Date: Monday, 07 April 2025
https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/us-secstate-rubio-only-russia-will
https://theduran.com/u-s-secstate-rubio-only-russia-will-be-to-blame-if-no-ceasefire
U.S. SecState Rubio: Only Russia Will Be To Blame If No Ceasefire in Ukraine
7 April 2025, by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s press Conference at NATO on Friday, in Brussels, stated that President Donald Trump is losing patience with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin over Trump’s demand he accept an unconditional ceasefire in Ukraine, and that Ukraine’s President Zelensky has already accepted Trump’s demand for such a ceasefire but Russia’s President Putin is — as one of Rubio’s questioners summed up Rubio’s position — “dragging his feet” in order to continue the war as long as possible. Rubio said that if Trump continues to lose patience with Putin, Trump will back congressional proposals to increase sanctions against Russia unless Putin will say yes very soon to Trump’s demand for an unconditional ceasefire in Ukraine.
Rubio presented a picture of Trump as being focused only on “peace” (whatever that might mean) and Rubio repeatedly refused to answer the repeated questions from the press concerning what that word would mean in this context (in which Russia currently is actually winning the war). Rubio said “Peace means you stop shooting at each other. I mean, it’s as simplistic as that.” If he really believes this, it would be remarkable, because anyone in diplomacy — and even most of the general public — know that getting to peace in a war is anything but simple, and even an unconditional ceasefire rarely produces peace but much more commonly enables the two warring sides to build up their forces for an ultimate intensification of the war. So, a ceasefire has no clear relationship to reducing the deaths and destructions in a war. And to use the term “peace” in relation to a ceasefire is actually deceptive and therefore raises questions about a speaker’s actual motives. But, of course, no journalist at a press conference will question the speaker’s motives. (To do that would antagonize the speaker and therefore reduce the likelihood of career-success for that journalist.)
Rubio also said that Greenlanders came up with the idea that Greenland should be a part of the U.S. and that Trump didn’t (which is false — the idea that Greenland should become a part of America has been a goal of U.S. Presidents ever since President Andrew Johnson, who was one of America’s worst Presidents, first tried it in 1867), and he said that “the Greenlanders have made clear that they want to be independent of Denmark” — which is true but not necessarily relevant to whether they want to become dependent upon America instead of upon Denmark. The latest poll there showed that 85% oppose becoming part of America, and only 6% support the idea. This is a far higher rejection of America than Greenlanders’ polled rejection of Denmark ever has been. So, Rubio is lying about that matter.
Rubio also stated that, “We’re going to have to spend more on national security, because we have a global footprint,” and this means that though Trump is slashing the federal budget on non-‘defense’ spending, he will increase ‘defense’ spending even beyond what Biden had been planning. So, he’s trying to slash the currently 47% of federal “discretionary” spending that pays for all non-military and non “national security” matters, but he will be increasing the currently 53% of “discretionary” spending that pays for all military and “national security” matters. Trump’s second term will take away some butter in order to buy more bombs. His Secretary of State has now said so.
Following here will be highlights from Rubio’s press conference, an abbreviated version of it; and the entirety of the press conference can be seen and heard in this youtube, and its transcript is complete at the U.S. State Department’s website:
Q: The prime minister of Greenland – excuse me – the prime minister of Denmark, which at this point, owns Greenland – so Denmark, a NATO Ally, is saying that it’s unacceptable, that one country cannot annex another country.
A: The Greenlanders have made clear that they want to be independent of Denmark. Denmark should focus on the fact that the Greenlanders don’t want to be a part of Denmark. That’s what they should focus on. We didn’t give them that idea; they’ve been talking about that for a long time.
Q: The President said he would not rule out using military force against Denmark, a NATO Ally, to take —
A: No, he said he would not rule out – no, no, no – he said he would not rule out – he said I’m not going to rule out anything if Greenland is encroached upon by a foreign power like a China or Russia or anybody else. [That’s NOT what Trump has been saying. He has been saying exactly what the questioner said he has been saying.] But it doesn’t matter because Greenlanders are going to make a decision. They’re the ones that want to get away from Denmark. They’re the ones that want to be independent, not us.
Q: Can you give us the – your – tell us about the American assessment of the conditions that Russia put forward following the – regarding the Black Sea ceasefire talks? And also, the British and French foreign ministers said this morning that Putin was dragging his feet. Do you agree with that, that —
A: Maybe – I mean, he might be. We don’t know yet. We’re going to find out fairly soon. I mean, look, we are – here’s what the President wanted to do. He wants to end this war and he wanted to test it very early in his administration. Is it possible to end this war on terms that are acceptable, obviously, to both sides? Because you can’t end a war unless both sides agree. And that’s what we’re in the process of finding out. We will know soon enough – in a matter of weeks, not months – whether Russia is serious about peace or not. I hope they are. It would be good for the world if that war ended, but obviously we have to test that proposition. The United States needs to know whether you’re serious or not about peace. Ultimately, Putin will have to make that decision; the Russian Federation will have to make that decision. I think the Ukrainians have shown a willingness to enter, for example, into a complete ceasefire to create space for negotiation. At some point here fairly soon – not six months from now – the Russians and Putin will have to make a decision about whether they’re serious for peace or not, and I hope they are serious. It would be good for the world if that war ended.
Q: And what is – what is your assessment of the Russian conditions that were put forward?
A: We’re going to wait and see. The Russians know our position in terms of wanting to end the war, and we will know from their answers very soon whether they are serious about proceeding with real peace or whether it’s a delay tactic. If it’s a delay tactic, the President’s not interested in that. If this is dragging things out, President Trump’s not going to fall into the trap of endless negotiations about negotiations. We will know soon enough whether or not Russia is serious about peace. If they are, that will be great. Then we can move towards peace. If they’re not, then we’ll have to re-evaluate where we stand and what we do moving forward about it, but we’ll be in no different a position than we are today or we were when he took office. He wanted to know early in his administration: is peace possible? We’re testing to see if the Russians are interested in peace. Their actions – not their words, their actions – will determine whether they’re serious or not, and we intend to find that out sooner rather than later.
Q: And what about their conditions?
A: Which conditions? [Rubio wasn’t willing to think about Russia’s national-security needs — he’s like a negotiator who ignores the needs of the person he’s trying to negotiate with, and that’s a very bad negotiator.] I don’t – bottom line is, to me, at the end of the day, what’s going to matter here is whether we’re going to move towards peace or not. If peace is real, we will know soon enough. If they’re not interested in peace, we will know soon enough, and we’ll make decisions on the basis – I hope they are real. We want them to be serious about peace, and hopefully they are, but we’ll know sooner rather than later.
Q: On the 5 percent defense spending target, have you received pushback to this idea while you’ve been here this week? And you mentioned yesterday up to 5 percent – was your language – what do you mean by up to 5 percent?
A: Well, I said up to a path – getting up to 5 percent at some point. I’m not saying overnight, but to get to that point, we think that’s what NATO Allies need to be spending for NATO to face the threats that itself has identified and articulated. Here’s the good news. The good news is everyone generally, with a couple exceptions, are spending more on defense today than they were three, four or five years ago. That’s positive. That trend needs to continue. So, the trend lines are good but they need to continue.
But this is not about spending, okay? This is not about money necessarily. This is about capability. In order for NATO to be stronger, it needs partners that are stronger, okay. The United States commits a lot to NATO and continues to. We are as involved in NATO today as we have ever been, and we intend to continue to be, but it has to be a real Alliance, and that means that our Alliance partners have to increase their own capabilities. So, hopefully two things have led to that. The first is the war in Ukraine, I think, has woken up a lot of people on this continent about real threats and real war. And the other is, I think, the pressure and the statements of President Trump that have been pretty consistent about increasing their spending. So, this whole trajectory of more defense spending began, I believe, back in 2017, 2018 under President Trump’s first term. We want that trend to continue.
Q: Will you try and get the official target as 5 percent rather than 2 percent? And will the U.S. commit to 5 percent?
A: Sure. We’re heading there now. I mean, we’re going to have to spend more on national security, because we have a global footprint, and that’s the point that I think has been made and missed in a lot of places, okay. We’re going to have to increase defense spending in our country. So, look, I think our partners know they need to do more, they’ve all indicated they want to do more, they’ve begun to do more, and that trend needs to continue.
Q: Mr. Secretary, you mentioned that you met with [Russia’s] Kirill Dmitriev, in order to stop them from dragging their feet, Is there anything that you said – perhaps not threats, but is there anything that you said you wanted to see concretely from the Russian side in order to —
A: Yes, peace. We want to see peace.
Q: But specifics.
A: Peace means you stop shooting at each other. I mean, it’s as simplistic as that. What we’re not interested in – and I’m not accusing them of this; I’m just telling you – what we’re not interested in is negotiations about negotiations, that we’re not going to continue this forever. So, none of it was threatening. Members of Congress have begun to file bills to increase sanctions. So, there is going to be growing pressure from Capitol Hill to impose sanctions that we’re not going to be able to stop if, in fact, we’re not making progress towards peace. All these factors have been explained in the nicest way possible. Hopefully he’ll take that message back to Moscow.
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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.
