Should the West give more arms to Ukraine? | Peter Hitchens challenges Paul Mason

foreign we were warned repeatedly by by Russians from Yeager gaida the kind of liberal we effect to like to Vladimir Putin the kind of Russian we absolutely despise repeatedly that the expansion of NATO was going to lead to trouble we did nothing about it and I think we need to take some interest in that fact and to stop pretending that this is a purely one-sided event and also we need to have as a country a serious discussion which dissent is allowed almost every time I say things like this uh I'm I'm accused of being a Putin apologist by people who can't pronounce the first and don't understand what the second means of being some sort of Traitor and I've said lots and lots of pictures of dogs bottoms on the internet which is what happens to anybody who takes his view as it's stupid because a country which doesn't debate its own foreign policy is the sort of country which which for instance invades Suez and and gets involved in the erosion invasion of Iraq we need debate on foreign policy and dissent should not be smeared in this frankly puttanesque way that I faced so anybody he's planning to do when he put his smearing I'm ready for you and it is extraordinary how little we in this country know about Continental Europe especially anything east of the old and I think we should be a great deal more careful about getting involved in things and so we know more about it I was astonished that we actually have for the first time in my lifetime a major shooting war on the European continent which might actually become a nuclear war and far from trying to bring it to an end or seek peace my government is pouring weapons into it we certainly do know nothing of it if you're a prime minister then what would you do I'd be straining every sinew that I had to try and bring about peace talks I think you wouldn't give them any emotions the most important I think I think if you see a fire do you pour petrol onto it or do you pour water onto it feeding weapons into this is is uh it's prolonging it but if they didn't have the weapons Russia would actually win so you had people like macron achieve peace talks the idea that that Britain's contribution to this uh matter is crucial seems to me to be as with so many of our views of ourselves in the world wholly overblown and conceited uh the this is a war between the United States and Russia being fought on Ukrainian soil our contribution is purely as so many of our foreign policy actions are to do with tonying to the Americans rather than hoping to achieve any other results so do you think the Americans shouldn't have given that I think I think the Americans have have having having uh well let me let me let me avoid too much too much early controversy here and so I think the Americans have a larger responsibility than any other Nation apart from Russia to help bring about peace and I think that we and all the other major nations of the world should be using our good offices both in private diplomacy and through the United Nations to persuade them to do so I don't see any alternative to the West standing with Ukraine in order to defend its right to exist there's also a self-interested bit here Ukraine gave up nuclear weapons and the Budapest memorandum China Russia and France none of what we weren't in this maybe were just distracted at the time um China Russian and France signed a agreement with them saying we guarantee your your territorial Integrity as look if you give up your nuclear weapons they did and then we didn't to put in ripped up the Budapest memorandum I have friends at the front in um leftists you know people who here will be really anti-government at the front one of my friends his name is taras billus and he's an editor of a magazine about about the commons okay and I met him two days before the war broke out he's now at the front they sent me a picture of their the only heavy weapon in his unit which is a Maxim gun any of you military historians will know that Max higher and Maxim invented this gun in 1898 and it was in if you've ever played little toy soldiers with Russian Second World War toy soldiers they're the little machine guns with a shield okay that's the heaviest weapon he has if we hadn't sent them weapons better than that he'd be dead everybody else would be dead the torture chambers of isium will be taking place in Kiev it's to portray Ukraine and some poor pitiable unarmed country is slightly misleading if I'm a sophistic I need to Arms from somewhere if you look at the Ukrainian Army even now it says bmps t-72 C6 t62s grants the it's armed with Soviet year equipment and its Army is organized as a Soviet Army it's just that they don't want to live in a post-soviet reality are all the young people I met there want to live in a western reality and that is their right to continue watching this video click the link in the top left or in the description below or visit iai.tv for more debates and talks from the world's leading thinkers on today's biggest ideas

Channel: The Institute of Art and Ideas

Views: 26,162

Keywords: learning, education, debate, lecture, IAItv, institute of art and ideas, IAI, philosophy, peter hitchens, the war we never fought, left vs. right, great britain, peter hitchens ukraine, paul mason, ukraine war debate, should we give weapons to ukraine, politics of war, philosophy of war, philosophy debate, politics debate, morality of supporting the war, peter hitchens debate, uk politics, ukraine war, head to head, head to head paul mason peter hitchens, supporting foreign wars

Id: sUNdH1yVEAE

Length: 5min 11sec (311 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 11 2023