The Duran Podcast - Russia Recalibrates After Trump's Iran War

Episode Date: March 28, 2026

Russia Recalibrates After Trump's Iran War

All right, Alexander, let's do an update on the conflict in Ukraine. So, Alexander, I think we have a lot of ground to cover in this video. We can also talk about the economic situation in Moscow, in Russia, sorry, because we do have some news from Nabilina out of Moscow as to the economic situation in Russia. And we could talk about what's happening on the front lines and also talk about I think it would be interesting to talk about Putin and Dimitriev and the diplomacy, Lavrov's recent statements, the perceived diplomacy, if there even is a diplomacy that is taking place. Peskov has made statements as well about the diplomacy as has Ushikov.

So I guess in this video we'll cover pretty much everything as to what's going on with Project Ukraine and also with Russia and what's happening in the Kremlin. So where would you like to begin? I think we should start with the Kremlin and what is going on there because my very clear sense is that since December, starting with the Valdai attack, the importance of which, in my opinion, simply cannot be overstated. I mean, it was an absolutely seminal event in deciding the direction of events from that point. onward. But since December, I think there's been a sea change, not just in Russian policy, but in Russian attitudes and political discussions that are taking place in Russia, in the

Kremlin itself, in wider Russian society. And these have now been strongly reinforced by two particular specific events. One is the conflict between the United States and Iran, which has undoubtedly shaped opinion inside Russia. And just to anticipate, Russian opinion tends to be strongly pro-Iran on this issue. And there's been comparisons are being made within Russia between the way that Russia has handled its relations with the United States and the way Iran has handled its relations with the United States and has conducted the war. So that is one thing. The other are developments in the economy. And here, this is actually where I'm going to start, because in January, we got economic news. And for the first time in, I think three years,

we actually saw a contraction. GDP in January was 2% below where it was in January 2025. Industrial production held up better. It was at 0.8% down, but that is still a decline. Now, the Russians have become very used over the last four years to see the economy grow. And of course, in 2023, 2024, the economy grew strongly. It grew by 4%. And not only grew, but there was a lot of investment, there was a lot of development. The aerospace industry has been moving forward rapidly. The computer microprocessor, that side of

the economy has also been growing very strongly, machine building, all of those things, as well as consumer because everything has been going at a fair pace. Suddenly, after a slowdown in 2025, we see an actual fall in January. And this is entirely, and I want to stress this again, it is entirely caused by one overriding factor. And that is monetary policy. Now, we've discussed this in program after program. What happened was that in 2023, early 2024, Nebula and the central bank cut interest rates too far.

That led to overheating in the economy, especially in the housing and construction sectors. That also led to an investment boom, which caused further overheating. and pressure in the labor market, and altogether that pushed inflation up to 10%. Now, Nebulae reacted, as she always does in these situations, by pushing up interest rates very, very high. She pushed interest rates up to 21% at one point, which is unimaginable in the West, extraordinary even for Russia. What has happened since then is that steadily inflation has declined. And by the end of 2025, it fell to around 5%. There's a tick up in the winter, as by the way, there always is in Russia. In this particular winter, in this particular case, there was a further,

The tick up went further up because there was an increase in VAT, always unpopular with people, and it always pushes up inflation. But that is a temporary factor, which is ebbing away. But even as inflation has fallen, Nebulaeck also has been doing the same thing that she always does, which is cut interest rates by baby steps. So she tends to cut interest rates by 50 base points at a time over an extended period. And the effect of that is that real interest rates continue to be at about 10%. So if you have 10% inflation,

and 21% interest rates as you did by the end of 2024, then your real interest rate is about 10%. If you have 5% inflation and 15% interest rates, which is what you have in Russia today, then real interest rates are still at 10%. This is, I think, something that is always easy for people to understand. So, you know, they look at interstrates. They've come down from their peak, but they're not coming down as fast as people need, given the underlying fall in inflation. And, of course, this is now starting to choke off investment. It's having all of the problems.

If you remember, we discussed in a programme. that we did in the summer. Now, Nebula has repeatedly assured people that these high interest rates are necessary, first to bring down inflation still further, to meet her 4% target. And she wants to do that this year. But also that these high interest rates,

high though they are, will not result in a recession. She promised Putin that. She said, There will be no recession in Russia. All the indications are that there will be no recession. She has repeatedly given that promise. Well, what has now happened is that in January, we have the first indications of a recession, an actual contraction.

Now, to repeat, this is not because of sanctions. It's not because of low oil prices. there has been an increase in the budget deficit. But we can now see that that increase in the budget deficit was partly caused by the fact that in January, the economy started to contract. And that obviously reduces tax revenue. So Nebula now is on the back foot.

And so is Putin, because of course, Putin backed her throughout this very high interest rate policy, as he usually does. So we had an extremely defensive statement from the Buehliner, admitting that economic activity over the winter was, as she put it, less strong than the government, than the central bank anticipated. And we had a meeting in which Putin discussed economic questions. And you could see that Putin himself was upset about this. He was upset about the contraction in January.

This is obviously going to rub off on Nebula. I anticipate we're going to see interest rates fall faster this year than perhaps Nebulae originally intended. Now, this economic backdrop, this shifts in the economy, which, as I said, are very very linked to the central bank's monetary policies, not to sanctions, not to oil, prices, all of those things. They have, in part, I think, explained a lot of the murmurings that have been taking place in Moscow over the last few weeks. I mean, people sense that the economy is weaker, and that's making them upset. And they also...

so have been increasingly frustrated, and this has been true throughout 2025, but it became increasingly so after the Valdai attack, by the fact that the government, that Putin himself continued to talk about dialogue, negotiations with Donald Trump and seemed to rely on Donald Trump as some way of fixing the situation in the war. I have argued that since the Valdai attack, the reality is that Russian government policy on the war, on the diplomacy, has hardened. And in fact, I would suggest that over the last two weeks, we've seen further proof of this. Firstly, there was another meeting. The Ukrainians and the Americans, the Russians, apparently, had been invited to kind of.

they decided that they would not come. So the Russians stayed away. There was this meeting. The Ukrainians and the Americans discussed all of the same things. The messaging from Moscow, from Uschaakov especially, is that the Russians will stick rigidly with what was agreed in Anchorage between Putin and Trump. We've never really been told what that was. my sense about the Anchorage agreement is that Trump said to Putin, basically we will accept Istanbul Plus. But the Russians in return made some agreements about sequencing. So first a Ukrainian withdrawal from Dombas, then a Ukrainian withdrawal from other places. I think one of the reasons why the Ukrainians are so resistant to withdrawing from

Donbass is that they don't want, they know that that is a pathway to Istanbul Plus, which obviously they don't want to see. The Russians are sticking strongly by that. So this meeting that took place between the Americans and the Ukrainians went nowhere. The Russians say it's going nowhere. Ushikov's comments basically point to something going around. In a circle, Zelensky is complaining about this. I think the reality is that there's been a discussion in the Kremlin

since the Valdai attack, an agreement that there should be no further concessions made. I think this became obvious when Medinsky rejoined the negotiations. But this has not been communicated. to the Russian people. And it's causing dissonance because Putin himself, who's clearly embarrassed by this, because he spent most of 2025 trying to develop a relationship with Trump, instead of coming out straightforwardly and saying, we're not really in negotiations anymore, he's basically withdrawn completely from the Ukrainian issue, the diplomacy issue. And in the meantime, time, it's left to others, notably Dimitri F, he remains visible, he's talking to the Americans

still. We're going to discuss him in a moment because I think that we might be seen quite a lot from him in the future for reasons I will explain. But the messaging in Moscow is not to the wider Russian public is not getting through. Now, my sense is that if you are looking at overall popularity in Russia, Putin remains pretty much as popular as he has ever been. He still has a massive, loyal constituency within the Russian population. If you're looking at elite people, people in the Kremlin. I think a decision about Ukraine and the negotiations with the Americans has been made. And I think that particular question has dissipated. If you are looking at some people within the Russian patriotic nationalist movement, they are still very frustrated. They still don't

understand why Dimitriyev is out there. They're frustrated because Putin isn't explaining things clearly. There was, there's been criticisms of Putin on social media, both in Russia and in the West. There was a strong attack on him on Vladimir Soloviovs program, which is a program broadcast on Russian terrestrial television. So you could see that there is this criticism. that Putin is not taking the strong line on Ukraine and with the Americans that he should be. I don't think this is a problem for Putin because I think within the leadership, within the Kremlin, this issue has been resolved, but it is affecting his wider popularity, perhaps, with the nationalist section of Russian society. But I think most of the critical,

criticism, most of the concerns come from the business community, come from industrial leaders, come from people who work in business. And that is now an enormous part of the Russian population, who are becoming increasingly frustrated with this very tight monetary policy, which, despite all the promises, now does threaten potential recession. I don't think. I don't think, there will be a recession. I think monetary policy is going to be east significantly this year. I think Nebula's comments, if you read them carefully, show that. But as I said, there's been damaged done. And Putin spoke to Russian industrialists and business people just a day or day ago, very widely publicized speech.

And you could see that it was a speech of reassurance. He said that we're going to be stable. We're going to move forward with our overall economic plans. And we are going to use the money from the higher oil price, not to engage in some big spending program, but to pay off the debts, to stabilize things, so that we can move forward further in future. So it was a speech basically Putin telling the business people,

look, I know what you're all thinking, I know what you're worried about. We are listening to you. Remain calm. We will have this under control. How does the oil price factor in to all of this? Yeah, well, this is very interesting. 100 plus oil price. Yeah, absolutely.

Okay. So this is, I think, something that we need to understand about this. But the Russians, it swings and roundabouts. On the one hand, a very high oil price, which is what we're likely to get over the next few weeks, is a financial bonus. I mean, it means that money is now pouring back into Russia. It means that the government's budgets can be balanced or balanced better. Putin, in this speech to the industrialist, said we need to take a conservative approach to this. We should not use this bonanza for some massive spending screen.

He's absolutely right about that. Doing that would reignite inflation. So that's not what you want to do. What you need to do is to stabilize things now. You need to bring this thing back into balance. You need to avoid recession, in other words, and pay off, pay down debt. If you pay down debt, then that gives you scope for more sustained investment in future. And he warned, and this is exactly a point I've made in previous programmes,

he warned that yes, oil prices now are high, but they're going to go down soon. He actually said this. He said, never assume that the oil price is going to remain. high for very long. We see that it goes up and then it goes down again, that there's high demand and then there's low demand because of global recessions. So what we've got to do is we've got to use this bonanza, not to go hell-bent on a huge spending spree, but to stabilize things now so that we can move forward in the future. And the audience like that, by the way, and it got a big round of applause.

So again, it's important to say that all of these people, the industrial people, all the business people, the people in the financial part of the economy, fundamentally, and this is the thing that I think people in the West need to understand, they are conservatives in the way that they believe the economy should be run. They are, the discussion in Russia about economics, about fiscal and spending policies is between different types of conservatives, people who want a more moderate monetary policy, the Nambulina wants, but who also want, you know, control. They don't want, you know, Erdogan style, zero interest rates and big deficit spending. That's not what they're about at all. So there are people like that who won't say, you know, monetary policy mustn't be as tight as it is now. We should be more balanced about fiscal policy.

But again, they are, by most standards, fiscal conservatives and monetary conservatives. And then we have the extreme fiscal monetary hawks who are there in the central bank, who are haunted by. Russia's recent history of hyperinflation and who always overcompensate against any sign of financial and discipline or monetary indiscipline and do so by massive overcompensating. So we're going to see the pendulum swing and it's going to be swing further towards, you know, the more moderate. But you will never see in Russia the kind of reckless spending sprees that you would

in some economies as a result of the oil price boom that we're seeing now. So you mentioned that this recession, this downtick in the economy has nothing to do with sanctions or anything like that. The West and the US and the EU are not going to see it like that. Of course. They're going to look at these figures and they're going to say our sense. sanctions are working. Yeah, absolutely.

So let's ratchet them up. Which is another point, by the way, people in Russia are making, which is one reason why it was very, very important politically that Russia avoid recession. I mean, a slowdown in the pace of growth is one thing. An actual contraction is another thing entirely. And I mean, this point has been made to Putin. many times, and it's made by Putin himself. So, you know, there's an awful lot of people who are very angry with a

abuelina at the moment because she gave clear promises that there would not be a recession, there would not be a contraction. The central bank's messaging was relentlessly about that, and instead, in January, the contraction came. Now, I should quickly say, there were factors. I mean, there were few working days this January than there were last, in January last year. The weather was colder, and that does obviously have an effect on economic activity. But you could push those points ultimately.

And Nebula was trying to, but that's never going to convince many people. Yeah, I agree. So, Telegram, I think let's talk about Telegram, and then we'll talk about Iran and how the war in Iran is affecting Russia. Yeah. How it's affecting the perception of Putin and the way he's going about the war with Ukraine and the West. But before we get there, the policy towards Telegram has been a disaster. You want to talk about poor messaging. The whole telegram thing is very poor messaging, the cutting off of telegram and trying to herd everyone into their new application called Max.

I understand it. They want to control their information space, absolutely. But they're going about it all wrong. Well, indeed. And this is a typical Russian mess in the sense that it's exactly how the Russian government and bureaucracy often does things. So, Telegram is, of course, as we all know, a platform which originated in Russia is very, very widely used in Russia. Pavel Durov, its founder is ultimately Russian. And it is one of the most widely used messaging apps and platforms in Russia.

Lots of companies, entities, businesses. have their social media presence on telegram. It's used to send messages very, very regularly. People phone each other on it. They get all kinds of things on it. And, of course, Russian ministries do. The Russian Ministry of Defense has a very interesting presence on telegram. I mean, you can go there and you can read all the updates that they provide and all sorts of things.

And other Russian government entities do. So last year, the Russian government, Russian security agencies come along, tell Putin we have to gain full control of our information space. There's reasons to think that Ukrainian agents operating the dirty war inside our country are using telegram, which by the way is unquestionably true. So we need to shut it down. We need to shut it down right away. We're going to set up our own government control platform, which is max, and it's going to be the one that everybody must use from now on. And so the decree is issued.

We're going to slow down telegram. We're going to switch off telegram. Nobody quite knows what they were going to do. But ultimately, everybody could see that they wanted to switch off telegram. and get everybody on to Max. Max is new. Nobody knows how good it's going to be. There are the inevitable teething problems.

In Russia, because of the history, anything that is government connected and is about information is always going to invite suspicion. I mean, you know, we're talking about, you know, the country which 30 years ago was the Soviet Union. So it's understandable that there are those sort of concerns. And, well, Max wasn't ready to absorb this flow, and it really wasn't set up to do that in any

effective way. And in the meantime, there's been pressure on Telegram. It's slow, it's slower than it was. It's not working as well as it was. People are very upset and angry about this. And you can see that certain departments of the government are in effect in rebellion against this policy. And one of the most interesting ones is the Ministry of Defense, which continues to publish its channel on telegram. It remains as active and as busy as ever. It's as if they're paying absolutely no attention to what the other part of the Russian government. has been up to. Putin himself has said absolutely nothing about this. I mean, he's been completely silent about the telegram episode. Peskov, his spokesman, does the usual thing.

Oh, you know, whenever he's asked about this, well, you don't ask me, go to the relevant ministry, talk to them about this. It's something to do with me. This is a government issue. This is leaving everybody very, very frustrated. I spoke about how, on the the nationalist side of things. There's been a lot of criticism of Putin over the negotiations with the Americans, over all of those kind of things, the conduct of the war, all of those sort of things. Bear in mind that all of these people, where do they go? Where do they mostly publish?

They publish on Telegram. That's where all of these various channels are located. Suddenly they see that they're at risk of being closed down. unless they move to Max, which, as I said, is a government-controlled thing, they are furious. And one of the reasons they are so angry is, with Putin, it's not just about the war and all of these other things,

but because they feel that telegram has been pulled from underneath them and that this is in part a Kremlin plot to close them all. down because there's always that fear in Russia. So this has led to a great deal of disaffection and anger across Russia. And again, if it had been done in a more structured way, if people had been told in advance that, you know, this is the problem. We're having to think of alternatives because the Ukrainians are using telegram and it is becoming dangerous. We're setting up this alternative. We advise you. We recommend that you gradually move on to NACS. This is a much better platform. We will work and improve it and that this will take, we accept that this will take

time to do. This would not have been an issue. But the way it was done was an absolute disaster. But it's often the way the Russian government works. It does things in a very arbitrary manner without wider consultation and expects that everybody will simply do as they're told. Now, that might have worked once upon a time in the Soviet era, but it obviously doesn't work today. Yeah, well, the whole telegram thing is also on top of all the other sites that are blocked. So it's just a major headache for everybody. Everybody. You have to have a VPN, and sometimes the VPN works.

Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you use the application in the center. Nothing works. Yes. You leave the center. It might work. And so, I mean, the whole thing has been just a complete mess. It's a complete mess.

But the telegram thing is important because it's a Russian. It's a Russian. Yeah. It was seen as a Russian application. It's very popular, but it's also the last platform that was left, to be quite honest, the last messaging app that was left because most of the other messaging apps have been shut down, not working. Or you need the VPN.

That's the thing you need to have the VPN. And even VPNs are blocked. So you have to search for VPNs that work. There was a lot of other ways they could have gone about this without even shutting down telegram without even touching it, without even shutting down or touching the other sites, to be quite honest. They didn't have to go this route. I don't know why they did it, but there were a lot of other ways, technical ways and marketing

ways that they could have gone about controlling information space. Of course. They took the easy way. They took the lazy way. Well, the arbitrary way, which is very much the way that the Russian state does things. Now, I will say that probably they will be a little bit more flexible. We're probably going to see telegram functioning rather longer. The restrictions may loosen.

I think the direction of travel is very much in the direction. direction of, you know, gaining control of the Russian information space. And by the way, there would be a very strong constituency, probably a majority of people in Russia who would ultimately support that. But in the meantime, massive damage has been done. And of course, again, Putin, who has, I mean, ignored this whole topic, which is a topic which affects people. I mean, it affects everybody. This is a very, very internet-based society now. Putin has avoided everything to do with it. He's not come out. He's not spoken about it. He's not addressed people's concerns about it. It's not discussed on his Q&A's. He's steered completely away from the whole discussion.

Yeah, well, where is Putin? What is Putin up to? You mentioned that he has given a speech on the economy. He rarely talks about Ukraine anymore. He doesn't. I mean, I don't think he talks about Ukraine at all, to be quite honest, over the past couple of months. Yes. You had some statements from Peskov. Once again, Peskhov calling the United States partners and this type of language. Ushikov gave some statements as well.

He also paints the picture of things going well with the United States. United States, even though there is pushback or hardening with regards to what was agreed on in Anchorage. You have Dimitriev on social media, lavishing praise on Trump while hating. He hits the UK and the EU super hard when it comes to the United States and Trump. I mean, it is best buddies, best friends, best buddies, peace on earth, stuff like that. And all of this is happening at a time. when you have the war in the Middle East, the war with Iran, where being connected to Trump right now is probably not the best thing for world leaders to do. It's not going to help your reputation. You're polling at home, hitching, hitching to Trump because this Iran war is extremely unpopular, even in the United States. I imagine it's much more unpopular.

in Russia. And then you get into the dynamics, just real quick, you get into the dynamics of how Iran is fighting this war, which is now being compared to Putin's policy with the war in Ukraine. Now, two very different situations, two very different wars. All of this is understood, but at a surface level, on a very basic surface level, there is that comparison of, look at how Iran is going about it and look at how Russia is going about it, especially Alexander with regards to the neighboring countries or let's say the third parties that are involved in this conflict, the way that Iran is fighting an asymmetric war incorporating or going after the GCC countries or where the U.S. is operating in the GCC countries because they were being used to attack Iran

while you have the constant provocations from the U.S. vassals towards Russia, and all you get from Russia is a strongly worded statement. Yeah, okay. So, I mean, a lot to unpack there. Let's kind of the picture of what's happening. Let us start with Putin. My sense about Putin is that he has been greatly embarrassed by the fact that he invested a huge amount of time last year, trying to develop a relationship with Trump. He had the meeting in

Anchorage. He had, I think it was eight telephone calls. He met with Wittgolf and Kushner. There was this appearance that was this period of time when it looked as if the relationship was going to burgeon, at least Putin seemed to think it was. With Kushner and Wickev multiple times, he met. Multiple times, exactly. Eight times as well. In the middle of the night for five-hour sessions. Exactly. Exactly. And all of that has turned to dust.

And of course, people in Moscow, in the Kremlin were warning Putin that it would turn to dust. We can identify one person without any doubt who was giving those warnings. And that was Medvedev. I mean, he's various social media comments. have made that absolutely clear. I mean, that he thought the whole thing was a complete waste of time. He said, you know, Trump is not a friend of our country. He's an enemy of our country.

Why are we spending so much time with him? And Lavrov, clearly, has never been fully on board with this whole process. If you read what he's been saying, I mean, I don't myself have any doubt about this. So Putin invested a huge amount of time on Trump. He went to Anchorage. He came away with this agreement, whatever it was in Anchorage. I've already commented on the fact that when he returned from Anchorage and addressed the Russian Security Council, I was looking at the faces of all the people who were listening to him.

And I could tell that they weren't convinced. I mean, they didn't believe it. So he has been embarrassed, and this, I think, at a personal level, has been a very significant blow. I think, to say it's very simply, he's lost face. He's lost face with people inside the Kremlin. And I think that for that reason, he is staying away for the moment, for the whole time. of Ukraine. He's basically saying, look, I tried what I tried last year. It didn't work out. I'm going to leave it to the military to sort things out from this point on. And as to these negotiations,

well, we see that they're going nowhere. And I'm going along with the decision that our negotiators should stop turning up to these meetings. Now, Uschikov is a much more important person. person than Peskhov. I thought there was a significant difference in tone. I should say that one of the differences with Oshikov is that he talks very ironically sometimes, which doesn't always come across. I think that when he spoke about partners and things of that kind, he was being very ironic. I got the sense that his latest comments were very hardline. As for Peskof, I don't think one should overstate his importance. Dmitrieff is a completely different case in point, because Dmitriyev is still out there. He's still talking to the Americans. He's still criticizing the Europeans.

He's not a member of the Russian government. He's not even formally. of Putin's, though obviously, I mean, he's acting on Putin's instructions. He still, as you rightly say, talks up Trump and criticizes the Europeans. There is a lot of frustration in Moscow at Dmitrieff still being able to engage in these discussions. But I'm going to say, I'm going to here express my own view. over the next couple of months, we're going to see a massive crisis in the global economy. And I think that is likely to happen, even if the war with Iran ends quickly, which, by the way, I don't think it will.

And inevitably, in one way or another, people are going to be beating their way to Moscow's door. people from across the global south, from the Arab world, from places like Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, perhaps ultimately Europe, the United States. Who is the person that they will meet first? I'm going to suggest that it is in fact going to be Dimitriou because he's the head of Russia's direct investment Fund, he is the person who has all the connections in terms of oil sales and finance and all of those things. He's the kind of person who can do the deals.

Say, look, we've got fertilizer. If you need fertilizer, yes, we can provide it, but we need X amount of money invested in our industries in return. So I think that this perhaps partly explains why at the moment, despite the fact that, as I said, he has annoyed many people in Moscow, he continues to be allowed to operate and talk in the way that he is doing. Dimitriyev has always had some support from the nationalist side of the spectrum of Russian politics because he has been a consistent advocate in Russia of re-industrialization. And he does, therefore, much more to say someone like Peskov, who is simply seen as Putin's spokesman and, you know, is not taken seriously. Dimitriv does have a reservoir of goodwill that he can draw upon.

And at this moment in time, I think even some people who have been frustrated with him are probably going to come, within the elite, within the Crown there, are probably going to say to themselves, well, this man, where he is, over the next couple of months, might actually prove useful. So, Dmitriov is someone to watch. That's what I would say. And annoying and irritating, though he may be, he might actually increase in influence, or at least increase in profile over the next few months. Never make the mistake, however, of thinking that he shapes Russian policy in the diplomatic

and military fields. He does not. He is not in any way responsible for any of the decision-making relating to Ukraine or the war there. Okay, so before you get into the impact of the Iran war and how people are comparing the way Iran is going about it and how Russia has been going about it, just a quick question. Would you say that the fact that Dimitriev is taken in such a hard line against the UK and Europe while taking such a soft, almost friend-like manner with the United States. A friendly line with the United States is indicative of his desire

to want to do business with the United States while shutting out completely the EU and the UK. Is that where he's going to lean towards? That's his direction. He doesn't say much about China, by the way, as well. No, he doesn't. He doesn't, because he's not involved in that. He's very focused on the West.

Exactly. And by the way, the Arab world. Right. He is the person who has been very, very active in developing Russian contacts with various Arab states, the Gulf states. I mean, he's got lots of contacts and connections there, in Dubai, in Riyadh in all of those places. Now, as for the China business, that is operated and run by a completely different set of people who are not as visible at all as Dimitriov is. Now, I think there is some element of this in that he does want, it obviously has interests in developing a relationship with the US.

But I'm going to say something else. I mean, he is, Dimitriev is a commercial, a business negotiator. And I have to say that especially over the last couple of weeks, even before, by the way, the conflict in Iran started, because the Russians could see that the conflict in Iran was coming, by the way. I mean, no doubt about that. You go to the Russian media, you could see it. I get the sense that Dimitriyev is engaging in positioning. He's saying, in effect, look, with the Americans, we have a dialogue. With the Europeans, we have none. You people in Europe are idiots. You are completely imbeciles. You are destroying your economies. You're allowing deindustrialization processes to take place. You are refusing to deal with us when even the Americans are dealing with us. And I think he's doing that in anticipation of the day, which may come when some people in Europe say the Italians, the Spanish, some, the French, start coming round to the Russians, maybe even the Germans, and say, well, can we have a bit of gas? Can we have a bit of oil? Can we have a bit of fertilizer?

He's positioning himself so that when that happens, if that happens, he's in a position both either to say no, because it's not his decision at the end of the day or alternatively to drive a very, very hard bargain. Dimitriov reminds me of various officials of that kind that the Russians used to have in the Soviet era. There was a man called Leonid Krasin, who before the Second World War played exactly the same role. He used to travel around Europe and the West, always talking about all the enormous deals and bargains that you can have if you do it with us. It became very well-known in Britain, by the way. But in fact, and always, when the negotiations crystallized, he would be as hard as nails. And I think, as I said, he's just someone to watch and to see how things shape up. Because, of course, the other thing that we haven't mentioned is that with the Iran war,

the Russians now for a certain period, they know it's not going to be very long, but they are in pole position to take advantage because all of these things that are now going to be in short supply, oil, gas, helium, fertilizer, titanium, aluminum, all of these things, they have in abundance. and they are able to supply to various people around the world. So you want somebody out there who has the ability to drive the hard bargain for you. And that's what Dimitia has done. And I think that's what we're likely to see him do. Yeah.

The conflict in Iran. How is that affecting things? Because I'll be honest with you, with everyone. When you go through social media, the various social media platforms. For the first time, you start to notice Russia and Putin getting a significant amount of criticism when there's a comparison of the way Iran is doing things and the way Russia has been doing things. Once again, I want to stress the fact that two separate wars, two different conflicts, two different histories,

they're not exactly the same, nor are they even close. There are some similarities, but we're not talking about the same. type of war, the same conflict, or even the same adversaries on the other side. But on a surface level, you get the comparison of, well, look at how Iran is doing it. Why is Putin not doing it like that? I mean, I think before I discuss what the Russian public is saying about this, and the Kremlin is also saying about this, I think there is an important, very important point to make, which is that, of course, Iran is,

taking the battle to its enemies, it's bombarding Israel, it's attacking the Gulf States, it's doing all of those things, after it was openly attacked. In other words, the Americans and the Israelis conducted direct strikes against Iran itself. They initiated a war. The Russians have not been in that position yet. Yes, the Americans have, have conducted attacks inside Russia, but they have done it through proxies and not on anything like the scale, as we've seen in terms of the attack that we're seeing Iran have to face now. Now, before this happened, before this attack that took place now, before the attack on the 28th of February, there was exactly the same criticisms made about Iran that was made

about Russia, that the Iranians never reacted properly, that there would be the massive attack and destruction of Hezbollah, there would be the assassinations of imported people in Tehran, and that Iran always pulled its punches, it always sought negotiations, it always avoided to the extent that it could, going into outright war. So the war, in a sense, was forced upon it before it actually reacted in the way that it is now doing. And I think you could argue the same point is the same is true about the Russians, if, of course, the United States did something beyond reckless and started to launch air strikes with the US Air Force and missile strikes by the the US military on Russia itself, then of course Russia would be at war and we would start to see

reactions and attacks on NATO countries. And in fact, it would be a catastrophic situation. We would be in World War III. So I think that point, I would make that point because it's one I think that people need to keep in mind. Now, let's talk about the response in Russia. First of all, overwhelmingly visibly, Russians support Iran. The Kremlin supports Iran. They've talked about this being a war of aggression against Iran. They've used extremely strong language. As we've discussed in previous programs, and I've discussed extensively on my channel,

and as is now being increasingly admitted in mainstream media in the West. This goes beyond verbal support. The Russians have been giving material assistance to Iran, both in food and other economic products, but also in terms of weapons, drones, intelligence. I think the evidence that this is happening is becoming very, very strong. But inevitably, the fact that there's been this conflict, the fact that the Iranians are responding so ferociously, is making people say, well, the Iranians are acting in this way. Why are we continuing with this step-by-step approach in Ukraine? Why cannot we attack the Ukrainians in the same sweeping way that the Iranians do

towards the Gulf states. And if you go to Vladimir Soloviov's program, Soloviov live, on Russian television, that is exactly the point he is making. And it is gaining traction. It's gaining traction with some people, you know, within the nationalist community in Russia. I personally would say it is exactly the other way around. That rather than...

then say, should Russia have behaved like Iran, I would say that on the contrary, America in conducting its war against Iran, if it was going to go to war against Iran at all, which, as you know, I oppose. But if it was going to do that, it should have looked at what the Russians did. It should have taken a careful, methodical, risk-averse approach. It should have. It should have It should have planned methodically and prepared carefully and anticipated things like the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. The Russians have consistently managed to avoid disasters in Ukraine, precisely because that's the approach they've taken. But of course, within Russia itself, within those people who want to see a quick, decisive, end to the war, the way that Iran is conducting itself in the war, that is having an effect.

And we see that someone like Soloveyov is becoming more critical of Putin in response to it. Again, what gives Solovov traction, further traction, is that Putin is absenting himself. He's not coming out and defending his position. even putting up someone like Gerasimov, or better still bellows of the defense minister, to explain it to the Russian people and to respond to the things that people like Solofiophis say. Yeah. And I also believe that Ukraine has taken advantage of it. Ukraine. NATO and the United States are taken advantage of it by striking Russian energy facilities as well. So they take advantage of all of this and they hit those energy facilities

and it makes people even more upset inside of Russia or who are pro-Russia. It really frustrates them more when they see the oil storage on fire. Yes. Not that makes any fundamental difference. Through St. Petersburg, but through the Baltics or through Europe and St. Petersburg, because then they ask, or, for example, the UK seizing ships, whether it's happening or not or whether the drones are moving through Eastern Europe, they then further say, well,

not only are they hitting us, but they're using Europe and they're using the Baltics or the UK is going after us. So that even compounds. Absolutely. You can absolutely see that. And it is something that exists in Russia itself. I mean, the drone strikes, the Ukrainian drone strikes are not actually having much effect. Now, I've discussed this many times. I repeat it again.

but the imagery is what matters. The tankers that are being seized, again, are not making any fundamental difference to the oil trade. In fact, I mean, if I can say so, they are an act of unimaginable stupidity at this time. We have a worldwide oil shortage and some people in Europe want to restrict the trade in oil and energy products even further. I mean, you know, it really is a case of whom the gods destroy. They first make mad. I mean, you would want to keep oil traded at this time, not restricted.

Even the Americans could see it. The Europeans, of course, hopeless. They can't, even though they're much more vulnerable to disruptions in the oil markets than the Americans are. But anyway, never mind. The point is, as I said, people are looking at what the Iranians are doing. And they're saying, look, if the Iranians can act in this way and can shock the world and frighten the world and at the same time gain an enormous amount of sympathy and support from around the world, which they are, by the way, then why are we not doing the same?

And I don't personally think this criticism is entirely fair, but politics and war are never fair. And I come back to this point. Putin himself is steering away from confronting this issue. I mean, since December, since the Valdai attack, I get the sense that he's been, in a kind of sullen rage and has been very, very unwilling to come out in public and to speak about this. I mean, he's not even meeting with generals, he's not even accepting giving us military updates. It's all being left to Gerasimov to do.

I mean, Gerassimov is telling us all sorts of very interesting things. But of course, it doesn't carry the traction that one gets when it is the president of Russia. exactly okay a long video we recovered a lot of ground absolutely the durand dot locals com we're on x we're on rumble we're on telegram go to durand shop pick up some merch and also check us out on substack take care yes