Around the beginning of Russia’s war on Ukraine, retired Army Col. Douglas MacGregor, a past-his-sell-by-date joke of a man, was always on Tucker Carlson’s show and up Vladimir Putin’s ass, finding every available opportunity to take Russia’s side against Ukraine, and by extension against the United States. (Not because this is a proxy war, but because Russia is our adversary and Ukraine is our ally. Russia is a rightwing dictatorship and an autocracy. Ukraine is a fledgling democracy. Etc.) As Media Matters has documented extensively, MacGregor is Tucker’s “foreign policy muse” and a “coup-curious conspiracy theorist.” Tucker tells his viewers that MacGregor is telling them the truth, whereas more respected generals are manipulating them.
Unsurprisingly, Donald Trump nominated the guy to be his ambassador to Germany, though the nomination went nowhere. When Trump started firing all the remaining patriots at the Pentagon after he lost the 2020 election, he crammed MacGregor into a role there as senior adviser to acting SecDef Chris Miller. As Axios reports, just after the election, and just after MacGregor got that sweet job, Trump’s favorite enforcer boy Johnny McEntee gave him a note with Trump’s HEREBY ORDERS for the Pentagon:
1. Get us out of Afghanistan.
2. Get us out of Iraq and Syria.
3. Complete the withdrawal from Germany.
4. Get us out of Africa.
History tells us that the Pentagon said fuck that and ignored the loser.
MacGregor openly says Putin should be able to steal Ukraine’s territory. MacGregor thinks maybe the West hates Russia so much because it’s Orthodox Christian. He says Ukraine is simply being used as “cannon fodder for the United States and [George] Soros.” There appears to be no Russian propaganda he won’t spread. He’s such a fucking bigot in so many ways, so you can see why Tucker and Trump love him.
Now he’s back and he’s found a different stupid white guy to give him attention. (We don’t know if he “left,” we just hadn’t seen him as much in a while.) He went on Charlie Kirk’s show yesterday to spread pro-Putin propaganda, on the eve of the one-year anniversary of Russia’s genocidal invasion, that actually Russia didn’t even start this war.
Kirk had asked what “success” would look like for Russia. MacGregor answered:
MACGREGOR: Well, I think success for the Kremlin would be an end to this war, to be blunt. I think both the Russian people and the government would like to see this thing end. They’d like to negotiate an end to it. But they’re certainly not going to walk into a negotiation where they’re told, well, you have to accept guilt, quote unquote, for the war, which they really didn’t start.
They started it, to serve Putin’s sad demented delusions about Making Russia Great Again.
But let us say one thing: This war is over when Ukraine beats Russia to a bloody pulp OR the actual leadership and people of Ukraine tell us their goals have changed. (This is not likely to happen so please refer to the first part.)
MACGREGOR: And then they’re not going to give up all the terrain that they’ve already seized, which was largely occupied by Russians.
Oh yeah we bet they are. Including Crimea. Pretty sure that’s why Tucker and Elon are so hellbent lately on asserting that Russia should get to keep it.
MACGREGOR: Remember, their initial demands, if you will, were pretty modest. You know, give these two republics in the far east autonomy. You give neutrality to Ukraine and ultimately recognize that Crimea is ours. They’re not going to fall back on those now. They’re going to demand neutrality for whatever form of a Ukrainian state exists. But it’s going to be significantly reduced in size in a territorial sense.
Remember the days right before Russia started the war when Putin just declared “independence” on behalf of the two regions it wanted to steal? That’s all Putin wanted. And for Ukraine to give up its sovereignty and right to its own defense to make Putin feel better. And to agree that the land Russia stole when it invaded the first time should just be Russia’s now. Modest demands! You know, for “whatever form of a Ukrainian state exists. But it’s going to be significantly reduced in size in a territorial sense.”
Let us now say another thing: Anyone — ANYONE! — talking about finding a “peaceful solution” to this war that isn’t defined as that peaceful sound when the last Russian leaves Ukraine with their sad dick in their hand is somewhere along the spectrum between “unwitting Russian mouthpiece” and “actual Russian agent.” Only MacGregor knows where he really falls on that spectrum.
MACGREGOR: The problem is that we don’t seem to be interested in negotiating.
“We.” Because remember, the Russian conspiracy theory is that this isn’t Ukraine’s war, that we are somehow forcing them into it. Weird how they keep asking for more weapons to defend their homeland.
MACGREGOR: And so, the other fallback position for the Russians — and a gentleman just came back from Moscow told me this very recently, the Russians are prepared for a 30 month war with us.
“Us.”
In other words, they’ve amassed all the ammunition, the equipment and the capabilities they need to fight us for two and a half years. They don’t want to, but they’re prepared for it.
Never miss a chance to provide fluffer services to the Russian armed forces free of charge, dude. Ain’t nobody else gonna do it.
For a good indicator of how good this flamed out former general is at predicting how wars are going to go, refer to last summer, when he told Charlie Kirk that, with a couple exceptions, the war was pretty much over.
If you’re interested in the reflections of some real experts on where Russia’s war against Ukraine really stands, a reminder to please read Timothy Snyder on why western shrieking about ESCALATION! and NUCLEAR WAR! is concern-trolling bullshit. Also, here is an hour with Anne Applebaum and her reflections one year into the war. It’s a conversation with Bill Kristol, but don’t hold that against her.
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