It made mother russia a lot smaller though it is still pretty huge too. It also sits on the border separating russia from europe. Ukraine is a word that literally means border land and the southern part of it stretches across the black sea, a key water route for ferrying oil and natural gas to europe, which is russias biggest customer for the stuff that keeps the lights on. Curb sha and ukraine havent been the friendliest of neighbors since ukraine declared itself an understood pen dindep. Ukraine also had a lot of old the old soviet unions military nukes which theyve destroyed when they went independent and to the delight of western fortune hunters ukraine boasts a lot of its own oil and natural gas which partly explains why modern day ukraine is so central to the many, many scandals that beeve all been living with since President Trump become the nominee in 2016. The Trump Campaign made a single change to the entire rnc platform, just one. Watering down language that called for the protection of ukraine from russia which had invaded its former territory and still occupies the part that sticks out into the black see called crimea in 2014 causing the International Sanctions that have been bedevilling Vladimir Putin and donald trump ever since. The cold war has also been corruption central with oligarchs and president s grasping for control of the countrys natural resources. Paul manafort who now sits in prison earned mulls doing private business with those oligarchs and helped to elect and consulted for a ukranian president for nearly a decade. By the way, he was super close to russia and very, very corrupt and when he was ousted in a peoples revolution in 2014 called the revolution of dignity he fled to russia. Ukraine is also at the center of the bonkers right wing Conspiracy Theory that russia didnt really attack our election in 2016 but rather than ukraine did and that the collusion was not with Donald Trumps campaign but with Hillary Clintons. Ukraine has proved rich not just in conspiracy theories but also opportunities for werners looking to make a post buck. Its also been the draw of oil and natural gas money. That is a draw that really put ukraine on the map for would be new school oligarchs including american ones and it appears that the part of the scandal that could lead to Donald TrumpsImprovement Centers on some of those corrupt individuals looking to profit off ukraines energy sector, even as trump seeks dirt on Hunter Bidens role with the ukranian gas company. House democrats are seeking documents about whether rick perry pushed ukraine to put trump friendly americans on the board of the state owned gas and oil company in crew yan. In the t ukranian crow anies are accused of a scheme to inkpluns u. S. Politics with Illegal Campaign contributions mplts they also alleged lay worked to get the ambassador to ukraine fired because she wouldnt play ball and helped giuliani to help dig for dirt on the bidens. One of them owns a Company CalledFraud Guarantee that Rudy Giuliani worked for and the other owns an odessa nightclub called not the bah da bing but mafia rave. You cant make this stuff up. And then theres the second country thrown into the mix and that is turkey. Here it is smack in the middle between europe x rush scha asia middle east. When Michael Flynn allegedly plotted the kidnapping of an opponent of the autocrat who runs turkey, erdogan, flynn ultimately pled guilty to lying to the fbi about his contacts with russia and his secret lobbying on behalf of turkey. Trumps ties to erdogan are back in the news after trump add ha phone call and abruptly announced he would whisk special forces out of Northern Syria a big boost to turkey. Well get to that in the show. Hers donald trump bragging about it to his onetime Campaign Manager on the radio in 2015. If youre elected president and prosecuting the war, what do you do with turkey . Is turkey is a reliable partner . Well, i also have i have a little conflict of interest because i have a major, major building in istanbul and its a tremendously successful job. Its could trump towers, two towers not the usual one, its two. So hes the author of a mem roir called a mind unralphed. Great to talk with you. Okay. I want to read to you a bit of your september 2016 piece and this was for news week. It was actually retweeted by Hillary Clinton during the campaign and it was how the trumps organizations foreign business ties could up end the u. S. National security. Lets talk about how this figures into the plot that we are trying to unravel through impeachment coming up. Lets start with ukraine. Why is it that ukraine is so central and so important really to russia in such that it has gotten now to rudy ghoiuliani io so much trouble . Theyre engaged in almost a hat trick of corruption and stupidity but ukraine is so important because it is a mainak sesz mainak sesz to the black sea. Crimea is already under control of russia. Russia has been trying to destabilize ukraine for a long time. They are still fighting ukraine, and now you have a situation where the United States is viewed thanks to donald trump as another enemy of ukraine. In fact, last week one of the main people behind an Anti Corruption group in kif said well now we have the United States is really no different than russia. Theyre both engaging in disinformation campaigns, theyre both destabilizing us. And Rachel Maddow has a great new book and she talked about the gas and businesses around the world and the way they corrupt governments. The thing thats fascinating is the size. Its the biggist country in europe. Its giant but also the fact that it is a natural gas bo hemoit and russia wants to control it. The only power and the only kind of pull they have is they could turn the lights off in europe. They could cut off the oil and so they really want to have a port to the black sea to be able to get oil and gas out and thats sort of the key to it but now all the sanctions have made it impossible for them to do business. Do you kind of understand why donald trump cares about that . Donald trump is in a completely different realm. Because you know, one of the things you have is youre creating a circumstance where russia, if they gain control of ukraine, would be able to engage in energy blackmail of the entirety of western europe. Where donald trump falls into this is he doesnt he doesnt care about international politics. This is where the stupidity comes in. Hes all obsessed with fox news type conspiracy theories. Hes just not in on the on the game that its all a lie. And so hes spinning about mueller and dmc servers in the ukraine and you have the biden series of lies, and you ultimately have trump who is working to help his own egoand win for 2020 and and truthfully, the geo political consequences of what hes doing are too complex for him to worry about. Yeah, lets go to turkey, because i want to read the part your 2016 piece that Hillary Clinton retweeted was about turkey and Donald Trumps interest in turkey. You wrote when faced with the prospect of losing the malls of dollars that flow into the Trump Organization from that istanbul property what position would President Trump take on relations including that that countrys role in fighting against isis. We kind of gotten answer to that. You wrote that in 2016. Did we now get the answer . Because trump and his family, lets not forget his kids, theyve got business there. Theyre making money from there. Why do do you think weve seea connection between his financial interest and his behavior regarding turkey . Absolutely. Aef we became president we started seeing turkish president erdogan basically threaten trump in a very, very subtle way. Trump makes it out to be the development of his own. Its the development of a group and they just paid for trumps name to be on it. Hes making millions of dollars a year for his name to be on it. In his first phone call with erdogan when he had been elected president he passed on, you know, good feelings from folks from dogan who he described az his Business Partners and a week later erdogan out of nowhere arrests a Senior Executive with Dogan Holdings and it was a very and i was told by a middle eastern source it was a very, very planned effort to tell donald trump look what i can do. And so these kinds of conflicts are massive and we may not see all the pieces moving, but certainly erdogan does. Yeah. And obviously trump does because one thing that hes about is his business and making sure that he continues to make money. Yes. Thank you so much. Somebodys actually trying to call me while im the show which is fascinating. They wanted to talk to you probably. Fridays explosive testimony from the former ambassador to ukraine. Thats next. He former ambassado ukraine. Thats next. 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And just feel very fortunate to have been there. I think she has been a model diplomat and deserved better than the shabby treatment she received from this president and from the secretary of state. The model diplomat that congressman was speaking of is marie yovanovitch. She was the u. S. Ambassador to ukraine until she was ousted at the urging of Rudy Giuliani. She gave nine hours of testimony to House Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry. She testified in defiance of the white house. And the state department who had ordered government officials not to cooperate with congress. And her testimony was scathing which we know because she released her Opening Statement just as her secret deposition was about to get underway. It reads in part, although i understand that i served at the pleasure of the president , i was never theless incredulous that the u. S. Government chose to remove an ambassador based as best as i can tell on unfounded and false claims by people with clearly questionable motives. Joining me now a former Deputy Assistant secretary of defense for Russia Ukraine and eurasia. Thanks for having me. How unusual would it be for a career diplomat to be removed from her position at the behest of people who are not in government, people who were associated with the president s lawyer . Its its not just unusual, joy, its outrageous and actually if you look at the time line, she was asked by the state department presumably by the secretary of state to extend her tour into 2020, because there was a transition going on if you remember, you outlined the history of ukraine, there was a transition going on in their government and there was a new we have new this new president zelensky whos running ukraine who is inexperienced and so the idea was lets keep a seasoned ukraine watcher, somebody who knows ukraine really well in place and then just within a matter of months because of these two random, you know, cowboy guys, shes yanked out of there. And she knew why. I mean, clearly she knew, but she was shocked as she should have been. Let me read more of the statement. She wrote you will understandably want to ask why my posting ended so suddenly. I wanted to learn that too and ive tried to find out. I met with deputy sek retear of state who informed me of the curtailment of my term. He said the president lost confidence in me and no longer wanted me to serve as his ambassador. We now know that there was a senator involved in that group of people who wanted ms. Yovanovitch to be put aside. There were the two people just arrested who were giulianis associates who went to the senator, Pete Sessions, congressman named Pete Sessions who then sent a letter and here it is. This is obtained by nbc news. They went to Pete Sessions, representative Pete Sessions and he wrote a letter, the letter written on congressional letter head on may 9th, 2018, addressed to the secretary of state. It asks pompeo to consider terminating ms. Yovanovitchs ambassador ship and find a replacement because sessions said he received information that she had spoken privately and repeatedly about her disdain for the Current Administration in a way that might call for the expulsion of her immediately. We now know the two men arrested also arranged a big donation to congressman Pete Sessions. Is that at all normal for the way that the government, the federal government normally functions . No, i mean, obviously people donate money to members of congress who are running for office and expect favors and you know, depending on what they want, you know if its legal, fine, but this was highly inappropriate. Highly unusual. And it was also according to ambassador yovanovitch a lie because she had never disparaged she says in her statement she had never disparaged President Trump pub welcomely or privately and that makes sense to me knowing her as i do know her from having worked in government with her and then even after i was out of government working with her. You know, shes not the type of person to do that. Shes a professional. She knows she serves at the pleasure of the president , whoever is sitting in that oval office. So the fact that these two citizens, i mean, its like your uncle joe could go over to ukraine and make something up, send a letter to a member of congress and get you fired . I mean its outrageous. Let me play very quickly what congressman sessions said to our affiliate in dallas last sunday. Take a listen. She was very much against the administration, did not represent them and spoke publicly against the administration. We were frustrated in congress with the amount of activity that was going on with replacing ambassadors and it was part of that push and was one of those pieces of feedback that i gave. So hes standing by what he did. That was his response to everything. You are among a nearly 30 former state and National Officials who have gotten together and read an open letting all pompeo to defend ms. Yovanovitch. I want to play you a sound bite of mike pompeo and hes speaking on friday to see whether you think he will actually do what you all are asking him to do. Take a listen. In mid february you were in warsaw and so was Rudy Giuliani. During your time there did you meet with giuliani . You know, i dont talk about who i meet with. I went to warsaw for a particular purpose. So youre not going to say whether you met with him . When i was in warsaw i had a singular focus. My focus was singly on the work that we have done. It sounds like youre not going to say. When i was in warsaw, we were working diligently to accomplish the mission. Mike pompeo was on the phone call that is going to be the core of the impeachment of donald trump, the phone call to the new president of ukraine. Do you trust mike pompeo to do anything to protect the state department from donald trump . No i mean, joy, this saddens me that i have to say this. We wrote this letter to secretary pompeo so our hope when we wrote it it was before this interview, which by the way i have to praise the journalist because i read the transcript. I havent seen it, but she was really asking great questions, respectfully and he was dodging all of them. And thats disturbing because if you dodge that question, then youre implicitly admitting yes, i talked to, you know, giuliani. Yes, met with jute jugiuliani. Its unsettling because hes taking the side of this random renegade operation but frankly speaking if i could say one other thing, ive said for a while now that sondeland was acting with the knowledge and probably the instructions of pompeo. Thats what im worried about because he says in his messaging back to ukraine more recently, if you have a problem talk to s which is secretary pompeo which is to say that sandland who was running this renegade operation to try to get dirt on Vice President biden and to throw dirt on the ukranian government with regard to 2016, he was i believe acting with the knowledge of secretary pompeo now and this is disturbing. And quickly before we let you go. Mr. Sondeland are on a list of people that are to be deposed next week along with other people involved, bill taylor and weve listed them all there. Cole, george kent, these folks are all expected to be deposed next week. The Trump Administration has done a couple of things. One is that theyve essentially said dont comply. They said every