Ukraine war Q&A: Why Europe can't risk 'foolish' Russia attack - despite 'very alarming' NATO warning

You can watch it back at the top of this live page, or scroll below to catch up on our summaries of Clarke's best answers.

Today he covered...

• The "two sides" to NATO chief Mark Rutte's comments on Russia;
• How Moscow will view the death of a UK serviceman in Ukraine;
• Why a European offensive on Russia would be "foolish" and what Kyiv's allies really need to do;
• What Trump cutting ties with Europe could look like, and why there's likely "no going back";
• Whether or not European leaders are actually weak;
• If it's possible for Ukraine to deter Russia from further aggression in the event of any potential peace deal;
• And how a failure from the EU could leave Ukraine in "big trouble".

Ukraine is expected to run out of money as soon as April, which has led European leaders to look for alternative funding, as America has halted its financial support.

Among the options is the use of frozen Russian assets that are currently mostly held by a clearing firm in Belgium.

However, Belgium fears it might be held legally responsible, as Russia has dubbed the plan "theft". The EU hopes to find an agreement on this by the EU summit on 18 December.

Asked about the prospects for a deal and the consequences of a failure, Michael Clarke says that Belgium is "under intense pressure to give in".

He adds:

"I think they'll go for it because they're looking at two or three different mechanisms to make it work, and I think the reason that they'll do it because they're desperate".

Clarke believes Ukraine will be in "really big trouble" if the EU doesn't proceed with the plans, as Volodymyr Zelenskyy's nation will run out of money to fund the war.

Despite this, Clarke says there will be backlash from countries as "Hungary will go berserk, the Russians will go berserk, and the Americans will be extremely critical". 

"But it will convey to Ukraine enough money to keep them going for the next couple of years," Clarke says.

He also believes the move would "show the Americans that we're not going to roll over in [the] face of their blackmail on other things". 

Efforts to seal a US-proposed peace deal for Ukraine continued this week.

As of now, it contains three documents, Zelenskyy confirmed, one of which will focus on security guarantees, one of the most sensitive issues. 

European officials have previously coined the phrase of turning the country into a "steel porcupine" to prevent another Russian attack after any future peace deal.

Asked how Ukraine could successfully deter a future attack, our military analyst says that no type of armament in isolation could protect the country from this.

"There is no physical solution to Ukraine's security problem."  

Even minefields could only slow an attacker down but not stop them, Clarke says.

He says there is only one solution:

"The only thing that would stop Russia is deterrence: the knowledge that either the European forces were sitting in Ukraine ready to fight for them, which is hard to imagine at the moment, and even harder to imagine that they are backed up by American forces."

"If Ukraine gives up the fortress cities in the Donbas, the only security they can have is by being heavily armed and being backed by their allies in some way."

American military support is implausible by now, he says, however.

Even a wider security guarantee, backed by European forces, is "a long term aspiration", that cannot be achieved by the spring of next year, he adds.

Another question on Trump's shift away from Europe asks what this means for the future of the US military presence and its bases in Europe.

The US had about 80,000 armed forces personnel stationed in European NATO countries by the end of 2023, according to then-president Joe Biden. 

Our military analyst Michael Clarke says the fate of the nearly 40 bases depends on how severely Trump wants to cut ties.

Clarke says around 15 of the bases are sizeable outposts and there's an expectation maybe 25% of the US force will be withdrawn.

But it's who is withdrawn that really matters. He explains:

"If they pull out their combat troops then Europe won't be so worried because combat troops can always come back pretty quickly. But if they pull out the logistics and their engineering and all the all the backup forces, then it doesn't matter with combat troops, they can't, you know, do anything."

So if these logistic forces are pulled, then that would be a problem, Clarke says.

But he adds that he thinks what will actually take place will be a "symbolic withdrawal" that would be "reversible".

Clarke also points out that pulling troops back to the US would cost the country more than keeping them in Europe.

Donald Trump's no holds-barred interview with American outlet Politico made headlines this week. 

In it, the US president made derogatory remarks about Europe, saying Kyiv's European allies were talking but "not delivering" for Ukraine.

He also said Europe was "decaying" and suffering from "weak" leaders.

Watch his remarks in the video...

But did Trump have a point?

Clarke says that European leaders really are weak in the sense that the heads of Europe's big four countries are facing domestic issues.

He says Keir Starmer has domestic problems, Emmanuel Macron, who is in his final term, is "essentially a lame duck", Friedrich Merz has "big domestic problems", even though he's a very "assertive, imaginative" man, and Giorgia Meloni, whom Clarke calls "a very strong character", has a "lot of coalition problems".

But our military analyst also says they are confronting these problems internationally "pretty well".

More importantly, France, Britain and Germany are confronting these issues in a "united way".

 "There's a sort of reality to all of this if you can get more than two of the big four on board, nothing tends to happen. But if you get three or four of them united on something, it tends to happen because it overlays the institutional issues, the EU issues, the NATO issues. If they agree that you've got to get on with something, it tends to happen."

Clarke recalls this week's meeting of Macron, Starmer and Merz in London: "In a previous era this would have been a huge event," he said.

"Either it's a sign of how poor Europe is in world politics, or it's a sign of how united they are," he said.

 Aside from Trump's Politico interview, European allies were also startled by the updated US National Security Strategy this week.

In it, the Trump administration decried Europe's "unrealistic" expectations about ending the war in Ukraine. 

It also said mass migration would make Europe "unrecognisable" and incumbent governments were subverting freedom of expression and "genuine democracy".

The document all but commits the US to regime change in Europe as it vowed to support "patriotic European parties".

A viewer asks whether Trump's foreign policy shift away from Europe marks a permanent change to the world order, or whether Trump's successor may undo it.

According to Michael Clarke, the "short answer is... there's no going back for the United States".

"It's only the first year at the moment, and it's full of deliberate confusion... and deliberate proactiveness," he adds.

Clarke says we're yet to see the full extent of the four years of Trump's second term.

He says:

"I don't think, even if there's a sort of big Democratic comeback in 2028, America won't be the same again because you know, it's not all about Trump".

Clarke believes "Trumpism is a phenomenon that's been developing in America in the way the Republican Party has gone since 2004, 2006, 2008".

What Clarke thinks is possible after 2028 is a "Trumpist candidate" slotting straight in, and the period "might be 12 years" or even longer.

"The MAGA America we face now in terms of international affairs is a reality... and that's not going to change soon. The changes that we're already seeing now this year will be very, very hard to unravel". 

Watch: Europe's relationship with Trump 'on life support'

While Europe has been adamant about avoiding a direct confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia, a viewer asks whether it's time to "call Russia's bluff" and go on the offensive.

As an example, they name the American bombing of Iran's nuclear programme in June, when the US targeted three of Iran's main nuclear facilities and managed to "destroy" parts, according to Iranian officials.

Our military analyst says "going on the offensive" is not something the West has ever wanted to do.

Clarke says: "The West wants to help Ukraine resist this attack, it certainly doesn't want to attack Russia directly. We have no interest in doing that and it would be a very foolish and dangerous thing to do."

But he points out that the question gets to the heart of one issue which is that Ukraine's allies need to "be proactive" as Russia has been setting the agenda constantly, leaving Europe always reacting.

Clarke thinks this time might be coming.

He says:

"I suspect we're getting to that point, early next year, because if the Ukrainians are going to suffer a withdrawal of US support, which hasn't happened yet, and it may not, but if it does then the Europeans are going to have to decide, are they going to be more proactive in helping Ukraine."

Clarke adds this could be done by implementing a no-fly zone in Ukraine, putting European forces in western Ukraine or having a screening force along the country's border with Belarus.

Since the start of its full-scale invasion, Russia has claimed that it's really fighting NATO in Ukraine - claims no doubt fuelled this week by the death of British soldier Lance Corporal George Hooley,

Before the death of the British serviceman in Ukraine, the UK had confirmed "a small number of personnel" on the ground. 

They are believed to be helping the Ukrainian military, providing security for the embassy, and giving medical training. But NATO countries have always denied being actively involved in the war.

The Russian foreign ministry has already jumped on the opportunity, asking the UK to disclose what the man was doing there.

Moscow has claimed British troops are helping Kyiv carry out terror acts, sabotage, and extremist tasks in Ukraine.

Michael Clarke says it is part of Russia's narrative: 

"They say that... this is NATO using Ukraine as a frontline because NATO is attacking us."

He adds that Russia views itself as "resisting a Western attempt to conquer Russia, with Ukraine as the frontline".

Clarke said that while Russia may regard "any foreign troops" in Ukraine as "fair targets", Chinese and North Korean troops have been deployed to help Moscow. 

"There are a number of troops fighting on the Russian side," he added.

Watch: 'Very little is known' about UK military in Ukraine as death of serviceman confirmed

The UK government confirmed on Tuesday that a British soldier died in Ukraine in a "tragic accident".

28-year-old Lance Corporal George Hooley was "observing Ukrainian forces test a new defensive capability, away from the front lines" when the accident occurred, according to the Ministry of Defence.

Asked whether there was any indication what was being tested, Clarke says:

"The only hint was in the British statement, which said it was an air defence system of some sort, which is entirely plausible."

That's one of the things that the Ukrainians are trying to come up with new answers to, Clarke adds, as the country has a major need for air defence in the face of nightly Russian strikes.

He believes there could be some clever innovations, particularly around lasers or electronic systems, that can help in air defence rather than having to fire a missile.

He adds there's no reason to disbelieve the MoD statement.

"It's been revealed that some of our special forces operate in Ukraine," he says.

"What they do, I don't know, and nor should I know, but it's entirely logical that they would be acting as advisers well behind the lines.

"I think the truth is pretty close to what the military said it is: It was a tragic accident on an experimental range somewhere deep in the west of Ukraine, a long way away from the front lines."

In a visit to Berlin, the NATO secretary-general, Mark Rutte, has today issued a gloomy warning.

Noting that conflicts are no longer fought at arm's length, he said the alliance must be "prepared for the scale of war that our grandparents and great-grandparents endured".

Watch the moment in the video...

Presenter Kamali Melbourne asks our military analyst Michael Clarke about these comments in the first question.

Clarke says there are two sides to Rutte's idea and warning - a political and a philosophical one.

He explains:

"The political basis is to bring people along to the idea that peace is not inevitable, that we're not entitled to a peaceful Europe just by wishing for it, and that we've got to be prepared to face reality, which is getting darker all the time."

But our defence analyst says the philosophical side is "more alarming" for him.

Clarke sums this up by pointing to how supposedly peaceful periods of European history were actually rocked by repeated conflicts.

He adds: "We can only avoid the war that we really don't want to fight, by being prepared, really prepared to fight it."