaux, that's the you know, nuclear facility in Iran, right? A way to kind of showcase decisive leadership and that Trump saw an opportunity which was low risk, relatively low risk, in the sense that you know, he could do it, they could do it, they could pull it off, that Venezuela was weak, they're picking, they're picking on a weak country, they're not picking on a strong country. So, in other words, he can bully Ukraine to a certain extent, he can bully Venezuela, he can he can bully Iran, right? But he can't bully Putin. He can't bully China, right? No, and and so, you know, so I think that this was like an opportunity that he saw, let's just do it. And uh I do I think there was much thought that went into it. Not really. I I think like he says he's running uh Venezuela now. I mean, is he no evidence that we're running Venezuela? I mean, maybe he has a different definition of the word run.

Miichele mcAloon:

You're running Venezuela, right?

Adam Entous:

Yeah, so anyways, bottom line is is they kind of make decisions, and then you know, this is one of the things that Trump thinks is is one of his strong points. He constantly is is uh not taking a position on something, he then makes a decision, and then he can easily like completely reverse himself in a few minutes or hours or days, right? Or weeks.

Miichele mcAloon:

It seems like the last person he talked to, it changes his mind.

Adam Entous:

Yeah, or how much respect or disrespect he feels he picked up during his last phone call or last meeting, right? So, yeah. I mean, honestly, this could be a message, a sign that Putin will see, oh, I guess I get to have Ukraine now. Or it may very well be, oh, it has nothing to do with that, and they'll insist on the current agreement that's being pushed to try to get the Ukrainians to agree to. But like you said, who knows what Putin is going to decide to do.

Miichele mcAloon:

Right. Adam, I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us. I mean, you're you really are clear. You've brought up a lot of different things and different ways to look at it to further the story. And that's what a journalist should be doing. That's what a good investigative journalist should be doing. So I really appreciate it. Hopefully, you've got some big writing projects in the future. Yeah. Uh and uh and guys, this is Adam Intus in the New York Times, probably one of the best investigative reporters in the West. So you need to go look at this article because it really is filled with so much information and really, really, if you want to understand where the situation is today, this is your source. This is your article. So, Adam, thank you so much, and I wish you a happy new year.

Adam Entous:

Okay, great. You too, you too.