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Transcript

The Waiting Room · Stay in the Room Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: This project supports Ukraine's right to defend itself, and Europe's security.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: It holds every source to the same evidence standard, including its own side.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Some of this week's discussion has said barrels, and has said Starlink was turned off.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: So two corrections first, because a hostile reader would find them.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: The first tranche of Russian diesel in Trump's deal is 300,000 tons, not barrels.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Trump wrote tons, and Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said tons.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: And Starlink was not turned off over Ukraine,
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: The military service, called Starshield, was speed-capped.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Terminals moving faster than roughly 160 km an hour lost their connection.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Bad enough.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: Not the same thing.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Now, start with the appointment board.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: The 31st of October.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Russia's ban on diesel exports ends.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: The 3rd of November.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: The United States elects a new house, and a third of the Senate.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: The 6th of November.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: A Pentagon review of American forces in Europe puts its options in front of
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: the US Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: The review itself is due to finish in December.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: January next year.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: The new Congress sits.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: The 7th of April next year.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: The American license covering Trump's Russian diesel deal runs out.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: January 2029.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: This administration's term ends.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Laid out like that looks like a waiting room.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: A number on the screen.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: A row of plastic chairs.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone watching the clock on the wall.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: It is tempting to read Europe as sitting in that room.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Much of what the Trump administration has done since September calls for a response,
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: and the response looks slow.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: My reading is that European governments are holding back.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Until the 3rd of November tells them.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Whether they face a mood or a settlement.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: I have found no European government saying so on the record.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: And two other explanations fit the same delay.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Europe may lack the capability,
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: the money, or the agreement to do more, whatever the calendar says.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Or it may be hedging on purpose, because an open break with Washington has costs of its own.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: All three can be true.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: The election may be the cause.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: Or just a convenient date to hang the delay on.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: So, is this a midterm effect?
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: Or the new normal?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: My argument is that for the decisions Europe has to make,
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: the answer matters less than it feels like it does.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: A new Congress can change how costly it is.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: For the President to use his powers, it does not remove the dependency underneath them.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And the things Europe needs to replace.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Take longer to build than any American electoral cycle lasts.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: That holds whichever explanation for the delay is right.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Here is what would prove it wrong.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: If, by the spring,
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: the new Congress has stopped a troop cut the administration wanted,
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Or forced Allied weapons sales to restart against the President's wishes.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Then the vote changed the structure, not just the mood.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And waiting was the right call.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: There are two clocks in this waiting room.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Only one of them is on the wall.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: The one on the wall is the political clock, the polling.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: The count on election night.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: The week of spin that follows.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: The other is the strategic clock, and it measures something cruder.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: How long it takes to build the things you currently borrow.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: The numbers on that clock measure different things.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: In a 2025 Defence News survey,
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Most of 17 experts said Europe already has,
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: or could have within three years,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: enough satellite communications and unmanned surveillance to fight Russia
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: without American help.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: That is sufficiency, not a like-for-like replacement.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Replacing Patriot Air Defense batteries takes around seven years,
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: on the estimate of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: A European missile with a 2,000-kilometer range is a development target for
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: the 2030s, and the same center counts about 850 American aircraft.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: That can refuel others in flight, against 336 in Europe.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: None of those numbers moves on the 3rd of November.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: An election can change who signs the orders.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: It cannot shorten a production line.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: The loud clock is not nothing.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Congress already holds two levers that matter to Europe.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: The Defence Authorisation Act, signed last December, does not forbid a troop cut.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: It puts procedure in the way of one.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Before American forces in Europe stay below 76,000 for more than 45 days,
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: or NATO's top command or major American equipment is handed over,
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: the Defence Secretary must assess the effect,
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: consult allies, and certify to Congress that the move serves the national interest.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: And the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Commander
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: of US European Command must each give an independent assessment of the risk.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing can proceed for 60 days after that material reaches Congress,
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: with Pentagon funding as the enforcement,
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: NBC News reported in September,
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: citing unnamed officials,
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: that the review is weighing cuts of 25,000 to 40,000,
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: from a presence of about 80,000.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: On any of the counts in circulation, a cut that size would have to go through that process.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: The second lever is the Graham Act.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: The Russia sanctions law that passed the Senate 86-11 in August became law
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: in September and made many sanctions mandatory.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Both levers share a design feature.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: Each has a door marked national interest, and the President walks through it.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: By putting a certification in writing.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: On the 16th of October, two days before the Graham Act's measures were due to take effect.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: That is what happened.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: The law had created the new tariffs and sanctions.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Trump's order invoked its national interest waiver to suspend them.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: Existing sanctions stayed in place.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: So this is what the midterms can do.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: A changed Congress will struggle to rewrite these laws over a veto.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: But it can make each certification cost something.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Hearings, subpoenas, conditions on money.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Changing the legal power is hard.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Changing the price of using it is not.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: And a high enough price changes behaviour.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: If that happens on the troop floor, or on weapons sales, it meets the test I set out earlier.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Some levers are harder for Congress to reach.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: It can try to block an arms sale.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: It has no straightforward way to make a president approve one.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: The order in which American stock is allocated is largely an executive decision.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And the satellite link sits somewhere between the government and a private company.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Who controls it is disputed.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Mid-October showed how exposed that last one is.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: On the 14th of October, the Starshield speedcap disrupted the fast-interceptor drones.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: Ukraine uses against jet-powered Shahids.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the disruption eased within a day.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: But on the 16th,
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: presidential advisor Sahih Beskresnov told the Associated Press
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: the cap itself remained.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: And on the 17th, Zelensky said access was not fully restored.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Who said the cap is disputed?
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: Musk says the US military, and ultimately the president, decide such limits.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: The White House told Ukrainian officials it does not control SpaceX.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Reuters,
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: citing three unnamed officials,
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: reported that the order came from inside the White House,
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: and a senior US official denied it came from Trump.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: Connectivity back is not the same as capability back,
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: and whoever turned the dial, no vote was involved.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: The weapons lever has been touched too, though less cleanly than the headlines suggest.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: On the 3rd of September,
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: Trump posted that America was keeping its munitions for ourselves,
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: and that sales to allies would resume soon.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: On the 15th of October,
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: he told Newsmax, sales would resume once American stocks were replenished.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: No formal order has surfaced.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: The day after the first post,
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: a NATO spokesperson said equipment bought through Pearl was still arriving.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: That was before the October repeat.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: Pearl is the scheme through which Europeans buy American weapons for Ukraine.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the scheme matters.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: By NATO's counts,
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: it is supplied between two-thirds and three-quarters of the missiles
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: for Ukraine's Patriot batteries.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: The same gap runs through the commitment that matters most.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Article 5.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: Its ambiguity comes in three layers, and only one belongs to Trump.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: The treaty commits each ally to take such action as it deems necessary.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: That is 77 years old.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Doctrine, not drift.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: The Ankara Summit Declaration of the 8th of July reaffirmed an ironclad commitment
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: to collective defence under Article 5.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Reuters reported that all 32 ambassadors, the American one included, had approved the text.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Then the spoken word.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: Around the Hague summit in June 2025,
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: Trump said the commitment depends on your definition,
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: before adding that he was committed to being their friends.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: In January this year,
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: he floated invoking Article 5 to make allies guard America's southern border.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And what gets done is a review weighing deep troop cuts,
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: a stated halt on munitions sales, and a satellite cap nobody will own.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: The signature says ironclad.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: The spoken word says it depends.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: The acts say the review is weighing what it is weighing.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: When those disagree, plan around the acts.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: They are the only layer with physical consequences, and they fall hardest on the capabilities.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: The White House can restrict without asking anyone.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: This usually gets argued as a choice.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Abandon America, or rely on it.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: That is the wrong question.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: The ballot on the 3rd of November is binary.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: The dependency is not.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Europe will not replace every American tanker,
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: satellite, and Patriot battery, inside a parliamentary term.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it does not need to.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: It needs an order of replacement.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: The capabilities that can be restricted overnight,
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: and that Europe can field on the shorter timelines, go first.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: The ones that take a decade start now, precisely because they take a decade.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sorted that way.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Satellite communications and unmanned surveillance come first.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Both sit within the executive's reach.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: And on the experts' estimates, Europe could have enough of both within about three years.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: Three years is not tomorrow, and enough is not independence.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: But one of them has already been restricted once, without warning.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, three things to watch.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: November gives an early reading.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: The spring gives the verdict.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: If, after the 3rd of November,
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: the administration says sales to allies have resumed,
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: without any change in what Congress can do, that would strengthen the reading.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: That Trump's stated halt was a reversible political position, rather than a structural change.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: It would not establish that the election caused the reversal,
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: because stocks and production may have changed too.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Either way, it tells you the lever can go back on just as easily.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: If reporting after the 6th of November says the options cut below 76,000,
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: and a certification follows,
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: the structural reading gains,
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: and the spring will show whether the new Congress made
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: that certification cost anything,
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: and a test for my own reading,
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: on two decisions that look stalled,
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: One is the European Commission's talks on giving Ukraine access to
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: the EU's own government satellite service,
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: which the Commission says cannot yet replace Starlink for military use.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: The Europeans keep buying American air defence for Ukraine,
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: through Pearl,
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: or order elsewhere,
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: if either moves after the 3rd of November,
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: whichever way the vote goes, was probably a convenient date, rather than the cause.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: If they move in response to the result,
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: that strengthens the waiting room reading, though it does not prove it on its own.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: One election is a small sample,
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Count reversed measures, not speeches, you can sit in the waiting room.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: But the number on the screen is not what changes Europe's situation, the production lines are.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: And some of those clocks can be started today.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: Start the one that isn't on the wall.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: The Troop Review timetable was reported by Reuters and NBC News.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: The rules on troop numbers come from last year's Defence Authorisation Act.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: The Graham Act Waiver was reported by ABC News, CNBC and The Hill.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: The Starshield reporting is from the Associated Press, Reuters and the Kiev Independent.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: The capability timelines come from Defence News and the Centre for Strategic
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: and International Studies.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Full sources are at the foot of the written version.