gerasimov and shoigu. which is what prigozhin wanted. how shocked were you by that? how surprised were you by the? very. from the officials i ve spoken to, they were as well. experienced are surprised by all of us. that s why i believe that if it is true that prigozhin has backed off and compromised, he s gotten something in return. it s probably gerasimov and shoigu s heads, on a stick. you know, and we don t know yet whether is actually an organized russian military attack on his own wagner forces. you know, prigozhin has been the tip of the spear for vladimir putin beyond ukraine, throughout other continents in african elsewhere. so, he s been prosecuting russian foreign policy in syria
prigozhin. prigozhin says he s now moving back towards ukraine. it s not clear how far he s going to go. it s not at all clear what prigozhin has agreed to, or with whom he s agreed. so, all to say, the big picture is, putin is in trouble. maybe has weathered the storm for the moment. he s got big problems. the other thing is, ukrainians are preparing their counteroffensive. so, if not today, if not tomorrow, ambassador taylor, you have spoken about this multiple times. i ve asked you this question multiple times. what is the off ramp for ukrainians? when does this actually end? when does russia admit defeat? could this feasibly be the beginning of an off ramp for the war in ukraine? it could. it could, yasmin. if putin has the difficulties that i just described. if prigozhin is shown to be, is
clearly not a strong player in the defense of this line that the russians are trying to hold in ukraine, if the morale of the russian soldiers is as bad as it must be, as they have been it s been shown that the russian chain of command is in disarray, and it s been shown that some of the russian units have been pulled off the line to go back into russia to defend itself. against prigozhin. all of those indicate that there is an opportunity for the ukrainians to push through this counteroffensive, and to get into the russian rear. and get into a place where the russians, and you asked what ends this? this ends with president putin realizing that he s lost. that he s lost in ukraine. and he tries to come up with some kind of an agreement. when he decides, when he realizes, when he concludes that he s lost?
counter special operations forces. not heavily armed, hardened military leaders. the fact is, there s an element of self preservation with all the moves that prigozhin was countering, wagner have been encountering, they were not gonna go up against tanks in these heavily armed formations. an air force that looks like it did, some six or seven combination of planes and helicopters were shot down. you know, the biggest takeaway for me from this, this is not the end of the story. each all a dark will look to secure their position, potentially through the idea of securing a small army. we ve entered a period of war, the russia ukraine more, of a men s instability. a lot of opportunity for ukraine, ukraine could seize the momentum from the gaps in command and control and probably secure some territory. it s a hugely unstable period of time. and someone foreseeable, frankly, based on the fact that russia was losing this war for pretty much the past year. i asked this question a
lloyd austin is making another trip to asia are we seeing a growing importance of asia to washington? that importance has been growing for some time and there is a difference between the temporary priority that the war in ukraine is making in washington and the recognition that the long term priority is our relations in asia both economic and security. and the problem of balancing the interests and cooperation for economic reasons with the interests in a more steadfast policy towards china for security reasons is the prime issue for the american foreign policy beyond ukraine. the us china tensions policy beyond ukraine. the us china tensions remain - policy beyond ukraine. the us china tensions remain very - policy beyond ukraine. the us| china tensions remain very key to this summit. at china s defence secretary, li shangfu choosing not to meet with the us counterpart this weekend, what did you make of that? is a