Col. Brewer Back to Ukraine
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Transcript
17 segmentsPleasure to welcome Nebraska's Colonel Tom Brewer back to the program ahead of another trip over to Ukraine. Colonel, good morning. Good to have you back. Good morning, Gary. I won't be here for your retirement, but congratulations. It's great to actually get to retirement. Now that you've got some time, we'll just take you with us on the next trip. Well, thanks, yeah. I'll be on board. I just want you to come back safe. Welcome to our best. You're leaving tomorrow. with some other Nebraska's, and this is a mission for an orphanage over there, right, the Nebraskaans are helping with? Well, it is. It's actually, there's two orphanages, but there's one that's a very specific Nebraska orphanage that we're helping with, but we're also, we've got an ag mission, we've got a medical mission, and so we're kind of got a full plate, and we're compressing it into a limited amount of time because for some reason everybody wants us back for Christmas. Right. The bombing continues at a horrendous clip, the bombing by Russia then. Now they're sending drone strikes into the capital itself, right? That's true. They've... expanded from an occasional attack, which they had done all over the last almost four years now, to where Kiev's getting hitting hit with hundreds of drones at night. And it's really been sad in the sense that the majority of those strikes have been on civilian targets. They're just not targeting the military. It's all to break the morale of the people. I thought it was odd that Kiev wasn't targeted more. The first several years of this war, Tom. I mean, after all, that's the seat of government. That's where Volodymyr Zelensky is. Why do you think that is? Well, I think part of it was there was a fear that Moscow would be hit, but Moscow was able to build enough air defense around it where I don't think they fear Moscow getting hit now. And really, for Ukraine, they have to spread those defenses out to, you know, there are other big cities like Harkiv and Zaporiz. So they just don't have enough air defense to protect everything. Jim and I were talking a bit ago. The president is, he's got people over there talking and talking back and forth. He's got this peace proposal out there. He says Vladimir Putin is on board with it. He's criticizing Volodymyr Zelensky for not embracing it. What's your view of what might be possible here with his latest proposal?
Well, I'm going to be a little blunt on that. I don't believe that he has the best team over there. I think it's when you take Jared Kushner and Unwisecroft and send them over to make the deal, they're trying to make some type of a deal like you're making a real estate deal. And they don't understand that you're talking about a future of a country, and you're talking about asking them to just disregard the fact that they've given so many sons and daughters. in the fight that, to give up all the ground that they have, to take their army from a million man army to a 200,000 man army, and to essentially give Vladimir Putin everything he wants is just not a good solution. And I think that it's really causing a lot of... you know, a respect and love they have for the American people to be in question, and I hate that because I think we've done her a good job, and in some cases of helping them as much as we could. And Europeans start to step up, and they're doing their part finally to, you know, really... Make sure that they're paying for what needs to be paid for. But to step away and give him what he wants right now is really wrongheaded. You know, if everything we're hearing about Russia and Vladimir Putin is true, that he's squandering lives by the tens of thousands and capital. in the millions and billions of dollars and hurting his country. What kind of grip does he... Are there no people in the government over there in Moscow who can push back on him to the extent that he could be ousted? Or do they all think this is fine? No, I think the only ones that have any chance would be the oligards. And, you know, anybody who does push back, whether you're a mother who's upset about losing your sons or... Someone in the government, you end up in Siberia are dead, and they realize that. So it's, you know, it's a sad situation for the country because you hate to see the fact that Russia is in such a horrible place. When this war is over, there will be a shell of the country they were. and the oil sanctions are probably the easiest way. I mean, quite frankly, between you and I, if I was king for a day, I would continue those sanctions. I would shut down that black fleet that's hauling the oil out, and I would give them 100 tomahawks, and I think that the war would be over in a couple days. You're going to be in the vicinity of Kiev, so we pray for your safety. When are you due to come back? Well, we come back on the 23rd, And then we'll sit down with some of the folks here in Nebraska that have been super helpful and all of these missions because just remember University of Nebraska Medical Center, University of Nebraska Ag College have been great about helping to find ways for them to be able to continue to have kind of a normal life under the conditions they're in. So it's a true Nebraska effort. We got John Grinvolve from Channel 7 who's coming who's going to tell the story of the things that we do and see over there because of you go.
And no one tells a story. It's like it never happened. Right. Okay, Tom. Godspeed. Thanks for the time. We'll talk when you get back. All right. Thanks, Gary. You bet. Nebraska, Colonel Tom Brewer here on KFAB's Morning News.