 It's December the 2nd, 2021. It's Wednesday, 11 o'clock. I'm only mean one thing. It's time for What Now, America? I'm Tim Epichel, your host. Welcome. And today's title is China, Russia, Pollute Earth's Orbit. About two weeks ago, Russia sent up a missile and it destroyed one of their satellites in outer space in Earth's orbit. That strike created 1,500 pieces of new debris that circles the planet each orbit. Those debris pieces will be potentially in our orbit for decades, if not longer. When that strike took place, the astronauts in the International Space Station were woken up and told to immediately go into their escape capsule and hide out there for two to three hours in the event that some of that new debris field would either penetrate the space station or damage it severely. Fortunately, that didn't occur. The point is, Russia knows very well that there is agreements between Russia, China, the United States, that number one, creating new space debris in outer space in our Earth's orbit is forbidden. And secondly, China knows that they're not supposed to weaponize their satellites with missiles, specifically hypersonic missiles. So the question is right now is, we have over 27,000 pieces of debris. But the big issue is we have thousands of satellites, technologies that we rely on each and every day that we didn't have in the 1960s that make our lives better. All this technology potentially is in jeopardy from all the space debris. Yet Russia abandons the international agreements and decides to create more debris. The United States response was, this was reckless, but that's the only response they received. That was reckless. So here to talk about this issue of space debris, our technology in Earth's orbit, and the bigger picture, connect the dots is what's really going on. And with me to discuss this is Jay Fidel and Winston Welch. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, too. Jay, back in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, United States and Russia and China were blasting off nukes in open air environments, spreading radioactivity across the globe, depending on weather patterns. We now have basically Russia blasting their satellites, creating all sorts of space debris. By the way, one piece of space debris can travel at 17,500 miles per hour. A paint fleck can actually go through an international space station and create a hole. That's how fast these pieces move in orbit. Yet Russia is completely ignoring that. And so what are the implications of our existing technology in space? All the satellites and all the countries that's sent up now put in jeopardy by over 27,000 pieces of debris. What should we tell Russia? Because they obviously did this without a second thought. What should the nations, what should the world be sending the message to Russia as to knock it off? I don't think Russia cares what the world says. And I wish there were an easier solution. And our sanctions haven't been productive either. I don't know what they want. They want to be the naughty. They want to be a mischievous country. They want to be rogue is what they want to be. Their economy is not that great, it's not that big. What did somebody say? It was the size of Texas. There are other similarities, I might add. Anyway, we're in a cold war with Russia. This morning, the FBI rounded up a whole bunch of people. I don't know if they rounded them up, but they identified a whole bunch of people in Russia that were involved in the ransomware initiative. And they have made hundreds of millions of dollars doing ransomware in American companies. Are we doing that to them? I don't care what the government tells me on this. I don't believe we are doing that to them. I don't believe we have the power to fight with them at that level, nor will. So what's happening is they're having their way with us. Sure, they knew this was going to make a mess in space, but they want to be rogue. And they also want to control space for their own purposes. I think this is a control point, but it is. It's another story with China, it's just different. But Russia is such a rogue, and we are not stopping them in any way. Watch what happens in the Ukraine. Watch what happens in the internet. Watch what happens in the election. Well, I wanted to talk about the specifics of Ukraine because I do see correlations. I guess the question is, do you see a correlation to the blatant violation of an agreement with all the nations that have technologies in our space and their indifference and their troop build up along the Ukraine border? 100,000 troops are now positioned, poised potentially to invade Ukraine. Is there any correlations to these two actions? Oh, sure, it's the rogue thing. They don't follow agreements. They do what they want to do. And remember that there's no international body that can stop them because they sit on the Security Council and they can veto anything in the United Nations. So this is really, in terms of a global process, it's out of control. And Joe Biden can talk to Vladimir Putin, have a nice conversation with him. It isn't gonna stop him from doing what he does. I mean, he knew about the ransomware. He knows about all that hacking. He knows all the things that Russia does because he controls it. He's a dictator. And on top of that, he's knocking off any possibility of a democratic election. Navalny is still in jail and the other guy who was trying to run against Putin, some, his party was disbanded by government action. They disbanded his political party two days ago. So I mean, what's happening is he is emerging as a more mischievous dictator than before and we're threatening to Western Europe. And remembering the gas problem, he controls the natural gas into Western Europe. He's trying to be more powerful than he should be. And there's nothing that Europe will do, nothing that we will do with standing by. And this goes to not only his attitude and Russia's attitude as a government, but it goes to the American attitude in terms of dealing with them. Surely there's something we can do because over time this is so corrosive to our standing in the world, to our role in the global society. We look more powerless every day. Now, it's not just Russia, but Russia is a major contributor to our image in the world these days. And this is part of it. Right. Winston, President Bush, President Biden's Secretary of State. I don't know where Bush came from, but it did. He said that, not only did this blast of a missile have serious consequences, but what does that mean? I mean, what is the stick that the United States or its allies can bring out against either Russia or China to prevent this kind of weaponizing space, if you will. I mean, there's an agreement that we're not putting missiles in space, yet here China sends off a hypersonic missile from one of their satellites and hits its target on Earth. What consequences can the United States or its allies possibly implement to stop this kind of behavior and the continuation of blowing more satellites up and creating more space to breathe or worse yet, the invasion of Ukraine? It just seems like Jay's right. I mean, Russia doesn't care and it seems to do whatever it wants, like a wayward child. Well, it's, you know, from the Russians, I was watching the crown and somewhere on this says, you know, the Americans are new to the field and Russia needs to be treated as a great power that it is. And I backed this, of course, just to set in the fifties and some kerfluffle with, I've been right after that was Suez crisis. You know, I think when you've got satellites, remember, and then they have the Sputnik going up in that same show and this changed, apparently, the entire world at the moment, thinking there's a Russian satellite above our heads and a consciousness change at that time. Well, I've come back here 50 plus, 60 years later and we have, where NASA says, 20,000 cracked pieces of debris. We've got however, 500,000 maybe of the size of a marble that they can't even track. A lot of these things, you know, they're coming down to the earth at the incredible velocities. Nobody has an interest in having this space junk up there. I think Russian scientists understand this, that their satellites are just as vulnerable as ours are if a piece of debris hits them as do the Chinese. Nobody needs their satellites being taken out by a collision with a piece of space junk. And yet that's where we're kind of at or might find ourselves. There was a movie with Sandra Bullock in it that exactly addressed this thing. So that threat to the astronauts and cosmonauts and I don't know if the Chinese astronauts are called Sino-Nauts, but this is real. However, Ukraine seems a lot more real to me. So does Taiwan on the ground for us mortals who don't get the chance to jet out into space much. And you think about this, I saw there were three large American ships that went into Taiwan straight just this week or last week. And we think about that. So it'd be like, you know, it's interesting that America was still sales right there. NATO is right on the border of Russia right now with the Baltic States. And so Russia feels this sense like probably America did with Cuba and the Russian Missile Crisis that this power is right on our doorstep. And they don't like that feeling of being bullied or intimidated. So they're gonna lash out in other ways and they can do it in many other ways because they are in essence. You know, you raise a good point because Putin said one of the reasons he's had a troop buildup in the Ukraine border is he wants a firm standard agreement from NATO nations that all Eastward expansion and weapons systems will not place. So you're dead on. I mean, he recently, I think he said that today and that he has no intentions of withdrawing the 100,000 troops from the border until he gets such agreements from NATO. So good point, very good point. And you know, however, we've learned that, you know, you can't play K to dictator. If it just doesn't happen, they want more. However, if you look at Ukraine, I think that eastern portion of it is predominantly Russian speaking. And he's also, I think, feels that Belarusia and Ukraine are natural sort of parts of Russia, as it were. And has always wanted to, I think, really recreate the power prestige influence of the Soviet Union, as it were. It's, you know, obviously- You know, that sounds eerily similar to Hitler saying that Austria was a German speaking nation and therefore it was only a natural inclination to absorb them. I know that Putin says that about the Ukraine and that was his basis for Crimea, the invasion and takeover of Crimea. And nothing happened there. We didn't do anything. And so why were people in Ukraine? And I would probably be looking at moving west or pulling out. But you know, it's interesting you bring up Austria because after the war, it was the only country where the four great powers occupied it and then pulled out. They didn't do it for Germany, but they did for Austria. Maybe, maybe something like this could happen in Ukraine. I wouldn't trust Putin at all. However, if they could declare that this Ukraine be a neutral zone, as it were, that wouldn't be, if people could be trusted for that. I don't know that we're there. So right now, if I were in Ukraine, I'd be having a look behind my back or at least to the east. Yeah. Jay, kind of the same question to you. And you know, the United States seems to be taking a Neville Chamberlain type of approach that we wag our finger at Russia or China saying there'll be serious consequences either economic or otherwise. Same question to you. What does the United States have as far as a stick to really deter Russia from doing whatever it thinks it wants to? Either be creating new space junk in outer space or a potential invasion of Ukraine or the continuation of hacking in United States computers? You know, I have to answer that with nothing. We don't have anything. And if we had something, we wouldn't use it because of the nationalistic tone of the country. I mean, more than just the Trumpers feel that we ought to avoid foreign wars and entanglements we're in an isolation mode. We had a bad time in Afghanistan and for that matter, Iraq. We didn't achieve anything. We undermined ourselves. We stepped on our own toes. People are not going to support an initiative that goes for an overseas adventure. And it would take an overseas adventure. It would take some, you know, what do you call it, aggressive steps. I mean, and I think on the question of whether we can hack them the way they hack us, I get two reactions I would offer on that one. Number one is I'm not sure we do have the capability. You know, everybody says, oh, don't worry. You know, we got gizmos and secrets and software and hacking capabilities and we haven't even trotted them out. We have everything they have and more. I'm really not sure about that at all. I think that's overblown American exceptionalism, which is non-existent. The other part of it is if we did that, if we did that to say Russia or China, we'd get a response, wouldn't we? And I think it's fair to say they have the ability to hack our utility companies, our telecommunications, our water, you know, our facilities, our infrastructure right now, which is in any way and behind, including the software that runs it, it's behind. And we're not going to pass the BBB bill as much as, you know, both, all three of us would like to see that happen. So we're not going to do anything daring if we could and it's not clear we could. Also, you know, I don't think it's a matter of, whether it's just a matter of when Putin makes his move on Ukraine. You know, you never heard of the Tunk and Gulf. You never heard of Remember the Main. You never heard of a made up provocation, tail wagging the dog. He could create that any Tuesday. And my guess is that he will. He'll create something that is a phony provocation to those 100,000 troops on the border and in they go. What's interesting though, is that Ukraine is a real country. Ukraine is a government, a prime minister, a certain level of freedom of the press. Ukraine is, you know, it is a Western country of sorts. And if it disappears, it'll be a great tragedy. But I'm not sure that people in Ukraine are ready for a fight. They, you know, they're treating life and daily activities, you know, as, you know, normal. They don't, somebody said they look over their shoulder. Maybe they should be looking over their shoulders, but really, I do have some contact with Ukraine. They're kind of ignoring the issue. Maybe because ignoring it is the best way to deal with it. Well, clearly there's a great jeopardy right now. So clearly there's some pressure in the tank here and that needs to be relieved. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken will meet this week with his counterpart from Russia, Sergei Lavrinov. Any high hopes that something will be resolved as far as the troop buildups, either along Ukraine or a firm agreement that blowing up missiles, or excuse me, blowing up satellites in outer space will curtail and stop. Any progress projected for this meeting between Blinken and Lavrov? Well, let me approach that by saying, does Russia care about climate change? They didn't show up at COP26. This move on space is another way of dispoiling the environment. I don't think they really care. They're not doing anything about climate change in their country. Dictators don't care. They care about money and power. Let's examine that, Jay. I mean, they have hundreds and hundreds of satellites circling Earth's orbit. A piece of debris doesn't distinguish between an American flag and a Russian flag. Oh, I just think they don't care. They just don't care. So what? They screw up the satellites for the whole world. They don't care. And we could suffer. That's just another element of a declining world order. Okay, well, then I go to the question. Let me go to answer your question. Okay, go ahead. So I'm Tony Blinken and I'm with my counterpart in this meeting with Russia. What's exactly in my toolkit? Well, let's see, you guys got to stop that. You got to work with us to protect the world and all the people in the world. You got to be good guys. And the Russian guys stop. We don't care about being good guys. We care about advancing our own interests. You can advance yours and we can advance ours. What I'm saying is that Tony could threaten sanctions which are not really effective. We know that. Tony can stamp his feet. What is in Tony's toolkit? Winston is a brilliant guy. Maybe he has an answer, but I sure don't. Okay, what if it's not just the United States and the Paper Tiger veiled threats that we sometimes wave in front of China or wave in front of Russia? What if all of NATO and all the other nations that have an interest in preserving their technologies and outer space say, we got to step up to the plate with the United States and not have the United States be our only mouthpiece out there. What's the chances of that happening? That's a really good point. And that would be something that Tony Blinken could do. He could try to develop some allies in the EU. Our reputation in the EU is not sterling after Trump. In fact, not sterling by virtue of things that Biden has done and not done. So he may not have all that much leverage, but it would be great if he could establish some kind of coalition among the countries in the EU. So when he goes to speak to his counterpart in Russia, he's not just alone. Because alone, we don't have a lot of clout. Together, we have more clout. And the same goes for Asia and for China. We have to develop alliances and coalitions and multilateral arrangements so that when we speak, we speak with a bigger stick. Okay. Winston, earlier on, Jay mentioned the Spudnik moment that took place and scared the hell out of Americans because here is a Russian technology satelliteing, circling the earth. Didn't we have a Spudnik moment last month, early this month, when China set off its hypersonic missile from one of their satellites? And it just seems like the media really didn't pay a whole lot of attention to it. It was a one-day news event. Certainly didn't get the attention that Spudnik did back in 1950s, early 1950s. Why do you think that is? Why do you think that became a non-event where we actually have proven the weaponization of outer space and yet nearly a ripple in concern or reporting from the media? As it was two minutes ago and we can't focus on anything but the bright shiny object in front of us as well. How many decades have we had mutually assured destruction? This is, we've had this sort of Damocles over our head, our entire, our entire lives. We've never known a time when we couldn't have a reign of the cataclysmically, warfare exchange in 15 minutes. As we experienced here in Hawaii, you remember a couple of years ago when we had that warning inbound nuclear missile, this is not a drill. That was an interesting moment. I don't know if you were awake for that or were here, but I just thought, oh, so there's an incoming ballistic missile. Where do I seek a shelter from that? Okay, it's part of that. We have massive military industrial complex that needs to feed itself, so does China, so does Russia. But what is, I think interesting here is that we're, we need to take the deeper dive with both of these nations, with all nations. America's been spectacular at expanding its reach and influence over the last century, but especially since the war. We have raised and helped raise standard of living around the world, levels of education and sophistication. Are all of these countries our friends, our allies, our share in our interests? No, but I think the continued message here is we need to engage more deeply with all of these nations. We need to find our commonality just the same way that we do inside of our own nation. We need to find out where do we stand on common ground? How do we work on these problems together when we can and where we can together? That's the only chance we have as a species, a little alone, like COP26, was it, Jay? What are the Russians export? They export oil. Are the Germans gonna squawk? No, because Nord too just got the green light from the Biden administration. These people have a dance to do with each other. They're gonna do their dance. It's in no one's interest to inflame or poke or prod the other one. There's been these simmering things and the issues that are still there that are going to also be after this administration. The main thing is keep on engaging, keep on talking, lower the temperature, more baking soda all the way around, domestically and internationally, as we engage more deeply and find our common humanity in what we're gonna do about the really interesting problems that face us. You sound just like Neville Chamberlain. A little bit maybe to your average Joe, but honestly, it's gotten us where we are right now. Neville Chamberlain did not work. He said speak strong, who said speaks opera? Roosevelt, Teddy. Teddy, but those days, what are we gonna do? We're gonna send a million troops to defend Ukraine. It's not gonna happen. Well, that was my question. What does the nation, what does the allies of the United States, what do we do to curtail weaponization in space and invasions of Ukraine or Taiwan? What is the solution? I think Jay's comment of nothing is, he said nothing's gonna happen, but I think what I'm suggesting is deeper engagement, deeper involvement, deeper connections of our economy so that these- What I'm suggesting, just to be clear, what I'm suggesting is the United States cannot do any of that alone. We have to bring our friends into the ballgame and we are not doing that. We have to have coalitions and we have to have associations and arrangements with as many countries as we can so that when we talk nice like this, we're talking with the big stick of half the world. Yeah, what is the big stick? We're not doing that. We lost ground in Trump and we're not gaining it back yet. What is the big stick? What does the big stick look like? What could we do? I mean, we've heard for 50 years, economic sanctions. What does that look like? If I'm the United States and I put economic sanctions on Russia or China, doesn't mean that much. I'm sorry. Or terrorists. But if I'm the United States and I have 50 or a hundred countries who will act with me in sanctions, maybe the wrong word, but boycott, then maybe I have some clout. I have the power of embarrassment in the press and I have the power of the group. And if I could achieve that, there would be some twist, some leverage. Unfortunately, I don't think our State Department is doing that, or at least it's not doing that in any great degree. But to answer the question in the room here, that's what I think we have in our kit, our inventory is the possibility of doing that. We were very powerful after World War II because we won the war and because we had a lot of countries who were with us. The number of allies we had were all the anti-axis powers. That's a lot of people. And we had that to support us. Unfortunately, we don't have it now, but we could build it again. We ought to start building it right away today. All right. We've run out of time. Winston, would you like to address Jay's recent comments or do you have any last thoughts, closing remarks? Today's December 1st, not the 2nd. So it's World AIDS Day. So we remember all those afflicted by HIV and AIDS. I better get a new calendar. Hey, and you know what? This is one of those things that we've got to do together. We've all experienced COVID together as a planetary society. This is what I'm aiming at, Jay, is this idea that we have serious problems on a planetary scale that we can start looking at together. Our satellite's going down. But we've got real issues here and a sustained continued involvement on our shared humanity, I think does have wheels. And it's not about placating or indulging. It's about calling people out. And as we know ourselves, we've fallen on the democracy index. So gathering a coalition of willing democratic nations is a great place to begin. And we need to strengthen our own institutions at home as well as pointing the finger at those who are below us. And that's where I think we can continue to head rather than apocalyptic scenarios, let's look towards a brighter future because the alternative is grim, let's face it. I need you to be here, Winston, for that precious balance that you bring to the show and the conversation. Thank you, appreciate it. Jay, counterpoint? Yeah, two things. One is the calling out part is important, but we should not rely on the media to do that. The media is sometimes dead wrong and they follow each other. The original news comes from only a couple of media in the country, the rest just follow. And sometimes, and it was an example of that yesterday on MSNBC, where they had a number of their guests were blaming Biden for Omicron. I said, what, what is this? Well, they try to fabricate news right in front of us. This is my favorite channel doing this. My point is that you can't count on the media to keep it straight. And I think that's gonna be the case going forward. You have to count on government at least for part of this work, the work we're talking about, the work in dealing and correcting and being a moral leader. You have to count on government. And the problem is right now, government in this country is in shambles. I mean, you said an email around Tim about these women, about Boebert in Congress. She's like 11 years old, maybe nine years old, no common sense, no education, no scruples, no nothing, a child, an out of control child, making a mess all over the floor. And this is what we have in Congress. These are our leaders who we rely on to make public policy to lead a government in a very difficult and arguably declining world. We are in deep Kim Chi nationally. And to go back to my point a little while ago is that if we are going to be a global leader, if we are going to create collaboration around us and deal with these bad actors, we're gonna have to, you said it, Tim, we've got to clean house. We're gonna have to make a government that works. And frankly, we are a long way from that. And the distance is getting greater between us and rational government. This morning, you must have heard it live. There was the argument in the Supreme Court. I am on Roe v. Wade. I am not optimistic about that either. And my final comment would be, was one guy who lost his son in one of these school shootings. And he said, it's quite remarkable that the Supreme Court is so concerned about life in the womb. What about life on the streets? What about 100,000 people, young people who have been shot and killed with guns that Congress couldn't stop the long time ago? We have it upside down. And hey, that's the way it is. Well, I'll put the correlation back to the ineffectiveness of government and your comments about the ineffectiveness of government. Jay, you get the last word for December the 1st and I emphasize December 1st, not December 2nd. I'd like to thank you, Jay Fidel, Winston Welch for joining us this morning for What Now America? Join us next Wednesday at 11 o'clock for a new topic and a new discussion. And until then, aloha. MUSIC