How are Ukrainians feeling about the Trump-Putin summit?

0:00Hello, Ed Conway here. Here is what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods, bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common? On the surface, not very much. But on my podcast, Stuff Matters, I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how together they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow. Coming up on The Daily, as Trump prepares to meet Putin, what hope do Ukrainians have for an end to the war?

0:36Hello, Ed Conway here. Here is what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods, bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common? On the surface, not very much. But on my podcast, Stuff Matters, I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how, together, they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow.

1:10Hi, everyone. Welcome back to The Daily, where the newsroom is gearing up for the historic meeting, the second, in fact, between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. The US president wants peace. The Russian president wants pieces of Ukraine, something the Ukrainian president has already ruled out. But the people there have now seen years of war, catastrophic losses both on and off the battlefield, and they are tired. So what hopes do they have that an end is in sight? Land is not like an asset that you can exchange. It's a part of your soul, it's a part of your heart, it's a part of your life. That was Lisa Jasko, an MP from Wladimir Zelensky's party, and we'll be hearing more from her a little later.

1:56But let's start in Kiev with Peter Dickinson. He's editor of the Ukraine Alert blog and has been a permanent resident of Ukraine for 20 plus years. Peter, in your assessment, what hope is there in Ukraine for a positive outcome to those talks in Alaska? Well, I think we have to define what we mean by positive outcome. If you're talking about a ceasefire or significant progress toward peace, I think there's absolutely minimal expectations, almost zero, frankly. From a Ukrainian perspective, a positive outcome would be President Trump coming out of his meeting with a clear understanding that Putin does not want peace, that Putin is determined to continue with the war and America must get tougher with him, must apply more pressure to Putin.

2:41That's realistically what Ukrainians would like to see come out of the summit. Do the Ukrainian people see the giving up of territory as the passage to peace? Ukraine has said that for some time they've been quite open that they recognize that the areas that are currently occupied by Russia will remain controlled by Russia for the foreseeable future. They're de facto under Russian control for the long term. And Ukraine has recognized it's very unlikely that it would have the military capabilities to free that area. So that's around 20 percent of the country. And they essentially accept that territorial reality.

3:13what they're not prepared to do is actually sign off on the land and officially cede it you know redraw the maps and say okay this is now russia that's something i think that there's very little appetite for in ukraine as zelensky couldn't do it even if he wanted to in terms of ukraine's constitution there's no appetite publicly for that because people feel that if that were the case if they handed the land over to russia and rewarded russia in that sense it would be an open invitation for putin to continue the war further and it would validate the invasion as well we have heard from Donald Trump that if this first meeting in Alaska goes well, then there will be a subsequent meeting between Vladimir Putin and Vladimir Zelensky.

3:48I mean, first things first, do you see that happening? I'd be surprised, frankly. I mean, of course, anything's possible. But Putin's position with regard to Zelensky and Ukraine as a state, he essentially doesn't want to legitimize Zelensky, and he doesn't want to legitimize Ukraine either. He says that Ukraine is historically Russian land. He's taken back 20 % of it. He wants to take more. He's very clear that he doesn't view Ukraine as a legitimate country and certainly not Zelensky as a legitimate president. This is a very principled position from the Russians, and I don't think it's going to change soon.

4:17Long term, maybe, but I think in the short to medium term, Putin will not sit down with Zelensky. How fair is it to say that Vladimir Putin goes into these discussions knowing that he's winning the war? I think he certainly feels he's winning the war. I mean, if we look at the battlefield, his troops are advancing. He has the advantage in terms of the initiative. Is he winning it in a broader sense. I mean, we're three and a half years into the war now. Russia began this war with a reputation as one of the world's great military superpowers. And yet in that three and a half years, they've managed to gain just slightly over 10 % of Ukraine.

4:51They already held 8 % when the war began. It's not a great triumph from Russian arms by any means. I think I wouldn't be surprised if there were certainly voices within the Russian establishment who are saying, okay, look, this is not great for us either. And we'd rather get out of it, frankly. Do we know, though, how costly it has been for the Ukrainian side? We know that the official figures are not being put out there, but do we have estimates of how painful in terms of losses this has been for Ukraine itself? Well, most of the unofficial estimates that I see from military sources and analysts put the losses somewhere between two and three to one in proportion to the Russians.

5:21So if the Russians have lost, say, 250 ,000 men, the Ukrainians have lost probably around between 80 ,000 and 100 ,000 men. One thing, we can certainly say that the losses have been catastrophic for the Ukrainian side and continue to be so, but they are significantly lower than the Russian losses. Sure, but Peter, with the length of time that this conflict has been going on, the losses which affect every family in Ukraine in some form or another, have you detected on the part of the civilian population any sense of fatigue, any war fatigue? Oh yes, massively so. I mean, the whole Ukrainian nation is completely exhausted exhausted and very traumatized.

5:59I can't stress enough how traumatized most people are. So it's really a national mental health crisis, you could say, and there's huge exhaustion. But having said that, Ukrainians really don't see much option but to continue. As far as Ukrainians are concerned, Putin has been very clear his goal is to erase Ukraine. In that 20 % under Russian control, the Kremlin is systematically eradicating all traces of Ukrainian national identity, culture, history, language, you name it. Everybody's being forced to accept Russian citizenship and large numbers of people have simply been disappeared into a network of camps, many of them we fear are already dead.

6:42So we're talking about very, very grave attacks on Ukrainian national identity and on the entire concept of a Ukrainian state. People are quite determined still, I think, to keep going because they don't see any other way out. But we have begun to detect some problems when it comes to recruitment and indeed retention. Initially, at the very beginning of the war, there was a huge surge in recruitment, in volunteers joining the military. But I think since the first winter, that's become more and more of a problem. That was already an issue, certainly after the second year. Now, in the fourth year of the war, it's becoming a much more acute problem.

7:17and Ukrainians are trying to find different ways around it. You know, the mobilization age in Ukraine is still 25. So there's a whole category of people between the ages of 18 and 25 who normally are in most wars. Just on that, Peter, sorry to interrupt, but just on that, why doesn't Vladimir Zelensky do what the Americans have been calling for and reduce it to 18? So I think there would be a large body there who would serve and there's certainly no lack of willing to defend the country. but there's also no rush to go into what is seen as a meat grinder. I think realistically, from Zelensky's point of view, he understands that calling up the youth of the country would place a huge burden on Ukraine's future.

7:58And demographically, that's already quite, you know, one of the smallest segments of the population. So it would have an outsized impact on the future of Ukraine, sort of a one eye on the future, and also on his political future. it would be hugely unpopular among the parents of those children essentially or young adults if they were to be called up what they've done instead is they've introduced a new system of rewards and enticements and quite generous payments to try and get that to get the under 25s to volunteer and there's been some success there but it tends to vary from unit to unit because within the military there are units that have strong reputations for looking after their soldiers.

8:40And there are units that have very poor reputations where the commanders are considered to be Soviet-style commanders. They basically just throw their troops into futile attacks and rely on overwhelming the enemy with simply strength in numbers, which is seen as a very Russian approach to war, which nobody's rushing to take part in, of course. Given those catastrophic losses, the pictures that we see coming in from the east, the way in which Ukrainians are connected to what is happening on the front line. In your mind, is there any point at which they would back away from, not just their commitment to continuing to resist the Russians, of course they're going to continue to do that, but to continue to see Vladimir Zelensky as the person to lead that resistance?

9:25Well, I don't think anybody's fighting for Zelensky. I think this is a sort of misconception that a lot of people in the West have. Zelensky is far more popular in the West than he's ever been in Ukraine. The Ukrainian army has a very clear idea of what they're fighting for. They're fighting for their families, they're fighting for their homeland, and they're fighting to defend themselves in the final analysis. You know, Zelensky has been quite effective as a war leader in terms of mobilising the international community, and he's respected for that. But there's no great love for Zelensky in terms of his role domestically or in terms of his role as a war leader, I would say.

9:56Thanks, Peter. So let's consider the mood music just a little more and bring in Lisa Yasko, a Ukrainian MP in Zelensky's party. Lisa, great to have you on. Just explain, how are ordinary Ukrainians viewing what will be taking place in Alaska this weekend? Do they have any sort of confidence that this could be the beginning of the end of the conflict? That's a very hard question because I think Ukrainians lost hope a long time ago, at least from January this year. Before that, there was a hope that the West will do something, Trump will do something. and many Ukrainians lost hope because there is simply no one in the world that they could rely on on helping us to end the war with justice.

10:43Clearly, the people of Ukraine have fought hard and have fought long against Russia. This war cannot be continued by Ukraine in perpetuity. Is there a point at which ordinary Ukrainians would accept giving up territory in order to bring this conflict to an end? I don't see how Ukrainians can accept the territorial exchanges. I really cannot see that happening for many reasons, for legal, constitutional reasons, but also for human reasons and emotional reasons. We Ukrainians are very connected to our land, to our soil. And many people gave their lives away in this fight for your land. and land is not like an asset that you can exchange.

11:30It's a part of your soul. It's a part of your heart. I don't want to say that generally we are ready for the ceasefire, but of course many more people would want to have a ceasefire and all territorial questions would come after. Lisa, do you detect that the Ukrainians are beginning to lose patience in Zelensky himself? I think most of us, including me, had to learn what patience can be because it's not possible to achieve things you want if they're so global and if they're so big, if they're about existential questions like life and death or war and peace. Unfortunately, we cannot solve it only by ourselves.

12:12Do you still believe that when this war ends, Vladimir Zelensky will be the man who has brought peace back to Ukraine? You do not detect that people are tiring of him, that people are losing faith in his ability to end this conflict? The problem is that we still have to be united at the moment to work on the solution. After, there'll be up to Ukrainian people to decide who will be in politics, who will be in parliament, who will be president. But still the phase in Zelensky representing the voice of Ukraine is strong. Lisa, many thanks for your time. Really appreciate it. Okay, just a final thought then from Peter Dickinson from the Ukraine Alert blog.

13:02Peter, what is life like in Kiev, in the capital of Ukraine right now? Kiev is probably not necessarily representative. I mean, life in Kiev is fairly normal. It's a very big city. We're talking about, you know, probably now wartime population, somewhere between three and a half to four million people. You know, so a lot of people have left, but a lot of people have also come from other parts of Ukraine, relocated to Kiev. The big impact that you would notice on a day-to-day basis is the air raids. We have regular air raids, which are getting more and more deadly, with sometimes involving hundreds of drones, dozens of rockets, missiles.

13:35That can be very, very, very stressful. They can often last all night long, so it means that people are having sleepless nights. In many cases, they're having to pick up their belongings, maybe their pets, their children, and go down into the basements of buildings or into the metro stations, you know like sort of the blitz in London in the 1940s I don't want to downplay it it's not that dangerous I would say I mean of course if you're in a building that's hit it's very very dangerous but that is a very limited situation for most people it's just an inconvenience the other major factors would be I think that we have a curfew at midnight so people have to be you know you have to start making plans to get home earlier in around 10 you can't stay out late you'll see a lot of people around town who are soldiers military related people you see a lot of amputees a lot of people who've obviously been wounded in the war.

14:20That sort of thing really hits home. But broadly speaking, life goes on. Businesses are operating. The cafes and restaurants are full. New venues are opening up still all the time. There is a life beyond the war. There is a cultural life in the city. And a lot of people are very militant about that. They say, we must continue some sort of normality because that's what the troops on the front line are fighting for, to a sense. And I've heard that from soldiers as well. They've said, you know what? Don't feel guilty about going out and enjoying your life because that's why we're fighting for. We're not fighting so you can hide in basements.

14:51Do you see the Ukrainians as being able to continue in that vein for as long as is necessary? Or is there a finite amount of time in which this country can exist in this state of permanent conflict? I mean, all humans have their breaking point and Ukrainians are human. They're no different to anyone else. So, you know, at some point, yeah, we will approach that breaking point. That has to happen inevitably. The Russians, I think, are certainly waiting for that. Putin's goal is really to outlast the West and to wait until Ukraine finally breaks, be that the civilian population or the soldiers on the front line.

15:26So what Russia is doing essentially is just pouring on the pain on the front line with massive, relentless offensives and then bombing the country. They're making sure that there's nowhere which is safe in Ukraine. So that's also part of the psychological attempt to break the country's will. question about how long Ukraine can last. It really, really comes down to what the alternative is. If they believe that Russia's goal is essentially genocidal, they want to destroy Ukraine as a state and as a nation. There's not a lot of alternative. Your real choice is to fight or flee. So a lot of Ukrainians will be prepared to continue at least trying to make a go of life rather than just giving up because the alternative is not simply life under Russia.

16:07It's an end of Ukraine as they know it. A lot of people aren't prepared to accept that. Thanks, Peter. And that is your lot for this edition of The Daily. For the very latest on what is happening as regards that peace summit in Alaska, just head to skynews.com. We'll see you again tomorrow.

16:32Hello, Ed Conway here. Here is what might sound like a slightly random question. What do AirPods bananas and a pair of shoddily made running trainers from the 1970s have in common. On the surface, not very much. But on my podcast, Stuff Matters, I will uncover the deeper stories behind each of them. You will see how together they tell a fascinating new story about the world we live in. The first full series of Stuff Matters is out now. Just search for it on your podcast app and follow.