Zelenskyy-Biden meeting resembles meeting of Churchill and Roosevelt before the US entered World War II – American expert Fried 

President Zelenskyy paid a visit to the United States, he met with President Joseph Biden and representatives of the American Parliament. An extremely important conversation with President Biden took place. We have carefully read official statements in Ukraine and outside Ukraine, and listened to official statements. But the main question is how do you assess what was left out of public reports? What was, in your opinion, the most important thing - we are talking about concrete results for Ukraine as a result of President Zelenskyy's visit to the US?

I think president Zelenskyy had three objectives in mind. The first was to encourage the Americans to send more weapons to Ukraine and more sophisticated weapons. The second objective, even more important, was to invest and increase American political support for Ukraine. It's important that this support continues and I think Zelenskyy's address to Congress was intended to prolong and increase that support. The third objective was to have a strategic consultation with the president of the US, because this is a wartime summit and it has some resemblance to the summit between Churchill and Roosevelt before the United States entered the war. 

I don't think the US is going to war with Russia - we're not, we don't want to, but we are going to continue to support Ukraine. So the two presidents needed to have a face-to-face conversation about Ukraine's survival in this war of Russian aggression and this is a serious conversation. We all want victory for Ukraine, as president Zelenskyy said. And there needed to be a conversation of how the battlefield looks, how Russia looks, how Putin looks, and where we go from here. This was an important Summit.

Ukraine is fighting for its life. Americans know this. I think president Zelenskyy did a very good job both thanking the Americans for help and pushing them for more help. This is not easy, and he did it well. Putin is not winning on the battlefield, so he is trying to destroy Ukraine by destroying its energy infrastructure. I do not think he will succeed but we in the west need to help Ukraine both militarily and within support for its infrastructure. This costs money right now. The Congress of the United States is considering a huge budget package that includes 45 billion dollars for Ukraine. I hope this package goes through and we should know it by the end of the week. You're absolutely right that the US should continue to send weapons and should increase its quality as well as the quantity of those weapons. Ukraine has proven that it knows how to fight and use these weapons. The latest American decision to send Patriot systems to Ukraine is a good one. There needs to be more of these sent, and Ukraine is right to push but the Americans have done a lot already. So this is a war that hangs in the balance, and we do not know whether the next Ukrainian attacks will succeed. We suspect if the Russians try to attack that they will fail. We also know the stress that the Ukrainian economy is under because of Russian attacks. But we also can suspect and there is some evidence of stress in Russia. Ukraine is fighting for its survival. Russia is fighting for Putin's imperial vanity, and Russians don't always fight so well when they're fighting for the imperial vanity of the czar or Vladimir Putin. So much hangs in the balance and we don't yet know how this will turn out.

A war, particularly with Russia, is a competition for resources. Putin recently visited Belarus and met with Lukashenko. It is clear what was the main purpose of Putin's visit to Belarus: he is persuading Lukashenko to enter the war. In any case, we see the deployment of the Russian military group on the territory of Belarus. They may not have enough military forces to try to break through our border, but they can use powerful missile systems to shell our cities, we are talking about Central and Western Ukraine. In your opinion, what was the result of the meeting between Putin and Lukashenko?

Lukashenko supports Putin in principle and politically. But like Franco, the Spanish dictator in World War II, he's not quite willing to commit to support somebody else's war of aggression. I can't give you an answer as to whether Belarus will enter the war on Russia's side, nor can I tell you what will happen if they try. I don't think the Belarusian Army would be enthusiastic about this fight, and I don't think the Belarusian people would be enthusiastic either. After all, the Belarussian democratic opposition is fighting in some sense the same fight the Ukrainian people are fighting - for independence and for freedom. But I can't predict and I won't predict whether Putin will try a new offensive from Belarus territory. Some people think he might, others believe that he doesn't have the resources. I tend to think that Russian resources are limited.

Putinism is a system based on lies and theft. Lies and Theft. And putinism has weakened the Russian military just as it has weakened Russia as a whole. But it doesn't matter what I think. Putin may try new attacks, and we in the West have to be prepared to continue our support for Ukraine.

Yes, the situation is extremely serious. Russia, and Putin in particular, are preparing for the so-called long war. I do not see any signals indicating that Putin and the Russians are tired of the aggressive war against us. Now they are starting to strengthen mobilization measures. We understand that this story can last longer. What are the remaining tools in the hands of the West, in particular economic, financial, perhaps some additional ones that would hurt the Russian economy so much that they would be forced to negotiate with the entire civilized humanity. We have read more than one statement from, for example, the G7, the European Union. We see that sanctions packages are implemented one after another. The Russian economy is still standing. There are companies that provide the Russian military with chips, with the help of which they begin to rebuild missile systems, which then fly into our peaceful cities and kill us. What, in your opinion, should be improved in the current sanctions policy of the West in order to make the Kremlin feel how painful it is to fight against Ukraine?

There are two forms of economic pressure on Russia that the West including the United States has either launched recently or is planning to increase. One of them is restrictions on Russian exports, and the latest and biggest example of this is the oil price cap. That's a complicated mechanism, not easy to enforce, but there is already evidence that it is depriving Putin, depriving Russia of revenues that it needs. It is cutting into Russia's profits from the sale of oil. I don't want to get too satisfied because Russia will try to cheat. This oil price cap needs to be enforced, but the purpose is to reduce Putin's and Russia’s income, and there is a very good chance it will succeed.

Secondly, can we learn from this example? Are there other areas of Russian exports which we can go after? Possibly. Secondly, we have had good results in restricting our own exports to Russia, particularly of chips, microprocessors that seems to have had an impact on Russian automobile and other kinds of production. In other words it works. It won't work perfectly but it doesn't have to. It has to work well enough and it seems to be working. So the question is are there other areas of export restrictions we can try? I believe that both Europe and the United States are considering their next moves in this regard, and I wouldn't be shocked if we saw some action taken after the holidays, early in the new year. So you are absolutely right, there is more we can do. Pressure on the Russian economy will work but it will take time, so the major instrument we have is of course weapons for Ukraine and support for Ukrainian energy infrastructure. That's the most urgent task but the economic pressure on Russia will build over time. I remember the 1980s the economic pressure against the Soviet Union was not as strong as it is now and the Soviet economy eventually failed, so we need to put more pressure on Russia and my former colleagues in the U.S Administration are thinking of ways to do it, and I suspect it's their thinking plan.

The so-called peace plans - Kissinger's peace plan, President Macron's statements and so on - all create a picture that seems to suggest that some negotiations are possible. It was emphasized, particularly in the White House, that three scenarios are being considered, at least according to The Washington Post. Those scenarios that involve the loss of our territories, in particular the case of the temporarily occupied Crimea, are not accepted by our side. What tracks will be productive now and what, in your opinion, is happening in this huge diplomatic pyramid? A lot of people come up with different initiatives, and it is hard to say whether they do it on their own behalf or they represent certain environments, financial or industrial groups. It is not only about Mr. Kissinger, it is about world diplomacy in general.

Do you remember the speculation about negotiations during and immediately after president Macron's visit to Washington? President Biden said he didn't object to negotiations in principle, and president Macron said he didn't want to force Ukraine in the negotiations. So there was immediate speculation - maybe there are negotiations that can happen. But the very next day the Kremlin said that negotiations have to start with the recognition that Russia has new territories, in other words the Russians are willing to negotiate only on the basis of Ukrainian and Western surrender. That's not a serious negotiating position, so I don't have much interest in hypothetical discussions of negotiations when the Kremlin is clearly not serious about negotiations at all, except on its own terms. 

I’ve read Henry Kissinger's article, the only interesting point in that article was that he said that Ukraine and NATO need to deepen their relationship, and he hinted at something like serious security guarantees for Ukraine. Now that is interesting. But the whole notion of Kissinger's idea was predicated on Ukrainian surrender of millions of people and land including territories that Russia occupied by force, illegally the Donbas. I don't think the Kremlin is serious, at least not yet. The Biden Administration is correct. It doesn't oppose negotiations but it is helping Ukraine achieve the best possible results on the battlefield so that it will be able to negotiate on its terms to the degree possible and not Putin's terms. And I think President Biden was pretty clear about that in his conversations with Zelenskyy. But I think there are too many people who are too eager to go into negotiations, and for them negotiations start with Ukraine surrendering people and territory, which is a bad idea.

How long do you think the war can last? In particular, it is an attempt to measure the financial, human and other resources of the Kremlin. We understand that if Putin is ready for some decisions, the main thing will still happen on the battlefield. But there is an equally important question - a question of resources. So to what extent will the Russian economy be ready to seriously get on the military track? We see that they have resumed, for example, the production of heavy equipment - it seems that they are preparing, perhaps, to wage a permanent war. That is, they will try to freeze the situation in certain frontline areas in order to preserve them in the future for six months, a year and so on.

You are absolutely right that Russia would probably regard a temporary ceasefire as a moment to pause and regain its strength and attack again. This is obvious considering that this is pretty much what happened after 2014. It used the Minsk process to gain time and prepare its next assault on Ukraine. We would be stupid to expect otherwise, and I don't like being stupid. But the question is can Putin succeed? And that is not clear to me. The Russian economy is under stress. Russian society does not support the war, they are forced to express their support. And if you listen to the rather hysterical fascist rantings on Russian state television, I can imagine that outside of a small extremist part of Russian society most Russians are indifferent. And the evidence of that is the hundreds of thousands of young men who fled the country to avoid the draft. 

This is not the Great Patriotic War. This is more like the Russo-Japanese war or World War I, both of which Russia lost. Ukrainian suffering is enormous. The Russian people have either no idea or don't care but they would be unwilling to do what the Ukrainians are doing - to suffer that much, and I think Putin

understands this. Which is why time is not necessarily on his side if Ukraine can get through this winter, and if we in the West are serious about economic pressure on Russia and provide more military and economic support for Ukraine. This is not easy, but president Zelenskyi was right - U.S support for Ukraine is not charity, it is an investment in our own security.

Yes, but we know the example of Cuba and North Korea, where the standard of living was rapidly falling, reaching the very bottom. But people carried out criminal orders of their generals and their Communist Party secretaries. Now we have another extremely dangerous story - it is about Iran and its ballistic program. Does the civilized West still have sanctions mechanisms that would put so much pressure on Iran so that it would not supply ballistic missiles to Russia, which without exaggeration would be used to kill us?

It is true that Russia is strengthening its relations with Iran, and Iran is supplying Russia with weapons. I expect North Korea is doing the same. As for our pressure on Iran, we're doing a lot against Iran, and I don't think that additional pressure will stop all of the Iranian weapon sales to Russia. But those weapon sales will not make a strategic difference in the war. The weapons aren't good enough. I don't think Iran will make a critical difference. It's not clear to me what Russia is going to gain from prolonging this war. They may lose. Putin doesn't appear to be a confident person. He has canceled his New Year's press conference, his New Year's reception, as well as his address to the Russian Duma. Has he done these because of bad health? Has he done this because he fears the reaction? Either way it is not the sign of a confident leader. We have to remember this. We know of our own problems, we know of the suffering of the Ukrainians. What we aren't sure about is how much pressure the Russian system is under, and I suspect it is under quite a bit of pressure. They are not winning the war, they know it. And the West and democracies have not been as divided or weak as Putin expected and hoped. Putin is more isolated in the world.

Benjamin Netanyahu, who's going to be the next Israeli Prime Minister, do you think he is going to be happy with Putin's relations with Iran? India has already canceled its annual Summit with Russia, for the first time in 20 years. Russia is isolated and we have to remember even as we address our own divisions that the divisions and weaknesses of Russia can be even greater.

And what will be China's role? There was an extremely strange visit. We don't know the whole truth, but the former President of the Russian Federation Medvedev, the man who replaced Putin in office, who is responsible for the war against Georgia, who is now making unacceptable and obscene statements, tweeting all sorts of nonsense. Well, Dmitry Medvedev met with Xi Jinping. I do not know about Medvedev's powers. There is an assumption that he brought some either oral or written proposal from Putin. So what is China's position and to what extent will China be ready to influence Russia in order to deter or recall Putin's imperialist desires?

Do you think that the Chinese are impressed with Putin's unsuccessful war against Ukraine? I don't. Do you think that they were pleased that Russia launched this war right after the Chinese and Russians concluded an agreement about friendship without limits? I don't think so. I think that the Chinese are appalled by Russia’s poor performance, by its strategic misjudgments, by its clumsiness in starting something that it can neither control nor stop. Russia has always been a junior partner to China, at least for the last few years. Now it is quite obvious - they are an aggressive and incompetent junior partner. I doubt that the Chinese are going to engage in risks for Putin's sake. Moreover, don't forget the Chinese have their own big problems. The Chinese government reversed itself on Covid restrictions. Now Covid is spreading very quickly through China. That is going to hit their economy, their economic growth is low. The Chinese president Xi and Biden had a pretty good meeting on the margins of the G20 Summit, which means that the Chinese may not want to increase their confrontation with the United States. Moreover, they saw that the West is not as weak as they might have imagined and that they are not as strong as they hoped. What does that do for Russia? It ought to alarm any serious strategist in the Kremlin, if there are any left, that China is not going to stand with Russia, that it cannot stand with Russia as Putin drags it into greater and greater adventures. I doubt that the Chinese  will risk violating U.S sanctions, even the oil price cap. Oh they won't agree to the oil price cap, but they might tacitly observe it. No, Putin's position is not strong. Small comfort to Ukrainians who are suffering, I understand this, but strategically this is not the way Putin thought things would go. He's made serious misjudgments, his position is much weaker than it was a year ago. 

In your opinion, what should President Zelenskyy do on top of everything he has already done? We understand how much work our government and our army have to do now. But maybe you see certain steps that our government should take to improve our situation.

 Much depends on the battlefield and I cannot possibly give advice to the Ukrainians who are fighting for their lives. The Ukrainian government I think knows perfectly well what it needs to do, which is help its people get through the winter, maintain political support in the West and make sound military decisions, which by the way it seems to have done pretty consistently. It has shown sound judgment throughout this phase of the war. At some point this phase of the war will end and there will be a period of reconstruction and I hope -  transformation. The Ukrainian people are fighting to have a European country with European standards of governance, honesty and the rule of law. A transformation is possible, I think the Ukrainian people will insist on it. But right now there's a war on.

The Ukrainian government has shown solid leadership in this situation. The Ukrainian military has done magnificently. President Zelenskyy's visit to Washington was successful, he made a powerful impression in Congress. So much depends on the battlefield, but the supporters of Ukraine - the Poles, those in Germany who support Ukraine, the British, the Canadians, the Americans - all know what the stakes are. We are all looking at this in the same way. This is important. Ukraine is fighting for its and our freedom - as the Poles used to say and it applies to Ukraine as well. We know this.

So it's Christmas time, as president Zelenskyy said, and I think the Ukrainian people fighting for their lives will do well.  They will succeed and therefore Slava Ukraini!