Niall Ferguson: Are we the Soviets now? 

Regarding DEI, my wife is a liberal animator. Her pitch was accepted by a children’s TV show, and they have since shaken and demoralized her with their DEI committee’s endless “notes” about how she should tweak her characters and what they do. It is literally 98% their own creation now, not her original pitch. The original pitch was abstract robots made of toys and now it’s a black girl with smooth, boring textures everywhere. “Can you adjust the skin tone? Can you make the girl cuter and happier? She can’t have an asymmetrical face. Can you make her hair more… realistic?” Btw the DEI people are plain rude by any professional standard, waiting til the last minute and completely disregarding whatever she has produced. To your thesis, these experiences change how she sees society as a whole. Hardly a death of despair situation but it is demoralizing. The resulting short is bland as hell, psychologically inauthentic, and something that cannot affect kids positively, beyond DEI’s own terms of success.

I don't agree that immigration is the only answer to maintain society...

I live in Eupore. Young and old are outraged by massive uncontrolled migration and the associated corruption and crime we are subjected to. Niall is deliberately obtuse on this point. I can't imagine why.

Niall is losing it. He still thinks he is in a unipolar world, and that the opinion of the population does not matter 😮

When this guy called Mike Pompeo a thinker I knew he was full of shit.

Odd. Niall sounds way more 'establishment' than I've ever heard from him before. Is it the knighthood? This is an unpleasant surprise.

The problem with Ferguson’s argument is that he is confusing the US military budget with the capacity to build arms. Those two things are miles apart.

As an American I take note of how willing Niall Ferguson is to volunteer the US to fight on every front of the new cold war the policies he supports have caused. Also, how willing he is to expend Ukrainian lives while we just ship arms to a war it can’t possibly win.

Every time I hear Ferguson, he contradicts himself or overlooks things. For example, he said the Tories have been in power 14 years and that Cameron used the referendum as a ploy to please the right. He overlooked the fact that Cameron offered the referendum not expecting to win an overall majority in 2015 and being in coalition again so he could drop his pledge, and that, yes the Tories have been in office since 2014, but that the public were offered a different Tory party under Johnson but it never materialised.

Ferguson sounds like a confused emeritus professor chiding Freddie for pointing out his inconsistencies.

@46:00 "it's a bargain...they do the fighting...they do the dying" 💀💀💀 An offensive realist's wet dream I don't think I could ever say those words out loud without feeling humiliated

Britain lost its empire and destroyed its economy fighting both world wars. In 1916 the empire's GDP was greater than that of the US. Was the war worth it? The US played it smart, it waited until Hitler declared war before joining up. Why was Hitler mainly Britain's problem? It had never previously shown any interest in Central European politics. Czechoslovakia consisted of 5 ethnicities that did not get along. The Germans in the Sudetenland were enthusiastic Nazis. The Slovaks fought on the German side in WW2. The Poles and Hungarians also invaded Czechoslovakia in 1939 and claimed territory. Churchill even condemned Polish aggression. A lot of nonsense has been written about appeasement by the British. Speaking as an American, we don't want to end up like the British Empire, broke and exhausted over a dispute we don't understand. I have visited Ukraine. It is not worth the life of a single American soldier, to paraphrase Bismarck.

The situation in most Western countries is so irrationally destructive that the only possible explanation seems to lie in the Greek saying: "the gods first drive mad those they wish to destroy".

"The war is a bargain" - how terribly cold and disconnected a neocon Niall is!

I think the biggest question we can ask is...why is house affordability [house value divided by salary] the biggest it has been since Victorian times? Forget national debt...this is the real experience of people in my generation who can't afford to buy a property let alone afford to raise children.

The guy loves the Cold War 2, it's like a football match to him. He is both a keyboard warrior and an intellectual, a rare combination.

Why way Nial talks you would think Washington and NATO have nothing to do with the Ukraine war

Nial Ferguson: Hans, are we the baddies?

Mr. Ferguson swimming in his own shit!!!

Sorry, but Mr Ferguson did not convince me. There were so many obvious inconsistancies in his argumentation. Freddy did a good job pointing some of them out.

Niall, sadly, has aligned himself wholly with the Victoria Nuland neocon faction.

You're omitting the fact that the Chinese are in no hurry over Taiwan. They have no intention of invading.

I get the feeling that Niall is walking the line between insight and not being cancelled. It's largely pointless listening to him nowadays.

Niall Ferguson contradicts himself. On the one hand, he worries that the United States's decline began to look like the late Soviet Union. On the other hand, he insists on waging Cold War II to maintain US supremacy, the United States must fight on all fronts with Russia, Iran, and China. Escalate to de-escalate? No appeasement? But how? The US's interventional foreign policies have produced nothing but endless wars and debacle after debacle. The reality is that the US is a dying empire and can't afford to do whatever it wants anymore. With its $34 trillion national debt, if the US doesn't focus on fixing its own problems and improving its own people's lives, the US Empire will implode like the Soviet Union.

Niall Ferguson is a WEF young global leader, class of 2005. Why would anyone trust what he says?

Don't confuse We the People with the WEF. We are not perfect, but certainly not _evil._

“Life expectancy for Canadians decreased for the third straight year in 2022, and more people died of COVID-19 than in any other year since the pandemic began, according to a report released Monday.” So much for Niall’s statement that the decrease in life expectancy in the US was quite unprecedented among advanced countries. Since he is living in the US now, Niall should pay a little attention to his North American neighbours. The reasons for this are various, but one of them is that unindicted war criminal Joe Biden’s Democratic Party and Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party are joined at the hip and follow the same kind of dysfunctional policies to make their own citizens suffer.

"European countries are aging, and so require immigration." This is where Ferguson shows his colours. He notes that Europe is not having children. Young people are not having families. He describes this as "aging", rather than totalitarian abuse. He says the solution is immigration, rather than reform of the totalitarian abuse of young people. Young people are being told they will never own a home. They must pay high taxes on low wages. Energy and food bills will keep them in working poverty for their entire lives, and they cannot have a family. Ferguson calls this "aging", and says the solution is immigration. Adam Smith never endorsed a system where the totalitarian planning of economies led to the destruction of the family unit, and the end of all personal freedom. He never endorsed usury becoming feudal tyranny. He never said we should sacrifice our children for the shareholders of banks. Ferguson is living in a dream. He has enough money to sleep easily, and so he sleeps, and dreams of fanciful things.

The argument that Russia would go further after Russia's goals were met in Ukraine is obviously wrong. Russia was willing to call it a day just a few months into the conflict. Why do people keep bringing up this ridiculous notion when it is so obviously countered by the facts?

Yes. And in case the message is unclear, they call us deplorables.

Follow the money he says except when it is the US/UK money

The idea that we need immigration "for the economy" is such a laughable lie, as is shown by the way immigration policy is formulated. For example we allow low wage unskilled immigrants to bring dependents who contribute nothing to the economy and actually drain public servants. Similarly the fact that we allow low wage immigrants at all, since anyone who earns below about £40k in the UK is a net drain on the economy and lowers our GDP per capita, making us a poorer country. How is any of that "helping the economy"? In fact it just helps big business by lowering the wages they have to pay, (privatizing the profits) while the public have to pay the taxes to fund the government services that low wage immigrants need to get by. (socializing the costs). If immigration was actually "for the economy" we would only allow permanent immigrants who would be net contributors to the public finances, we would allow them to bring no dependents, and any low wage immigration would be only via temporary work visas to fill skills shortages, with no access to public services and taxes paid to finance the services they receive purely by virtue of being in the country. The fact that it isn't done that way show that "it's for the economy" is a lie.

Good to see Freddy pushback. Ferguson sounded so contradictory. At the end he says, the cost of this war is in Ukrainian lives not our lives. Just imagine that.

21:53 “re-elected to the European Commission” Re-installed you mean.

An analysis poor in arguments and rich in preconceived ideas

Niall sounds like a classic government puppet.

Question: why are western countries so reluctant to enact pro-natal policies?

200 billion is a rounding error...right

Niall, how are tent cities of African men in Paris contributing to the economy? The half of Muslim women in the UK who are unemployed? We know the migrant demographics that contribute economically and the ones that don't. Stop importing millions of dependents who resent us, it's not hard or complex.

A weird mix of high education, sophistry and heartlessness. This is a good insight into how we are being led, and in the wrong direction.

Despite Freddy’s best and most diplomatic efforts to extract something interesting from Sir Niall, ‘‘twas all in vain. Mindnumbing. A further reminder of why there is no hope to be found within the system as we currently know it.

Niall needs to get this through his head: We don't want a rounding error that allows us the "bargain" of sacrificing all the men in Ukraine. We want a rounding error on behalf of our own border.

The big problem we have in the west is the appalling mediocrity of our leaders

Does he work for Black Rock?

The answer is, yes. Yes, but its not "we", its the elites.

Escalating to de-escalate only works when you have complete military superiority that is understood by both sides. I challenge warmongers like Ferguson, who claim to be historians, to show at least one example where this approach has worked where both parties don’t accept complete military superiority of the other side. Before the obvious is stated, Israel past glories cannot be considered a success given that they never achieved the peace, and Israel pursuing this policy today has led it to the catastrophic cup de sac it finds itself in today.

Dont underestimate the people...they are quite willing to pay the price of regaining their sovereignty, their national identity and their families

His views on immigration are vastly simplified. People wouldn’t mind the immigration if immigrants were actually working and would pay their fair share of tax. Let’s not even mention the rising crime rates.

Lost me at 45:08 on «you have to escalate to deescalate»... War is peace.

He's terribly wrong about the anatomy of the ukrainian war.

Ferguson didn’t mention it but a significant if not the most important factor in people backing Brexit was regaining sovereignty the UK were conned into handing over all those years ago. The mess that has followed wasn’t inevitable but in large part due to the failure of the Tories to grab the opportunity. The collapse in productivity is a European wide phenomenon largely due to similar disastrous policies. As for interest rates, some of us have been pointing out since 2008 that zero to negative rates were disastrous and wouldn’t last for ever. That government chose not to fix at low rates was doubly dumb.

Following this conversation i had the strong impression that Ferguson is a well spoken person with the neocon mindset.

He's been knighted so I'm not taking anything he says in good faith

Ukraine will never freeze. It's not in Russias interest. This guy is an IR amateur.

I don't buy Niall's assessment of the war in Ukraine.

I've just witnessed Naill demonstrate beyond any doubt that he can only see the future in terms of the past, whereas history is littered with examples of where this fails. Do not respond to the new with the old.

Well, well, well. Good talk, but Mr F goes bonkers in his analysis regarding Ukraine, and populist definitions. Hiscstrenght in reasoning is suggesting causality when there's none.

I've listened to Ferguson many times and thought he was a great thinker. I don't know what's happened, maybe a knighthood that has gained him access to nice London clubs, but on every point in this interview he has been talking like an establishment shill. He has either bought in or he has been bought. And Freddie has the measure of him.

I don‘t understand why you cannot limit immigration and have a strong wealthfare state… I mean speaking for Germany the biggest takers of benefits are immigrants by a massive margin. also, if you allow immigration to stop, yes you will have to survive a couple of decades or so until the boomers have all naturally passed, but then your overall population will be smaller and there will be fewer old people per capita. Sorry I fundamentally reject the idea that we should choose between mass immigration or abandoning the welfare state…

Freddie Sayers should be knighted for his patience with this interviewee. What a load of twaddle from Ferguson ! I mean who listens to this guy ?

The negativity towards your guest has restored my faith in humanity

What a sick elite perspective, Niall is pushing.

The first half of this interview was illuminating and rational but Ferguson suddenly remembered that he was straying from his conservative,right wing trope and made a uturn, contradicting himself in the process. The interviewer did well.

Oh dear, I guess I now have to add Niall to the list of formally serious minds that I used to take into consideration, when I would try to formulate my opinion, on the best solutions, to solve complex problems.

Oh fuck I can’t listen to this bs anymore

Very dissapointed by Ferguson. He used to be better. No Niall, migration does not save our welfare state. The migrants are a net cost. They take out a lot more than they put in. Even second generation is far below the original population in work participation. Many studies have showed that. They are a drain on our resources and destabilising our societies. We would be better off keeping the border closed. The West has poured in enormous amount of weapons and aid to Ukraine. We have nothing more to give. And a lot of what they got dissapeared through internal corruption in Ukraine. When Trump is elected he will negotiate a peace deal. Farage not a serious person??? Give me a break! You completely lost me at that point. It tells med YOU are not serious. Farage is our only hope.

This is shockingly the most concise and insightful discussion on modern America that I have come across. I work for the Air Force and as a knowledge worker we see this unfolding everyday even at our ranks. "Death by despair" and non-merit based advancement is dead on. Thank you...

44:29 This guy sounds like the guy who would order a filet mignon at dinner but not put anything toward the check, then ask "what's the problem?"

Hello from the LSA (Late Soviet America). We better pray we aren’t treated as we have treated others.

We are in late stage Usury. We have an oligarchy driving the open borders Globalisation project, with a Managerial Class in charge. There will be no good ending now.

Freddie should of got the knighthood. Thanks for calling the warmonger out.

Niall is wrong on the cause of excessive deaths in the 90s Russia - it was the collapse of economy and social services due to lack of credit line to support the currency during the US-proposed "shock therapy". It worked in in Poland with loans and credits, but US refused to do it for Russia. Same thing happened in Yugoslavia with denied credit/financing through IMF - US knew exactly what they were doing, causing the country to fall apart and supporting independence of several national leaders. The only difference in the current situation - nobody will bail out the US, simply because they can't - there's no organization with enough money in the world to do it.

Almost breathtakingly sociopathic disregard for the death of hundreds of thousands of young men.

"Give Ukraine more arms" , "Escalate to De-Escalate" - This man is quite prepared to watch (from a safe distance, no doubt) as hundreds of thousands of people die for nothing. A warmonger. Old men talk whilst young men die. Please organise an interview with someone credible like Professor Mearsheimer or Professor Sachs.

For those of you confused by Ferguson - it might be because he doesn't fit neatly into our "polarized" politics. He's critical of both the identitarian (woke) left and the populist right. I love this about him as it demonstrates actual critical faculties and not lazy ideological group-think. He's a clear and nuanced thinker.

"More muscular approach" this guy is a warmonger. That's exact reason west is failing. Insted of adaption and cooperation they choose domination.

Ah, this guy. I read one of his books a long time ago. Still hoovering around the Americans trying to convince them they are Rome. Smoke ass blow.

I think Freddie has to platform the regime now and then

Looks like war has been treating Niall very well, nice threads... I wonder if he can hear the screams of the men that died to pay him for that.

"Are we the Soviets now?" What did Soviet people have besides a single party: Free education (nurseries, kindergartens, schools, vocational schools, colleges, universities) and free extracurricular activities for children where they could develop comprehensively (music, sports, chess; in almost any Soviet city, one could join a club for young inventors, model aviation, railway and water transport, communications, photography, and cinema). The average level of state budget expenditure on education in the USSR was 11.7%, and 2-4% on science. Free healthcare and disease prevention, which also included sanatorium and spa treatment. In every small populated area, there had to be at least a duty doctor and a midwife. The USSR allocated 7-10% of its GDP to medicine and healthcare. Genuinely functioning social mobility - regardless of whether their parents were collective farmers or workers, their children had a real opportunity to become scientists, ambassadors, or ministers. There were no social barriers to career advancement. Free housing. During Brezhnev's time alone, 164 million people received free apartments. No unemployment. No homelessness. Absolute safety (everyone who lived in the Soviet Union in the past and lives in Russia now can confidently assure that it was in the Soviet state that all conditions were created to protect people from various types of crimes; in Russia, they say: with the fall of the "Iron Curtain," people acquired iron doors). So I can assure you that you are not the Soviets

I must admit, regardless of how brilliant Niall ferguson may be in many respects, that a guy that still live so hopelessly in the past, to call China, Russia and Iran "The axis of Ill Will" loses my attention totally.

“It’s a bargain to keep Ukraine in this war” and “we need to escalate to de-escalate” tells us all we need to know about this individual. Subhuman and an intellectually bigot.

Host is good. Continually producing counter arguments without losing his composure

The only striking moment from this interview was the vision of Niall's Red tie.

I agreed with quite a lot he said on Britain, Western Europe and the US but then he got to the Ukraine and China. It's almost nostalgic to see the long and proud history of British elites having nfi what they are talking about when it comes to Russia and China coutinues to this day. Bravo.

One can agree with Ferguson or not (and I tend to), but if he doesn't at least make you think, then you're not thinking. Thanks for having him as a guest, UnHerd. 👍

Warmonger.

Pompous doesn’t even come close. Unless you’ve been in a real fight? I’m betting the last fight he had was in infant school

It's impossible to finish watching this show with a condecending Ferguson siding with warmongers such as Pompeo and contradicting himself with a fantasy of American supremacy that is painting itself more and more in a corner. Good interview work by Sayers though!

Yes I'm a bit confused with Ferguson's analysis of Ukraine. I think he is underestimating the financial cost to the civilian west in terms of their living conditions today. I'll give him the benefit doubt on the strategic benefit of supporting Ukraine but he does allude to the sovereign debt crisis earlier but skims over it. I think he is severely underestimating this. Freddie challenges in the right areas though and is a great at asking questions. Interesting all round though. Thanks gents.

Nial Ferguson : " don´t mess with the banks, Meloni.."

Niall Ferguson is an example of how British intelligentsia become utterly ineffective. He reminds me of an Anglican priest, or a Church of Scotland minister, and some Professors I knew in Edinburgh. I hear someone trying to tell as much truth as he can, but within the limitations of not wanting to sound like an extremist to those in power. It ends up incoherent. He says we need Detente. He says we cannot afford war. He knows that we don't have the artillery shells. But STILL, somehow, the answer is to escalate the war in Ukraine; to show Russia that we will not back down. No mate, we will back down, either next year or in 20 years, just like in Iraq, and in Afghanistan, and its pretty clear that Putin has priced that in by now. Only a fool, or an ignoramus which he is not, would actually think that the Russians are going to back down.

Nial speaks in inuendo. Once you get past all the sophisticated language he really doesnt say much. "Farage is not a serious person"

Was Niall nursing a hangover? Seems far more irritable than his normal suave delivery...

"Independent Ukraine...", "democratic Ukraine..." you're my honey, you didn't even blink😚

Starts with a valid question, rapidly devolves into “the Americans must fight 3 simultaneous wars in Europe, Middle East, and Asia!” 😅

Niall: We have to give the Ukraine to escalate to push Russia back. How would you do that if Russia has a nuclear weapon that it's willing to use and Ukraine doesn't? How would you escalate when the opponent always has the upper hand on the escalation ladder?

"Escalate to de-escalate" only works when an opponent calculates that the costs which you can inflict on them, significantly outweigh those which they can inflict on you. Using his own analogy - threatening to punch someone in the face is not a good way of getting them to de-escalate, if they're able to pull out a gun and shoot you in the head. Both Russia and the US know they have the means to comprehensively destroy one another, if push comes to shove. Russia invading Poland or the Baltic states is therefore utter fantasy - as they have publicly stated, time after time. The only meaningful way to de-escalate the situation, is for the US to finally accept genuine Russian security concerns and allow the inevitable to play out in Ukraine.

I'm a Niall Ferguson fanboy but "I'm a free trader" wasn't followed by a suggestion as to how we go about getting our industrial base back.

Bezmenov warned us and we ignored him.