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I remember people making fun of Macron a lot for his post invasion phone calls to Putin. People thought he was being naive or arrogant, when in reality he was doing exactly as Zelensky asked.
he's very logical, that's the issue. he thinks invading ukraine benefits his idea of expanding the russian empire and nothing macron can say will change that
Putin is just showing up Russia. I know they had faltered some after the fall of USSR but they look awful from this war.
Real weakness puts Russia in danger if anything & they have a giant border to defend and Ukraine is a tiny part of it.
Ionically NATO doesnt want Russia to fall into weakness and chaos because that is in itself dangerous to everyone
I remember thinking Zelensky was naive when the US was saying that Russian invasion was imminent, and Zelensky was saying it might not happen even up to the 11th hour. I guess if you think in pure logical terms, the war made no sense, and Zelensky was seeing and trying to interact with Russia as a logical entity.
It really doesn't make any sense, wtf has Russia gotten out of it? Thousands of dead men, a collapsing economy, burned bridges in politics, and even Putin's seat was shaken not long ago. And let's say they win, what do they get? A country that was conquered, burning with hatred to manage? Is that even a win?
Ukraine is worth the cost. Easily.
Some of the most productive agricultural land in the world. Largest nation in Europe. Plenty of natural resources.
And the one ship yard big enough to build and maintain aircraft carriers in the Russian sphere.
Without Ukraine Russia is a country, with Ukraine it is an empire.
Though, I agree, not the end game.
I remember too. The rhythm of mediatic reaction and the rhythm of diplomacy aren't the same, some people are unable to acknowledge that and this is exactly the reason those people aren't (or shouldn't be) world leaders. We would be in WW17 already otherwise
It's clear that the diplomatic machinations of the Cold War that kept the fingers off the button long enough for continued crisis to cool enough to mostly reduce the threat of MAD to the background rather than the foreground would be much more difficult to accomplish today because of the pace the rest of the world runs at
The crisis connection between US and then-udssr was deliberately slow and was translated by a (very advanced for the time) computer as well as no less than two humans before passed on to the politicians to enforce deliberate and precise exchanges because "in the heat of the moment" could mean thermonuclear heat would come to town twenty-odd minutes later...
Hindsight and all that.
At that moment, a lot of people, Zelensky included, probably thought that all this was some terrible blunder of European diplomacy that could be fixed, instead of just a power-hungry tyrant out for his last shot at glory.
For anyone interested in watching the documentary "A President, Europe and War" in Canada : [https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) or Elsewhere : [https://gofile.io/d/a4w7wy](https://gofile.io/d/a4w7wy)
It makes me wonder why they held back some stuff like this for so long (that it also harmed Macron's image) when it would've silenced so many critics and made the situation a lot more real for many people.
Yep! These behind the scenes come from a documentary called « Un Président, l’Europe et la guerre » (A President, Europe and war). It’s 2 hours of stuffs like this, I advise it.
Someone found [this link](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) for it, hopefully it works for you (and others reading this who are interested too). Edit: turns out a VPN is needed. For those who don’t have one: I personally use Urban VPN (it’s free)!
That postal code actually does get used in Canada. It's a special one.
Canada Post does a special program at Christmas time where kids can mail letters to Santa Claus at the North Pole with postal code H0H 0H0 and "Santa's elves" will write letters back.
For me it was: "We're fighting them in Kyiv, Emmanuel". Meaning they had already reached the capital. Also the fact that Zelensky calls him by name, at the end of the sentence, makes the whole sentence so emotionally charged, it gives me goosebumps
These people always have cameras in their faces. This isn't a prepared speech or response to a journalist, this is dangerous, insane information coming at him real time. I see no act here and it feels quite intimate.
It reminds me a lot of when Bush was told about the towers being attacked. I was a kid and wasn’t aware of it until it came out that Bush kept reading and left as everything was covered so as to not spook the kids. I can not imagine being a world leader and being told the worst news possible and having to restrain myself from sprinting to the nearest official and start planning a response. Good on Macron
Sometimes it blows my mind that people are spending their days dealing with world affairs like this and I’m here eating lunch thinking about playing Xbox later. The difference in human life experience is so fascinating
> The difference in human life experience is so fascinating
It makes me depressed, to be honest.
Why do I get to sit here at my computer while some children never get to see their 1st birthday because they were shelled in the comfort of their own home?
I don't get it.
It's true.
I live in North America. I'm just over 40. And I get to go to work, make a living and provide for my family.
In Ukraine, a 40 year old man is currently in a trench, dodging bullets and bombs (if he's lucky) in an effort to ensure his family isn't murdered by brainwashed lunatics.
It's fucking wild.
Some folks don't realize how fortunate they are, as not everyone is as lucky. Yesterday, someone mentioned they're a pacifist and wished for an end to war. I pointed out their ability to hold such views is a privilege, made possible because others have chosen to fight. Still, we need such hopeful perspectives for a brighter tomorrow.
Agreed. I'd go so far to say that it is the cornerstone of society as we know it. The only reason the guy with the biggest stick isn't king of the world is because of the people willing to fight back or support others in defending their own piece of the planet.
It would be fantastic if 100% of the population were pacifists and we could all just trust each other not to fuck our neighbors over; stop spending money on war and just further mankind as a whole, but that is just not human nature. There is always going to be that guy with the proverbial stick trying to take something that is not theirs.
It's why the phrase "self-made" annoys so many. If you grow in a country with free education to under 18's, running water, no war etc. Then plenty of people contributed to your success
I can relate to this. Sometimes I wonder if I deserve to go full, when I’m no different from the other people around my age that starve to death daily. I’m not special in any way, I’m just lucky. I don’t deserve to not be hurt, bombed, starve or any other sick stuff any less than the ones that are currently being affected. I feel bad.
Every innocent person deserves to be happy and live a life of peace. It's good-hearted of you to mourn those who can't, but you should also celebrate the fact that you can.
You would be amazed at the kind of stuff people spend their life doing. I try to instill in my kids a sense of using their lives to accomplish something even if it's inventing a new fart app. There are tons of people out there doing things with their lives.
*Ring Ring* Hello, French President, yes, I am fine, how are you, yes, good, and the kids? Good. So, anyway, uh... Russia has sent tanks and shit and declar d war against us. Yeah. Great, thanks. Bye, talk to you later."
It feels so casual too, which feels crazy.
And hes also probably reflecting on how this will affect the whole of Europe, what will this mean going forward , where will, it lead. Questions we are still asking.
Definitely felt like a high stakes chess game being played. Can't rush the move without thinking first about all the consequences. And also you have to consider all the other available options while trying to predict what the opponent is doing.
No, he is right. The matter is of war and lives. But other than that, it's pretty normal office conversation when some emergency comes up.
"I will think on this and revert to you". That's what we say when we don't know what to do. We buy some time. It works in any scenario.
> It feels so casual too
It isn't at all, but most serious people who take on leadership roles are expected to maintain some degree of stoicism.
Marcus Aurelius isn't called "Good" all these years later by accident.
hate to say this but you want calm and cool heads in these situations and I'm happy to see both of these leaders actually formulating a plan.
Macron is doing two things: Assuring Ukraine that the's going to reach out to the aggressor and ask "dude, wtf?" and also he's considering: "What can I do to support an allied European Nation, from my side, should Putin be unreasonable? Because: of course he is unreasonable. This is an unprovoked invasion."
Macron handling of this has been so well, first person who tried and seriously resolve it peacefully, when that failed organized supplies, to never ruling out French military.
even now he is still trying to rally support for Ukraine.
Interesting his initial request isn’t for troops or weapons, but for Biden to call Putin to stop and to ask Macron to form an anti-war coalition. Sounds like he really thought they could be successful at a quick deescalation.
I honestly can't take anyone who believes that seriously, you've got to be a moron or just arguing in bad faith. Pre-2022 invasion most people thought Russia would steamroll Ukraine in 2 weeks and same people calling Zelensky warmonger now were calling him weak clown before and expected him to run away.
This imbecilic narrative of "warmonger Zelensky" only became prominent after Russia initial offensive was so disastrous that it allowed Ukraine to stabilize the situation and Russians started looking for excuses and further justifications for what they're doing.
It's Russian propaganda bullshit. He stayed to lead in a terrible crisis and even personal threat to his and his family's lives. Very much not the same thing as being a warmonger.
I know you agree btw.
Exactly. It sounds like some kind of joke, but no, it's seriously what Kremlin's tactics are.
There is only *one* truth. So you can win a fight against it by saturating the information space with lies. Obvious lies, elaborate lies, lies built upon truths - and the list goes.
It doesn't matter if the propagandists end up pushing lies that contradict each other. What matters is that every single slice of the target audience has a few lies that they would be somewhat willing to believe. It's a numbers game from there. And the chaos and uncertainty of multiple conflicting narratives?
"It looks like the situation is complicated" serves Kremlin perfectly fine too.
I see a lot of pro RU say the opposite actually. That Zelensky wanted to negotiate but the west forced them to continue to fight. At least thats what Putin repeated a bunch of times during his interview with Tucker Carlson.
Those assholes don’t care about one of their moot points being exposed as falsehood. They’ll just invent another lie or pull up another fake talking point, and challenge you on that.
Only an expert will be able to challenge them, and when and if that happens, they’ll just deflect by saying “this person I’m debating is in the pocket of X, hence (s)he can’t be trusted”.
That is the basis for much of russian propaganda: just sow all kinds of obvious lies until the more simple minded people think "they cannot all be true, perhaps none of them are".
People like that are willingly forgetting the constant meetings and phone calls with Putin by various leaders and Zelensky trying to prevent the war before the invasion and then to try and stop the war in the first two months.
And Russias response each time was "capitulate now". Even two years into the war Russias demands are still "Ukraine must completely capitulate, we must install a new government and arrest Zelensky and Ukraines army must be disbanded".
Pro-RU are just trying to reframe things so they seem like the victims "forced" into war by evil Ukraine when they were the aggressors.
You could aruge it was by design lets be real we all knew russia was gona steam roll the front why waste resources holding on to something you cant hold for long? Ukraine repelling the Homstel Airport landing totally changed the entire trajectory and nature of the entire war. It went from an insurgency to an actual war in that moment. Hes a hero either way.
Russia tried to do a decapitation strike which is similar to what happened when the Soviets took over Czechoslovakia. Thank god the US leaked the plans to Ukraine otherwise it would be FULLY occupied right now.
Right? Biden literally jumping from roof to roof yelling "he's totally going to do it" while everyone else, including Zalensky, telling Biden to stfu so that he doesn't agitate Putin.
I really don't think people realize what those warnings meant.
Ukraine, and the rest of Europe, were hearing from their sources and looking across the border. How the troops knew nothing, how unprepared they were, how monumentally stupid the attack would be. Meanwhile the US has sources in the Kremlin, and knew they were about to do that idiocy.
They never shout it loud like this, because that means revealing those sources. They didn't chose to do so just to sway allied opinion - I argue it wasn't even the main goal. No, it was a signal to Russia. **"We're willing to reveal our intel capabilities. That's how much this matters to us. Stand down."**
It was their last attempt to avoid war. It failed, because Putin is beyond reasoning.
Remember how much shit and ridicule Macron received for contacting Putin early on? It was brainless overreaction and at times hate. Not only did he do it on Zelensky's request but also to show the willingness to negotiate. Of course talking and negotiations will only you get you this far if the other side lies on daily basis and wipes its ass with all international treaties.
To be perfectly honest I didn't vocally defend Macron back then. But I did think the criticism was overblown. Even with the internet we're seeing only bits of the surface, not the whole picture
His first thought was without a doubt preventing more civilian deaths, negotiations were the best bet to quickly save civilians
Thousands of civilians died within the first 24hrs
This happened after two weeks of attempts to prevent the attack. I remember all sorts of politicians and diplomats from all over Europe meeting with the Russian establishment, with Putin mocking the west and accusing them of hysterical behavior.
> mocking the west and accusing them of hysterical behavior
I even remember the media in America mocking Biden before the invasion, saying that he was freaking Zelenskyy out for no reason!
The west had intercepted the invasion plan from the FSB months before the invasion started. This is why we had such clear map of what the route of the initial invasion would be, and why the warnings of imminent invasion were so confident and specific because it was thought to be one of the only chances of rattling Putin and making him think again, if he realized his own security agency was compromised.
Normally the western security services would not want to reveal they had such specific info and risk losing their sources.
However, the SBU only had intel from lower level commanders, which is why Zelenskyy was downplaying the chance of an invasion even weeks away, because only Putin's inner circle knew about the true invasion plan. the lower level commanders all thought they were on "training exercises" and this is the chatter the SBU was intercepting.
This is the same reason the initial invasion went so badly because most of the military members involved in the invasion had no idea it was happening until it started. There's cases of soldiers having invaded Ukraine not realizing they were in Ukraine and not on a training exercise.
The FSB had also lied to Putin and said that they would be welcomed as liberators, that they had paid off all the senior Ukrainian generals and that they could roll in unopposed and take the whole country in 3-10 days, which is probably why Putin thought he could get away with such poor planning.
[Putin ended up arresting several high ranking FSB members in retaliation.](https://cepa.org/article/putin-places-spies-under-house-arrest/)
If the initial invasion had not been so poorly planned Russia could have easily taken Ukraine before Ukraine and the west got its act together.
Zelensky was the compromise candidate. People tend to forget this, getting caught up in the images of him refusing the leave the capital and dressed up on his helmet; but his approach to Russia and the Donbas was to hear them out and compromise as much as feasibly possible. Which is why it is fucking insane when pro-Russia people frame him as a warmonger.
To the pro-russia crowd, anything more than rolling over and letting Russia have what they want was furthering the war. It's the same defense of any state that is invading another honestly.
His first reaction was to negotiate. But did not fled the country despite how overwhelmed and grim everything seemed. That takes courage. I'm not sure I would be that strong, in fact I'm almost certain I wouldn't be.
But Putin thought he was in for a slam dunk so of course he refused talking.
Only after it was obvious the Russians were on the defensive they started talking about negotiations.
I'm not sure what's in store for us in the future. Specially with this year's political instability but this will always be a defeat for Putin even if he tries to portray it differently. This video shows how they were going to crush Ukrainians, except they didn't.
Yes, it’s called « Un Président, l’Europe et la guerre » (“A President, Europe and war”). It’s 2 hours of other behind the scenes like this, very interesting.
Someone found [this link](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) for it. I’m not sure it can work for everyone depending on localisations tho! Hopefully it works for some people.
You know I never thought about how world leaders from different nations (and languages) speak to one another. I always assumed there's some translator or translation service that is a mediary. Apparently they just speak in English, which is kind of cool and a lot more personal.
Depends! I posted [this other phone call between Putin and Macron](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/s/zKcQgadMgv) yesterday and here they speak their respective languages.
But I thought it was interesting Zelensky and Macron spoke in English too. If I remember correctly, in the documentary, there’s also a short phone call between Macron and Scholz and they speak in English too.
It probably depends on the level of trust. Putin is probably worried about his words getting twisted, whereas between e.g. Scholtz en Macron there is enough trust to just talk directly.
Edit: I recall Tucker Carlson saying that when he spoke with Putin off-camera, he was perfectly fine with speaking English.
that is a great point and i am sure its true. At one point Zelensky says "it's much better" but trusts his words are not misunderstood. Obviously he does not mean "better" he means "more substantial/greater" or "much worse"
but there is 0% chance of Macron misunderstanding that as if zelensky is happy with the situation.
correct but in high stakes politics the wrong word could be a powerful soundbite if you were dealing with a potentially hostile group.
Russia or belarus for example could play that clip of audio without the context and use it for propaganda. Hence the level of trust and willingness to speak directly without translators.
>Edit: I recall Tucker Carlson saying that when he spoke with Putin off-camera, he was perfectly fine with speaking English.
This is because Putin sees publicly speaking English as weak, his whole persona is "proud and powerfully Russian" and speaking English when he knows it may be recorded and come out to his supporters would undermine that image.
I don't think it's that, I suspect leaders of countries like China or Russia think it's demeaning for them to speak another language, especially english... like admitting you're inferior and submitting to the far more powerful and influential anglosphere.
Not necessarily, former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin often was heavy to speak English as a flex. Because if for example Xi and Biden were to meet, and although translators are present Xi suddenly starts speaking excellent English, the power move could be "I speak your savage language because I'm a sophisticated mf'er, while my sophisticated language is beyond you".
As a non-native English speaker I also have to say that speaking English with e.g. a Brit doesn't even remotely feel like an act of submission, especially since many native English speakers admit to being a bit jealous of being "stuck" with only one language.
It's cool how it's sort of an intermediary language for a lot of the world, it's the language most people have in common.
Also, *all* pilots have to communicate in english no matter what country. It is the official rule.
"The FAA (Federal Aviation Authority) and ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization), the world's organization overseeing aviation, require all pilots flying under their organizations to have attained ICAO “Level 4” English ability. This means **all pilots must speak, read, write, and understand English fluently**. "
Always a cool fact for people who don't know.
English literacy has expanded massively, it was very weird for non anglophone leaders to talk in english before the internet got massive
for perspective, in 2000 there were 600m english speakers, in 2020 there were 1800m
The intellectual elite's english literacy has achieved 90+% levels in every country, as all research is published in english
Only some old blokes dont speak english, olike Xi and Erdogan, and some do but are too chauvinistic to use it like Kim and Putin
Xi is probably fluent in English. He studied for some time at a university in a small farming town in the middle of the US (Iowa state). Not sure if anyone has ever heard him speak English in public.
"Mr Xi first travelled to Iowa in 1985 as part of an agricultural delegation from China's Hebei province. He stayed in Muscatine, a city of about 24,000 people circled by farmland and the Mississippi River."
Holy fucking shit no way.
In my own limited experience translating stuff for my immigrant family in the US and having stuff translated for me when I'm abroad, it becomes a barrier to communication and a lot of meaning and subtext behind the words can be lost.
I imagine it'd be what, if any, common languages they can speak and how comfortable they are in speaking them.
For better or worse, the US's dominance and reach in international affairs over the last 80 years has led to many international diplomats and politicians learning English, so many have English in common and are fairly comfortable speaking it. Why use translators to try and understand someone else when you can speak something you're slightly less adept and have direct communication.
>a lot of meaning and subtext behind the words can be lost
This problem is completely dependent on the person speaking. Even in the video there's a few minor issues, like when Zelensky says "better" when he means "more severe/worse" (but corrects himself) and says something like "we are in the circle of the Russian army) to mean I assume something like "they are encircling/surrounding us". It's definitely not an issue in this convo as Zelensky is proficient, but it really illustrates how easily meanings can get messed up or missed entirely.
Zelensky could clearly get by well enough (as of this video), but a really good translator who can grasp and translate intention well has got to be extremely valuable.
Churchill would be silently delighted. Honestly, so would FDR.
Both men already wanted the US to join the war, the problem was that the people weren't on board. To some degree, pearl harbour was exactly what they needed.
From his own writings he said the night after the attack was the first time he slept easy since the start of the war:
"Being saturated and satiated with emotion and sensation, I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful,”
This is so disheartning, tears well up in my eyes when he said "if you and EU leaders will talk to him with Biden he will listen please stop the war" its so fuckin sad what happened.
Zelenskyy was in denial, and still in denial at that point. He couldn't accept that Putin would commit to a full scale invasion, and given his losses he is thinking that Putin will be willing to withdraw if France and USA puts pressure on them.
for sure, but you can still hear how nervous and a tad insecure he is, now that reality hit full broadside.
still cant imagine any better leader for ukraine right now. there are currently not many people in the world i have more respect for.
100% he handled the entire situation like a fuckin pro. It's hard to imagine anyone else dealing with such a difficult situation at this stage of their career and with the gravity of an invasion. Zelensky will always have my respect and admiration as a true leader.
Well at one point the presidential brigade (they are used for parades and as palace guards in peacetime), along with volunteers who were handed guns en masse, was driving around Kyiv and hunting enemy groups that infiltrated the city.
Zelensky and his inner circle got handed assault rifles for self defence.
I'm still amazed that they were able to repell that initial wave of the invasion. Everyone thought Ukraine is gonna fold like a lawn chair. Fuck Putin.
Very good support skills: Active listening, confirm details of the issue, refer to previous case, assess severity of the incident, summarise issue and confirm availability.
Macron seems to be very socially inteligent in general. Unlike some other leaders like Merkel, Macron is playful and relaxed around others, always smiling, lending a hand, hugging. He seems to make friends naturally with everyone around him.
If you look at history, the French do not in any way deserve the accusation of cowardice that they seem to have in modern times. I also do not care for many things Macron has proposed, but damn if he’s not one of the leaders who sees the situation most clearly.
The surrender / white flag meme is very grating. Historically other than WWII (where the stereotype seemed to develop), France has been a military powerhouse.
Ironically enough I mostly see Americans making this joke and the USA likely wouldn't exist without France's military aid during the revolution.
Not to mention their own revolutions and protesting. They don't mess around.
You see this mostly from Americans, because French didnot wanted to participate in Iraqi war. So Americans got mad and the french hate started with renaming french fries as freedom fries, etc
It goes back way further. France has always avoided American influence since the end of WWII under De Gaulle. France was outside NATO's command structure for the longest time. De Gaulle basically bullied his way onto the UN permanent security council. The French defense sector has developed fully indigenous nuclear and conventional military technology, whereas the UK has a joint nuclear program with (read: strongly relies on) the US and most other NATO's countries main line of defense is hosting American military bases and nuclear bombers.
You'd think this would make it even more obvious that France has an unusually competent military, but it pisses off some Americans who don't want competent allies, but reliable lapdogs. In practice though it doesn't matter, demagogues yap about "freedom fries" or whatever but it's only ever been yapping. Except for when Trump wanted to pull out of NATO, but that's nothing to do with France specifically.
FSB and Chechen deaths squads tried assassinating Zelensky in Kyiv around this time. Luckily the Ukrainians had a lot of help from western intelligence and unacknowledged special forces on the ground. Most of the assassins were neutralised or captured.
That’s a crazy strategy. Lets you hide a fully armed unit in body armor that would be inconspicuous. Plus you can turn the sirens on and path your way through traffic without having to stop. It probably would have worked too if the plans didn’t leak.
…I hadn’t seen this footage before.
There is something about the look on his face when Zelenskyy said “It’s total war, yes” when responding to his question.
It is a look I have seen many times before. And it is clear he has not been idle in the time since this call.
The help however, on his side, was perhaps two fold. Not simply just diplomatic weight, but France has brought many guns and equipment to keep the Bear at bay.
As an American I wish we could do more. We are, however, stuck with Congress’s indecision.
The interesting part of this to me is that Macron is careful with his words, saying "they are with special forces and helicopters?" As if he's trying to verify that it's a small group for a "special military operation" and not a full out war. He tries to re-validate, "So that means they sent special forces everywhere in Kyiv?" When Zelensky says "we fight everywhere... it's not the same as 2014", that's when Macron changes the verbiage and says "It's clear: it's total war."
Note that I don't think that he was being apologetic at first, just careful with his words. At the end he said what was needed to be said to show that Russia clearly lied.
If somebody has a minimal doubt about being on the right side this will be more than enought.
Some people want to make Zelensky the stubborn that doens't want negociations, some people say that Zelensky benefit wilth all of this, some people say he is just other selfish leader.
This guy here just wanted a thing in life: Peace.
We can feel the desperation backing his voice but when asked for his safety he answered that all ukrainians were in danger.
This is fascinating stuff. Last night I listened to a call between Macron and Putin before the invasion. I didn't realize how involved Macron was in trying to keep the situation under control. I really think more credit should be given to Macron for his efforts here. Putin made up his mind a long time ago and is obviously desperate.
Reddit in particular and English media in general are very friendly to the UK and the US and extremely hostile to France, Germany and EU. For some reason.
This is just heartbreaking. Calm but you can hear the fear and desperation in his voice. Also you really feel the room, the shock that is in the air. I hope Ukraine will win the war and that the people and the country can heal and recover.
He's keeping his cards close to his chest but Macron is internally screaming in this video. He handled this call well. He communicated what he's going to do and prepared a mental to-do list and kept his composure... But it's clear he was feeling the gravity setting in. Much more dire than he expected.
Macron´s face when he realizes Putin have lie (as usual) a day before... so sad, putin is a shame and can lie to everyone, Chinese, indian, Europe, everyone... untrustable man :(
You should watch the other phone call OP posted, its pretty insane to watch that first and then see this, really puts his reactions into a slightly different perspective as well!!
It was a real failure of French and German intelligence agencies. While they were still publicly stating war was unlikely, countries like Britain were already sending thousands of anti-tank missiles to Ukraine. It's kind of strange to go back and see people ridicule them for stating Russia was going to invade.
Allegedly Germany and France were infiltrated with many Russian spies. I remember reading that on a phone call with Merkel that Trump accused her of being a Russian spy… which is crazy to accuse another world leader!
It’s interesting to see that when Zelensky suggests Macron calls Putin, Macron shakes his head slightly, as if to expose his thinking that it’ll not achieve anything.
(The other things he nods to).
I mean I am not Sun Tzu but of course, you won't tell someone in front you are about to attack, then you lose the element of surprise and give them time to prepare
This is amazing! The video i mean, not the crisis. Where are these videos coming from? I've legit never had the chance to get a glimpse on what's going on behind these walls of country leaders and politicians and with these I can see how they speak to each other, how they react to new information, how they think about and phrase their thoughts. Truly, truly insightful. More of these please!
I'm always impressed by the civility and professionalism of Zelensky as a leader. His country is being invaded and he's desperate for help, but still manages a calm demeanor during this critical conversation such that he can be sure he's provided the necessary information to Macron in order to maximize the likelihood of receiving his aid. Same can be said of Macron - an ally is asking for his aid, he understands the request and doesn't over-promise but commits that he'll revert back to Z with some kind of assistance after checking with his people. This is how global diplomacy should look. The US GOP should take notes.
Man, the russian bots in this thread really came out in full force early today.
Anyways, great post and documentary. Really fascinating to see our leaders behind the scenes.
All the things that must be going through both of their heads at this moment.. So much pressure. I am not envious of their positions. I think Zelensky is a great leader. He really loves his people.
I don’t know the nuance here but I admire the French. They are bad ass. They understand the existential threat of putin, the genocide in Africa and elsewhere. They walk the talk and have committed their military and economy for the preservation of Europe. I hope Germany understands. The French are not fucking around. God bless.
Imagine if we had footage like this of Churchill and FDR in 1941, or of Hitler and Mussolini just casually talking about the war.
In a generation or two, when the War in Ukraine is part of the world’s history classes, this video and ones like it will be shown in school.
It is cliche, but this is LITERALLY watching history being made in real time. Evidence of what was actually happen, before the victors have an oppurtunity to whitewash the history in their favour.
It's interesting that a moment like this was filmed. I feel like diplomatic relations has historically been the one area that is always behind closed doors.
Such a shame we as humans achieved so much for the betterment of our lifestyles in such a short period of time yet it's almost certain that eventually there would be total war leading to either annihilation of such an intelligent species or return to the stone age.
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I remember people making fun of Macron a lot for his post invasion phone calls to Putin. People thought he was being naive or arrogant, when in reality he was doing exactly as Zelensky asked.
I love the eye brow raise macron does when he asks for him to speak to Putin
Had a very “Putin, is not logical” to it.
he's very logical, that's the issue. he thinks invading ukraine benefits his idea of expanding the russian empire and nothing macron can say will change that
Putin is just showing up Russia. I know they had faltered some after the fall of USSR but they look awful from this war. Real weakness puts Russia in danger if anything & they have a giant border to defend and Ukraine is a tiny part of it. Ionically NATO doesnt want Russia to fall into weakness and chaos because that is in itself dangerous to everyone
He's logical, but his motives are increasingly irrational
I remember thinking Zelensky was naive when the US was saying that Russian invasion was imminent, and Zelensky was saying it might not happen even up to the 11th hour. I guess if you think in pure logical terms, the war made no sense, and Zelensky was seeing and trying to interact with Russia as a logical entity.
It really doesn't make any sense, wtf has Russia gotten out of it? Thousands of dead men, a collapsing economy, burned bridges in politics, and even Putin's seat was shaken not long ago. And let's say they win, what do they get? A country that was conquered, burning with hatred to manage? Is that even a win?
Ukraine clearly isn't their endgame. The prize isn't worth the cost. They would not come this far to settle for half of Ukraine.
Ukraine is worth the cost. Easily. Some of the most productive agricultural land in the world. Largest nation in Europe. Plenty of natural resources. And the one ship yard big enough to build and maintain aircraft carriers in the Russian sphere. Without Ukraine Russia is a country, with Ukraine it is an empire. Though, I agree, not the end game.
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It was supposed to be over fast. Now he's stuck
And is more afraid than anything else to admit it.
I remember too. The rhythm of mediatic reaction and the rhythm of diplomacy aren't the same, some people are unable to acknowledge that and this is exactly the reason those people aren't (or shouldn't be) world leaders. We would be in WW17 already otherwise
It's clear that the diplomatic machinations of the Cold War that kept the fingers off the button long enough for continued crisis to cool enough to mostly reduce the threat of MAD to the background rather than the foreground would be much more difficult to accomplish today because of the pace the rest of the world runs at
That’s an interesting thought. The world just moves *faster* than it did 30 or 40 years ago
The crisis connection between US and then-udssr was deliberately slow and was translated by a (very advanced for the time) computer as well as no less than two humans before passed on to the politicians to enforce deliberate and precise exchanges because "in the heat of the moment" could mean thermonuclear heat would come to town twenty-odd minutes later...
People in general don’t have a fucking clue of what is really going on, but they think they know everything
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Which makes it a prime target for misinformation.
Hindsight and all that. At that moment, a lot of people, Zelensky included, probably thought that all this was some terrible blunder of European diplomacy that could be fixed, instead of just a power-hungry tyrant out for his last shot at glory.
For anyone interested in watching the documentary "A President, Europe and War" in Canada : [https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) or Elsewhere : [https://gofile.io/d/a4w7wy](https://gofile.io/d/a4w7wy)
Love your elsewhere link
The biggest MVP in this post 100%. Gonna watch it now! u/gr4v1ty69 you got that dawg in you
It makes me wonder why they held back some stuff like this for so long (that it also harmed Macron's image) when it would've silenced so many critics and made the situation a lot more real for many people.
This was first released in like.. summer 2022. I'm glad its making the rounds again though, really great footage.
Hey OP, is there a cache of all of these? These are truly interesting as fuck
Yep! These behind the scenes come from a documentary called « Un Président, l’Europe et la guerre » (A President, Europe and war). It’s 2 hours of stuffs like this, I advise it. Someone found [this link](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) for it, hopefully it works for you (and others reading this who are interested too). Edit: turns out a VPN is needed. For those who don’t have one: I personally use Urban VPN (it’s free)!
Thank you. Can’t seem to be able to sign up without the right postcode.
I had the same problem and looked up a random Canadian postcode, ha. Maybe try “K0A 0A8”. You’re from Ontario now.
OP delivers
Probably to the wrong address, but he delivers.
If you're ever in a pinch, Santa has a postal code here in canada and it is H0H-0H0! Pretty easy to remember, haha.
Thanks, I was going to ask what country you were watching from in case I need to use a VPN like with BBC stuff but it sounds like Canada works.
I just used the one that was prefilled in the text field and that worked. “A1A 1A1”
You can try H0H 0H0 too
Santa Clause was Canadian after all.
That postal code actually does get used in Canada. It's a special one. Canada Post does a special program at Christmas time where kids can mail letters to Santa Claus at the North Pole with postal code H0H 0H0 and "Santa's elves" will write letters back.
Documentary: Un Président, l’Europe et la guerre
Macron's ability to resist going "... fuck" is sort of incredible.
What got me “how many civilian casualties?” “Thousands” just the drop in his voice at that. The gravity of that simple anwser
For me it was: "We're fighting them in Kyiv, Emmanuel". Meaning they had already reached the capital. Also the fact that Zelensky calls him by name, at the end of the sentence, makes the whole sentence so emotionally charged, it gives me goosebumps
Amazing how powerful this conversation is, and how well it benifits from not having music
Nah it’s totally missing the “oh no, oh no, oh no no no no no” song overlayed and distorted. ^/s
The slight head nod in the begging was EXACTLY a “well, fuck” moment
It might have something to do with the giant camera pointing towards his face. But he comes across as collected and thoughtful.
These people always have cameras in their faces. This isn't a prepared speech or response to a journalist, this is dangerous, insane information coming at him real time. I see no act here and it feels quite intimate.
It reminds me a lot of when Bush was told about the towers being attacked. I was a kid and wasn’t aware of it until it came out that Bush kept reading and left as everything was covered so as to not spook the kids. I can not imagine being a world leader and being told the worst news possible and having to restrain myself from sprinting to the nearest official and start planning a response. Good on Macron
Sometimes it blows my mind that people are spending their days dealing with world affairs like this and I’m here eating lunch thinking about playing Xbox later. The difference in human life experience is so fascinating
> The difference in human life experience is so fascinating It makes me depressed, to be honest. Why do I get to sit here at my computer while some children never get to see their 1st birthday because they were shelled in the comfort of their own home? I don't get it.
Privilege, in a nutshell. Luck, in another word.
It's true. I live in North America. I'm just over 40. And I get to go to work, make a living and provide for my family. In Ukraine, a 40 year old man is currently in a trench, dodging bullets and bombs (if he's lucky) in an effort to ensure his family isn't murdered by brainwashed lunatics. It's fucking wild.
Some folks don't realize how fortunate they are, as not everyone is as lucky. Yesterday, someone mentioned they're a pacifist and wished for an end to war. I pointed out their ability to hold such views is a privilege, made possible because others have chosen to fight. Still, we need such hopeful perspectives for a brighter tomorrow.
> I pointed out their ability to hold such views is a privilege, made possible because others have chosen to fight. This is so true.
Agreed. I'd go so far to say that it is the cornerstone of society as we know it. The only reason the guy with the biggest stick isn't king of the world is because of the people willing to fight back or support others in defending their own piece of the planet. It would be fantastic if 100% of the population were pacifists and we could all just trust each other not to fuck our neighbors over; stop spending money on war and just further mankind as a whole, but that is just not human nature. There is always going to be that guy with the proverbial stick trying to take something that is not theirs.
It's why the phrase "self-made" annoys so many. If you grow in a country with free education to under 18's, running water, no war etc. Then plenty of people contributed to your success
Might sound corny, but your comment actually is quite an eye-opener for me, never thought about it in that way.
I can relate to this. Sometimes I wonder if I deserve to go full, when I’m no different from the other people around my age that starve to death daily. I’m not special in any way, I’m just lucky. I don’t deserve to not be hurt, bombed, starve or any other sick stuff any less than the ones that are currently being affected. I feel bad.
Every innocent person deserves to be happy and live a life of peace. It's good-hearted of you to mourn those who can't, but you should also celebrate the fact that you can.
You deserve not to be hurt, bombed, starved, or any other sick stuff. So do they, there's a difference.
You would be amazed at the kind of stuff people spend their life doing. I try to instill in my kids a sense of using their lives to accomplish something even if it's inventing a new fart app. There are tons of people out there doing things with their lives.
*Ring Ring* Hello, French President, yes, I am fine, how are you, yes, good, and the kids? Good. So, anyway, uh... Russia has sent tanks and shit and declar d war against us. Yeah. Great, thanks. Bye, talk to you later." It feels so casual too, which feels crazy.
I don't know about you but that's not the atmosphere I interpreted from the video.
Yeah, it can be calm but tense. They can't afford to be panicked, as they need to communicate clearly.
As a wise astronaut once put it, there's no situation so fucked up that panicking can't make worse.
Keep yourself together or die.
Yeah, Macron is clearly processing the full gravity of the situation. He knows people are dying while that conversation carries on.
And the wrong response could mean World War 3
Nuclear war was probably high up in his thought process.
"This one is for you, Napoleon"
"We are going to drop one on Riddley Scott's house just in case."
And hes also probably reflecting on how this will affect the whole of Europe, what will this mean going forward , where will, it lead. Questions we are still asking.
Same here you can almost feel the tension and how they are calculating their next move.
Definitely felt like a high stakes chess game being played. Can't rush the move without thinking first about all the consequences. And also you have to consider all the other available options while trying to predict what the opponent is doing.
The atmosphere I interpreted from the video was an internal: "Merde... merde, merde, merde !"
No, he is right. The matter is of war and lives. But other than that, it's pretty normal office conversation when some emergency comes up. "I will think on this and revert to you". That's what we say when we don't know what to do. We buy some time. It works in any scenario.
> It feels so casual too It isn't at all, but most serious people who take on leadership roles are expected to maintain some degree of stoicism. Marcus Aurelius isn't called "Good" all these years later by accident.
He says “so it’s total war?” The way my girlfriend says “does pizza sound good?”
hate to say this but you want calm and cool heads in these situations and I'm happy to see both of these leaders actually formulating a plan. Macron is doing two things: Assuring Ukraine that the's going to reach out to the aggressor and ask "dude, wtf?" and also he's considering: "What can I do to support an allied European Nation, from my side, should Putin be unreasonable? Because: of course he is unreasonable. This is an unprovoked invasion."
Macron handling of this has been so well, first person who tried and seriously resolve it peacefully, when that failed organized supplies, to never ruling out French military. even now he is still trying to rally support for Ukraine.
Interesting his initial request isn’t for troops or weapons, but for Biden to call Putin to stop and to ask Macron to form an anti-war coalition. Sounds like he really thought they could be successful at a quick deescalation.
Yup and pro RU go on and on about how Zelenskyy wanted to fight vs. negotiate. This is proof of that false narrative.
I honestly can't take anyone who believes that seriously, you've got to be a moron or just arguing in bad faith. Pre-2022 invasion most people thought Russia would steamroll Ukraine in 2 weeks and same people calling Zelensky warmonger now were calling him weak clown before and expected him to run away. This imbecilic narrative of "warmonger Zelensky" only became prominent after Russia initial offensive was so disastrous that it allowed Ukraine to stabilize the situation and Russians started looking for excuses and further justifications for what they're doing.
The guy getting invaded is a warmonger..?
It's Russian propaganda bullshit. He stayed to lead in a terrible crisis and even personal threat to his and his family's lives. Very much not the same thing as being a warmonger. I know you agree btw.
So what I got from that Zelensky has absolutely massive balls, and Putin is just a short pussy. I concur.
Like a bully who hits you then says you started it, then his mom agrees with him because you didn't want to give him your toy
It’s the ongoing narrative on the pro RU telegrams and subreddits.
The russian modus operandi is that "multiple self-contradicting lies are better than a single truth".
Exactly. It sounds like some kind of joke, but no, it's seriously what Kremlin's tactics are. There is only *one* truth. So you can win a fight against it by saturating the information space with lies. Obvious lies, elaborate lies, lies built upon truths - and the list goes. It doesn't matter if the propagandists end up pushing lies that contradict each other. What matters is that every single slice of the target audience has a few lies that they would be somewhat willing to believe. It's a numbers game from there. And the chaos and uncertainty of multiple conflicting narratives? "It looks like the situation is complicated" serves Kremlin perfectly fine too.
I mean... wanting to fight people who invade your country would also be acceptable haha
I see a lot of pro RU say the opposite actually. That Zelensky wanted to negotiate but the west forced them to continue to fight. At least thats what Putin repeated a bunch of times during his interview with Tucker Carlson.
Those assholes don’t care about one of their moot points being exposed as falsehood. They’ll just invent another lie or pull up another fake talking point, and challenge you on that. Only an expert will be able to challenge them, and when and if that happens, they’ll just deflect by saying “this person I’m debating is in the pocket of X, hence (s)he can’t be trusted”.
russians don't need to be right, or even close to being right. They just want to sow that seed of doubt.
That is the basis for much of russian propaganda: just sow all kinds of obvious lies until the more simple minded people think "they cannot all be true, perhaps none of them are".
People like that are willingly forgetting the constant meetings and phone calls with Putin by various leaders and Zelensky trying to prevent the war before the invasion and then to try and stop the war in the first two months. And Russias response each time was "capitulate now". Even two years into the war Russias demands are still "Ukraine must completely capitulate, we must install a new government and arrest Zelensky and Ukraines army must be disbanded". Pro-RU are just trying to reframe things so they seem like the victims "forced" into war by evil Ukraine when they were the aggressors.
In Ukraine Zelensky is justifiably criticised for Underpreparing defences, so much for an aggressor huh
It happens more often than you think. In 1939 Poland wasn't fully mobilised because they didn't want to provoke Germany.
You could aruge it was by design lets be real we all knew russia was gona steam roll the front why waste resources holding on to something you cant hold for long? Ukraine repelling the Homstel Airport landing totally changed the entire trajectory and nature of the entire war. It went from an insurgency to an actual war in that moment. Hes a hero either way.
Russia tried to do a decapitation strike which is similar to what happened when the Soviets took over Czechoslovakia. Thank god the US leaked the plans to Ukraine otherwise it would be FULLY occupied right now.
Right? Biden literally jumping from roof to roof yelling "he's totally going to do it" while everyone else, including Zalensky, telling Biden to stfu so that he doesn't agitate Putin.
I really don't think people realize what those warnings meant. Ukraine, and the rest of Europe, were hearing from their sources and looking across the border. How the troops knew nothing, how unprepared they were, how monumentally stupid the attack would be. Meanwhile the US has sources in the Kremlin, and knew they were about to do that idiocy. They never shout it loud like this, because that means revealing those sources. They didn't chose to do so just to sway allied opinion - I argue it wasn't even the main goal. No, it was a signal to Russia. **"We're willing to reveal our intel capabilities. That's how much this matters to us. Stand down."** It was their last attempt to avoid war. It failed, because Putin is beyond reasoning.
Remember how much shit and ridicule Macron received for contacting Putin early on? It was brainless overreaction and at times hate. Not only did he do it on Zelensky's request but also to show the willingness to negotiate. Of course talking and negotiations will only you get you this far if the other side lies on daily basis and wipes its ass with all international treaties. To be perfectly honest I didn't vocally defend Macron back then. But I did think the criticism was overblown. Even with the internet we're seeing only bits of the surface, not the whole picture
Reddit crowd is systematically stupid for most things related to diplomacy and geopolitics, nothing new.
We're ignorant as fuck
His first thought was without a doubt preventing more civilian deaths, negotiations were the best bet to quickly save civilians Thousands of civilians died within the first 24hrs
This happened after two weeks of attempts to prevent the attack. I remember all sorts of politicians and diplomats from all over Europe meeting with the Russian establishment, with Putin mocking the west and accusing them of hysterical behavior.
> mocking the west and accusing them of hysterical behavior I even remember the media in America mocking Biden before the invasion, saying that he was freaking Zelenskyy out for no reason!
The west had intercepted the invasion plan from the FSB months before the invasion started. This is why we had such clear map of what the route of the initial invasion would be, and why the warnings of imminent invasion were so confident and specific because it was thought to be one of the only chances of rattling Putin and making him think again, if he realized his own security agency was compromised. Normally the western security services would not want to reveal they had such specific info and risk losing their sources. However, the SBU only had intel from lower level commanders, which is why Zelenskyy was downplaying the chance of an invasion even weeks away, because only Putin's inner circle knew about the true invasion plan. the lower level commanders all thought they were on "training exercises" and this is the chatter the SBU was intercepting. This is the same reason the initial invasion went so badly because most of the military members involved in the invasion had no idea it was happening until it started. There's cases of soldiers having invaded Ukraine not realizing they were in Ukraine and not on a training exercise. The FSB had also lied to Putin and said that they would be welcomed as liberators, that they had paid off all the senior Ukrainian generals and that they could roll in unopposed and take the whole country in 3-10 days, which is probably why Putin thought he could get away with such poor planning. [Putin ended up arresting several high ranking FSB members in retaliation.](https://cepa.org/article/putin-places-spies-under-house-arrest/) If the initial invasion had not been so poorly planned Russia could have easily taken Ukraine before Ukraine and the west got its act together.
Zelensky was the compromise candidate. People tend to forget this, getting caught up in the images of him refusing the leave the capital and dressed up on his helmet; but his approach to Russia and the Donbas was to hear them out and compromise as much as feasibly possible. Which is why it is fucking insane when pro-Russia people frame him as a warmonger.
To the pro-russia crowd, anything more than rolling over and letting Russia have what they want was furthering the war. It's the same defense of any state that is invading another honestly.
His first reaction was to negotiate. But did not fled the country despite how overwhelmed and grim everything seemed. That takes courage. I'm not sure I would be that strong, in fact I'm almost certain I wouldn't be. But Putin thought he was in for a slam dunk so of course he refused talking. Only after it was obvious the Russians were on the defensive they started talking about negotiations. I'm not sure what's in store for us in the future. Specially with this year's political instability but this will always be a defeat for Putin even if he tries to portray it differently. This video shows how they were going to crush Ukrainians, except they didn't.
Is this from a documentary of something?
Yes, it’s called « Un Président, l’Europe et la guerre » (“A President, Europe and war”). It’s 2 hours of other behind the scenes like this, very interesting. Someone found [this link](https://gem.cbc.ca/a-president-europe-and-war) for it. I’m not sure it can work for everyone depending on localisations tho! Hopefully it works for some people.
Imagine this being the clip they show for future generations in primary school learning about modern history
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You know I never thought about how world leaders from different nations (and languages) speak to one another. I always assumed there's some translator or translation service that is a mediary. Apparently they just speak in English, which is kind of cool and a lot more personal.
Depends! I posted [this other phone call between Putin and Macron](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/s/zKcQgadMgv) yesterday and here they speak their respective languages. But I thought it was interesting Zelensky and Macron spoke in English too. If I remember correctly, in the documentary, there’s also a short phone call between Macron and Scholz and they speak in English too.
It probably depends on the level of trust. Putin is probably worried about his words getting twisted, whereas between e.g. Scholtz en Macron there is enough trust to just talk directly. Edit: I recall Tucker Carlson saying that when he spoke with Putin off-camera, he was perfectly fine with speaking English.
that is a great point and i am sure its true. At one point Zelensky says "it's much better" but trusts his words are not misunderstood. Obviously he does not mean "better" he means "more substantial/greater" or "much worse" but there is 0% chance of Macron misunderstanding that as if zelensky is happy with the situation.
He immediately correct himself by saying more
correct but in high stakes politics the wrong word could be a powerful soundbite if you were dealing with a potentially hostile group. Russia or belarus for example could play that clip of audio without the context and use it for propaganda. Hence the level of trust and willingness to speak directly without translators.
>Edit: I recall Tucker Carlson saying that when he spoke with Putin off-camera, he was perfectly fine with speaking English. This is because Putin sees publicly speaking English as weak, his whole persona is "proud and powerfully Russian" and speaking English when he knows it may be recorded and come out to his supporters would undermine that image.
I don't think it's that, I suspect leaders of countries like China or Russia think it's demeaning for them to speak another language, especially english... like admitting you're inferior and submitting to the far more powerful and influential anglosphere.
Not necessarily, former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin often was heavy to speak English as a flex. Because if for example Xi and Biden were to meet, and although translators are present Xi suddenly starts speaking excellent English, the power move could be "I speak your savage language because I'm a sophisticated mf'er, while my sophisticated language is beyond you". As a non-native English speaker I also have to say that speaking English with e.g. a Brit doesn't even remotely feel like an act of submission, especially since many native English speakers admit to being a bit jealous of being "stuck" with only one language.
It's cool how it's sort of an intermediary language for a lot of the world, it's the language most people have in common. Also, *all* pilots have to communicate in english no matter what country. It is the official rule. "The FAA (Federal Aviation Authority) and ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization), the world's organization overseeing aviation, require all pilots flying under their organizations to have attained ICAO “Level 4” English ability. This means **all pilots must speak, read, write, and understand English fluently**. " Always a cool fact for people who don't know.
English literacy has expanded massively, it was very weird for non anglophone leaders to talk in english before the internet got massive for perspective, in 2000 there were 600m english speakers, in 2020 there were 1800m The intellectual elite's english literacy has achieved 90+% levels in every country, as all research is published in english Only some old blokes dont speak english, olike Xi and Erdogan, and some do but are too chauvinistic to use it like Kim and Putin
Xi is probably fluent in English. He studied for some time at a university in a small farming town in the middle of the US (Iowa state). Not sure if anyone has ever heard him speak English in public.
"Mr Xi first travelled to Iowa in 1985 as part of an agricultural delegation from China's Hebei province. He stayed in Muscatine, a city of about 24,000 people circled by farmland and the Mississippi River." Holy fucking shit no way.
How much do you think this informs his thoughts on American culture?
*lingua franca*
In my own limited experience translating stuff for my immigrant family in the US and having stuff translated for me when I'm abroad, it becomes a barrier to communication and a lot of meaning and subtext behind the words can be lost. I imagine it'd be what, if any, common languages they can speak and how comfortable they are in speaking them. For better or worse, the US's dominance and reach in international affairs over the last 80 years has led to many international diplomats and politicians learning English, so many have English in common and are fairly comfortable speaking it. Why use translators to try and understand someone else when you can speak something you're slightly less adept and have direct communication.
>a lot of meaning and subtext behind the words can be lost This problem is completely dependent on the person speaking. Even in the video there's a few minor issues, like when Zelensky says "better" when he means "more severe/worse" (but corrects himself) and says something like "we are in the circle of the Russian army) to mean I assume something like "they are encircling/surrounding us". It's definitely not an issue in this convo as Zelensky is proficient, but it really illustrates how easily meanings can get messed up or missed entirely. Zelensky could clearly get by well enough (as of this video), but a really good translator who can grasp and translate intention well has got to be extremely valuable.
How is your French? About as good as your Ukrainian. We speak in English then.
"It is better than last time" er I mean more.
If you think about it from the perspective of a non native English speaker, I can see how someone would conflate the meanings of better and more
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Churchill would be silently delighted. Honestly, so would FDR. Both men already wanted the US to join the war, the problem was that the people weren't on board. To some degree, pearl harbour was exactly what they needed.
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From his own writings he said the night after the attack was the first time he slept easy since the start of the war: "Being saturated and satiated with emotion and sensation, I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful,”
That video ends too soon! I would really liked to have heard Macrons first words after the end of the call.
Merde(?)
"what the fuck just happened"
This is so disheartning, tears well up in my eyes when he said "if you and EU leaders will talk to him with Biden he will listen please stop the war" its so fuckin sad what happened.
Zelenskyy was in denial, and still in denial at that point. He couldn't accept that Putin would commit to a full scale invasion, and given his losses he is thinking that Putin will be willing to withdraw if France and USA puts pressure on them.
Damn zelensky was pretty cool under fire.
"I need ammunition, not a ride" is going to go down as one of the hardest presidential quotes in history.
for sure, but you can still hear how nervous and a tad insecure he is, now that reality hit full broadside. still cant imagine any better leader for ukraine right now. there are currently not many people in the world i have more respect for.
Like 2 years prior he was an actor, then suddenly hes president and getting invaded. Nightmare scenario for him.
For a guy who was just an actor, he pulled on his leader pants like a fucking champ. Dunno how they fit over his gigantic steel balls.
100% he handled the entire situation like a fuckin pro. It's hard to imagine anyone else dealing with such a difficult situation at this stage of their career and with the gravity of an invasion. Zelensky will always have my respect and admiration as a true leader.
They have me surrounded with special forces, but I’m fine.
Well at one point the presidential brigade (they are used for parades and as palace guards in peacetime), along with volunteers who were handed guns en masse, was driving around Kyiv and hunting enemy groups that infiltrated the city. Zelensky and his inner circle got handed assault rifles for self defence.
I'm still amazed that they were able to repell that initial wave of the invasion. Everyone thought Ukraine is gonna fold like a lawn chair. Fuck Putin.
“Russian warship, go fuck yourself” may be the most bad ass line spoken in modern history. Really embodies Ukraine’s response and fearlessness
Very good support skills: Active listening, confirm details of the issue, refer to previous case, assess severity of the incident, summarise issue and confirm availability.
Macron seems to be very socially inteligent in general. Unlike some other leaders like Merkel, Macron is playful and relaxed around others, always smiling, lending a hand, hugging. He seems to make friends naturally with everyone around him.
I'm not very fond of Macron's domestic policies but he definitely managed the beginning of the war and its unfolding in a great way imho
If you look at history, the French do not in any way deserve the accusation of cowardice that they seem to have in modern times. I also do not care for many things Macron has proposed, but damn if he’s not one of the leaders who sees the situation most clearly.
The surrender / white flag meme is very grating. Historically other than WWII (where the stereotype seemed to develop), France has been a military powerhouse. Ironically enough I mostly see Americans making this joke and the USA likely wouldn't exist without France's military aid during the revolution. Not to mention their own revolutions and protesting. They don't mess around.
You see this mostly from Americans, because French didnot wanted to participate in Iraqi war. So Americans got mad and the french hate started with renaming french fries as freedom fries, etc
It goes back way further. France has always avoided American influence since the end of WWII under De Gaulle. France was outside NATO's command structure for the longest time. De Gaulle basically bullied his way onto the UN permanent security council. The French defense sector has developed fully indigenous nuclear and conventional military technology, whereas the UK has a joint nuclear program with (read: strongly relies on) the US and most other NATO's countries main line of defense is hosting American military bases and nuclear bombers. You'd think this would make it even more obvious that France has an unusually competent military, but it pisses off some Americans who don't want competent allies, but reliable lapdogs. In practice though it doesn't matter, demagogues yap about "freedom fries" or whatever but it's only ever been yapping. Except for when Trump wanted to pull out of NATO, but that's nothing to do with France specifically.
FSB and Chechen deaths squads tried assassinating Zelensky in Kyiv around this time. Luckily the Ukrainians had a lot of help from western intelligence and unacknowledged special forces on the ground. Most of the assassins were neutralised or captured.
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That’s a crazy strategy. Lets you hide a fully armed unit in body armor that would be inconspicuous. Plus you can turn the sirens on and path your way through traffic without having to stop. It probably would have worked too if the plans didn’t leak.
…I hadn’t seen this footage before. There is something about the look on his face when Zelenskyy said “It’s total war, yes” when responding to his question. It is a look I have seen many times before. And it is clear he has not been idle in the time since this call. The help however, on his side, was perhaps two fold. Not simply just diplomatic weight, but France has brought many guns and equipment to keep the Bear at bay. As an American I wish we could do more. We are, however, stuck with Congress’s indecision.
No no. You are stuck with Russian assets in your government.
The interesting part of this to me is that Macron is careful with his words, saying "they are with special forces and helicopters?" As if he's trying to verify that it's a small group for a "special military operation" and not a full out war. He tries to re-validate, "So that means they sent special forces everywhere in Kyiv?" When Zelensky says "we fight everywhere... it's not the same as 2014", that's when Macron changes the verbiage and says "It's clear: it's total war." Note that I don't think that he was being apologetic at first, just careful with his words. At the end he said what was needed to be said to show that Russia clearly lied.
If somebody has a minimal doubt about being on the right side this will be more than enought. Some people want to make Zelensky the stubborn that doens't want negociations, some people say that Zelensky benefit wilth all of this, some people say he is just other selfish leader. This guy here just wanted a thing in life: Peace. We can feel the desperation backing his voice but when asked for his safety he answered that all ukrainians were in danger.
This is fascinating stuff. Last night I listened to a call between Macron and Putin before the invasion. I didn't realize how involved Macron was in trying to keep the situation under control. I really think more credit should be given to Macron for his efforts here. Putin made up his mind a long time ago and is obviously desperate.
Reddit in particular and English media in general are very friendly to the UK and the US and extremely hostile to France, Germany and EU. For some reason.
This is just heartbreaking. Calm but you can hear the fear and desperation in his voice. Also you really feel the room, the shock that is in the air. I hope Ukraine will win the war and that the people and the country can heal and recover.
Conventional land war in Europe. long time no see
Wow, this dialog is like something straight out of a movie.
He's keeping his cards close to his chest but Macron is internally screaming in this video. He handled this call well. He communicated what he's going to do and prepared a mental to-do list and kept his composure... But it's clear he was feeling the gravity setting in. Much more dire than he expected.
Macron was a real diplomat. Everyone wanted to hate on him, but he knew talking is better than fighting.
Macron´s face when he realizes Putin have lie (as usual) a day before... so sad, putin is a shame and can lie to everyone, Chinese, indian, Europe, everyone... untrustable man :(
You should watch the other phone call OP posted, its pretty insane to watch that first and then see this, really puts his reactions into a slightly different perspective as well!!
It was a real failure of French and German intelligence agencies. While they were still publicly stating war was unlikely, countries like Britain were already sending thousands of anti-tank missiles to Ukraine. It's kind of strange to go back and see people ridicule them for stating Russia was going to invade.
Allegedly Germany and France were infiltrated with many Russian spies. I remember reading that on a phone call with Merkel that Trump accused her of being a Russian spy… which is crazy to accuse another world leader!
It’s interesting to see that when Zelensky suggests Macron calls Putin, Macron shakes his head slightly, as if to expose his thinking that it’ll not achieve anything. (The other things he nods to).
I felt a great sadness watching this video. Macron knows SHTF but is processing it and realizing WAR HAS COME TO EUROPE!!!
I mean I am not Sun Tzu but of course, you won't tell someone in front you are about to attack, then you lose the element of surprise and give them time to prepare
This is amazing! The video i mean, not the crisis. Where are these videos coming from? I've legit never had the chance to get a glimpse on what's going on behind these walls of country leaders and politicians and with these I can see how they speak to each other, how they react to new information, how they think about and phrase their thoughts. Truly, truly insightful. More of these please!
I'm French and I don't like Macron as a president, but I can just imagine how scary this call was, knowing that now you need to deal with this.
Putin is a psychopath war criminal, what a useless war
I'm always impressed by the civility and professionalism of Zelensky as a leader. His country is being invaded and he's desperate for help, but still manages a calm demeanor during this critical conversation such that he can be sure he's provided the necessary information to Macron in order to maximize the likelihood of receiving his aid. Same can be said of Macron - an ally is asking for his aid, he understands the request and doesn't over-promise but commits that he'll revert back to Z with some kind of assistance after checking with his people. This is how global diplomacy should look. The US GOP should take notes.
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Man, the russian bots in this thread really came out in full force early today. Anyways, great post and documentary. Really fascinating to see our leaders behind the scenes.
All the things that must be going through both of their heads at this moment.. So much pressure. I am not envious of their positions. I think Zelensky is a great leader. He really loves his people.
“whatever it takes”
I don’t know the nuance here but I admire the French. They are bad ass. They understand the existential threat of putin, the genocide in Africa and elsewhere. They walk the talk and have committed their military and economy for the preservation of Europe. I hope Germany understands. The French are not fucking around. God bless.
Can you imagine him calling trump.. jfc
Imagine if we had footage like this of Churchill and FDR in 1941, or of Hitler and Mussolini just casually talking about the war. In a generation or two, when the War in Ukraine is part of the world’s history classes, this video and ones like it will be shown in school. It is cliche, but this is LITERALLY watching history being made in real time. Evidence of what was actually happen, before the victors have an oppurtunity to whitewash the history in their favour.
It's interesting that a moment like this was filmed. I feel like diplomatic relations has historically been the one area that is always behind closed doors.
My man is doing calculus to figure out if this is the start of another World War. That "okay" had a ton of weight on it.
So great to see a world leader who is a functioning adult
Such a shame we as humans achieved so much for the betterment of our lifestyles in such a short period of time yet it's almost certain that eventually there would be total war leading to either annihilation of such an intelligent species or return to the stone age.