My response to your feedback

[RyanMcBethProgramming]

Perhaps you could also fix your video about military spending because I found 25 things that were wrong in that video and they couldn’t have been mistakes.

[KaybeCA]

There is nothing wrong with being wrong. There's only something wrong with staying wrong.

[jeffersonricardo]

Accountability and ownership is important. And YouTube journalism feels like it could easily go after rapid reporting and not accurate reporting. Thanks for acknowledging your mistakes.

[petrmilosh]

Thank you, sponsor of the deleted video, for making Johnny think more deeply. It seems you’re the main reason this is happening. ❤

[larrydzemorsky]

Idk this term "nato expansion" sounds silly to me. Eastern European countries begged to participate. On the other hand no one asked Warsaw whether it want to be in the Warsaw pact.

[CinematicSeriesGaming]

I'm glad you're acknowledging your mistake. I'm looking forward to the new version of the video where you analyze the "NATO expansion" from the perspective of Eastern Europe and Baltic states. The main error of your original video was this outdated 20th century assumption that USA and Russia are the only major players in the world who have complete power to shape the world in any way they see fit. Europe is not just some chess board where Americans control one side and Russians the other. European countries have had a long history with Russia long before USA even existed.

When countries like Poland, Hungary or Lithuania joined NATO, it wasn't because USA forced them or even manipulated them into doing so. This is the kind of nonsense the Russian propagandists want you to believe. In reality, all of these countries joined VOLUNTARILY. There were huge movements in Eastern European countries advocating for joining NATO. And people really wanted it! Joining NATO was a huge opportunity to prosper without the looming threat of an imminent Russian aggression. The sort of security guarantee that lets you focus on improving your own country and being productive instead of endlessly worrying about the security of your borders and possible Russian incursions.

It would be nice if you included a segment about the history of Russian aggressions, genocides and war crimes agains various European countries. You should also talk about the legacy of the Soviet Union and the effects it had on the Eastern European countries. For example, Poland was basically a puppet state subservient to the Soviet Union since 1945 up until 1989. With a history like that, it's not at all surprising that Poles were eager to join NATO and didn't want to have anything to do with Russia.

I get what you were trying to do in the original video. You kinda wanted to be the devil's advocate and explain the perspective of Russia. But unfortunately, you ommitted a lot of important facts of history, and inadvertently fell for the Russian propaganda and Russian revisionism. The whole idea of "NATO expansion" is nonsensical. It's basically a projection by the Russian propaganda. Russia has always been an aggressive imperial regime that sought to subjugate smaller nations and install puppet regimes to broaden its sphere of influence. It has no regard for the sovereignety of other nations and for the will of its people. So when Russia accuses USA of "expanding NATO", it tries to create this false equivalency suggesting that USA behaves in the exact same way. Russians want you to believe that Europeans have no agency of their own and that we are just pieces on the board to be captured by one superpower or another. This is absolutely not true when it comes to European countries joining NATO.

[rybnitskyi]

As a Ukrainian, and a long-time viewer It was sad to see that the opinion of tens of millions of Eastern European people was simply ignored. Unfortunately, a lot of people from Western countries perceive this as a Russia-NATO issue, and not as an Imperial power that wants to get back its colonies. As all humans, we simply want to have security that could be provided by NATO only (except nuclear weapons, which were taken from us in exchange for empty promises), and financial and personal freedom, provided by the EU.

[CyclicMac]

This guy never cared about being wrong in the past. Then all of a sudden he is about to lose a sponsor and makes this. He knows what he’s doing and he knows it will work.

[Fishboi]

Jake Broe just posted a great video on this topic:)

[neoexplains]

Hat’s off to you. Turning this into a chance to make the video even better is a great reaction. One thing I actually enjoyed in the original video was the focus on narratives and how different places view history through their own lenses. Maybe a structure that flips between these perspectives could work better?

That way, it doesn’t come across as though you’re fully adopting a single perspective as your own.

Excited to see the new version!

[yarkobroda]

"living next to modern Russia". Its not a modern problem. Muscocy has always been an imperial colonial power.

[Teh-Penguin]

The mistake I see is the way you do your research. You don't research to get to the truth, you research to get to your point.

[michalakdotnet]

I'm Polish 🇵🇱, and my wife is Ukrainian 🇺🇦. Today, I was referring her to your video on NATO, and the lack of understanding of Eastern European notions was simply mind-boggling to us. I told her that I kinda feel let down by this guy Johnny, who, so far, was one of the best geopolitical journalists in my eyes. Your response, though, only made me more certain that I wasn’t wrong about you. Great display of integrity. My trust in the content you provide has grown. The revised version of the video is going to be a banger, and I can’t wait for it. Thank you for what you do and how you approach your craft.

[gotchathespider]

I think rather than doing a series, each video with a different perspective, you need to have each perspective in a single video. Even after every video releases, even if you make sure it's clear there's more parts with different perspectives, there's a lot of people who will only see one and will come away with a biased perspective.

[The_Cats_Pajamas]

Are people really praising Johnny when the only reason he uploaded this amendment is the sponsor pulling out?

[teemuharjunen]

1st off NATO doesn't expand. Sovereign nations ask to join and then every other nation has to ok them.

[Chx_rles]

If only mainstream journalism had this level of integrity!

[frost_bite]

I wanted to say that in the NATO video. To me it was odd that all the newly joined NATO countries in the east had been painted with the same brush as to their relationship with Russia. Romania's negative relationship with started mostly in the 20th century, but Lithuania had started in the late 15th century at the minimum. Lithuania has hundreds of years of fighting Moscow and being wary of them, but that is not the same for everyone.

[FireCrauter]

I recommend Jake Broe video, he talks about this.

[NovaNTS]

I am from Ireland and we have many polish immigrants and naturalised citizens now. Ask 99% of them about their opinion on Russia and it will not be pretty. Their nation wanted to join NATO in order ot be a free and independent nation for many reasons. I hope he covers things like that and what others have mentioned in the new video.