Is Russia Really Ready For War With Europe?
Newscast
BBC
4.4 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 3 December 2025
⏱️ 45 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today, NATO ministers have been meeting to discuss the US’s 28-point plan for peace between Russia and Ukraine after Russia rejected the plan and said it was “ready” for war with Europe.
Adam is joined by Europe editor, Katya Adler and the Economist’s defence editor, Shashank Joshi to discuss what President Putin’s statement means for a divided NATO.
Plus Faisal Islam, BBC Economics Editor, joins the conversation to discuss the UK’s possible involvement in a new European defence fund and the government’s latest suggestions it could be looking to get closer to the EU again.
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New episodes released every day. If you're in the UK, for more News and Current Affairs podcasts from the BBC, listen on BBC Sounds: https://bbc.in/4guXgXd Newscast brings you daily analysis of the latest political news stories from the BBC. The presenter was Adam Fleming. It was made by Anna Harris with Kris Jalowiecki. The social producer was Joe Wilkinson. The technical producer was Dafydd Evans. The assistant editor is Chris Gray. The senior news editor is Sam Bonham.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:05.7 | Hello, we're marking the fantastic news that you can now message newscast via your smart |
| 0:11.0 | speaker, and we're doing it by opening our smart speakers corner where we hear your story of |
| 0:16.0 | smart speaker slip-ups. Listen to this amazing one from Kate in Glasgow. |
| 0:21.4 | Alexa! Alexa! |
| 0:24.4 | Alexa, play with your floor. |
| 0:29.6 | Alexa, play video four. |
| 0:34.9 | Alexa, play with your floor. So that is the sound of a |
| 0:40.3 | So that is the sound of a two-year-old |
| 0:42.5 | Glasgowian daughter trying to get her favourite radio station at dinner time |
| 0:46.5 | because of course all two-year-olds love Radio 4 |
| 0:48.8 | Kate's daughter is now nine |
| 0:50.5 | so tells us that she's requesting a lot more Taylor Swift |
| 0:53.2 | from her smart speaker rather |
| 0:54.6 | than Radio 4 nowadays. And you know my obsession is about how my smart speaker doesn't do punctuation, |
| 1:00.1 | so the messages end up quite garbled by the time they reach Newscast HQ. We've had one, |
| 1:05.2 | which says, hi, newscast comma, this podcast is very helpful for my politics, A, level, from Ruth, because her smart |
| 1:13.9 | speaker has not done any of the punctuation, apart from putting a full stop after A. Anyway, |
| 1:19.0 | keep your messages coming. You just fire up your smart speaker and say to it, ask BBC sounds |
| 1:24.2 | to send a comment to newscast, and then what follows couldn't be simpler. |
| 1:29.3 | And what follows now is an episode of Newscast. |
| 1:33.0 | Newscast from the BBC. |
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