Unedited: Brian's interview with NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg

I'm Elise Hu.

And I'm Josh Klein. And we're the hosts of Built for Change, a podcast from Accenture. On Built for Change, we're talking to business leaders from every corner of the world that are harnessing change to reinvent the future of their business. We're discussing ideas like the importance of ethical A.I. or how productivity soars when companies truly listen to what their employees value. These are insights that leaders need to know to stay ahead. So subscribe to Built for Change wherever you get your podcasts.

I totally believe in you. General Secretary, what is your goal here with the General Assembly today? What does this give the NATO General Secretary an opportunity to do? My main message here in all my meetings is to say that the brutal invasion of Ukraine last year is a blatant violation of the core principles this organization is built on. It's a violation of the U.N. Charter. It violates the borders, the territorial integrity, sovereignty of a sovereign independent nation in Europe, Ukraine. Russia's not even here. China's not even here.

Those two are very thick together, very tight together. Does that make your objective hard to achieve? Well, they are here, but not at the level of heads of state and government. And they are following what is the message from this General Assembly. And of course, there are many nations that have different opinions, but the vast majority of the nations of the world have condemned clearly the invasion of Ukraine by Russia.

But more importantly than just to condemn is to actually act. And therefore, it is extremely important that NATO allies, the United States, but also Canada and European allies are now delivering unprecedented support to Ukraine to ensure that President Putin doesn't win. Five hundred thousand, they say roughly, have been killed together on both sides. Was this war preventable? Of course it was, because this is a war of choice. This is President Putin deciding to invade another country that has in no way threatened his country. So this is a war of choice, meaning also that President Putin can end this war tomorrow by not attacking Ukraine. We have to ensure that President Putin does not win this war, because that will be a tragedy for Ukrainians, but also dangers for NATO allies, for the United States, for European allies. Because then the message to President Putin, but also to other other leaders like Xi in China, is that when they use military force, when they violate international law, they get what they want. So it's in our security interest to ensure that President Putin doesn't win in Ukraine. And Russia's complaint is, hey, you guys violated your word.

The Warsaw Pact countries became NATO countries. You guys are right on our border. We feel threatened.

What do you say to that? First of all, that the Warsaw Pact countries and those countries in Europe bordering Russia, they have the right to choose the wrong path. It's a fundamental principle that also China, Russia has subscribed to, is that every independent nation has the right to choose. It's not NATO that has forced Poland or Lithuania into NATO. It's Poland and Lithuania that through democratic open processes have decided that they want to join. I'm coming from Norway, a small country bordering Russia. And back in 1949, we were the only country bordering Russia. And Russia said, or the Soviet Union said, this is a danger, this is a provocation. But then Washington, London, Paris said, Norway can be a member if they so want.

And they accepted us. I'm very glad that that was the approach then as it is now. So far, this war a year and a half old, you have enough counteroffensive going on right now. How much better would that offensive be going if Ukraine had the tanks that they were promised and the demining equipment that would have allowed them to move forward? Of course, it's always possible to speculate what would have happened if we had provided even more support even faster. But the reality is that the United States, but also European allies and Canada have provided much more support and are continuing to providing military support to Ukraine at the scale that no one expected when this war started. President Putin made a big mistake when he invaded Ukraine, partly to underestimate Ukrainians, but also to underestimate the resolve and the commitment of NATO allies to support Ukraine.

I understand that and I agree with you. $70 billion the U.S. has spent. Got it. But what if we got this stuff on time? First, no patriots, you got patriots. No high Mars, you got high Mars. No F-16s, you're getting F-16s. Now you have cluster bombs. What if all this stuff got there ahead of time? What if it got there on time?

But no one can say exactly what would have happened. What we have seen is that the support from NATO allies has evolved as this war has evolved. In the beginning it was extremely important. Is it too cautious though? Is it too cautious because they worry about Russia's response? Well, what we have seen now is that NATO allies are delivering long-range missiles, cruise missiles.

The United States is delivering high Mars. And allies have started the training of pilots for F-16s. So I think this demonstrates a commitment to provide high-end advanced capabilities to ensure that Ukraine creates an independent nation. So are you for the F-16s getting there? When do you think the F-16 pilots will be trained and ready to get into theater? Well, I'm very much in favor of and I welcome very much that NATO allies have decided to provide F-16s. I cannot say exactly when they will be ready.

It will take some time to train. But just the fact that this has been announced has an impact because it sends the message to Moscow that they cannot wait us out. We are there for the long haul. And again, we do this to support Ukrainians but also to protect ourselves. Because again, it is dangerous if President Putin wins.

It makes us more vulnerable. So it's in our security interest to support Ukraine and therefore welcome what the United States does. But also European allies, billions of dollars and euros in support for Ukraine. And Mr. Secretary, in America, they say, hey, listen, we gave 70 billion.

That should be enough. On the other hand, they're also saying that we should be focused on China. Do you see a link between China and Russia and how this affects our relations and our ability to fend off China? China is watching the war in Ukraine very closely. And the more successful President Putin is, the more inclined China will be to use force to achieve their goals. The less successful President Putin is, the less likely it is that China will be using force. So we are sending a message not only to President Putin but also to Beijing by providing support to Ukraine and ensuring that President Putin doesn't win. If we allow him to win in Ukraine, then we are sending the absolute wrong message to Beijing and increases the use of military force also from China. Some say, wow, America is emptying their artillery coffers for Ukraine. That makes us more vulnerable to China.

What do you say to those people? I'm saying that the biggest risk is to let President Putin and Russia win in Ukraine. Then we are making ourselves vulnerable. Then we are sending the message that when they use military force, they get what they want, be it President Putin or President Xi. Second, this is not only United States. Canada, European allies are also really, really providing significant support to Ukraine. It demonstrates the value for the United States to have NATO, North America and Europe standing together. When we stand together, North America and Europe and NATO, we are 50 percent of the world's military might and 50 percent of the world's economic might.

So when we stand together, we are all safe. I know you're not a military guy, but you're Prime Minister of Norway and people know you know the military. How did the prognosticators get it so wrong that Kiev would fall in three days and offer Zelensky a ride rather than armaments? And here we are a year plus in and it's Ukraine on the march.

How did the experts get it so wrong? Because it's always very hard to predict wars. It's about counting battle tanks and artillery pieces. But it's also about something which is hard to count, and that is the morale, the courage, the determination. And I think what really impressed the whole world was the morale, the soul of the Ukrainians. Did it surprise you?

Yes, at least I was impressed by the courage. And of course, nobody really knows before they are in the crisis, as the Ukrainians were in February last year. And they impressed the whole world, not only the Ukrainian armed forces, but also the Ukrainian people and Ukrainian political leadership.

And we just need to continue to support them because, yes, we pay a price for our support, but the price of not supporting them is even higher. All right, my fellow Fox Across Americans, you probably heard about liver health formula supplement many times. But did you know they already sold over two million bottles?

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So go to GetLiverHelp.com slash Jimmy now. I'm Elise Hu and I'm Josh Klein, and we're the hosts of Built for Change, a podcast from Accenture. On Built for Change, we're talking to business leaders from every corner of the world that are harnessing change to reinvent the future of their business. We're discussing ideas like the importance of ethical A.I. or how productivity soars when companies truly listen to what their employees value. These are insights that leaders need to know to stay ahead.

So subscribe to Built for Change wherever you get your podcasts. They are both members of NATO. What's your message to them? Well, all NATO allies are providing support.

Not much. Well, they are providing support to NATO because NATO has, we have programs and packages which are financed by all the members to support Ukraine. We agreed at the Vilnius Summit to have a big program for what we call interoperability to ensure that Ukrainian armed forces are fully interoperable, can work together with NATO forces. This will move them closer to NATO membership.

But you're right, of course, different allies provide different levels of support. But I welcome that all allies agree that it's late, that's in July, that we have to stand by Ukraine and also finance joint efforts to support Ukraine. Hungary and Turkey are standing in the way of Sweden. Hungary doesn't like an article that was written in 2019, and Turkey has a problem with something with Swedish politics. Clearly Sweden would be an asset to NATO in every way.

You know Sweden well. Why can't you get Turkey and Hungary to understand that this makes the alliance stronger? So first of all, all allies have agreed to invite Finland and Sweden. And now Finland is already a full member and Sweden will become a full member.

Are you sure? Yes, because it was clearly stated at the NATO Summit with all the heads of state and government in Vilnius in Lithuania in July from the Turkish president that they will ratify as soon as possible. Meaning when the Turkish parliament convenes later on this fall. So I'm confident that Sweden will become a member. It will be good for Sweden, it will be good for NATO and also good for Turkey. Would you back a mission to have NATO escort these ships of grain, full of grain, out of the Black Sea? You could do it, you have the firepower, you have the naval force, it's for humanitarian purposes, let alone Ukrainian economic purposes.

Would you support that? NATO has two tasks in this war. One is to support Ukraine as we do. And the other is to prevent this war from escalating beyond Ukraine to become a full-fledged war between NATO and Russia. That's the reason why we have not deployed NATO troops on the ground and not been directly involved in the war.

And I think that's the right thing to continue to do. Do you worry about that being a message that Russia would consider a bridge too far? We should not do anything that can make us in direct part to the war. But of course we are supporting the efforts to get grain out of Ukraine. More and more of this grain is now going through the territorial waters of Romania and Bulgaria, which are NATO allies. And of course this is within their territorial waters.

And then we need to constantly assess what more we can do to help to get grain out of Ukraine. I understand Bulgaria, Romania and Poland have had missiles land on their territory. Not a Rule 5 violation.

What does a Rule 5 violation look like? Because if there's an accident, does that include a NATO nation, does that include action and return? Well, what we have stated very clearly is that an armed attack on a NATO ally will trigger a response from the whole alliance. Also an attack on one ally will... What about by mistake? Of course, what we have seen so far, we have no indications that these incidents we have seen with drones, for instance, are intentional attacks on NATO.

So of course this is a different thing than a full-scale armed attack. 9 of 30 NATO nations have hit their 2% on the plane. Poland is actually above the US in percentage. What is your message to the second half?

And it seemed like President Trump was the one who got closest to getting people's attention, that it matters. Well, my message to all NATO allies is that they have to spend more and especially those who are investing less than 2% of GDP on defence. The good news is that since we made this pledge in NATO in 2014, all allies have significantly increased defence spending. More and more allies are spending 2% of GDP on defence and the vast majority of allies have plans in place to be there within a few years. So in total we added 450 billion extra for defence across Europe and Canada, so we are really moving in the right direction.

You have done the impossible. You communicated with President Trump last night and President Biden. You get praise from both of them. Why did you seem to work so well with President Trump? Well, I am focused on my main task and that is to keep North America and Europe together. It didn't threaten you when he said, I don't know about NATO, or it creates some doubt about everyone paying their fair share. No, but I told him, as I told all the American presidents, that my task is to travel around to capitals in Europe and Canada and to convince them to spend more. And the good news is that they are spending more.

Also, Germany is now close to 2% and therefore what we see is that European allies are making a difference when it comes to defence spending. Last question. How does this war end? You said it's going to be a longer war than anyone thought. How does it end?

And what do you say to the American people who are saying, I'm tired of writing checks here with $33 trillion in debt? Nobody knows today when and how this war will end. Wars are by nature unpredictable.

They tend historically to last longer than we expect when they start. So therefore we need to be prepared for long haul, but we don't know how long this will last. Yes, we are paying a price, but the price for not supporting Ukraine is much higher because that will make us vulnerable. Then we will really be in a more dangerous situation because then China will see that we are not willing to stand up for our values and protect democratic independent nations.

That will be a much higher price to pay in the long run for the United States and for all the NATO allies. Mr. Secretary, thank you so much. Congratulations on getting another year. Thank you so much. Great to meet you, sir. Thank you. Listen to the show ad free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcast, Amazon Music with your prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.