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It's a busy week in Europe. NATO defense ministers are meeting and the 59th Munich Security Conference will be held.

It's also a challenging time for the West. The Ukraine conflict is reaching one-year mark with no viable resolution. A recent story by Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh about the U.S. blowing up the Nord Stream pipeline is looming large over the events.

I'm inviting Professor Alfred de Zayas to share his thoughts on this.

Edited excerpts:

CGTN: The West has been battling Russia over the moral high ground since the Ukraine conflict broke out. Do you see Seymour Hersh's story shifting the narrative in Russia's favor in the long run?

Alfred de Zayas: Objectively speaking, we in the West, we do not occupy any moral high ground a vis Russia. The problem is that we in the United States, most Brits in England and Germans in Germany actually believe our own propaganda. We are indoctrinated into believing that we are the good guys by definition, and that we have a mission to bring democracy and human rights to the rest of the world.

That is why a report that Seymour Hirsch just issued on the bombing, blowing up of the Nord Stream is not likely to have much of an impact with the American public. It simply bounces off. People believe that what they want to believe.

CGTN: Do you see the story sowing further discord in the Western alliance over the Ukraine conflict in the near future? 

Alfred de Zayas: I don't think so. The mainstream media - New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal - has been successful in conditioning our minds to the necessity of consensus, consensus among the western countries. 

In the United States. Congressman Matt Gaetz is calling for a stop of the flow of weapons to Ukraine. We have a number of academics like Richard Falk and Jeffrey Sachs and John Mearsheimer who are pushing for mediation, but they are not being listened.

CGTN: The Ukraine conflict has lasted for about a year and had cost countless money and resources. Do you see the conflict dragging on for another year or so?

Alfred de Zayas: It definitely can drag on for one more year. It's a question, as I've said it before in other interviews, we Americans are willing to fight this proxy war against Russia till the last Ukrainian.

Assuming that the United States sends fighter planes and Germany sends fighter planes et cetera, then the likelihood of a confrontation with NATO, a direct Russia - NATO confrontation is much higher. And under those conditions, we are facing apocalypse. Because if we start a third World War with nuclear weapons, no one is going to survive and it's going to impact you! It's going to impact the Chinese. It's going to impact the Indians, It's going to impact of the Africans. It's going to impact the Latin Americans.

The main thing is we need peace. 

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