Eric Swalwell

It's not going to feel good.

It's not going to be as cathartic as blowing up things and looking like the big man.

But I think, you know, there is a way forward still, but he's got to be the hero and take it.

The only thing I would say is the Russians want a world, a multipolar world, in which there are various spheres of influence, and the Russians have consistently said they envision a world where we have a sphere of influence in our part of the world, the Russians have a sphere of influence in theirs, the Chinese, etc., etc., etc.

And the only thing I would say is the Russians might be willing to let the Cuban thing slide

if they know they're really going to get a deal out of us on these connected issues in eurasia ukraine iran and dealing with china and uh we again here there's the western hemispheric defense strategy this is what the president's team outlined in the national saying it's night it's not the 1962 communist party

Well, I think in terms of Cuba, I think the Russians would be willing to let that go the way we want it to go or the way Trump wants it to go if he can seriously sit down with them and be genuine about, yes, I'm going to work with you to get a deal to end all of these crises across Eurasia very quickly.

Cuba is seen as peripheral to Russia, I think.

And therefore I don't believe that the Russians would use Cuba as anything other than a cat's paw to give us headaches because we're giving them headaches.

So if we could kind of mutually deescalate, I think the Russians would say, okay, the Western hemisphere is your sphere.

We're going to have our sphere in our part of the world.

And we're going to let the Chinese carve out some sphere for themselves.

And this is the new world order going forward.

One of spheres of influence where we mind our own backyards more than we mind the backyards and front yards of others.

The Don Roe Doctrine.

And this is something, you know, I was very loud and proud about that.

I thought this is where we were going, which is why I was so angry about the Middle East excursion, because it's become more than an excursion, obviously.

It's real.

It's a quagmire.

So I do think there is a pathway forward, even with the Cuban issue.