Scott Ritter & Larry Johnson: Iran Retaliates, Hormuz CLOSED – Israel ENDS Trump Ceasefire
Danny Haiphong
Streamed live 108 minutes ago #iran #trump #ceasefire
Scott Ritter and Larry Johnson react to Iran's massive response to Israeli and US ceasefire violations, and what it means for the ongoing war.
Scott Ritter is a former UN weapons inspector and Marine Corps Intelligence officer. Larry Johnson is a former CIA analyst. You can support their work below:
Scott Ritter: https://scottritter.substack.com/
Larry Johnson: https://sonar21.com/
Transcript
Welcome everyone. Welcome back to the show. It's your host Danny Hifon. I am joined by two friends of the show. Larry Johnson, former CI analyst, now geopolitical commentator and analyst.
And we have Scott Ritter, former UN uh weapons inspector, and US Marine Corps intelligence officer, author, and geopolitical analyst. Gentlemen, thanks so much for joining me today.
Yeah, good to be here. I'm sorry I didn't get the word about the uniform,
otherwise I would have come appropriately dressed.
We got our blues on. We got our blues on. And you have your you have your signature Hawaiian shirt. So everything is everything is well. But what isn't
going well? Let's get right to it. Hit the like button everyone as you come on.
What isn't going well is this ceasefire debacle. Um you know Iran's deputy foreign minister said that they delayed a missile strike and drone strike
retaliation against Israel as uh Israel has been bombing Lebanon, killing over 200 in the last , thousands more
injured. Um Iran said that Pakistan assured it that it would uh the Pakistani mediators would uh talk to
1 minuteTrump and get Trump to essentially reign in Israel. Now there are reports that uh uh Israel is uh is this the report here?
Yep. That Trump called Netanyahu urging him to scale back Israel strikes in Lebanon to protect the negotiations per NBC. While the Trump administration
Israel both said Lebanon is not covered by the ceasefire, Israel agreed to be a helpful partner. Yet other reports are saying uh Scott and Larry that uh Israel
is going to conduct negotiations with Lebanon's government under fire. Um now Scott I want to start with you. You know
Iran has kept very strict control over the straight of Hormuz. Some reports have said that they've kept it closed or
have closed it further because of these strikes because Lebanon is a key part of this ceasefire. Uh there's it there's reports that only one vessel now in the
last has uh went through and uh that this ceasefire is very much on the brink. So how about we start with you
Scott? What's going on here? Uh and how should we see the current situation regarding the ceasefire and the war?
First of all, there is no ceasefire. So let's stop talking about a ceasefire. Um it doesn't exist. Uh there are
precursors to a possible ceasefire. Um but this was always going to be a mess.
We knew that on day one when Israel bombed Beirut and when the United Arab Emirates bombed uh you know bombed Iranian oil infrastructure. Um you know
this is this is a conflict that has u many moving parts. Uh we also have 31 autonomous military districts in Iran
that some of which may not be communicating effectively with uh with you know the Iranian government. And so
you know because they are autonomous if they haven't been given the word to cease and desist they may continue operating. So this was always going to be a mess. It's also a political mess.
uh you know there's a lot of um you know politically sensitive tightroppes that have to be walked here by the United States, by President Trump and by Iran.
um you know what what you have is um an agreement in principle that uh Iran's
10 um you know salient points are on the table and um United States 15 salient
points are on the table and uh the parties are supposed to meet and begin a two-eek process of reconciling these
points. So the notion that everything's agreed to up front is absurd. Nothing's been agreed to up front except that there's a need to talk. Um it's tragic
what's happening in Beirut. Absolutely tragic. But it's Israel. What do you expect? Um you know there's a game being played here and the you know there's a
script being followed. The you know the the fact is the United States did agree that Lebanon would be part of the ceasefire that was stated upfront. Um
because when they accepted the Iranian points as a precursor to further discussion, the Iranian point said that Lebanon will be included. Uh the
4 minutesAmerican points didn't say that, but that doesn't automatically prelude the Iranian point and the Pakistani president made it clear that the United States understood that Lebanon would be
included. The problem is the United States was negotiating without coordinating with Israel. So now they have to go back and coordinate with Israel. BB was very unhappy. Um he said
he could tolerate a discussion with Iran, but Lebanon's a special issue.
Hezbollah is a special problem and that uh they need to, you know, continue doing what they're doing. What they can't do is allow Lebanon to
automatically be rolled into Iran. So what what Israel is doing is playing a game where they can now uh you know be seen as linking any ceasefire with a
negotiation with the Lebanese government separate from the US Iranian talks. This is all just part of a game that's being
played. Um I I what I say and I'll leave it with this is that um both Iran and the United States have reached the
maximum uh level of their uh escalation ladders, their respective escalation ladders. To go further for each one of them is to invite permanent harm.
permanent harm to Donald Trump politically, meaning that things will will be done that can't be reversed in time to have an impact on a positive
impact on the November election. Donald Trump is only cares about Donald Trump.
He's the ultimate narcissist. We have to stop talking about American national security, foreign policy objectives,
etc. This is all about Donald Trump's legacy. And Trump is panicked right now because um it's not looking too good for him. And so, you know, we have to let
Donald Trump be Donald Trump. Iran is concerned about going so far that it doesn't matter if sanctions are lifted.
If if enough harm is done to Iran um that you know the the promise of the Iranian government to take care of the Iranian people will not be fulfilled.
Right now Iran is on the cusp of being able to fulfill a 47-year promise to the Iranian people that u there will be
economic good times and that's the Iranian objective right here. There's other things wrapped in. You know the nuclear issue is one about pride not
about necessity. So Iran will negotiate on that. The straight hormuz is about survival. So Iran won't negotiate that
away, but they will negotiate some sort of you know joint um you know stewardship. There's a lot of maneuver room here. But what's clear from at
least from my perspective is that neither party can afford to continue this conflict. There must be a resolution. So there's going to be a lot
of games being played and unfortunately these games involve people dying such as nearly 300 Lebanese. But um I I there
isn't a ceasefire, but I'm very optimistic that there will be a ceasefire.
Yeah. Larry, what's your uh what's your thoughts here?
I see this this is like a negotiation between two people about where and what to eat. Uh the one party, let's call it
the United States, uh they want to eat a worm encrusted piece of cow manure. Um,
the other party, Iran, is wanting to eat steak.
So, how do you think that negotiation's going to go? Where where where's the middle ground? There is no middle ground. That's the point number one. So,
the 10 points that Iran laid out were not negotiable points. They are their
expectations and demands of what must be made in met in order for there to be negotiations.
So they're not going to negotiate over how much of the straight of Hormuz they close. In fact, I think uh the Ayatollah
Mushtava Kame just said, "Hey, it's under new management. uh you know so uh get rid of it's it'll be the straight of
Iran not her moves have got to be lifted. They're not
they're not going to go they're going to sign up to an agreement and oh yeah we promised that we'll lift the sanctions just like we did under JCPOA.
Iran's already you know they've already been down that path but they signed up to that agreement. They fed they thought they even had the assurances of Russia
and China back in 2015 and it's signed. Then all of a sudden,
you know, Europe's like, "Well, we're not sure yet. You got you got to jump through this hoop. You got to do this extra thing." And then Trump tears up the agreement. And despite having signed
it, despite having complied with allowing inspectors, despite doing what had been asked of the agreement, they didn't get a goddamn thing. So, I think
they understand now. No, we're not going to have promise you, you know, double pinky swear that we'll do it. No, it's
that's that's got to happen before any they make movement on anything else.
Number one. So, um it'll be interesting to see if Iran allows Witoff and and uh Jared Kushner in the room uh tomorrow.
And that's assuming that the talks go forward. Now, we got to look at how this how this evolved. When the initial agreement was announced, I I I'm not sure if Trump hadn't read it properly,
but as Scott said, you know, the United States had agreed, okay, Lebanon's on the table, Lebanon and Yemen and Iraq,
those three, it wasn't just Lebanon. Um the initial reaction in Israel and among
the Zionist crowd including the Christian Zionists like uh uh the Mr.
Huckabe the Christian Nut out of Arkansas and uh then the the Ben Shapiro and the Mark
Leven's. You knew you knew it was bad when Levin who normally can't talk without screaming. Okay. Is like you
need to get a sedative and hit him up with a couple of darts to drop him down to a level of normality. He was almost
depressed and he was he was talking in a in a low voice. So that that told me right away, uhoh, here come here comes
the storm. And so between uh so this was agreed to Tuesday night. So, between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, uh
I I think Trump got uh the, you know, a number of verbal beatings and lashings and all of a sudden he was like
Butterfly McQueen from uh you know, Gone with the Wind. I don't know nothing about birthing no babies, Miss Scarlet.
I don't know nothing about Lebanon. No,
no, no. We didn't agree to that. No, we and boy, they got to get rid of they got to open that straight now. And you know,
so he was reversing everything that that they had agreed to. Uh the it was the intervention and that's why Israel said,
"Great, this is our chance. We're going we're going to take try to take Beirut back to the stone age, which they did on
Wednesday." And you know, Iran was reacting. Okay. Uh there is no there is no they're not honoring this agreement.
But it was the intervention of Pakistan and I believe also China. And you know,
while that one uh document or tweet is that you showed was see seemed to be a polite
conversation, no. Uh it was I I think somebody on the Trump team called and threatened Israel. You know, you cut
this out now. So since since the end of Wednesday, we haven't had any more of those bombings. Now, there's there's
still fighting going on on the ground between uh Hezbollah and Israel. And I think where that is headed,
Israel's ultimately they're going to have to they're going to have to withdraw their forces in a couple of weeks probably. So the the talks
the talks that will take place, you know, starting on Saturday, the the parties will arrive on Friday, but the
actual talks will be on Saturday. We'll know how serious they are. Will they be in person? And by that I mean, will they be sitting in the same room talking to
each other? Are they going to continue this other nonsense of, you know, the the Pakistanis walk in and talk to the Iranians and then they walk down the
hall to another room and talk to the Americans and then, you know, that that that's You know, they call that diplomacy and that that will achieve nothing.
Yeah. You go a long way to do something as as indirect as that. Uh Scott, uh I want to get you in here and maybe to comment on, you know, the various
positions that both sides have taken amid these uh uh you know, bad faith uh actions taken by Israel and the United
States since uh talks have been announced. Uh here was what Donald Trump said today that the shooting is going to start bigger, better, and stronger than
anyone else has ever seen before until a real agreement is if a real agreement is not reached and complied with. Um so you
know and there was a lot more to it but uh let's not read the whole thing here.
And then Iran is saying of course that this these talks are in danger of uh falling apart if the Lebanon question is not resolved. So but what do you make of
Trump's stance here? The Trump administration stance it seems to always be a lot of bluster talking about coming back in and destroying everything if
Iran doesn't do what the US says. Uh Iran doesn't seem like it's budging. And
uh you know uh Larry mentioned China. Um some of what I heard about why China got involved is because well what happens if
the United States did what it threatened to do uh just a couple days ago and then Iran did what it said it was going to do in retaliation, take out uh all of the
Gulf energy. Well, a lot of the world's energy would be destroyed and that would hurt China. That would hurt the entire world economy. But your reactions to uh these developments?
Well, first of all, you know, I I I I hearken to uh Game of Thrones um uh season one. Uh
I love that show, by the way. I know what reference you're about to make. I just heard you say, sir. Okay. Which part of G which part of season one?
Okay. Well, when when when Joffrey is the new king and he's being dressed down by Tyrion in the council and u and
Joffrey says, "You can't speak to me that way. I am the king." And he speaks,
"I am the king." And then his grandfather says, "Any man that has to say he is the king is not the king." And that's how I view Donald Trump's posts.
If you got to sit there and say, "The shooting's going to start. We're going to kick your butt 40 days after the shooting started." and you haven't kicked their butt. Um,
it's empty bluster. Look, the United States expended the totality of their so-called good targets. There are no
good targets left. All that's left now is a war crime, a blatant war crime. We know that what's going on right now is a war crime, an illegal war of aggression.
We know that war crimes have been committed. the massacre of the uh 1605 170 uh school girls in Minab and other
atrocities uh you know of equal um you know horror um so I'm not trying to pretend that the United States hasn't
been committing war crimes they have but one could articulate um you know military intent on some of
these that you know or accident but now the expanded target deck that Trump was talking about is 100% collective
punishment, 100% cultural genocide. His own words convict him and his own words are what basically got him in trouble
because I believe the establishment push back. I believe that um generals put him on notice that we won't execute these
orders. These are unlawful orders. Um we're not going to do that. And Donald Trump may have never intended to uh
execute those orders. These were all the bluster before he accepted something that had been put on the table prior to the bluster. That's why I believe this.
Those 10 points had been articulated by uh Iran well before Donald Trump threatened to erase Iranian civilization.
So it's not as though the Iranians went,
"Oh god, no. He's threatening to erase us. Here's 10 points." The Iranians already had the 10 points out there.
Zarif had already published his paper in foreign affairs. I mean, so the Iranians had their position. This is Donald Trump
impressing himself, you know, talking to himself. Um, but there will no there there won't be any more shooting because
there's nothing to shoot. The war is over. We lost. He just can't admit it.
You know, we there's nothing more we can do. We're out of significant quantities of standoff precision guided munitions.
So, we can't do long range strike anymore. Not in a meaningful fashion. uh part of the strike package that was moving in were B-52s armed with Mark 84
gravity bombs with the satellite guided components of the JDAM components. Um they pulled back when it suddenly became
clear that oh the Iranians have long range standoff radar guided missiles still in service. That's what shot down
the F-15 E. And we can't come in and suppress those effectively anymore because they also have this whole new
thing that we hadn't planned on electro electroloptical guided infrared guided combination thereof. The we didn't
defeat the Iranian air defense. The Iranians played us. We didn't destroy their navy. Who the hell do you think laid those mines in the water?
The Iranian Navy. Hey Pete, how's that looking for you, pal? And I can guarantee you this. Iranian aircraft will be flying in the Iranian skies
because they haven't been destroyed either. They've been stored. The Iranians wrote out our attack, wrote out the best we have. And now they've come
in with phase two and we don't know how to deal with it. We we had two options to save face. First option was to go
into Natan, not to not Natan's Isvahan and do the seizure. Um I'm writing something up right now. I don't want to,
you know, drag on forever, but, you know, there's more to this mission than meets the eyes. This this rescue mission. It's not what it's much more
than that. Um, it it was the effort to go after the uranium and it failed.
Absolutely failed. Desert one type calamity. Um, and two, we can't carry out an amphibious operation. The USS Tripoli couldn't get near the shore. U,
it's impossible. The military said,
"We're done." Trump has no options. He He can't secure the straight horror moves. And that's the critical thing.
Iran has their fingers on the throat of the global economy right now. They can squeeze anytime they want. And there's nothing Donald Trump can do to change
that. No amount of bluster will change that. And that's what's really hurting him. He can't declare victory. So, he had no choice but to bluster, bluster,
bluster, and make it appear that he brought the Iranians to the table. Well,
you saw PEG Seth, we have dominance. We dominate everywhere. Again, if you have to say you have dominance, you don't have dominance. It becomes quite
obvious. Um, so I, you know, I take everything this president says, right?
There's nothing more the United States can do. We don't have the military capacity. And, you know, we bring in China. Understand this. We just proved
to the Chinese that we can't defeat them in Taiwan. I just want everybody to understand that. We just proved there's no longer a question that we can't do
anything to China. The national security strategy document published in November of last year said the United States will dominate the Chinese by seeking
conventional military overmatch in the Pacific. Overmatch. That means we're superior. We're superior to nothing. We can't beat the Iranians. Imagine what we do against the Chinese and Taiwan.
Nothing. We can't secure the South China Sea. So the Chinese just proved that they have their fingers on the throat of
the international shipping lanes that go through that. They control everything.
20 minutesThis is a game changer. The United States needs to pull back and regroup.
And that's what we're doing. Look at what we're doing in Europe. I mean, I take I I think we're withdrawing 100,000 troops. That's what Marco Rubio says
we're probably going to do. I think NATO's dead because we're disengaging from Europe because we can't compete in Europe anymore. It's too expensive. It takes 6 months to deploy a heavy armored
brigade. It used to take us 10 days to deploy 300,000 troops rolling in on pre-positioned equipment. That doesn't
exist anymore. The United States is literally a paper tiger. We look good,
but all of our capabilities are legacy capabilities that don't match modern, you know, modern realities.
I'll just leave you with this. comedon of the Marine Corps Burger in 2019 said,
"We we can't carry out our mission because we're we're trapped by legacy amphibious operations. We can no longer put all our Marines on a handful of
amphibian ships and go in and project power short because they'll sink us before we get there." That was just proven. USS Tripoli is retreating from the region, not advancing on the region.
Um, and there we are. This is why the United States will have a will accept a ceasefire. It'll be interesting to see how we play it because there's a lot of
politics involved, but we have no other options. There will be no shooting because there's nothing to shoot with and there's nothing to shoot at.
Larry, please come in the same.
Well, you know, as long as we're fighting Grenada, man, we are badass.
Um, back in uh 1983 when the we did invade Grenada, uh there was a the SEAL
team led by uh the commander uh I think he was commander maybe his lieutenant commander Rick Ward and Rick was a
Vietnam veteran uh and he and his SEALs went to secure the governor of Grenada and they got him and then you know
they're carrying basically uh you know shortbarreled rifles and they've got handguns. Well, they were pinned down with some 50 caliber
machine guns, heavy machine guns that were manned by some Cubans. So, what did they do? They had to wait until the
Marines landed and deployed their tanks and the tanks came roaring up the road.
Now, why am I telling a story that's like 43 years old? Well, the Marines got rid of their tanks now. So, so, so if the same situation was unfolding today,
Rick and his buddies would be screwed,
okay? Because the Marines couldn't come rescue him because they don't have the tanks anymore. And and it's exactly what Scott was talking about that uh you
know, we've got we have a 20th century military model. It's based upon, you know, we've got these aircraft carriers
that can they can sell out and they can they have this this air power on board and boy, they can project force
except if they get within 500 miles of shore, they're vulnerable now to these
hypersonic missiles. And in case of China, they got to stay like a,000 miles off. And that creates a problem for the
projecting air power because the combat radius of like the F-35s is something like 500 600 miles. So, you know, just
do the math. If if you're if you're 700 miles offshore and you launch your F-35s, they're still they're going to
have to get refueled somewhere. And those air refuelers,
they're they're pretty easy targets to shoot down. They're uh they're not stealth. So you we've got that problem
that that the traditional way of projecting naval power no longer works and and that was highlighted in the Red
Sea last eight months ago as we tried to establish freedom of navigation. At least they had a very specific objective
military objective and the the US Navy failed. They got driven out of the Red Sea by the Houthies. Except Donald Trump
in classic Trump fashion proclaimed it uh they capitulated and and so let's go guys. They've they've won. We we've won. They've lost.
Let's go again. We retreat. And you know I can I've always I could see the Houthies. It would be like a a Monty Python skit. All the Houthy leadership
would be sitting around the table going capitulate. Did you capitulate me? I can't even spell capitulate, you know.
So, that kind of thing. Um, so we've got we've gotten to the age where it's it's pretend victory. Um, similarly, ground
forces. Oh, boy. We're going to we got this army, man. We're going to invade.
Well, okay. We got we got like 452,000 in the army now, and I think it's like 140,000 within the Marines. Um, and uh,
you know, that pales in comparison. We we had about that total number on the ground in Vietnam at the height in 1968
69. Uh so we couldn't we can't field that kind of army. Uh in 2003 when we
were going to invade uh Iraq we had 11 months to assemble troops in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
165,000 I believe was the number. We can't do that today. I mean you do that today. They're going to be getting hit with missiles and with drones, you know,
as as Scott recalls back back in those days, uh, going out for Scud hunts.
Well, the Scuds, you know, one, we never found them, but they were not very effective. Not today. The the those miss
the combination of missiles and drones make it completely ineffective.
So that that leaves us with air power and air power has its limits and but and
you know Iran they watched carefully you know 23 years ago what we did to Iraq
and they said okay we can't keep this stuff above ground no we can't do that we got to go underground and so they've
moved an enormous amount of their actual military assets underground and we no matter how many bombs and buster bunkers we drop, we're not touching it. So, uh,
this then brings up the point of how do you define victory? Well, okay, you got to have some objectives. The Iran's Iran
didn't choose this. So, it's it's had one objective. Survive and force the other side to come and seek negotiation.
That's exactly what has happened. It was not Iran running to Pakistan pleading,
"Oh, please call the Americans up, tell them we're sorry. We'll we'll we'll bend over and they can do whatever they want to us." No. No. It was the opposite way
that that the United States was pleading.
And and Israel's too too stupid and too damn proud to do the pleading, but they need it because her own chief of staff warned the government to two weeks ago,
we're collapsing. We can't continue this. So, you know, the the the United States is going to paint this as if a,
you know, it's a great victory. We forced the Iranians to surrender and and the Iranians might allow some of that to
go on without challenging it. Just, you know, be a little benevolent, but they're they are going to insist this
war against Lebanon stops now. And if it doesn't stop, you know, back back to the battle stations.
And that that leaves the world in um in in a difficult straight. And that straight is called the straight of
Hormuz because the Iranians basically have the world by the balls. It's worse than a chokeold.
Yeah. Yeah. Scott, I mean, and Larry,
you know, when I saw Iran publicly say that uh the reason why there will need to be naval coordination for any vessels coming through the street of Hormuz,
it's because there are mines laid out there. And uh if Iran if the milit navy and the military aren't coordinating and and uh escorting, you know, you might go
boom. So that's uh that that was that was really interesting, especially in this moment. But um you know,
actually, let me interject. Ask Scott have Scott put together a battle plan to retake the straight of Hormuz because I
want I want him to explain just how damn difficult if not impossible this thing is.
Sure. Yes, Scott, please. That's a great question. So, if I'm going to take the straight to Hormuz,
um first of all,
you're going to have to come through um Jordan. Um because you can't you can't
land 300,000 4 300 400,000 American troops in Saudi Arabia um that close to
Mecca Medina. So, you're going to have to come through Jordan. um which means now that you're going to um you're going
to need to go through Iraq and that's going to be contested. So right off the bat we're going to have a precursor fight securing lines of communication through Iraq. You're going to have to
set up several logistics uh hubs on the way in. So it's going to be um you know it's going to be an advance um contested
uh you know through resistance forces and attacked by drones and missiles as you're going in. But you're you're going to have to come through Jordan, set up
bases until you get to a position where you can um project fire
control over Kar and about 20 kilometers inside um of of Iran. Um and then you're
going to have to initiate an air campaign that's going to last as long as it takes to uh suppress meaningful resistance there. Um, and then you're
going to have to land um, land troops and sweep the coastline. Um, it's going to take, you know, when we plan to do
this, because we've been planning to do this for a while, uh, you know, we were going to come in through Chabahar, uh,
forceful entry in Chabahar. Um, you know, we're talking about 60 to 80,000 Marines followed up by 120 to 200,000
Army soldiers. That was the op. That op got modified to be operation Desert Shield, Desert Storm. um you know, but
this is the number of troops you're talking about. So, right off the bat,
and now we have to defend a long line of communication. You got to almost double the troops. Um we got to have air
defense that we don't possess. Um we can't do it. That's the problem. We
can't do it. We have we don't have the capacity to do it. If you really want to plan, then I would say we have to mobilize the United States of America.
We have to put two million um men uh and women uh primarily men in uniform. U and
we have to uh basically do a World War II style invasion and occupation of the
of the march going in. we're going to have to occupy Iraq and then we're going to have to move into Kuwait and occupy Kuwait and then we're going to have to
sweep into um Iran and and sweep our way down and uh you know we're talking you know millions of of troops to do this.
Um and we still might not win because the lines of communication are too tenuous. Uh you know the the Iranian
missiles will will create havoc on our logistics. Uh so there's just not a snowballs chance in hell that the US
military today is capable of securing the straight or moves. Zero, no capability, no capacity. But we knew that going in. That's the frustrating
aspect of this. And when Donald Trump says, well, we never anticipated. All we did is anticipate and we saw this when I
was uh a weapons inspector in Iraq. I I worked often with the fifth fleet and um you know, sitting there just having casual conversations. At that time we
felt confident that we could secure the straight armies using conventional naval power. Uh but as Iran developed, you now, its ballistic missiles, Iran got better and better and better. The reality became that we we can't penetrate their area denial weaponry. Um and so Iran owns the straight war moves and they will forever own the straight horror moves and there's nothing we can do to to change that equation. It's not even worth trying to come up with a plan because it won't work. it just will lead to massive casualties on the part of the United States.
[Danny] You know, another question I had, and Larry, you can start, and I know Scott is writing about this, the timing of this whole incident of the F-15 being shot down, came at the same time developments led to these upcoming talks, and talks of a potential ceasefire. And of course what happened after the rescue operation, plus whatever else was happening, seizing uranium operation, I just want to know Larry what your thoughts are on exactly what happened there, and how it influenced the US's position?
[Larry] You know, 20 years ago I worked on what they called an attack on a hardened deeply buried target, an HDBT inside Iran, to go after a nuclear site. And the lesson back then was it's too costly, not in terms of dollars, but in terms of human life and material. I do believe that the deployment order was given sometime around March 11th, March 10th, because we saw an uptick then in deployment out of all of the bases in the United States that service US special operations forces. It was coming out of Hunter Army Airfield in Georgia, that had the 75th Rangers, and an element of the Task Force 160. It was coming out of Pope Army Airfield that had both the 82nd, but also Delta Force, and some other units that are the Special Tactical Squad STS 24th. They're the preeminent special operations parachute rescue jumpers/combat controllers, the ones that go out and recover people. You had the 160th there being loaded up and moved at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. You had the other Ranger battalion out of Joint Base Lewis McCord. You had SEALs coming out of Oceanana Naval Air Station. So the only times that I ever saw those kinds of forces being assembled, was either for some big-ass exercise, or they were doing it for real world. And in this case, it was clear it was real world.
So now they were teed up. I don't know if they were going after Busher, after Isfahan, or after Natanz, because Natanz is about 30-40 miles north of Isfahan, maybe a little farther. What the F-15 was doing in the area was, let's call it preparation of the battlefield, or trying to destroy some assets.
What was unusual is that the chief weapons system officer, the WSO that was sitting in the back seat, which is normally handled by a lieutenant, or a captain, was a full-bird Colonel, who was the vice wing commander of the US forces at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base.
Now, I've talked to some friends that have worked at the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, the combined air operations center in Aludeid, and it was unusual. It was rare. But it wasn't unheard of that a senior guy like that would say, "I want to get my time in the plane, and I want to get my feet wet in this endeavor." It clearly got shot down. What we do know now is that as soon as they got shot down, the Pentagon, Centcom, and CIA, launched a massive disinformation campaign. Reports were getting leaked that the plane actually went down 120 miles southwest, down towards the the coast, let's say 80 miles from Kharg Island, instead of just south of Isfahan. I saw a map reproduced that showed the Colonel actually ejected the aircraft near a road juncture, a north south highway 65, and the Colonel landed say three-four miles away and probably broke his ankle. There were also reports of a broken leg. But he was able to crawl and hobble about a mile up the slope of this mountain, and hide himself.
Now the CIA started to later put out this nonsense that they found him because they detected his heartbeat from outer space. Horseshit. And they're putting that story out so they can hide what other capability they may have used to actually locate him. Because the only way you're going to identify someone by their heartbeat is by digitizing it. Putting it into a file, and then when you crash, we can come looking for you. You know, find Private Schmuckatella's heartbeat. Puhleeze.
So here's the question, and I'm trying to lay out a scenario that makes sense to me for what we see on the ground. And instead of landing at an airstrip that was in a valley about 8 kilometers north, these C130Js land on this desert land that's near one of the holy shrines of Ali. They're carrying two little birds, two AH6 little birds. We know just by basic math that if you've got two C130s loaded with two AH6 helicopters a piece, then the maximum number of troops that you can carry on each of those, apart from the three-man crew, is basically about 15 people. That's maximum. So that gives us a total of 30. And I'm thinking, how do you break out at 15? Do you want to have the two pilots that you'd need for each little bird? No. If you're running a rescue mission, you just want two pilots for one little bird on each plane. So you got a total of four pilots among the 30. That gets us down to 26.
Then, how many PJs do you want? Again, I'll put two PJs on one C130, and two PJs on another. You got backup in case something happens to the first one. So now we're down from 15 to 11. So 11 are made up of either Rangers, 75th Battalion, or SEALs. And that's just if this is a rescue scenario. Normally, when they go out to land those kinds of planes in a desert environment, you do a sight survey in advance. They didn't do a sight survey. So maybe that explains why the planes came in, and on landing they just dug in. And there is some damage to the wings, or to the propellers, like they hit the ground. So maybe that's the explanation. But in some of the photographs that were provided, you could see that the boom that's used to refuel was shot up. So, had these things been shot up and shot down out of the sky? That's a possibility. The one that really is bizarre is they they recovered an ID card from the wreckage along with her. It's a woman, a Major apparently. Amanda Ryder is her name. And she's got her platinum American Express card. "Don't leave home without it." I think the downing of this plane caused the mission to be cancelled. I think the reason they had those little birds already packed up in the planes was because that was part of the intended operation, and they repurposed it. But I'm just offering an opinion. I'd be curious what Scott thinks.
[Danny] Yeah. Scott, what's your assessment? I know you're writing about it.
[Scott] Look, this is all crazy stuff, so there's a lot of informed speculation. Let's start with this though. The intent to launch a raid against Isfahan was public information, right? Straight up public information, that included not just unnamed sources, but named sources, including General Votel, former commander of Special Operations Command. And also people who could be identified. The reason why I'm bringing this up is that Kash Patel just announced the arrest of some people who were speaking to the media in an unauthorized fashion, and he said we can't allow this. We hunt this down. We shut it down. Boom boom boom. But you have people talking to the media about this major raid that's being planned, and they're going to land, and 82nd Airborne is going to parachute a brigade in. They're going to build a runway, and then land aircraft with heavy excavation equipment. And they're going to spend weeks, perhaps months, digging out the south tunnel of Isfahan. This is the plan that's put out there. It's so absurd, it's not even funny.
I mean, Larry, you were involved in planning this. I will bet my entire paycheck that your plan didn't involve people staying on the ground more than a couple hours.
[Larry] Yeah. It's get in and out. Don't stay.
[Scott] Yeah. And nobody was prosecuted for the publicly released plan. General Votto wasn't called in to say, "Why are you talking about these things? Those are TTPs, baby. You can't talk about that." Because it's disinformation. It's a 100% disinformation campaign run by the White House. Why? Because the plan's completely different. We're not going to land and go in through the front tunnel.
And Larry, if you disagree with me anytime, please step in. Because I've worked with Joint Special Operations enough that I can say this confidently: Past patterns repeat themselves. They're not that innovative when it comes to many things, especially when it comes to national level planning. Before there's a briefing to the president, there will be models built, scale models, and full-scale models, and rehearsals conducted, where they're going to do every aspect of this mission: secure the airfield, unload the helicopters, fly to a point with special equipment, and execute the mission. They will have rehearsed this, and we even know where they rehearsed it, because this will have been done at the Nevada test site. I had a mission that trained up there. We also trained nearby at Edwards Air Force Base. This is how this works.
[Larry] Just by the way, that's where the exercise in 2006 took place.
[Scott] Yeah. It's just past patterns repeating themselves.
[Larry] I can probably even tell you the airfield that they landed at to simulate airfield seizure. It might be the same airfield that they landed at to simulate airfield seizure for Desert One. And it's the same one they used to simulate the rescue of UN weapons inspectors taken hostage by Iran, Iraq.
[Scott] But my point is this. President Trump made a decision sometime in March that they were going to launch this raid. They did a deception campaign to get the Iranians looking here. This was going to be an in-n-out operation. They were going to land. Again, we can take guidance from Ferdos. What we now know about Ferdos is that there was a ventilation shaft. When you have these deep underground facilities, there will be ventilation shafts. There has to be ventilation shafts because it's required for safety. You can't function down there without it. DARPA studied the National Geospatial, used to be Defense Mapping Agency --
[Larry] NGIA. NGIA.
[Scott] Yeah. They came up with some fancy name like Geospatial intelligence agency or something. They do modeling. They do the whole thing. They've been looking at this for years. We also know that IAEA inspectors were in this facility. They were in the tunnels. They reported back to the CIA. I promise you, I know this for a fact that they were debriefed by the CIA, and they took all the dimensions. They know where the ventilation shafts are, and they built models, and they found a vulnerability. And they were going to land, assault, go down the vulnerability, seize or destroy, and get the hell out of there. It was going to be a wham bam thank you ma'am kind of operation, because that's what they do.
You've heard about Master Sergeant Vining, the EOD legend from Delta Force during Desert Storm. He had a mission to go into Taji, and I can talk about it because he talked about it. If he hadn't talked about it, I couldn't talk about it. But he was going to go into Taji, a facility that I inspected later, which is one of their big sector operations command centers. There's a giant massive slab of concrete with a command center in there. We thought that's where Iraq was running their Scudwart. We tried to hit it with bombs, but they bounced off. So near the end of the war, he was going to go in with the Delta crew, Rangers were going to secure that site. He was going to go in, blast his way in, destroy the site, and come out. It was an in-n-out job. It wasn't going to last days. It was going to last hours. He has to get it done now. And that's just the way it is.
I believed, and now we also know again listening to Hegseth and company that the man in charge of the rescue mission was the commander Lieutenant General Bearer, I think his last name is. He's a former Delta guy. Lieutenant Generals don't command rescue missions. They just don't. He was the commander of a joint special operations task force that operates separate from central command authority, working directly for the president of the United States. These assets were brought in as part of this joint special operations task force, and they were given the mission of launching the Isfahan raid.
Now when you take a look at the timelines available here, I had been working under an assumption that maybe they were given an audible, meaning that getting this Colonel out was so important that they had to drop everything else to get it. I don't believe that anymore. Because if you take a look at the load out of the aircraft, I believe that this was an airfield seizure. There would have been follow-on echelons coming in that were called off because it went bad from the start, but the whole pilot-rescue thing, I don't believe we sent air helicopters out. I don't think Navy Seals made contact with the guy. I think this guy was picked up either earlier or whatever.
The president said there were only three little birds. Now, he could have misspoke, but he also talked about a package that was on there that contains specialized equipment, including anti-aircraft missiles. That means you're seizing an airfield. Again, we go back to Desert One. They don't change what they do. When the guys took over Desert One, took over that landing strip that Jim Carney had pre-surveyed, they came off with surface to air missiles. That was their thing. They were there to secure against a possible air attack. This team had similar loadout with more modern air defense equipment. They also had specialized scaling equipment, mountain climbing equipment, the President called it. They weren't climbing mountains; they were going into the mountain down a shaft. This was all on a pallet that could have been removed. Two of the three AH6 didn't get off the aircraft. They were in the aircraft, and were destroyed in the aircraft when it got blown down. Only one exited the aircraft. And according to the Iranians, it didn't fly. The Iranians are saying there was no aircraft rescue mission. They unloaded it. Some vehicles came off, airfield seizure guys. I'm thinking ATVs, some motorcycles to secure the airfield. But one of the planes apparently got hit by anti-aircraft fire, too. The Iranians claimed that they hit it, and there's physical evidence that suggests that this thing got screwed from the start. And when it got screwed, they needed to see if they could save the plan. And so they changed it from a failed raid on Isfahan, to a successful pilot recovery mission. But there's nothing about what happened on the ground that lends itself to believe that this team saved that pilot. The guys I've talked to were legitimately spun up on what was called a personal recovery mission. And everyone I scripted, over last count it was like 153 of the J-C exercises during that 23-year period, starting in 1994, it became a joke that every one of those missions, regardless of where it was, had to have an airfield seizure for the Rangers. That's what they do. So that's why you bring the 75th Rangers.
But again, the thing that doesn't add up for me is you've got only two J130s there. Now maybe there was another one involved that got away. That could have been the Rangers, because I role-played the US ambassador to Algeria in an exercise that was done at Jacksonville, Florida, and it was simulated. Delta Force came in to launch an assault, and we did it on the fire tower in one of the downtown areas of Jacksonville, and it was pretty funny. The general that was commanding was General Bargewell, who unfortunately later died in a tractor accident after he retired. But when Delta hit the tower, and started shooting, all the drug dealers on the street dropped their drugs, and we could have collected like a pharmacy later from all the drugs that were scattered about. But when they hit the airfield, as the plane lands, the C130 comes out, the ramp drops down, and the guys come riding out on motorcycles. You know, it's very Hollywood.
All I know for sure is the explanation that Donald Trump, John Ratcliffe, and Pete Hegseth gave the other day, and General Kaine, was a lie. It was not true. They dressed it up. They were putting lipstick on the pig, and putting a wig on her too. But it was not as they said. I still had clearances, and was in the inside, when operation Redwing took place. That became the movie Lone Survivor. So I was seeing real time what was happening then. I watched in real time back then the taking out of Bin Laden, and Pat Tillman, the whole thing surrounding Pat Tillman's death. All I saw was consistently that they tend to lie. You don't get the truth. You get a bunch of lies. Either it's to cover up incompetence, or sometimes it's covering up some genuine operational opsec information that you want to keep from the public. But more often than not, it's just trying to create a narrative that has a political objective.
Yeah. Well, in the last five minutes or so, both your takes on on just this question of then how much does this, uh, incident uh, as well as just a broader because now there's more reports for example about Kuwait and the disaster that happened there that led to the drone strikes uh, by Iran which uh, did cause the most casualties uh, for US troops during the kinetic part of this conflict. uh uh how much did all of this lead to the United States, Donald Trump uh you know uh agreeing to working toward a uh ceasefire and an eventual end to this?
Scott, you first.
I I I think the the failure of the um of the raid on Isvahan was the straw that broke the camel's back. Um there was
talk about amphibious operation against Carg. It was never going to happen. It just couldn't happen. Um, as I already pointed out, I think this was the straw
that broke the camel's back. Uh, the straight or horm closure was the thing that was killing um, this whole
operation. Um, this was an embarrassment and the president had no choice but to go into uh, you know, his crazy mode to make it appear that he forced the
Iranians to agree to a deal that the Iranians had already said they're willing to have a discussion about. Um,
but this was that's why I think this thing deserves so much scrutiny because this was u the thing this was the high
risk gamble that uh Trump was going to take so he could have a victory. Um, I don't think they were going to recover the nuclear material because that
stuff's just too heavy and too much of it. I think they were going in to destroy it. Um, and um and and and
that's that. But uh all right, Danny, I gotta run right now, Larry. Yeah, I just saw that message. Yeah, Larry. Yeah. See you later, man.
All right, Larry. Yeah, your final your final comments.
Yeah. No, I agree. I agree with Scott on that. Look, this um we don't have a clear military objective that we can
point to that we've accomplished in the course of now going on seven weeks of war. Uh and you know, Iran's objective is simple. Survive. They've survived.
Not only have they survived, yeah,
but they've now gained control of the world economy. They've recognized they got economic leverage that they didn't have before and they have shut down uh a
number of US critical military bases throughout the the Gulf. So, you know,
from that standpoint, uh Iran's actually now in a better position to support uh Hezbollah. And what we saw in this war was close coordination between the two.
So, um the there is a deal to be had, but it's going to be on Iran's terms,
and it'll be difficult for Trump to paint it as uh a great victory for the United States. But they may find a way
to try to do that. But if if the if they don't come to agree on Iran's terms, uh
then the the war will restart and we're going to I think the US is going to focus its efforts to militarily take the straight of Hormuz, which is mission
impossible because let's say they capture they got troops on Oman and they got troops on Kamesh. Great. the what the the the insurance companies insist,
you can't have uh ships going into an area where they might get hit with missiles. And as long as they've got missiles and drones that are too that
have a reach to to get to the straight of Hormuz, it's not open. It's that simple.
All right, my friend. Yeah, I got a bail to Garland Nixon will be mad at me.
So, Garland, I said hi and I'll I'll uh I'll close up here. Thanks so much, Larry. All right. And you have a safe travel, too.
Yeah. Take care. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Bye-bye.
59 minutesYeah, as Larry said, I am actually traveling to China very soon. I won't uh release the date. Uh but it will be in this period of the the ceasefire talks.
Um but I won't release the exact day and time, but I'll be trying to do shows there. So, everyone hit the like button because that helps keeps the show going.
Um with that news though, I just want to just end on this with the analysis that we just heard from Scott and Larry. Just
think about this sentence and uh then you tell me everyone if the world has changed. Iran has gained control over
the global economy. That's what Larry Johnson just said. You just re say that to yourself over and over again and then I think the message of the world has
changed and the reality that the world has changed dramatically just from the last six weeks, five, six weeks of this
war. Uh I I think tells us all we need to know about where the balance of forces are right now in the geopolitical
realm, but really in terms of the entirety of global political and economic organization. It's a it's it really is a massive defeat for the
United States. Maybe the biggest since Vietnam, maybe bigger. We will have to see how things of course transpire because that will dictate exactly what that looks like. But nevertheless,
everyone hit the like button. That helps keep the show going. I want to thank everyone who gave a super chat
um uh today. That was very much appreciated. I'll pull up some of you right now. Uh given what we say, uh why
did they not respond to the US when they bombed them at the end of the 12-day war? Hope to meet you, Scott. That's a good question. Um I, you know, my
opinion about this question is that what the United States did during those so-called bombings, the B2 bombers going
over the nuclear facilities, I have to say that it must have been coordinated and the damage was not significant. All right. And and I think and I think
that's why the it was an agreement. I think it was an agreement to uh give uh Donald Trump uh you know the uh the uh
apparent uh big strong moment he needed to then tell Israel to stop doing what it's doing. Uh the CRO said the USA
worked with Israel to strike worked with Israel to strike Israel yesterday. I think you mean to strike either Iran or Lebanon but uh nevertheless uh yeah the
United States is always working with Israel. Uh so we can't you know we can't say it's not. It always is. Whatever Israel is doing, the United States is doing. Thank you, Danny, for your work
and bringing the best analysts. Thank you so much for the generous super chat.
Um, here we have uh So, you should go into politics on Danny Foundation of Black America. Appreciate you. We Well,
I appreciate that. I'll never go into politics, but I appreciate that. I'll go into politics when the system is different. How about that? Uh when when
we have uh won a just and fair system for humanity. Uh I love Larry Sherk with the program. Scott and all. Love you
too. Thank you so much. Hussein, oh Hussein, yeah, go. Hey, hey, hey. How's it going? Thanks for watching. Um, I know you from DD Geopolitics. Uh, great
commentator. Everyone should follow DD Geopolitics on YouTube. It's quite possible uh that just as Russia faced diplomatic pressure from its friends to negotiate with Ukraine, Iran is facing
same as if we satisfy those demands and its core strategic position. Yeah, I mean I think that there are some pressure on Iran, right? And I think this is my position on this everybody
and then I will head out as well. My position on why Iran is willing to engage as this process, yes, has a lot to do with China, but I don't think it
is China trying to squeeze Iran into essentially stopping the war. I think Iran as well as the uh China and
Pakistan, they all looked at what was going to happen and they all saw that it was going to be a really big disaster for the it would have been a disaster
for the multipolar world. Iran could get through this. China could get through it. But uh if the United States crossed
the red line and began bombing the uh energy infrastructure, the bridges, all of this um to a massive scale or at least as massive scale as they could,
3 minuteseven if they just did it once, you know,
it did a little bit, then Iran would be forced to hit really hard the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the Gulf countries
energy, turn their lights out and maybe make it irreparable the damage that they would have done which um for Pakistan,
for China who have really close relationship by the way uh that would have been really difficult for them economically uh in the long term because
it would have been long-term damage and so that's why I believe that uh uh China stepped in to mediate but I really think
it was Pakistan who was like look with China at its back that was like look to the United States look if you do this it's going to not go well for you it's
not going to go well for anybody it's going to really harm us your interests are going to be devastated and destroyed and of course China, Pakistan to come to
China and say, "Hey, our relationship is so good, just understand that if uh we can't get Iran to the ta, you know, if
we can't get this to stop, uh then the consequences of the escalation would have been too dire." So, I think that's what happened. I mean, of course, with
more I don't have the details. I don't have uh what was happening in the back rooms or anything like that or on the the back channels, the calls or
anything, but uh that seems to be why China would intervene. It's not to discipline Iran and say, "Stop doing the war." No, no, no. If Iran is being
attacked, China just like most, you know, they follow the UN charter. It's like, nah, you got to defend yourself.
But if there's a chance to get the US to stop, they're going to take it because um what was being said, promised,
especially by Iran because we know the United States, we don't never know what the Trump administration or any US administration is going to do actually.
Uh it's words, right? But the words the civilization ending strikes um they you know if they had conducted any of that
uh any of the energy strikes then yeah we would have seen Iran hit back in kind and and China trusts Iran to do that. So they just didn't want to see that.
Nobody nobody really wanted to see that.
5 minutesUh it would have been born out of a necessity of this criminal war. And uh now we have the conclusion of Iran has control over a major part of the global
economy and the US can do nothing about it which is really the big checkmate at the end. Um without further ado everyone
hit the like button, hit the subscribe button if you haven't. Go to the video description. You can find Scott Ritter's website scottr.com. You can support him
there. You can find Larry Johnson's website. You can follow him and support him there. all the places to support this channel, Patreon, Subscues.
Tomorrow at 1 p.m. Eastern time, April 10th, I will be with Pepe Escobar at 100 p.m. Eastern time, April 10th, to continue the daily coverage.
Well, without further ado, everybody, uh it was a great show. I uh really, um you know, I thought it was a great analysis,
great show. We're going to continue uh doing this as much as we can as the new phase of the war uh continues and and
and develops. Everyone who's still watching, we had a big crowd, almost 30,000 today. We still have 21,000 on.
If you hear me and you're still listening, uh, be sure to hit the like button because if we get even half uh,
of you, if you even half of you haven't hit the like button yet, you do, you will make sure that this stream gets out
there to the rest of the YouTube algorithm that has not been able or at least as far as possible through the
YouTube algorithm. Um, and all that's very much appreciated. See you tomorrow,
1 pm Eastern time, April 10th. Until then, bye.
Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down ...
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Thu Apr 09, 2026 11:16 pm
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Thu Apr 09, 2026 11:29 pm
US disaster in Isfahan showed Iran’s geography a ‘quagmire’ for invaders: General
Thursday, 09 April 2026 3:59 PM [ Last Update: Thursday, 09 April 2026 4:20 PM ]
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/0 ... rs-General
A still image shows US aircraft destroyed during a botched American operation at an abandoned airbase in Isfahan, Iran, released on April 5, 2026.
The commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Ground Force says Iran’s geography is a “prison and a quagmire” for any ground invader, citing the US botched operation in Isfahan as a prime example.
Brigadier General Mohammad Karami emphasized Thursday that the failed US operation in the central region of Shahreza demonstrated the consequences of attempting to infiltrate Iran.
He stated that the Pentagon and the CIA jointly carried out the operation with more than 500 personnel and extensive resources, including nearly $1 billion in technical, military, and human investments.
Despite the efforts, the mission was halted, and the US forces were forced to retreat after Iranian forces dealt them a crushing blow.
“The disastrous failure of the US forces in Isfahan is a clear example of how Iran’s geography becomes a trap for any aggressor,” General Karami said.
Information obtained by Press TV has also revealed that the recent US-Israeli operation ended in a major strategic defeat for the enemy.
According to exclusive details, the US and possibly Israeli forces conducted extensive aerial reconnaissance ahead of the raid, during which they lost several aircraft, including at least one A-10 Thunderbolt II and two Black Hawk helicopters.
These initial operations set the stage for a disastrous mission orchestrated by the White House.
Contrary to the official narrative of a rescue operation for a downed F-15 pilot, Press TV’s investigation confirmed that the real objective was to infiltrate and attack one of Iran's nuclear facilities in Isfahan.
The landing site for the C-130 transport aircraft was chosen near a critical nuclear site, and Iranian forces had anticipated the operation.
When the first C-130, carrying U.S. special forces, landed on an abandoned dirt airstrip, it veered off the runway. As a second C-130 approached with support equipment, Iranian forces struck, forcing an emergency landing.
American commandos were trapped, and the operation quickly shifted from a nuclear infiltration to a desperate rescue attempt.
Despite efforts to extract the trapped forces, many soldiers abandoned equipment, including an officer’s identification, as they fled. US fighter jets bombed their own aircraft to prevent them from falling into Iranian hands.
Speaking during a visit to security units in western Iran on Thursday, General Karami underscored the importance of Iran’s unique defense strategy, which has been tailored to the country’s specific conditions.
He stated that Iran’s defense model is unlike any other in the world, relying on a decentralized structure and asymmetric tactics.
Karami highlighted the role of over 17 million volunteers, alongside military and Basij units, in forming a powerful national defense network. This, he said, reflects the unwavering determination of Iran’s armed forces and the people of Iran.
The commander added that Iran’s military forces have established a multilayered security belt across the country, making it nearly impossible for adversaries to execute successful military operations.
He credited the confusion experienced by enemy forces on the battlefield to the preparedness and resilience of Iran’s defense units.
“The enemy’s confusion in the battlefield is the product of Iran’s military readiness,” Karami stated, expressing full confidence in the strength and unity of Iran’s defense forces and the resolve of the Iranian people.
The US and Israel launched an unprovoked war against Iran on February 28, assassinating Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, along with several senior officials and military commanders as well as hundreds of civilians.
General Karami stressed that the war led to the creation of “unique convergence and synergy between the country’s defensive pillars and the Armed Forces.”
******************************
Press TV Exclusive: US suffered major strategic defeat in failed Isfahan operation
Tuesday, 07 April 2026 11:24 AM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 07 April 2026 1:25 PM ]
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/07/766446/press-tv-exclusive-us-suffered-strategic-defeat-failed-isfshan-operation
Information obtained by Press TV regarding the recent operation by the US-Israeli coalition in the central Isfahan province reveals a major strategic defeat for the enemy.
US President Donald Trump's frantic threats in the past few days to target Iran’s civilian infrastructure, including power plants and bridges, are a direct consequence of the heavy defeat suffered by the US forces in the Isfahan operation.
The failed raid was carried out after the enemy conducted extensive aerial reconnaissance operations in the days leading up to the attack, according to the exclusive information.
During those initial infiltration and reconnaissance missions, the US and possibly the Zionist regime lost a significant number of aircraft, including at least one A-10 Thunderbolt II and two Black Hawk helicopters.
The information obtained by Press TV reveals that "zero hour" for the failed Isfahan operation was set during a secret meeting at the White House under the direct supervision of the US president himself.
It has now become clear that this operation had no connection to the claimed rescue of a downed F-15 fighter pilot, a narrative initially pushed by American officials. Instead, evidence examined and confirmed by Press TV indicates that the real objective was to infiltrate and attack one of Iran's nuclear facilities in Isfahan.
The landing site for C-130 transport aircraft, chosen based on previous reconnaissance, was an abandoned airstrip located dangerously close to one of these nuclear sites.
The Americans miscalculated, believing that Iran's air defense would be unable to confront the aircraft involved in the operation. However, Press TV learned that the deployment of numerous US aircraft occurred while the Iranian Armed Forces were in full alert, waiting for them. In fact, American special forces fell directly into a trap set by Iranian forces.
The Iranian Armed Forces, including the Army, Law Enforcement (Faraja), the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), and local popular forces, initially did not show a serious reaction to the landing of the first C-130, which was carrying dozens of special forces commandos. Evidence shows this aircraft veered somewhat off the runway while landing at the abandoned dirt airstrip.
Minutes later, a second C-130 aircraft approached, carrying specialized vehicles, several MH-6 Little Bird helicopters, and other support equipment. At that moment, Iranian forces on the scene targeted the second aircraft before it could land, turning its normal landing into an emergency one. Two Black Hawk helicopters also arrived shortly after.
It was at this moment that the aircraft, helicopters, and commandos who had disembarked from the first plane became perfect targets for the Iranian Armed Forces.
After the special forces realized they had fallen into the trap, the White House situation room made a critical decision: the main operation to infiltrate the nuclear site was changed into a desperate rescue operation for the dozens of US commandos trapped under Iranian fire.
The Americans immediately sent several smaller aircraft to extract their forces, barely managing to gather the individuals and withdraw them from the deadly situation.
The rescue operation was conducted so hastily that some soldiers and officers abandoned their equipment, including, according to the evidence possessed by Press TV, the identification document of an American officer left behind in the area, to save their lives.
After the commandos were evacuated, American fighter jets established a line of fire with a 5-kilometer radius to prevent Iranian forces from approaching the abandoned C-130s at the airstrip. The jets also carried out heavy bombing of their own equipment to prevent it from falling into Iranian hands.
In this failed operation, US special forces did not even have the chance to fly the special Little Bird helicopters; some were destroyed on the ground, while others were destroyed inside the second C-130 aircraft.
Following this disgraceful and heavy defeat, Trump hastily and chaotically held multiple press conferences to cover up the failure and falsely portray it as a pilot rescue operation.
The information obtained by Press TV describes these propaganda shows, led by Trump and his Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, as reminiscent of Hollywood films – lies that have not even been accepted by many American audiences.
The information available notes that Trump will continue to fabricate other "Hollywood-style" operations to falsely claim achievements and appease public opinion in the US.
However, his and Hegseth's repeated storytelling and lying, which have reduced public confidence in him both in the US and across the world to the lowest possible level, have made his "Goebbels-style lies" very difficult to believe.
People in the US and across the world are asking a pointed question: "How is it that a country which supposedly has neither air defense left nor an army or armed forces has managed to shoot down and destroy so many fighter jets and various aircraft, and continues to add to its album of different types of destroyed fighter jets, planes, helicopters, and drones," a highly-placed source in Tehran told Press TV.
The heavy defeat of the Isfahan operation, he noted, could be recorded in history as the worst and most disgraceful failure of the US military, even worse than the failed Tabas operation of 1980, which saw a botched rescue attempt end in disaster for Washington.
The information obtained by Press TV notes that the heavy aftershocks of this "great debacle" for Trump will affect not only the fate of the ongoing war against the Islamic Republic of Iran but also the political future of "America's gambling and ignorant president," his Republican party, and the American political scene for years to come.
Thursday, 09 April 2026 3:59 PM [ Last Update: Thursday, 09 April 2026 4:20 PM ]
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/0 ... rs-General
A still image shows US aircraft destroyed during a botched American operation at an abandoned airbase in Isfahan, Iran, released on April 5, 2026.
[Danny] You know, another question I had, and Larry, you can start, and I know Scott is writing about this, the timing of this whole incident of the F-15 being shot down, came at the same time developments led to these upcoming talks, and talks of a potential ceasefire. And of course what happened after the rescue operation, plus whatever else was happening, seizing uranium operation, I just want to know Larry what your thoughts are on exactly what happened there, and how it influenced the US's position?
[Larry] You know, 20 years ago I worked on what they called an attack on a hardened deeply buried target, an HDBT inside Iran, to go after a nuclear site. And the lesson back then was it's too costly, not in terms of dollars, but in terms of human life and material. I do believe that the deployment order was given sometime around March 11th, March 10th, because we saw an uptick then in deployment out of all of the bases in the United States that service US special operations forces. It was coming out of Hunter Army Airfield in Georgia, that had the 75th Rangers, and an element of the Task Force 160. It was coming out of Pope Army Airfield that had both the 82nd, but also Delta Force, and some other units that are the Special Tactical Squad STS 24th. They're the preeminent special operations parachute rescue jumpers/combat controllers, the ones that go out and recover people. You had the 160th there being loaded up and moved at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. You had the other Ranger battalion out of Joint Base Lewis McCord. You had SEALs coming out of Oceanana Naval Air Station. So the only times that I ever saw those kinds of forces being assembled, was either for some big-ass exercise, or they were doing it for real world. And in this case, it was clear it was real world.
So now they were teed up. I don't know if they were going after Busher, after Isfahan, or after Natanz, because Natanz is about 30-40 miles north of Isfahan, maybe a little farther. What the F-15 was doing in the area was, let's call it preparation of the battlefield, or trying to destroy some assets.
What was unusual is that the chief weapons system officer, the WSO that was sitting in the back seat, which is normally handled by a lieutenant, or a captain, was a full-bird Colonel, who was the vice wing commander of the US forces at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base.
Now, I've talked to some friends that have worked at the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, the combined air operations center in Aludeid, and it was unusual. It was rare. But it wasn't unheard of that a senior guy like that would say, "I want to get my time in the plane, and I want to get my feet wet in this endeavor." It clearly got shot down. What we do know now is that as soon as they got shot down, the Pentagon, Centcom, and CIA, launched a massive disinformation campaign. Reports were getting leaked that the plane actually went down 120 miles southwest, down towards the the coast, let's say 80 miles from Kharg Island, instead of just south of Isfahan. I saw a map reproduced that showed the Colonel actually ejected the aircraft near a road juncture, a north south highway 65, and the Colonel landed say three-four miles away and probably broke his ankle. There were also reports of a broken leg. But he was able to crawl and hobble about a mile up the slope of this mountain, and hide himself.
Now the CIA started to later put out this nonsense that they found him because they detected his heartbeat from outer space. Horseshit. And they're putting that story out so they can hide what other capability they may have used to actually locate him. Because the only way you're going to identify someone by their heartbeat is by digitizing it. Putting it into a file, and then when you crash, we can come looking for you. You know, find Private Schmuckatella's heartbeat. Puhleeze.
So here's the question, and I'm trying to lay out a scenario that makes sense to me for what we see on the ground. And instead of landing at an airstrip that was in a valley about 8 kilometers north, these C130Js land on this desert land that's near one of the holy shrines of Ali. They're carrying two little birds, two AH6 little birds. We know just by basic math that if you've got two C130s loaded with two AH6 helicopters a piece, then the maximum number of troops that you can carry on each of those, apart from the three-man crew, is basically about 15 people. That's maximum. So that gives us a total of 30. And I'm thinking, how do you break out at 15? Do you want to have the two pilots that you'd need for each little bird? No. If you're running a rescue mission, you just want two pilots for one little bird on each plane. So you got a total of four pilots among the 30. That gets us down to 26.
Then, how many PJs do you want? Again, I'll put two PJs on one C130, and two PJs on another. You got backup in case something happens to the first one. So now we're down from 15 to 11. So 11 are made up of either Rangers, 75th Battalion, or SEALs. And that's just if this is a rescue scenario. Normally, when they go out to land those kinds of planes in a desert environment, you do a sight survey in advance. They didn't do a sight survey. So maybe that explains why the planes came in, and on landing they just dug in. And there is some damage to the wings, or to the propellers, like they hit the ground. So maybe that's the explanation. But in some of the photographs that were provided, you could see that the boom that's used to refuel was shot up. So, had these things been shot up and shot down out of the sky? That's a possibility. The one that really is bizarre is they they recovered an ID card from the wreckage along with her. It's a woman, a Major apparently. Amanda Ryder is her name. And she's got her platinum American Express card. "Don't leave home without it." I think the downing of this plane caused the mission to be cancelled. I think the reason they had those little birds already packed up in the planes was because that was part of the intended operation, and they repurposed it. But I'm just offering an opinion. I'd be curious what Scott thinks.
[Danny] Yeah. Scott, what's your assessment? I know you're writing about it.
[Scott] Look, this is all crazy stuff, so there's a lot of informed speculation. Let's start with this though. The intent to launch a raid against Isfahan was public information, right? Straight up public information, that included not just unnamed sources, but named sources, including General Votel, former commander of Special Operations Command. And also people who could be identified. The reason why I'm bringing this up is that Kash Patel just announced the arrest of some people who were speaking to the media in an unauthorized fashion, and he said we can't allow this. We hunt this down. We shut it down. Boom boom boom. But you have people talking to the media about this major raid that's being planned, and they're going to land, and 82nd Airborne is going to parachute a brigade in. They're going to build a runway, and then land aircraft with heavy excavation equipment. And they're going to spend weeks, perhaps months, digging out the south tunnel of Isfahan. This is the plan that's put out there. It's so absurd, it's not even funny.
I mean, Larry, you were involved in planning this. I will bet my entire paycheck that your plan didn't involve people staying on the ground more than a couple hours.
[Larry] Yeah. It's get in and out. Don't stay.
[Scott] Yeah. And nobody was prosecuted for the publicly released plan. General Votto wasn't called in to say, "Why are you talking about these things? Those are TTPs, baby. You can't talk about that." Because it's disinformation. It's a 100% disinformation campaign run by the White House. Why? Because the plan's completely different. We're not going to land and go in through the front tunnel.
And Larry, if you disagree with me anytime, please step in. Because I've worked with Joint Special Operations enough that I can say this confidently: Past patterns repeat themselves. They're not that innovative when it comes to many things, especially when it comes to national level planning. Before there's a briefing to the president, there will be models built, scale models, and full-scale models, and rehearsals conducted, where they're going to do every aspect of this mission: secure the airfield, unload the helicopters, fly to a point with special equipment, and execute the mission. They will have rehearsed this, and we even know where they rehearsed it, because this will have been done at the Nevada test site. I had a mission that trained up there. We also trained nearby at Edwards Air Force Base. This is how this works.
[Larry] Just by the way, that's where the exercise in 2006 took place.
[Scott] Yeah. It's just past patterns repeating themselves.
[Larry] I can probably even tell you the airfield that they landed at to simulate airfield seizure. It might be the same airfield that they landed at to simulate airfield seizure for Desert One. And it's the same one they used to simulate the rescue of UN weapons inspectors taken hostage by Iran, Iraq.
[Scott] But my point is this. President Trump made a decision sometime in March that they were going to launch this raid. They did a deception campaign to get the Iranians looking here. This was going to be an in-n-out operation. They were going to land. Again, we can take guidance from Ferdos. What we now know about Ferdos is that there was a ventilation shaft. When you have these deep underground facilities, there will be ventilation shafts. There has to be ventilation shafts because it's required for safety. You can't function down there without it. DARPA studied the National Geospatial, used to be Defense Mapping Agency --
[Larry] NGIA. NGIA.
[Scott] Yeah. They came up with some fancy name like Geospatial intelligence agency or something. They do modeling. They do the whole thing. They've been looking at this for years. We also know that IAEA inspectors were in this facility. They were in the tunnels. They reported back to the CIA. I promise you, I know this for a fact that they were debriefed by the CIA, and they took all the dimensions. They know where the ventilation shafts are, and they built models, and they found a vulnerability. And they were going to land, assault, go down the vulnerability, seize or destroy, and get the hell out of there. It was going to be a wham bam thank you ma'am kind of operation, because that's what they do.
You've heard about Master Sergeant Vining, the EOD legend from Delta Force during Desert Storm. He had a mission to go into Taji, and I can talk about it because he talked about it. If he hadn't talked about it, I couldn't talk about it. But he was going to go into Taji, a facility that I inspected later, which is one of their big sector operations command centers. There's a giant massive slab of concrete with a command center in there. We thought that's where Iraq was running their Scudwart. We tried to hit it with bombs, but they bounced off. So near the end of the war, he was going to go in with the Delta crew, Rangers were going to secure that site. He was going to go in, blast his way in, destroy the site, and come out. It was an in-n-out job. It wasn't going to last days. It was going to last hours. He has to get it done now. And that's just the way it is.
I believed, and now we also know again listening to Hegseth and company that the man in charge of the rescue mission was the commander Lieutenant General Bearer, I think his last name is. He's a former Delta guy. Lieutenant Generals don't command rescue missions. They just don't. He was the commander of a joint special operations task force that operates separate from central command authority, working directly for the president of the United States. These assets were brought in as part of this joint special operations task force, and they were given the mission of launching the Isfahan raid.
Now when you take a look at the timelines available here, I had been working under an assumption that maybe they were given an audible, meaning that getting this Colonel out was so important that they had to drop everything else to get it. I don't believe that anymore. Because if you take a look at the load out of the aircraft, I believe that this was an airfield seizure. There would have been follow-on echelons coming in that were called off because it went bad from the start, but the whole pilot-rescue thing, I don't believe we sent air helicopters out. I don't think Navy Seals made contact with the guy. I think this guy was picked up either earlier or whatever.
The president said there were only three little birds. Now, he could have misspoke, but he also talked about a package that was on there that contains specialized equipment, including anti-aircraft missiles. That means you're seizing an airfield. Again, we go back to Desert One. They don't change what they do. When the guys took over Desert One, took over that landing strip that Jim Carney had pre-surveyed, they came off with surface to air missiles. That was their thing. They were there to secure against a possible air attack. This team had similar loadout with more modern air defense equipment. They also had specialized scaling equipment, mountain climbing equipment, the President called it. They weren't climbing mountains; they were going into the mountain down a shaft. This was all on a pallet that could have been removed. Two of the three AH6 didn't get off the aircraft. They were in the aircraft, and were destroyed in the aircraft when it got blown down. Only one exited the aircraft. And according to the Iranians, it didn't fly. The Iranians are saying there was no aircraft rescue mission. They unloaded it. Some vehicles came off, airfield seizure guys. I'm thinking ATVs, some motorcycles to secure the airfield. But one of the planes apparently got hit by anti-aircraft fire, too. The Iranians claimed that they hit it, and there's physical evidence that suggests that this thing got screwed from the start. And when it got screwed, they needed to see if they could save the plan. And so they changed it from a failed raid on Isfahan, to a successful pilot recovery mission. But there's nothing about what happened on the ground that lends itself to believe that this team saved that pilot. The guys I've talked to were legitimately spun up on what was called a personal recovery mission. And everyone I scripted, over last count it was like 153 of the J-C exercises during that 23-year period, starting in 1994, it became a joke that every one of those missions, regardless of where it was, had to have an airfield seizure for the Rangers. That's what they do. So that's why you bring the 75th Rangers.
But again, the thing that doesn't add up for me is you've got only two J130s there. Now maybe there was another one involved that got away. That could have been the Rangers, because I role-played the US ambassador to Algeria in an exercise that was done at Jacksonville, Florida, and it was simulated. Delta Force came in to launch an assault, and we did it on the fire tower in one of the downtown areas of Jacksonville, and it was pretty funny. The general that was commanding was General Bargewell, who unfortunately later died in a tractor accident after he retired. But when Delta hit the tower, and started shooting, all the drug dealers on the street dropped their drugs, and we could have collected like a pharmacy later from all the drugs that were scattered about. But when they hit the airfield, as the plane lands, the C130 comes out, the ramp drops down, and the guys come riding out on motorcycles. You know, it's very Hollywood.
All I know for sure is the explanation that Donald Trump, John Ratcliffe, and Pete Hegseth gave the other day, and General Kaine, was a lie. It was not true. They dressed it up. They were putting lipstick on the pig, and putting a wig on her too. But it was not as they said. I still had clearances, and was in the inside, when operation Redwing took place. That became the movie Lone Survivor. So I was seeing real time what was happening then. I watched in real time back then the taking out of Bin Laden, and Pat Tillman, the whole thing surrounding Pat Tillman's death. All I saw was consistently that they tend to lie. You don't get the truth. You get a bunch of lies. Either it's to cover up incompetence, or sometimes it's covering up some genuine operational opsec information that you want to keep from the public. But more often than not, it's just trying to create a narrative that has a political objective.
-- Scott Ritter & Larry Johnson: Iran Retaliates, Hormuz CLOSED – Israel ENDS Trump Ceasefire, by Danny Haiphong, Streamed live 108 minutes ago
The commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Ground Force says Iran’s geography is a “prison and a quagmire” for any ground invader, citing the US botched operation in Isfahan as a prime example.
Brigadier General Mohammad Karami emphasized Thursday that the failed US operation in the central region of Shahreza demonstrated the consequences of attempting to infiltrate Iran.
He stated that the Pentagon and the CIA jointly carried out the operation with more than 500 personnel and extensive resources, including nearly $1 billion in technical, military, and human investments.
Despite the efforts, the mission was halted, and the US forces were forced to retreat after Iranian forces dealt them a crushing blow.
“The disastrous failure of the US forces in Isfahan is a clear example of how Iran’s geography becomes a trap for any aggressor,” General Karami said.
Information obtained by Press TV has also revealed that the recent US-Israeli operation ended in a major strategic defeat for the enemy.
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/07/766446/press-tv-exclusive-us-suffered-strategic-defeat-failed-isfshan-operation
Press TV Exclusive: US suffered major strategic defeat in failed Isfahan operation. Information obtained by Press TV regarding the recent operation by the American-Israeli coalition in the central Isfahan province reveals a major strategic defeat for the enemy.
According to exclusive details, the US and possibly Israeli forces conducted extensive aerial reconnaissance ahead of the raid, during which they lost several aircraft, including at least one A-10 Thunderbolt II and two Black Hawk helicopters.
These initial operations set the stage for a disastrous mission orchestrated by the White House.
Contrary to the official narrative of a rescue operation for a downed F-15 pilot, Press TV’s investigation confirmed that the real objective was to infiltrate and attack one of Iran's nuclear facilities in Isfahan.
The landing site for the C-130 transport aircraft was chosen near a critical nuclear site, and Iranian forces had anticipated the operation.
When the first C-130, carrying U.S. special forces, landed on an abandoned dirt airstrip, it veered off the runway. As a second C-130 approached with support equipment, Iranian forces struck, forcing an emergency landing.
American commandos were trapped, and the operation quickly shifted from a nuclear infiltration to a desperate rescue attempt.
Despite efforts to extract the trapped forces, many soldiers abandoned equipment, including an officer’s identification, as they fled. US fighter jets bombed their own aircraft to prevent them from falling into Iranian hands.
Speaking during a visit to security units in western Iran on Thursday, General Karami underscored the importance of Iran’s unique defense strategy, which has been tailored to the country’s specific conditions.
He stated that Iran’s defense model is unlike any other in the world, relying on a decentralized structure and asymmetric tactics.
Karami highlighted the role of over 17 million volunteers, alongside military and Basij units, in forming a powerful national defense network. This, he said, reflects the unwavering determination of Iran’s armed forces and the people of Iran.
The commander added that Iran’s military forces have established a multilayered security belt across the country, making it nearly impossible for adversaries to execute successful military operations.
He credited the confusion experienced by enemy forces on the battlefield to the preparedness and resilience of Iran’s defense units.
“The enemy’s confusion in the battlefield is the product of Iran’s military readiness,” Karami stated, expressing full confidence in the strength and unity of Iran’s defense forces and the resolve of the Iranian people.
The US and Israel launched an unprovoked war against Iran on February 28, assassinating Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, along with several senior officials and military commanders as well as hundreds of civilians.
General Karami stressed that the war led to the creation of “unique convergence and synergy between the country’s defensive pillars and the Armed Forces.”
******************************
Press TV Exclusive: US suffered major strategic defeat in failed Isfahan operation
Tuesday, 07 April 2026 11:24 AM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 07 April 2026 1:25 PM ]
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/07/766446/press-tv-exclusive-us-suffered-strategic-defeat-failed-isfshan-operation
Information obtained by Press TV regarding the recent operation by the US-Israeli coalition in the central Isfahan province reveals a major strategic defeat for the enemy.
US President Donald Trump's frantic threats in the past few days to target Iran’s civilian infrastructure, including power plants and bridges, are a direct consequence of the heavy defeat suffered by the US forces in the Isfahan operation.
The failed raid was carried out after the enemy conducted extensive aerial reconnaissance operations in the days leading up to the attack, according to the exclusive information.
During those initial infiltration and reconnaissance missions, the US and possibly the Zionist regime lost a significant number of aircraft, including at least one A-10 Thunderbolt II and two Black Hawk helicopters.
The information obtained by Press TV reveals that "zero hour" for the failed Isfahan operation was set during a secret meeting at the White House under the direct supervision of the US president himself.
It has now become clear that this operation had no connection to the claimed rescue of a downed F-15 fighter pilot, a narrative initially pushed by American officials. Instead, evidence examined and confirmed by Press TV indicates that the real objective was to infiltrate and attack one of Iran's nuclear facilities in Isfahan.
The landing site for C-130 transport aircraft, chosen based on previous reconnaissance, was an abandoned airstrip located dangerously close to one of these nuclear sites.
Press TV
@PressTV
JUST IN
WATCH: Press TV has obtained information about recent US-Israeli operation in Isfahan which reveals the failure of the operation.
According to evidence, the FAILED OPERATION has NOTHING to do with the so-called rescue operation for an American airman
Watch for more!
https://twitter.com/i/status/2041483359176823025
5:48 AM · Apr 7, 2026
The Americans miscalculated, believing that Iran's air defense would be unable to confront the aircraft involved in the operation. However, Press TV learned that the deployment of numerous US aircraft occurred while the Iranian Armed Forces were in full alert, waiting for them. In fact, American special forces fell directly into a trap set by Iranian forces.
The Iranian Armed Forces, including the Army, Law Enforcement (Faraja), the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), and local popular forces, initially did not show a serious reaction to the landing of the first C-130, which was carrying dozens of special forces commandos. Evidence shows this aircraft veered somewhat off the runway while landing at the abandoned dirt airstrip.
Minutes later, a second C-130 aircraft approached, carrying specialized vehicles, several MH-6 Little Bird helicopters, and other support equipment. At that moment, Iranian forces on the scene targeted the second aircraft before it could land, turning its normal landing into an emergency one. Two Black Hawk helicopters also arrived shortly after.
It was at this moment that the aircraft, helicopters, and commandos who had disembarked from the first plane became perfect targets for the Iranian Armed Forces.
After the special forces realized they had fallen into the trap, the White House situation room made a critical decision: the main operation to infiltrate the nuclear site was changed into a desperate rescue operation for the dozens of US commandos trapped under Iranian fire.
The Americans immediately sent several smaller aircraft to extract their forces, barely managing to gather the individuals and withdraw them from the deadly situation.
Press TV
@PressTV
Feature - From Tabas to Isfahan: Iran destroys two US C-130s, echoing the 1980 Eagle Claw debacle
By Ivan Kesic
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/05/766350/from-tabas-isfahan-iran-destroys-two-us-c130s-echoing-eagle-claw-debacle
From presstv.ir
10:41 AM · Apr 5, 2026
The rescue operation was conducted so hastily that some soldiers and officers abandoned their equipment, including, according to the evidence possessed by Press TV, the identification document of an American officer left behind in the area, to save their lives.
After the commandos were evacuated, American fighter jets established a line of fire with a 5-kilometer radius to prevent Iranian forces from approaching the abandoned C-130s at the airstrip. The jets also carried out heavy bombing of their own equipment to prevent it from falling into Iranian hands.
In this failed operation, US special forces did not even have the chance to fly the special Little Bird helicopters; some were destroyed on the ground, while others were destroyed inside the second C-130 aircraft.
Following this disgraceful and heavy defeat, Trump hastily and chaotically held multiple press conferences to cover up the failure and falsely portray it as a pilot rescue operation.
The information obtained by Press TV describes these propaganda shows, led by Trump and his Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, as reminiscent of Hollywood films – lies that have not even been accepted by many American audiences.
The information available notes that Trump will continue to fabricate other "Hollywood-style" operations to falsely claim achievements and appease public opinion in the US.
Press TV
@PressTV
Watch: Downed US aggressor aircraft in southern Isfahan
Follow: http://T.me/presstv
https://x.com/i/status/2040692749842727409
1:27 AM · Apr 5, 2026
However, his and Hegseth's repeated storytelling and lying, which have reduced public confidence in him both in the US and across the world to the lowest possible level, have made his "Goebbels-style lies" very difficult to believe.
People in the US and across the world are asking a pointed question: "How is it that a country which supposedly has neither air defense left nor an army or armed forces has managed to shoot down and destroy so many fighter jets and various aircraft, and continues to add to its album of different types of destroyed fighter jets, planes, helicopters, and drones," a highly-placed source in Tehran told Press TV.
The heavy defeat of the Isfahan operation, he noted, could be recorded in history as the worst and most disgraceful failure of the US military, even worse than the failed Tabas operation of 1980, which saw a botched rescue attempt end in disaster for Washington.
The information obtained by Press TV notes that the heavy aftershocks of this "great debacle" for Trump will affect not only the fate of the ongoing war against the Islamic Republic of Iran but also the political future of "America's gambling and ignorant president," his Republican party, and the American political scene for years to come.
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Fri Apr 10, 2026 12:45 am
Iran's stand on Strait of Hormuz forces Netanyahu to talk; Trump faces revolt | Janta Ka Reporter
Janta Ka Reporter
Apr 9, 2026
Faced with aggressive stand taken by Iran on the inclusion of Lebanon into the ceasefire deal, Benjamin Netanyahu today announced that he had instructed his team to hold talks on Lebanon. This was after several prominent MAGA faces openly criticised Donald Trump over his Iran policy and subsequent actions. Rifat Jawaid looks at the emergence of Iran as a new regional power despite six weeks of military conflict.
Transcript
So bloodthirsty terrorist Benjamin Netanyahu has finally agreed to hold talks with his Bullah fighters, but the Lebanese group has refused to talk to the Israeli genocidal maniacs directly.
However, a dreaded war criminal and notorious baby killer agreeing to abandon his urge for bloodshed of
innocent civilians shows the new power equation in the region and new superpower status of Iran. This happened
only because the Iranians put their foot down to include Lebanon in the ceasefire deal as it reimposed its chokehold of
the state of Hormos. This would be the broad focus of my video tonight. Also in this video, another powerful Iranian
Lego film mocking Donald Trump. So please stay tuned. Iran may have suffered a lot both militarily and as a
result of human losses in the six weeks of illegal war launched by the Americans and Israeli terrorists. But this
1 minutemilitary conflict has done one big thing and that is the new power equation in West Asia. Last of developments
have conclusively established Iran's new status of the regional superpower. Iran wouldn't have achieved this despite
developing nuclear bombs. Just a few weeks of control of the state of Hormos has brought the entire world to its
knees. Testament to Iran's new superpower status is in the latest announcement made by Israeli human devil
Netanyahu. Yesterday he launched an indiscriminate bombing of Beirut, killing hundreds of innocent civilians.
He rejected the ceasefire deal agreed between Trump and Iran saying that Lebanon was not included in that deal.
Today he spoke in a different tune altogether as he announced how he had instructed his team to hold direct talks with Hezbollah fighters for a ceasefire.
It's a different matter altogether that Hezbollah has refused to directly engage with Israeli terrorists. This was
possible only because Iran made its intention absolutely clear on Lebanon by reimposing the blockade of the state of
Hormuz. Iran also said that it will not be able to take part in Friday's talks in Pakistan if Trump renegged on the
inclusion of Lebanon in the ceasefire deal. Yesterday from Trump to Caroline Levit, everyone was denying the
inclusion of Lebanon in the ceasefire deal. In fact, Trump's deputy, Jedi Vans, too said that Iran doesn't have a choice to dictate it terms.
I think this comes from a legitimate misunderstanding. I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon, and it just didn't. We never
made that promise. We never indicated that was going to be the case. What we said is that the ceasefire would be focused on Iran and the ceasefire would be focused on America's allies, both Israel and the Gulf Arab states.
Fundamentally, we're on the right track.
We got a lot more to do. We got a lot more that the Iranians are going to have to accept as part of this negotiation,
but I think we've got a strong hand and we're going to play it well. Thank you all.
Today, even Netanyahu, who is arguably the most disgusting and evil creature to walk on this planet in living memory,
realized that he simply couldn't blackmail the American poodles, his American poodles in the White House any
longer. Hence his announcement for holding talks with the Lebanese group.
Iranian Foreign Minister Sayyad Basaraki pointed out and rightly so that the depraved and sick Israeli human devil
was desperate to keep the conflict going to avoid his legal trouble in the corruption cases that are scheduled to
come up for hearing next week. He wrote and I quote, "Netanyahu's criminal trial resumes on Sunday. A regionwide
ceasefire, including in Lebanon, would hasten his jailing. If the US wishes to crater its economy by letting Netanyahu kill diplomacy,
that would ultimately be its choice. We think that would be dumb, but are prepared for it." End quote. Sky News
spoke to emergency workers in Lebanon and their testimony is truly harrowing.
Let me just tell you where we are at the moment. We're in the Konishal Maser which is one of the main streets down in
central Beirut, center of the capital city. Um, one entire building has been leveled. It was about four or five
blocks high. What did you notice as soon as you arrived here? Was a devil. Mhm.
Was a devil. people is burned has grilled what you saw as you arrived which
sounded like a scene no one would want to see I was you realizing I arrived to Gaza or to Beirut
in the same point it was the same as Gaza disaster as as you put a a a piece
of burger on a grill people was grilled really the as I tell you it's not like
you see people was grilled. The one who I pick him up up I take him bones
all around here people all around here are large residential blocks. How how would you describe this
area because you're hearing the Israeli military are saying they were specifically targeting Hezbollah infrastructure command and control
centers. I want to tell all people all all world this world will tell us that there is here and here in there's noah
as we are a child of of pyro we are notah and we not including forbalah and we're not withah
well they clearly are some elements in the capital city if now if now they tell me that as a Jewish people here and he need our help
we will help him our message It's peace and humanity but but what happened here yesterday
this area it's a food and beverage containers and as we know and as we see it's for
closes container there's no military here Trump is an evil monster himself
but he's realizing the changing tide even amongst his MAGA base just watch this montage broadcast by CNN on how
prominent MAGA voices are now revoling against the deranged occupant of the White House.
Tonight, a mega revolt growing over the president's war with Iran, even as President Trump claims victory with a shaky ceasefire deal. Listen right here for yourself.
Iran has basically gotten everything it wants in the agreement cuz Trump was desperate to open the trade of Hormuse.
7 minutesThis is a huge black eye to the United States, but this thing 39 days in is a total and complete disaster. And we have been right about it. I am sick of this
s I'm just I'm I'm sick of it. Can't he just behave like a normal human? I
mean, honestly, like the president 3D chess, shut up. Shut up about that
You don't threaten to wipe out an entire civilization. We're talking about civilians just casually in a social
media post. Those people who are in direct contact with the president need
to say no. I'll resign. I'll do whatever I can do legally to stop this because this is insane. And if given the order,
I'm not carrying it out.
I'm confused. I can't believe we went to this war. I when we started bombing Iran, I was like, they can't this can't be true. Supposedly, they're trying to stop the terrorists.
That's crazy, though. if you're the terrorist.
You know what I'm saying? Like if you want to stop them, stand in front of the mirror.
And when you look at the cumulative reach of these MAGA faces, you would understand the trepidition gripping
Trump right now. Then the New York Times has blown the lid of the secrets surrounding Trump's decision to attack
Iran and therefore endanger the lives of American soldiers. Aside from JD Vance, no one in the Trump administration.
No one, not a single cabinet member opposed this deranged man's decision to sacrifice his soldiers to satisfy Netanyahu's genocidal urge.
The New York Times reporting makes it very clear now that the people who have been alleging that Benjamin Netanyahu
talked Donald Trump into this war now have tremendous support for that position. According to sources within
the Trump government and possibly the Israeli government, the Times does not reveal the sources, but does include
details in the situation room that can only be described by Trump people who
were actually in that room and then secretly revealed it to the New York Times. Vice President J. D. Vance
emerges from the reporting as the only clear opponent of Donald Trump's war in
meetings with Donald Trump. The rest of Donald Trump's adviserss and cabinet were clearly afraid to take a position
that Donald Trump might not like. And so Marco Rubio, who was in the room as both Secretary of State and National Security
Adviser, has proved himself by this reporting to be the worst national security adviser in history, who gave
the president no advice about what to do, no advice about whether he should go to war or not go to war.
Right-wing provocator and Trump voter Tucker Carlson is quoted in the reporting in a telephone conversation with Donald Trump, which is an
indication that Tucker Carlson may well be one of the sources for this reporting. It was just a discussion between those two people. So, the
version of that discussion would have to come from one of them. In a discussion about going to war in Iran, the Times reports a couple of weeks before the war began, Mr. Trump, who had known Mr.
Carlson for years tried to reassure him over the phone. "I know you're worried about it, but it's going to be okay,"
the president said. Mr. Carlson asked how he knew because it always is, Mr. Trump replied.
The rank stupidity of Donald Trump, as it appears in that
passage, is in every paragraph of the Times report. When Donald Trump went around the room to get everyone's opinion before finally announcing his
decision, he got absurd responses from everyone there except Vice President
Vance. His CIA director, according to the New York Times, offered no opinion on whether to proceed. His always incompetent White House chief of staff,
Susie Wilds, according to the New York Times, quote, told Mr. Trump that if he felt he needed to proceed for America's
national security, then he should go ahead. It is exactly exactly the kind of spineless, mindless
council you imagine the most ignorant president in history who has chosen his cabinet and his advisers for their weakness and for their blind and stupid loyalty would get.
When is when it was JD Vance's turn, the Times reports Mr. Vance, whose disagreement with the whole premise was well established, addressed to the
president, you know, I think this is a bad idea, but if you want to do it, I'll support you.
There will be more reporting like that for years and years to come. And most of
the people in those meetings, in those rooms, will be lying for years to come.
Then we are now learning the true extent of Iranian retaliatory strikes across the Gulf region. Saudi Arabia has
announced that work on its key energy infrastructure will remain suspended for the foreseeable future. Why? Due to the
damage caused by Iran. An official at the Ministry of Energy has told Saudi Arabia's state news agency that
operational activities have been halted at several energy facilities in the country due to recent Iranian attacks.
That's because Iranian missiles destroyed the pumping stations on the East West pipeline leading to a loss of
approximately 700,000 barrels per day in Taraput. Iranian missiles also resulted in one death and the injury of seven
Saudi nationals working for the Saudi energy company. The Manifh production facility was also targeted resulting in
a reduction of approximately 300,000 barrels per day from its production capacity. The Kuras facility had previously been targeted as well,
resulting in a reduction of another 300,000 barrels per day in its production capacity. attacks also extended to major refining facilities
directly affecting exports of refined products to global markets. These are some of the damages brought to light so
far. The true extent will be known once the dust settles in days to come. Trump and his war criminal Israeli boss
attacked Iran to diminish its clout in the region. They ended up making the Islamic Republic even more powerful, not
just in the region, but globally. I will leave you with another Iranian Lego video released to celebrate the
capitulation of Trump following the ceasefire announcement.
But pulling strings and your vote is getting cold.
We're not just fighting for Iran. Hear this clear. Your people reached out to us. Yeah, we got the DMs here. If one nation's going to stand against the
Epstein regime's fear, it's us till the last breath. We've been doing it for years. We're standing here for everyone.
Your system never wrong. They've known all along the enemy was always you. The real Brit wore a suit and sung a patriotic song while selling their own
citizens and calling it strong. Stealing from your own people, making them bleed.
Taking tax dollars just to fund your own greed. They waking up to the lies. The illusions of burst. You screamed America first. Now you put losers first. Make
Israel great again. Your government is run by pedophiles. They ordered you to die for Israel.
They ordered you to die for Israel. They lied to you.
They saw everything. If the public ever saw the files, man, the planet would shake from the level of filth and the crimes in your wake. No wonder Jeff called you the worst. You degenerate
snake. Um, you claimed you never set foot. You went 40 plus times. You sick bastard. You cuss. We stepping up to the plate. Epstein regime got a fall. You
fake Christian elite sacrificing the ball. human. You talk real big for a man with tiny hands.
Tiny hands. Tiny things. Tiny everything. We saw everything. And word got out. The smallness kind of expands.
No wonder all those rage tweets, all those desperate rants. Overcompensating bully always causing the scene. You said you love losers. Well, look at your team.
Your government is run by Your government is run by pedophiles. They ordered you to die for Israel.
They ordered you to die for Israel. They lied to you.
That's it for me. Thank you very much for your support of this platform and our journalism. If you haven't subscribed to my channel, please do so
because that's one of the many ways you can support independent journalism. God bless you all.
Sync to video time
Janta Ka Reporter
Apr 9, 2026
Faced with aggressive stand taken by Iran on the inclusion of Lebanon into the ceasefire deal, Benjamin Netanyahu today announced that he had instructed his team to hold talks on Lebanon. This was after several prominent MAGA faces openly criticised Donald Trump over his Iran policy and subsequent actions. Rifat Jawaid looks at the emergence of Iran as a new regional power despite six weeks of military conflict.
Transcript
So bloodthirsty terrorist Benjamin Netanyahu has finally agreed to hold talks with his Bullah fighters, but the Lebanese group has refused to talk to the Israeli genocidal maniacs directly.
However, a dreaded war criminal and notorious baby killer agreeing to abandon his urge for bloodshed of
innocent civilians shows the new power equation in the region and new superpower status of Iran. This happened
only because the Iranians put their foot down to include Lebanon in the ceasefire deal as it reimposed its chokehold of
the state of Hormos. This would be the broad focus of my video tonight. Also in this video, another powerful Iranian
Lego film mocking Donald Trump. So please stay tuned. Iran may have suffered a lot both militarily and as a
result of human losses in the six weeks of illegal war launched by the Americans and Israeli terrorists. But this
1 minutemilitary conflict has done one big thing and that is the new power equation in West Asia. Last of developments
have conclusively established Iran's new status of the regional superpower. Iran wouldn't have achieved this despite
developing nuclear bombs. Just a few weeks of control of the state of Hormos has brought the entire world to its
knees. Testament to Iran's new superpower status is in the latest announcement made by Israeli human devil
Netanyahu. Yesterday he launched an indiscriminate bombing of Beirut, killing hundreds of innocent civilians.
He rejected the ceasefire deal agreed between Trump and Iran saying that Lebanon was not included in that deal.
Today he spoke in a different tune altogether as he announced how he had instructed his team to hold direct talks with Hezbollah fighters for a ceasefire.
It's a different matter altogether that Hezbollah has refused to directly engage with Israeli terrorists. This was
possible only because Iran made its intention absolutely clear on Lebanon by reimposing the blockade of the state of
Hormuz. Iran also said that it will not be able to take part in Friday's talks in Pakistan if Trump renegged on the
inclusion of Lebanon in the ceasefire deal. Yesterday from Trump to Caroline Levit, everyone was denying the
inclusion of Lebanon in the ceasefire deal. In fact, Trump's deputy, Jedi Vans, too said that Iran doesn't have a choice to dictate it terms.
I think this comes from a legitimate misunderstanding. I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon, and it just didn't. We never
made that promise. We never indicated that was going to be the case. What we said is that the ceasefire would be focused on Iran and the ceasefire would be focused on America's allies, both Israel and the Gulf Arab states.
Fundamentally, we're on the right track.
We got a lot more to do. We got a lot more that the Iranians are going to have to accept as part of this negotiation,
but I think we've got a strong hand and we're going to play it well. Thank you all.
Today, even Netanyahu, who is arguably the most disgusting and evil creature to walk on this planet in living memory,
realized that he simply couldn't blackmail the American poodles, his American poodles in the White House any
longer. Hence his announcement for holding talks with the Lebanese group.
Iranian Foreign Minister Sayyad Basaraki pointed out and rightly so that the depraved and sick Israeli human devil
was desperate to keep the conflict going to avoid his legal trouble in the corruption cases that are scheduled to
come up for hearing next week. He wrote and I quote, "Netanyahu's criminal trial resumes on Sunday. A regionwide
ceasefire, including in Lebanon, would hasten his jailing. If the US wishes to crater its economy by letting Netanyahu kill diplomacy,
that would ultimately be its choice. We think that would be dumb, but are prepared for it." End quote. Sky News
spoke to emergency workers in Lebanon and their testimony is truly harrowing.
Let me just tell you where we are at the moment. We're in the Konishal Maser which is one of the main streets down in
central Beirut, center of the capital city. Um, one entire building has been leveled. It was about four or five
blocks high. What did you notice as soon as you arrived here? Was a devil. Mhm.
Was a devil. people is burned has grilled what you saw as you arrived which
sounded like a scene no one would want to see I was you realizing I arrived to Gaza or to Beirut
in the same point it was the same as Gaza disaster as as you put a a a piece
of burger on a grill people was grilled really the as I tell you it's not like
you see people was grilled. The one who I pick him up up I take him bones
all around here people all around here are large residential blocks. How how would you describe this
area because you're hearing the Israeli military are saying they were specifically targeting Hezbollah infrastructure command and control
centers. I want to tell all people all all world this world will tell us that there is here and here in there's noah
as we are a child of of pyro we are notah and we not including forbalah and we're not withah
well they clearly are some elements in the capital city if now if now they tell me that as a Jewish people here and he need our help
we will help him our message It's peace and humanity but but what happened here yesterday
this area it's a food and beverage containers and as we know and as we see it's for
closes container there's no military here Trump is an evil monster himself
but he's realizing the changing tide even amongst his MAGA base just watch this montage broadcast by CNN on how
prominent MAGA voices are now revoling against the deranged occupant of the White House.
Tonight, a mega revolt growing over the president's war with Iran, even as President Trump claims victory with a shaky ceasefire deal. Listen right here for yourself.
Iran has basically gotten everything it wants in the agreement cuz Trump was desperate to open the trade of Hormuse.
7 minutesThis is a huge black eye to the United States, but this thing 39 days in is a total and complete disaster. And we have been right about it. I am sick of this
s I'm just I'm I'm sick of it. Can't he just behave like a normal human? I
mean, honestly, like the president 3D chess, shut up. Shut up about that
You don't threaten to wipe out an entire civilization. We're talking about civilians just casually in a social
media post. Those people who are in direct contact with the president need
to say no. I'll resign. I'll do whatever I can do legally to stop this because this is insane. And if given the order,
I'm not carrying it out.
I'm confused. I can't believe we went to this war. I when we started bombing Iran, I was like, they can't this can't be true. Supposedly, they're trying to stop the terrorists.
That's crazy, though. if you're the terrorist.
You know what I'm saying? Like if you want to stop them, stand in front of the mirror.
And when you look at the cumulative reach of these MAGA faces, you would understand the trepidition gripping
Trump right now. Then the New York Times has blown the lid of the secrets surrounding Trump's decision to attack
Iran and therefore endanger the lives of American soldiers. Aside from JD Vance, no one in the Trump administration.
No one, not a single cabinet member opposed this deranged man's decision to sacrifice his soldiers to satisfy Netanyahu's genocidal urge.
The New York Times reporting makes it very clear now that the people who have been alleging that Benjamin Netanyahu
talked Donald Trump into this war now have tremendous support for that position. According to sources within
the Trump government and possibly the Israeli government, the Times does not reveal the sources, but does include
details in the situation room that can only be described by Trump people who
were actually in that room and then secretly revealed it to the New York Times. Vice President J. D. Vance
emerges from the reporting as the only clear opponent of Donald Trump's war in
meetings with Donald Trump. The rest of Donald Trump's adviserss and cabinet were clearly afraid to take a position
that Donald Trump might not like. And so Marco Rubio, who was in the room as both Secretary of State and National Security
Adviser, has proved himself by this reporting to be the worst national security adviser in history, who gave
the president no advice about what to do, no advice about whether he should go to war or not go to war.
Right-wing provocator and Trump voter Tucker Carlson is quoted in the reporting in a telephone conversation with Donald Trump, which is an
indication that Tucker Carlson may well be one of the sources for this reporting. It was just a discussion between those two people. So, the
version of that discussion would have to come from one of them. In a discussion about going to war in Iran, the Times reports a couple of weeks before the war began, Mr. Trump, who had known Mr.
Carlson for years tried to reassure him over the phone. "I know you're worried about it, but it's going to be okay,"
the president said. Mr. Carlson asked how he knew because it always is, Mr. Trump replied.
The rank stupidity of Donald Trump, as it appears in that
passage, is in every paragraph of the Times report. When Donald Trump went around the room to get everyone's opinion before finally announcing his
decision, he got absurd responses from everyone there except Vice President
Vance. His CIA director, according to the New York Times, offered no opinion on whether to proceed. His always incompetent White House chief of staff,
Susie Wilds, according to the New York Times, quote, told Mr. Trump that if he felt he needed to proceed for America's
national security, then he should go ahead. It is exactly exactly the kind of spineless, mindless
council you imagine the most ignorant president in history who has chosen his cabinet and his advisers for their weakness and for their blind and stupid loyalty would get.
When is when it was JD Vance's turn, the Times reports Mr. Vance, whose disagreement with the whole premise was well established, addressed to the
president, you know, I think this is a bad idea, but if you want to do it, I'll support you.
There will be more reporting like that for years and years to come. And most of
the people in those meetings, in those rooms, will be lying for years to come.
Then we are now learning the true extent of Iranian retaliatory strikes across the Gulf region. Saudi Arabia has
announced that work on its key energy infrastructure will remain suspended for the foreseeable future. Why? Due to the
damage caused by Iran. An official at the Ministry of Energy has told Saudi Arabia's state news agency that
operational activities have been halted at several energy facilities in the country due to recent Iranian attacks.
That's because Iranian missiles destroyed the pumping stations on the East West pipeline leading to a loss of
approximately 700,000 barrels per day in Taraput. Iranian missiles also resulted in one death and the injury of seven
Saudi nationals working for the Saudi energy company. The Manifh production facility was also targeted resulting in
a reduction of approximately 300,000 barrels per day from its production capacity. The Kuras facility had previously been targeted as well,
resulting in a reduction of another 300,000 barrels per day in its production capacity. attacks also extended to major refining facilities
directly affecting exports of refined products to global markets. These are some of the damages brought to light so
far. The true extent will be known once the dust settles in days to come. Trump and his war criminal Israeli boss
attacked Iran to diminish its clout in the region. They ended up making the Islamic Republic even more powerful, not
just in the region, but globally. I will leave you with another Iranian Lego video released to celebrate the
capitulation of Trump following the ceasefire announcement.
But pulling strings and your vote is getting cold.
We're not just fighting for Iran. Hear this clear. Your people reached out to us. Yeah, we got the DMs here. If one nation's going to stand against the
Epstein regime's fear, it's us till the last breath. We've been doing it for years. We're standing here for everyone.
Your system never wrong. They've known all along the enemy was always you. The real Brit wore a suit and sung a patriotic song while selling their own
citizens and calling it strong. Stealing from your own people, making them bleed.
Taking tax dollars just to fund your own greed. They waking up to the lies. The illusions of burst. You screamed America first. Now you put losers first. Make
Israel great again. Your government is run by pedophiles. They ordered you to die for Israel.
They ordered you to die for Israel. They lied to you.
They saw everything. If the public ever saw the files, man, the planet would shake from the level of filth and the crimes in your wake. No wonder Jeff called you the worst. You degenerate
snake. Um, you claimed you never set foot. You went 40 plus times. You sick bastard. You cuss. We stepping up to the plate. Epstein regime got a fall. You
fake Christian elite sacrificing the ball. human. You talk real big for a man with tiny hands.
Tiny hands. Tiny things. Tiny everything. We saw everything. And word got out. The smallness kind of expands.
No wonder all those rage tweets, all those desperate rants. Overcompensating bully always causing the scene. You said you love losers. Well, look at your team.
Your government is run by Your government is run by pedophiles. They ordered you to die for Israel.
They ordered you to die for Israel. They lied to you.
That's it for me. Thank you very much for your support of this platform and our journalism. If you haven't subscribed to my channel, please do so
because that's one of the many ways you can support independent journalism. God bless you all.
Sync to video time
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Fri Apr 10, 2026 2:37 am
Lawrence Wilkerson: Ceasefire Fails, NATO Died & the U.S. Risks Civil War
Glenn Diesen
Apr 9, 2026
Lawrence Wilkerson is a retired Colonel in the US Army and the former Chief of Staff to the US Secretary of State. Colonel Wilkerson discusses why the ceasefire may be failing, why NATO is dead, and why the U.S. could be heading toward civil war.
Transcript
Welcome back. We are joined today by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, the former chief of staff to the US Secretary of State. Uh, thank you very much for coming back on the program.
Good to be with you, Glenn. I always like coming to where is it again? Norway. Sweden. Same. Same.
Well, um, we have a ceasefire now, at least so we're told. uh and uh it
appears to be already falling apart. Uh I don't want to be overly pessimistic.
It could just be a rough start. Uh but given the dispute over whether or not Lebanon should be a part of the ceasefire, it appears that a key
component is being challenged. Uh how are you assessing the situation, the possibility of actually arriving at a peace here?
First, as a military professional, I have to offer the opinion that uh I've been around a few ceasefires,
both uh chapter 6 and chapter 7 and other things, and it's difficult. It's extremely difficult. You got to give the
first week or two even to establishing it. That's the first point. Second point is with Iran, it might be even longer
because they have had a lot of their communications to outlying forces, if you will, destroyed. And so it has to be runner, motorcycle, car, you know,
whatever that they deliver the messages.
So that's the first thing about ceasefires that is demonstrating itself here possibly. But the second thing, and
you insinuated it, and it's more important, there's no inclination whatsoever of BP Netanyahu to stop in
Lebanon. Now he is murdering at the rate of a hundred or so a day civilians, not Hezbollah fighters, civilians.
And it's kind of a mystery as to why he's doing it other than Hezbollah itself is handing him another defeat just like it did in 2006.
2 minutesEven his own IDF captains are telling him this is not good. We're we're not winning this. So he usually reacts to
that sort of message by bombing the Jesus out of everything he can find. in this case, buildings, hotels, dry
cleaners, you name it, all over Beirut and the rest of Lebanon. And so you put your finger on what I think is the greatest impediment and Iran has made
that clear. If it's not a ceasefire in Lebanon as well as elsewhere, then the deal's off.
Well, it's uh I saw that uh Joe Kent, he reacted to uh Trump's outburst that uh
perhaps it's time to well, he didn't say leave NATO, but uh that's kind of the direction is going. And Joe Kent tweeted
something along the lines that uh we will leave NATO so we can take the side of Israel when Turkey and Israel eventually, you know, clash in Syria.
3 minutesWell, I guess I have a twofold question.
Do do did you see the United States leaving NATO and uh I mean I think NATO
now has the most obedient secretary general ever and so but I guess that's not the main driver here but uh will the
US leave NATO you think? And uh do you think such a clash is possible in which the US would actually Yeah. Well, if not
fighting the Turks directly, at least uh well push heavy heavy on the side of Israel.
I I think NATO's dead. I've said that before, I'll say it again. I think NATO's default. It may take a few
months, even a couple of years to die completely so that everyone pronounces it dead and says a prayer over its
grave, but it's dead. And Trump might not make any formal declaration of that,
any formal declaration of the United States leaving NATO. He's not that kind of guy. He's not definitive. He's mccurial and he's wishy-washy.
And it's very difficult to get a really cogent statement out of even more difficult today than it was in the past.
So I don't think that'll be formal in that sense, but it'll certainly happen.
It's a it's a fatal comple I think already. Ukraine has put the dagger in its heart. But the dagger was already there when we stiffed Russia after
George HW Bush and didn't follow up on our promises to essentially allow Russia into Europe.
Every president after that in his own way starting with Bill Clinton and 78 days of bombing uh put paid to that
promise. So that's that. The other aspect is Erdogan or whomever might take over for him. Fidan or whomever in
Turkey is not stupid enough to make an enemy in your face of the United States at
this particular juncture. Were he to be antagonistic to Washington from a distance as it were, I I could buy that
on certain issues like the Kurds and Syria and Israel eventually, but I don't
see any burgeoning relationship between Israel other than an antagonistic one.
And if we come off of Israel, which I think we are going to do, remember I think Israel is our tool, not the other way around. in the very near future,
possibly within the next 18 to 24 months, either as a force majour move
away or a pronounced and solid we're through with you move away. I think we're going to and that's going to
really disturb a lot of these billionaires who've been placing their bets on this relationship and pumping money into the Congress and the
presidency and elsewhere in the country t trying to persuade everyone that they can that Israel is essential to the US's
defense in Southwest Asia. At one point it was, but now we're leaving. Mark my words, we're leaving.
we are either going to go back to offshore balancing, which we should never should have abandoned it. Um, or
we're just going to leave and not even do offshore balancing because we frankly are getting limited in our maritime
assets and our maritime assets are getting increasingly dated. Take our carriers for example, which have shown their vulnerability in this conflict.
They will not get any closer than that uh what we call in the Pacific the thousandmile line.
That's the reality of carriers in this world of drones and high-speed missiles.
So we're seeing a transformation that's taking place in a number of stages on a number of levels now with this war in
southwest Asia which incidentally which is what a lot of people like General Van Riper who did the Millennium Challenge war game in 2002 I think it was maybe
three and others who have studied this situation have predicted that this essentially would be one the end of the
US presence on the ground anyway in any significant way in southwest Asia in the Levant even in North Africa even and it
would be the end of eventually Israel as a Jewish state in the Levant. It could prosper as a democracy were to be able
to achieve that and it will probably be the end of even maritime interests in
the region since we are now exclusively only dependent on ourselves for both LNG
and oil. And the only country that we have that ties us really ties us strongly to this radar moves other than
the global impact on the economy and so forth were to be closed for an extended period of time is Japan because Japan
till gets much of its product through the state or moves from southwest Asia.
That really has been the strategic interest of the United States for some time. Not its own petroleum but Japan's
petroleum. And that relationship is getting very dicey too at the same time for many of the same reasons colored a bit differently. Korea,
the other countries in the region that are beginning to see what we really are.
Um mo most staggeringly Korea because I think what I'm hearing from peninsula is get out of here, leave. The faster the
better, but they just don't have the politicians yet to take that on and do it. Um maybe Kim Jong-il might help him
a little bit. Uh Kim Jong-un. So it's all unraveling. The the entire global
framework that we crafted after World War II mostly at our immediate behest.
It's unraveling or mistakes you might say. But it was inevitable. It was inevitable. As Coen Pal said to me in 1989 at Fort McFersonson, Georgia,
they're all gone, Larry. the Thatchers, the Medrons, the Kohl's, the Majors,
they're all gone. When they are all gone, and when people who don't have their feet in the war, even as 12y olds,
are in charge, the world is going to change majorly. And you're not going to like it, Larry. He was right.
Why did he say that? Why I know why they left? I mean, but why why why are there no qualified politicians replacing them?
he had seen, and this is my surmise because we only talked about that specific issue a couple of times over
the years ensuing 16 years. most notably when I was working for him in a private
capacity between 97 my retirement and his assumption with the state department
along with me in 2000 December 2000 um when we were doing things like going to Nigeria to oversee with Jimmy Carter and
the Carter Institute the uh election at that time of Okanooi uh and other things
like that going to Haiti for example to see if we could calm things down there and we had a chance to chat about it again. And I I think his principal
concern was that what HW Bush had started and even he himself at the end
of his term in 93 had started to be foul the nest of that is a reproachma of
significance with Moscow bringing them into the political alliance as well as the military alliance and then spreading
it out into a new European security architecture which would include Russia.
When he was thinking about the possibilities of that actually happening and realizing how fragile the chances
were that it would happen, then he saw chaos. And he saw the chaos not so much because there were no coals or
meterrons. That was part of it certainly, but because the memory in the population at large, like most memories
of cataclysmic events, would be so fragile, if not gone, that there'd be no force, if you will, to keep them
together and no force to keep us in their midst. And I think he was right.
So across yeah NATO we're fragmenting uh as you said NATO is dead in East Asia be
it South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, they're beginning to reconsider some of this alliance system. Uh and uh but how about
West Asia? Uh do you do how do you see the United States either leaving or being kicked out of of West Asia? And uh
is this because the Gulf States decide uh the alliance is a vulnerability? Is it that the United States uh loses
interest or is the US essentially expelled by for example Iran holding on to the straight of Hermus and putting crushing limitations?
That's a huge question and I don't want to conflate Southwest Asia with West Asia in general. And by that I simply
mean I don't want to conflate what's happening in Iran and what is going to force us out of our ground positions in the Arab countries and possibly Egypt
too. I I suspect Egypt I suspect they're going to get tired of us too. And we may get tired of giving them the $3.6 billion every year just to get them to
keep the peace treaty with Israel. After all, there's no Israel to keep the peace treaty with. There won't be any money for the Egyptians no matter who's there
sicier or whatever. But I think it's different as you go north. Um, you start with Turkey, you have to throw Afghanistan in there, Pakistan in there.
Of course, you have to throw Western India in there because Western India is very different from Eastern India. You
have to throw the caucuses, I think, in there. You have to look at what's happening and what is the principal axis
for this inexraable shift of power. And it's the same principal axis that existed when it came the other way
being to the west and made America if you will. um it's going back the other way and that's the principal axis
through Duchamp Bay, Samuran, Tashkant and so forth on into Jing province in
China and I think that's going to make that area extremely important particularly when all the pipelines that
are pumping under construction envision for construction are finished and oil is
moving more or less north south north rather than east west and fueling these economies to the point that they're even
greater than they are today. If you look at the economies in Central Asia right now, they are staggeringly successful.
You it doesn't matter that they have Nazerbayas and people like that in charge of them, autocrats basically with golden statues to themselves in the town square.
They are very successful. the hotels that we used to equate with Paris and with London. Well, sometimes with
London, the Ritzens maybe would meet that criteria. And then you look at what's in these cities now and they
don't even compare. These hotels are magnificent both in their grandiloquence and in the cost of their rooms and the
luxury of staying there. Central Asia is sitting on top of enough natural gas and oil at a time when the transition is
going to have to take place otherwise we're going to destroy ourselves. But that's 50 to 75 years probably. They're
sitting on top of the energy in the world that is most important. Not least of which is under the Caspian Sea if
they can ever figure out how to deal with that. Um, so I think those relationships per force are going to have to be maintained.
South of there is a different ballgame altogether. And I include in the south of there, the southern rim of India. Um,
and I include southwest Asia because I think China is going to make sure we don't come back once we're out. And I'm
confident we're going to be out substantially out. We'll sell B we'll sell battle groups and strike groups and things through the south or through the
North Arabian Sea and through the Indian Ocean in general. And maybe our relationship with the Indian Navy will stay solid because though Delhi is not
all that happy with it, the Indian Navy is very happy with operating with the US Navy. They're learning a lot from it and
the interoperability is growing. um that might become so obvious to the civilian leadership in Delhi though that it gets
curbed considerably. Not to say that India and the United States aren't going to stay fairly close. They are I think
just because of China if nothing else but it's going to be a different world.
It's going to be an entirely different world and we don't seem to recognize that Glenn. We don't seem to recognize it. And where we do recognize it, we're fighting it tooth and nail. Look at what
we just started doing with the Israelis being the line share of the bombing.
We're bombing the hell out of that railroad that China had finished all the way to the Persian Gulf and was going to come up into the belly of the Caucasus
and be its final southern road base road initiative. They're bombing it. They're bombing the be Jesus out of it now.
Every day they're bombing that railroad.
Um that's not because they want Iran to not have a railroad.
That's because they know where that railroad's going. And that railroad will obiate almost immediately in conjunction
with the other four, most of which in some way or other debouched into Europe, north, central, central, south.
That railroad will take 60% of the commerce that China now generates, which is probably about 40% of the world's
commerce off the seas where America has domain, if you will, or thinks it still
does, and put it on land. We don't want that. We don't want that at all any more than those Portuguese wanted it when they did it before some thousand years
ago and drove the Portuguese Portuguese off the water because they're charging too much for commercial shipping. So
they built a land route and the land route was cheaper by quite a margin and it put the Portuguese out of business.
We're going to get put out of business in terms of maritime supremacy because land is going to be the essence of economic contact. And these pipelines
prove it too. running north, south, and east, west. They're not over the water.
They're on land. U and I think that's where we're going. The straight over Muzra Baba Mandib straight will still be there
and commerce will still be flowing, but not nearly to the extent it is today because we're going over land because China is saying we're going over land.
I feel like this is the revenge of Halford Macker. That is the to an extent. Yeah.
Yeah. the the whole concern of the British. Yeah.
Look at what Putin's got to do. He's got to make a decision here. And I I see him thinking about it. Every now and then he'll make a remark or Sergey Lra will
make a remark that leads me to believe that they're thinking about it and they have people working on it. But which way does he go? I mean, with the Arctic
doing what it's doing right now, and I just read the latest report, man, are we getting sea ice melt four, five times
faster than we thought we would. Um, and that's got its own negative ramifications, too. But Russia's got the
longest navigable coastline. So, all of a sudden, Russia, who didn't have a warm water port, has a coastline that demands
maritime power. So, he's got to make a choice here. Um, I mean, he's got significant maritime power, principally
in his submarine fleet, but he's got it elsewhere, too. But I I suspect we're going to see Putin building more ice breakers in particular, and he already
has a hoorde of them, and other ships that can fly the Arctic as the Arctic becomes more pliable. And he's going to
have to think about becoming at least in that direction, a maritime power. So,
he's going to be both. He's going to be the world's biggest outside China land power and he's also going to be a maritime power. And I heard someone the other day, I think it was Doug McGregor,
I wanted to reach into the screen and shake Doug. I wanted to shake him. He said China had no maritime interest.
The largest deep water fishing fleet in the world. 6,000 ships fishing so ardently in the Antarctic that the
Antarctic Council had an emergency meeting over the depletion of the krill,
the basic building block of protein on the face of the earth. And so, I mean,
China has no maritime interest. Come on,
Doug. Wake up. You're too much a soldier. Um, I like Doug, so I'm just saying that because I want to hurl
rockets at him. China does have interest in the deep sea. very very integral
integral interest. We get focused on the South China Sea, the D-9 line, Taiwan and all that crap. Meanwhile, they are
fishing all over the world and they just built the world's state-of-the-art port on the west coast of Peru. Um, and
that's maritime. So, there is an interest there by that state which is the magnet of all this change really
because of its economic power. But Russia's got a decision to make. Do we go both ways?
Do we look east and west? Do we look north and south? Um do we just be remain a a major land power 10 time zones or
whatever? Or do we start courting people in the rest of the world? And that explains, I think, why Putin seems to
have this incredible affection, that's the wrong term, attraction to Donald Trump because he's the present
president, however, faultily of the United States. And Putin doesn't want to destroy that relationship. He's still
looking in that direction, and he's looking in the other direction, too. And he's looking north. So, he's got a real
tapestry to deal with. And I so far I've seen I think the competence in his administration and the people in general
even in the Duma and some that can handle this but can we replace Putin and
can we have a you know have a leader afterwards who might be even smarter than Putin or better at dealing with all
these multiple responsibilities that are falling on Russia.
They are the key geostrategic location outside China. And now that they're tacitly allied with China, they
present the world with a tremendous challenge. Europe to Europe in a a significant way. Europe has to
accommodate them and learn to live with them and benefit from that living. It can't fight them. It it'll be destroyed
if it fights them. It'll destroy itself if it tries to fight it. And that's that's my big concern about this US approach to China that's all bullets,
bayonets, and sanctions. It's stupid. It's just downright stupid. I think unlike the 19th or 20th century,
the the Chinese and the Russians aren't even though they are land powers,
they're not willing to seed the the oceans to the United States. And I think you're right that the Chinese
have both the road belt and the road that is they're going to focus on the sea as well. Uh but uh the Russians as well they I think they see their
territory is important to tie together the Eurasian continent as east west also north south especially with this international north south transportation
corridor which the US and Israel is as you said bombing now in Iran but uh they they also have the ambitions of being a
maritime power. You mentioned the Arctic route of course, but if you look at the way they are flirting with countries
like Indonesia, you you see that they do have some significant naval aspirations.
So they've been a naval power, a real one since Peter the Great at least, and they intend to remain one. Uh, and when
they sailed that oil tanker into I think it made port in Matanzas, Cuba. Um, that was in your face and all in the in the Monroe Doctrines, the Trump doctrine,
whatever you want to call it, call it what you want, in your face. I'm in Matanza floating war. And also two years
earlier when they sent Korskov, the frigot, and all my military mates said,
"Oh, that frigot, that's nothing. That frigot had hyper velocity missiles on it that would sink a US aircraft carrier in
a heartbeat um Kiraov I think her name was and they sent a a nuclear attack sub in there too. So the Monroe doctrine has
been dead ever since they did that if it weren't dead beforehand. So Putin knows what he's doing. He do he does it selectively. He does it for real
fundamental reasons that are positive for him and I would argue positive for what I'm talking about.
You have to accommodate this power shift, not fight it. Because if you fight it, you'll wind up in John
Mirshimemer's sandbox with the sucid trap and you'll get beaten,
but so will a lot of the world.
Well, this is the problem though, the the adjusting to the new world. I think this for for me this was the first thing I thought about when I read the article
by uh Krahammer back in 1990 when he wrote about the unipolar moment he coined the term you know because he he
had a very rational approach saying well so much power is concentrated now in the future probably the world will have a multipolar distribution of power and
then we'll embrace that but it doesn't work like this because you have leaders who are ideologically committed now to having one center power even after
realities have have changed So it's very difficult for but you know you have some you know even big brazinski you know the
national security advisor he uh he you know he wrote almost the bible on the unipolar moment with the grand chess board. However less focus he gets is on
this book on the on the choice. I think it was in 2012 when he recognized that well actually the distribution of power is becoming multipolar. America has a
choice. they can either accommodate it and carve out you know the position as a first among equals uh that is a very
favorable format for a multipolar world organized by the US or it can resist it but then see the rest of the world uh
essentially create a multipolar world in opposition to the US a balancing something along bricks and uh you know
so he he took at least some pragmatism with him but uh but at this point you know we already build an ideal
ideological structure around us being you know the hedgemony of the west is is the foundation of having peace and
stability in the world you know so this is uh we there's no adjusting to reality I mean people often leave out the human
aspect here that assuming that's also flaw by the way in political realism which uh yeah both me and Mimer belong
to that is it's often the assumption of the rational state I think uh it's not very professional at all.
And they forget people. They forget people. They don't read They don't read a lot of poetry.
I may be mistaken. John and I have never talked about that. I'd love to talk to about it. Do you read any poetry, John?
um anybody that reads good poetry and I'm talking about all over the world from Persia to China to you know the
English poets who we so tout all the time usually dwelling in the uh dwelling
in the 18th century 19th century 18th century mostly but um if you read poetry and you understand what poetry's power
is then you understand that there is an element to human life that is quite significant that has nothing to do with
rationality and everything to do with emotion, human emotion, which is probably one of the most unpredictable
things on the face of the earth. You never know when it's going to go up or down or do this or do that. Look at
economic crises, for example. Most economists who are worth a damn will tell you that the key to a really deep
economic crisis is when the people lose confidence in the system.
You can take all the statistics and put them out there and array them and say, "Oh, there's going to be a depression.
There's going to be a recession." If you still have the people's confidence, you can work your way through it. You can just see a few of those things
indicating something bad is coming and the people latch on to that, the people being the majority, and lose confidence
in the system and it completely collapses. That's really what happened in 29 to 32 in this country when we had
a great depression. Because if you look at the power indices and you look at what we had, you could see what we were going to do in World War II. You could
see why Yamamoto looked at Pearl Harbor burning, apocryphily or not, but very accurately said, "I fear what we've done
as awakened a sleeping tiger and filled it with a fearful resolve." He was absolutely right because he as a young
captain, he'd been in America. He had seen us from New York to California,
from Michigan to Texas, and he knew what we were capable of. And that's what we're talking about when we talk about confidence and people doing what they
have to do when they have to do it and doing it more based on emotion than on strategic calculation. Both are
necessary. Of course, the Mir Shimemers and the poets are necessary, but if you forget the poets, you're lost. You're
going down. that famous poem by Matthew Arnold which is not really touted much in the world of
literature except by the real cognacente and those lines at the end of that are
30 minutesjust a he wrote at the end of the 1800s in the romantic period and he predicted
everything that's happening today and the poem that's the most emotional in that sense is do beach where He
concludes with, "And we are here as on a darkling plane swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight where
ignorant armies clash by night." That's where we are. It's where we are today.
Of course, he was talking about the Huxley brothers and John Henry Cardinal Newman. Religion dying in the world and science taking over. But aren't we
looking at the same thing today in different clothing? Pete Hath is trying to bring religion back just like John
Henry Cardinal Newman did with the Catholic Church. But Newman was a lot smarter than Pete Hath. But we've we're
still in this same struggle. At least America is. And it's causing it to taint its foreign policy. Um, where else do
31 minutesyou get someone who calls the Pope's emissary in and chews him out for what Leo said and essentially tells him uh
apparently if it's being reported accurately and I have sources that tell me it is being reported accurately sources in the Vatican
that it's accurate that in fact we actually suggested we might want to do a null on the pope. You know, we might
want to move the Catholic Church to America like the French did. Um, that's how stupid and ignorant we are today.
We're playing in the past with forces that once unleashed are extremely dangerous and difficult to get back in
check again. And we have an idiot at the top. Um, and we're in this period that you and I were just discussing, however,
briefly. Um, and this is not the period where you want an idiot leading the country that's declining against the
country that's ascending. You just don't because then you get what you and me shammer are talking about. Well, I won't attribute it to you, but you get what
John's talking about. Inevitability of a war and we're going to lose. We're going to lose big time. My concern is the whole globe is going to lose because this is going to be nuclear.
Well, the problem is often when uh the social scientists put together theories,
but it assumes it's the same people when uh when we're rising as when we're declining. I think we need more
strategies and theories on how to manage decline because you know when site is rising with economically or yeah
whatever it's you know they usually then begin to embrace very cosmopolitan mindset openness all of this when there's decline it's in human nature you
retreat into the tribe then after this you will have more vicious nationalism into paranoia
yes very much so so you know when declining. It's not just we have to plan for weaker army um uh worse economy but
you also have to take into account a very tribal mindset uh more angry more vulgar more aggressive and uh more
hateful of adversaries. I mean um I I find it often shocking that people don't appreciate how how hateful we have
become. I mean, if you open any newspaper and read about our adversaries being the Chinese, the Iranians, the Russians, you know, forget about even
discussing rationally what their interests are, but the way they are portrayed, I mean, there's something horribly happening in our societies and
we can't even talk about it. It's quite fascinating. Um, and a man manifestation of that, a recent manifestation, not that it hadn't
manifested itself before, was the assassination of Charlie Kirk, which incidentally, Glenn, I don't know if you're following it at all, but we we
still don't know who did that. We know categorically that the person they arrested, the rifle they have in possession did not do the assassination.
So, what are they doing? What is the Trump administration doing with this incident, which doesn't rival the presidential assassination or even Dr.
King's assassination or Bobby Kennedy's assassination, but it was an assassination of a leading figure and it
associated itself directly with Israel and the US relationship with Israel in a way that many people in the intelligence
community in this country think is damning of Israel and damning of its prime minister. And yet, we're not even looking at it anymore. I I can't even find it anywhere in the press. Um,
this is terrible. that we do things like this, that we just hide these crimes and push them away when we can't find a
convenient scapegoat or, you know, Lee Harvey Oswald, for example. I'm not trying to compare Charlie Kirk with John
Kennedy, but it is the same kind of phenomenon and it's the same kind of symptom of decay of empire and decay of thinking and decay of brain power. Um,
it you could even go back to the Vietnam War and say that's where it started significantly for the empire.
Anyway, it's a mess. It's a mess. And we're not going to get out of it by fighting our way out, by sanctioning our way out, by challenging everyone in the
world to a duel. That's not going to work.
Yeah. It contributes to further polarization as well. I mean, if at least if there's openness and investigations then and airing out the
trouble problems, then uh a society can uh at least organize find consensus around the truth. because whenever it is
hidden then country will society will always polarize and follow convenient narratives instead. Um I I did want to
get back to something you said before though in terms of uh the consequences of of the Iran war. you mentioned that
uh uh if there is an Israel and I thought uh yeah this is an interesting point because it begs the question to
what extent uh there's permanent damage being done has already been done during this war which might not be over I would
bet it's not uh but do do you see Israel being in danger and can the Gulf states recover from this uh essentially go back to the way things were?
I think not. um especially your latter statement to the to the way things were. I think that's impossible.
If it's not impossible at this moment,
you and I are talking, Glenn, it's impossible because Iran is going to make it impossible. I think that's a fatal
plea. And I think NBS has already shifted the sovereign wealth funds plans away from Israel and towards Syria
instead. In fact, I have it on really good authority that he's already shifted all that investment he was going to make in a pipeline that would run up through
northern Saudi Arabia into Israel eventually, Hifa, and then across the Chahhan probably. And Israel was going
to benefit not only for trans shshipment fees, but also it was going to get its oil for, you know, now and forever, if you will, from Saudi Arabia that way.
Now, he's shifted all of that over to Syria. Quite a a decision if it has been made. And I, like I said, I have some
pretty good sources that tell me it has been made. That money is going to go that way. Now, well, that's going to dry Israel up unless the United States is
prepared to fund all of its petroleum where from wherever it might come. And that that also includes funding them
developing the oil field and gas field they stole in the Mediterranean from the Gazins. It belonged to them, but now
they're stealing it from Gaza and the one that they have in their own territorial water or their own economic zone. I forget which it is in the
eastern mid extreme eastern mid and they're stealing Lebanons. That's one reason he wants to go ahead with Lebanon because he doesn't want Lebanon ever to
recover to the point it could challenge it. This is all going to go to hell in the handbag very shortly because of the
moves that are being made by much more powerful countries in the oil and gas markets than Israel. In fact, Israel has
no power in those markets at all except what it can shoot or kill for. And it showed that with Mark Rich and Glen Core and all that stealing from Sodom Zay,
stealing from Syria when we had the war with Iraq. the real reason for the war with Iraq. If you've read Glenn Gary
Vogler's book and also Dennis Fritz's book, Deadly Betrayal, you know that the war was fought for Israel as much as
anything else, which is why Israel was pitching for it. So, I think their days are very, very numbered. If they were to
suddenly shift to find the political oomph and the political will to shift to a one-state solution that
included a truly democratic state since Lud took over, Israel has not been a democracy. That's all a farce.
But if they were to shift and if they were to accommodate despite the power of the wound, as Yaser Aarat used to say
all the time, despite that, if they were to shift and have a real democracy that treated its citizens roughly the same
across the spectrum of citizens that would then generate, then Israel could survive, I think, and Palestine could
come back in a significant way. the right of return, the return to the 67,
all the UN resolutions could be fulfilled. It isn't going to happen because of crooks like Tony Blair and Donald Trump. But that is something that
could happen if we can get rid of this detritus that is plaguing us now. These grifters, these money hungry bastards.
If we could get rid of them and get some decent leadership across the board,
including in the UN, new secretary general is desperately needed. and a revamping and revising of the UN Security Council is desperately needed.
And the first thing I'd do is kick Britain off. I wouldn't even let Britain be a member of the UN Security Council anymore. They're just there on our
toenails, if you will, standing on our toenails and hurting our feet. So if we could do these things, we could do them in a decade, maybe a decade and a half,
and we could get the world squared away again, as it were, and maybe at least partially salvage some of our reputation and some of our power in the world that
we've twittered away. I don't think it's going to happen. I don't think it's going to happen.
No, I saw a comment by Tucker Carlson today in which was arguing that why is it that no president um well why is that
every single president is more interested in govern governing the world instead of governing the United States?
I thought that was interesting especially when it came to Trump because I thought he was the ultimate president who would essentially you know say okay
I will abandon the empire to save the republic but I haven't seen that in any way. If anything, he seems to be doubling down on the mistakes which he
was uh criticizing when he was in opposition, but then you know follows the same policies
which in my international relations book which kind of focuses on Fred Hartman's the relations of nations which is a
terrific book in its sixth edition. It's still a ter terrific book. Um those are
small people. People like that are small people. They're the people that throw the rocks in the cogs of international
relations. I like that phrase, too. Fred used it at at Newport at the Naval War College when he was there lecturing. The
relations of nations. Not only is it sort of poetic, it also says it better. What are international relations? Well,
they're the relations of nations.
And one of the first prerogatives of a smart power that it should avail itself of 100% of the time is never have more enemies than you can handle.
Look at what we've done. We've created an enemy out of the whole freaking planet.
It's incredible the terrible leadership we've had since roughly HW Bush. Uh it's
probably unprecedent I can't say that because there were some really poor times in there but we weren't so hardpressed by international relations
and power but we've had some terrible presidents. Um probably more terrible ones than great ones. Certainly more
terrible than great ones. Um but we we've been damned for a generation here and we need to get undamned.
We've been damned in our Congress. Now we're damned in our Supreme Court, too.
I was looking at some of the opinions expressed the other day. We, you know,
we have this amendment going to change the Constitution with a very short amendment that would just
eliminate the effects of Citizens United and the decisions before it, which would be a terrific boon to our political
process to get all this black money out of it. Um, and we've been stunned at how fast it's moving. We already have 26
states. We only need 39. I think twothirds of the states, twothirds of the Congress, threequarters of the states. Um, I think we're going to get
it and we're probably going to get it within the next five or six years, which will be a real boon to our political process. But five or six years, you can destroy yourself.
Uh, and with this kind of leadership we have right now, we just might do that. Yeah. I was speaking to Judge Npalitano.
actually had him on this program and uh he expects a civil war in uh so there's a lot of pessimism going but uh you know
in what you mentioned with the institutions and all being corrupted under this power is one thing but but also the international system one should
ask whether or not uh um empire hedge money becomes a curse because if you go back to the 1990s
uh you know not only was the US admired by the whole world almost but the leading foreign policy your strategy by China, Russia was to get along as well
as possible with the United States. It's a, you know, well, I wouldn't only put the US in this category. The Europeans have been no better themselves. I mean,
they were also seen as a preferable partner to a lot of countries. But the way you see now, uh, essentially all of this being reversed, the power
diminished, uh, the reputation diminished.
I I have a feeling if we hadn't gone down Crowhammer's path of uh you know not not just the hedgemony of the US but this effort of
having the hedgemony of the political west uh it it could have been very different but you know we are where we
are and uh I I I did want to ask you though how you see again I just want to get back to the ceasefire again to go full circle here.
How what do you make how do you make sense of this? Because as the ceasefire is now in place, we also see troops being mobilized or sent to the region.
Uh is this is this just as a insurance like reassurance? Because in Iran, of course, they're not trusting for good
reason much of the diplomacy. They see it as being very deceptive. Is this primarily an effort by Trump to get out
of a horrible war he didn't want to be in or do you see Trump also buying time for a possible escalation? Uh I mean it
doesn't necessarily have to be one or the other. It could be of course you know trying to end the war or taking advantage to ramp it up. But how do you make sense of this ceasefire?
I think there are two ways to look at it and more than two but two principal ways to look at it. one it's another subtrauge just like you suggested and I
46 minutesthink probably Abbasi the foreign minister of Iran is looking at it that way right now and maybe Peshkin the president and maybe the speaker of the
mariss and others too I would if I were they and that that that is simply to say Netanyahu's objection strenuous you know
I I'm going to keep my war going in Lebanon to hell with you and your new diplomacy was all orchestrated ahead of
time and he is playing the bad guy and the guy whose badness would give the impression to the Iranians that this was
a genuine effort. And so what we're going to do is two or three days from now, we're going to blow the hell out of them again. Um or maybe even make an
assault on the uranium power. I think that's what we were doing earlier. By the way, we lost some very expensive
aircraft. We lost some people we haven't even reported yet. We lost assets in a way that made us look as stupid
really Glenn as stupid militarily as Jimmy Carter's military looked like in what was it 78 or whatever that we
pulled off Operation Eagle Claw and we had the helicopter pick up and run into the C130 in the desert in Iran, crash and burn and kill eight or nine people.
This was even dumber than that. So that had to be a shock to old PD Eggs and a shock as it was reported to Trump too.
But there doesn't seem to be any dissension there. They're still working together, sadly enough. And so that's one thing that could be happening. We
could be trying to lull the Iranians again into something that they think we're going to cease fire. They're think we're going to do diplomacy and we're
going to hit them again in whatever way we can. That's one possibility. The other possibilities were serious about this. We're serious. And Donald Trump
finally figured out after that story broke in the New York Times and elsewhere about how he made his decision
to start the war. BB was the sole counselor. Everyone else from General Kaine to JD Vance to Marco Rubio Pete Haggith was a sycopant all the way.
But everyone else was cautioning and BB was saying just do it. You'll see they'll collapse. they'll collapse. Go ahead and do it. I think that's probably
a pretty accurate summary of what the decisionmaking environment was like.
So, is he really serious? And being serious would mean figure out a way you can get out of this war and declare victory and to hell with Netanyahu.
If he's really serious, then we have some hard negotiation ahead of us and so do the Iranians. Um, I mean, I got their
10 points right here. same 10 points I would have laid out if I were they reparations end of all sanctions gone
from southwest Asia you know all these things will that be negotiable will they be able to work out something if they do go
49 minutesto genuine diplomacy in Pakistan or wherever they might do it I think I think it would if we had a team on our
side led by a president on our side who were serious about finding finally serious about stopping a war. Um, but I
don't think that's going to happen. I think we're more likely to find a muddle through or the first thing I described,
we're we're trying to fool them again and strike them in the middle of it or we'll get somewhere down the road and strike them again because Trump will get
mad and angry and realize he can't negotiate his way out. Not in any way that'll look good. And we're coming on the midterms and right now all the polls
show the Republicans are going to take a shellacking.
And I do mean a shellacking. So I mean if it's a free a reasonably free and fair election, which is a question too.
If it's an election period is a question. Um so I we don't have anything good to look
forward to except maybe in the second possibility if some success were to be achieved. And meanwhile, Glenn Hexith is
preacher packing. I call it old southern term. You put the good strawberries on the top and the rotten ones on the bottom. He's preacher packing the
military in all ranks. He's getting Christian nationalists everywhere he can in the rank structure so that when time
comes for the military to make a decision one way or the other with regard to the elections or whatever,
he'll have at least a sizable contingent in the military that'll take his side.
Is that the reason behind the all the purge, the firing of the general? You see this as being uh building a Trump loyal army?
Absolutely. and the way he's recruiting the states he's recruiting from the Christian nationalist counties he's
recruiting from the evangelical base he's recruiting from the conversions at the end of advanced individual training
51 minutesin the army for example they go to the river and baptize 60 or 70 recruits in the name of Jesus and God
you can't make this stuff up I mean this is something I was watching you've probably seen this movie uh Orlando
Bloom sort of grew to maturity in it. Um it's about the Crusades. Uh Ridley Scott did the movie and it takes a lot of
license with Rishard Cordelon and the crusaders and and Salahadin and the
confrontation between the crusaders and Salahedin on two or three occasions. one where he takes Jerusalem of course and
or Orlando Boom Bloom is allowed to march the uh citizens out because he's been such a great fighter and everything
has respect for him and all. So it's Hollywood but the times and the customs and the actions of the crusaders I think
are very well displayed. They were there for money and profit. They were there for money, profit, and land. Oh, I'm here for the pope. Where's the pope?
Where's the pope? Have you got him here with you? Oh, he's not here. I'm here for money and profit and land. I mean that that and even if the pope were there, he'd say, "Of course you're
looking for money, profit, and land for the Catholic Church." So, you know, Pete Hexth has this warped interpretation of
the Crusades, but that's what he believes. I'm convinced that's what he believes. And when he gets down on his knees and prays in front of the troops
and begs them to get down with him and pray, he's serious. He's serious. That's a dangerous man.
Well, if this is preparing for well,
what could essentially become a civil war, it's quite uh Yes.
Yeah. quite quite troubling. But u could be a civil war with with different segments waring in it. You could have
the Christian nationalists, the Dominionists, the dispensationalists and such looking to achieve Armageddon a
little a little closer to home. And you could have genuine Christians in there who take to the streets or whatever too
to protest that manipulation of and ultimate denigration of Jesus Christ.
Because there are some like that who are really getting angry at Hegath and angry at people like John Hegy sending money to settlers on the West Bank even now.
Um and there are other people who are getting very very angry at the MAGA crowd and some of the MAGA faithful getting very very angry at the people
getting angry with them. So you have the potential for a lot of different people out there on the streets and we have 400 million guns in this country.
more guns than people is quite an extraordinary statistic. H well,
some of them were floating across the Canadian border underneath drones. You heard about that one? No.
54 minutesThese entrepreneurs up there in Wisconsin and Minnesota, they put 10 or 12 Smith and Wesson P38s or whatever
under a drone in a bag. They only cost maybe $400 or $500 in in the US. They float them across to a buddy's backyard,
drop them in the backyard, pick them up later, and sell them in Toronto for two grand a piece.
It's It's the invasion of Canada.
Yeah, that's what you get for these new technologies. It's driving the FBI crazy.
Well, thank you for taking time. We're almost out of time. So, uh, it's, uh,
yeah, I wish there would be some more happy news, more optimism given that the war possibly came to an end and the
ceasefire still is in place. One would hope. Yeah, we would have some optimism, but uh, I don't see it quite yet. But,
um,
55 minutesI don't either. And I tell you, the place I would most not like to be because I'd probably get so angry I'd get myself killed real quickly. it is in Lebanon where they're just killing men,
women, children, anybody that happens to be under their bonds.
Yeah. Yeah. So BBC reported on it that Israel had struck Hezbollah command centers across the country. And this
Well, what you're seeing is just residential buildings being blown up with women, children, and men. Yeah.
Scattered. So it's quite horrible. I have a couple of friends there who tell me that it is absolutely the worst they've seen and they've been there for
a long time. So, they've seen a lot of bad times.
You don't know where to go. You don't know where to turn. You walk out in the street and there's a bomb.
Just feels like everyone can see where this is going and no one is trying to,
you know, go for course correction. It's not just the middle Middle East. You can say the same about Europe. I I can see where this is going going. That is the
war against Russia. This is going to escalate very soon. And uh it's just it's very predictable where we're going
to go and again nothing. It's quite depressing.
There are some people out there with gasoline cans just sprinkling it. Yeah.
Well, thank you for the time. Thanks again. However morose it was
Glenn Diesen
Apr 9, 2026
Lawrence Wilkerson is a retired Colonel in the US Army and the former Chief of Staff to the US Secretary of State. Colonel Wilkerson discusses why the ceasefire may be failing, why NATO is dead, and why the U.S. could be heading toward civil war.
Transcript
Welcome back. We are joined today by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, the former chief of staff to the US Secretary of State. Uh, thank you very much for coming back on the program.
Good to be with you, Glenn. I always like coming to where is it again? Norway. Sweden. Same. Same.
Well, um, we have a ceasefire now, at least so we're told. uh and uh it
appears to be already falling apart. Uh I don't want to be overly pessimistic.
It could just be a rough start. Uh but given the dispute over whether or not Lebanon should be a part of the ceasefire, it appears that a key
component is being challenged. Uh how are you assessing the situation, the possibility of actually arriving at a peace here?
First, as a military professional, I have to offer the opinion that uh I've been around a few ceasefires,
both uh chapter 6 and chapter 7 and other things, and it's difficult. It's extremely difficult. You got to give the
first week or two even to establishing it. That's the first point. Second point is with Iran, it might be even longer
because they have had a lot of their communications to outlying forces, if you will, destroyed. And so it has to be runner, motorcycle, car, you know,
whatever that they deliver the messages.
So that's the first thing about ceasefires that is demonstrating itself here possibly. But the second thing, and
you insinuated it, and it's more important, there's no inclination whatsoever of BP Netanyahu to stop in
Lebanon. Now he is murdering at the rate of a hundred or so a day civilians, not Hezbollah fighters, civilians.
And it's kind of a mystery as to why he's doing it other than Hezbollah itself is handing him another defeat just like it did in 2006.
2 minutesEven his own IDF captains are telling him this is not good. We're we're not winning this. So he usually reacts to
that sort of message by bombing the Jesus out of everything he can find. in this case, buildings, hotels, dry
cleaners, you name it, all over Beirut and the rest of Lebanon. And so you put your finger on what I think is the greatest impediment and Iran has made
that clear. If it's not a ceasefire in Lebanon as well as elsewhere, then the deal's off.
Well, it's uh I saw that uh Joe Kent, he reacted to uh Trump's outburst that uh
perhaps it's time to well, he didn't say leave NATO, but uh that's kind of the direction is going. And Joe Kent tweeted
something along the lines that uh we will leave NATO so we can take the side of Israel when Turkey and Israel eventually, you know, clash in Syria.
3 minutesWell, I guess I have a twofold question.
Do do did you see the United States leaving NATO and uh I mean I think NATO
now has the most obedient secretary general ever and so but I guess that's not the main driver here but uh will the
US leave NATO you think? And uh do you think such a clash is possible in which the US would actually Yeah. Well, if not
fighting the Turks directly, at least uh well push heavy heavy on the side of Israel.
I I think NATO's dead. I've said that before, I'll say it again. I think NATO's default. It may take a few
months, even a couple of years to die completely so that everyone pronounces it dead and says a prayer over its
grave, but it's dead. And Trump might not make any formal declaration of that,
any formal declaration of the United States leaving NATO. He's not that kind of guy. He's not definitive. He's mccurial and he's wishy-washy.
And it's very difficult to get a really cogent statement out of even more difficult today than it was in the past.
So I don't think that'll be formal in that sense, but it'll certainly happen.
It's a it's a fatal comple I think already. Ukraine has put the dagger in its heart. But the dagger was already there when we stiffed Russia after
George HW Bush and didn't follow up on our promises to essentially allow Russia into Europe.
Every president after that in his own way starting with Bill Clinton and 78 days of bombing uh put paid to that
promise. So that's that. The other aspect is Erdogan or whomever might take over for him. Fidan or whomever in
Turkey is not stupid enough to make an enemy in your face of the United States at
this particular juncture. Were he to be antagonistic to Washington from a distance as it were, I I could buy that
on certain issues like the Kurds and Syria and Israel eventually, but I don't
see any burgeoning relationship between Israel other than an antagonistic one.
And if we come off of Israel, which I think we are going to do, remember I think Israel is our tool, not the other way around. in the very near future,
possibly within the next 18 to 24 months, either as a force majour move
away or a pronounced and solid we're through with you move away. I think we're going to and that's going to
really disturb a lot of these billionaires who've been placing their bets on this relationship and pumping money into the Congress and the
presidency and elsewhere in the country t trying to persuade everyone that they can that Israel is essential to the US's
defense in Southwest Asia. At one point it was, but now we're leaving. Mark my words, we're leaving.
we are either going to go back to offshore balancing, which we should never should have abandoned it. Um, or
we're just going to leave and not even do offshore balancing because we frankly are getting limited in our maritime
assets and our maritime assets are getting increasingly dated. Take our carriers for example, which have shown their vulnerability in this conflict.
They will not get any closer than that uh what we call in the Pacific the thousandmile line.
That's the reality of carriers in this world of drones and high-speed missiles.
So we're seeing a transformation that's taking place in a number of stages on a number of levels now with this war in
southwest Asia which incidentally which is what a lot of people like General Van Riper who did the Millennium Challenge war game in 2002 I think it was maybe
three and others who have studied this situation have predicted that this essentially would be one the end of the
US presence on the ground anyway in any significant way in southwest Asia in the Levant even in North Africa even and it
would be the end of eventually Israel as a Jewish state in the Levant. It could prosper as a democracy were to be able
to achieve that and it will probably be the end of even maritime interests in
the region since we are now exclusively only dependent on ourselves for both LNG
and oil. And the only country that we have that ties us really ties us strongly to this radar moves other than
the global impact on the economy and so forth were to be closed for an extended period of time is Japan because Japan
till gets much of its product through the state or moves from southwest Asia.
That really has been the strategic interest of the United States for some time. Not its own petroleum but Japan's
petroleum. And that relationship is getting very dicey too at the same time for many of the same reasons colored a bit differently. Korea,
the other countries in the region that are beginning to see what we really are.
Um mo most staggeringly Korea because I think what I'm hearing from peninsula is get out of here, leave. The faster the
better, but they just don't have the politicians yet to take that on and do it. Um maybe Kim Jong-il might help him
a little bit. Uh Kim Jong-un. So it's all unraveling. The the entire global
framework that we crafted after World War II mostly at our immediate behest.
It's unraveling or mistakes you might say. But it was inevitable. It was inevitable. As Coen Pal said to me in 1989 at Fort McFersonson, Georgia,
they're all gone, Larry. the Thatchers, the Medrons, the Kohl's, the Majors,
they're all gone. When they are all gone, and when people who don't have their feet in the war, even as 12y olds,
are in charge, the world is going to change majorly. And you're not going to like it, Larry. He was right.
Why did he say that? Why I know why they left? I mean, but why why why are there no qualified politicians replacing them?
he had seen, and this is my surmise because we only talked about that specific issue a couple of times over
the years ensuing 16 years. most notably when I was working for him in a private
capacity between 97 my retirement and his assumption with the state department
along with me in 2000 December 2000 um when we were doing things like going to Nigeria to oversee with Jimmy Carter and
the Carter Institute the uh election at that time of Okanooi uh and other things
like that going to Haiti for example to see if we could calm things down there and we had a chance to chat about it again. And I I think his principal
concern was that what HW Bush had started and even he himself at the end
of his term in 93 had started to be foul the nest of that is a reproachma of
significance with Moscow bringing them into the political alliance as well as the military alliance and then spreading
it out into a new European security architecture which would include Russia.
When he was thinking about the possibilities of that actually happening and realizing how fragile the chances
were that it would happen, then he saw chaos. And he saw the chaos not so much because there were no coals or
meterrons. That was part of it certainly, but because the memory in the population at large, like most memories
of cataclysmic events, would be so fragile, if not gone, that there'd be no force, if you will, to keep them
together and no force to keep us in their midst. And I think he was right.
So across yeah NATO we're fragmenting uh as you said NATO is dead in East Asia be
it South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, they're beginning to reconsider some of this alliance system. Uh and uh but how about
West Asia? Uh do you do how do you see the United States either leaving or being kicked out of of West Asia? And uh
is this because the Gulf States decide uh the alliance is a vulnerability? Is it that the United States uh loses
interest or is the US essentially expelled by for example Iran holding on to the straight of Hermus and putting crushing limitations?
That's a huge question and I don't want to conflate Southwest Asia with West Asia in general. And by that I simply
mean I don't want to conflate what's happening in Iran and what is going to force us out of our ground positions in the Arab countries and possibly Egypt
too. I I suspect Egypt I suspect they're going to get tired of us too. And we may get tired of giving them the $3.6 billion every year just to get them to
keep the peace treaty with Israel. After all, there's no Israel to keep the peace treaty with. There won't be any money for the Egyptians no matter who's there
sicier or whatever. But I think it's different as you go north. Um, you start with Turkey, you have to throw Afghanistan in there, Pakistan in there.
Of course, you have to throw Western India in there because Western India is very different from Eastern India. You
have to throw the caucuses, I think, in there. You have to look at what's happening and what is the principal axis
for this inexraable shift of power. And it's the same principal axis that existed when it came the other way
being to the west and made America if you will. um it's going back the other way and that's the principal axis
through Duchamp Bay, Samuran, Tashkant and so forth on into Jing province in
China and I think that's going to make that area extremely important particularly when all the pipelines that
are pumping under construction envision for construction are finished and oil is
moving more or less north south north rather than east west and fueling these economies to the point that they're even
greater than they are today. If you look at the economies in Central Asia right now, they are staggeringly successful.
You it doesn't matter that they have Nazerbayas and people like that in charge of them, autocrats basically with golden statues to themselves in the town square.
They are very successful. the hotels that we used to equate with Paris and with London. Well, sometimes with
London, the Ritzens maybe would meet that criteria. And then you look at what's in these cities now and they
don't even compare. These hotels are magnificent both in their grandiloquence and in the cost of their rooms and the
luxury of staying there. Central Asia is sitting on top of enough natural gas and oil at a time when the transition is
going to have to take place otherwise we're going to destroy ourselves. But that's 50 to 75 years probably. They're
sitting on top of the energy in the world that is most important. Not least of which is under the Caspian Sea if
they can ever figure out how to deal with that. Um, so I think those relationships per force are going to have to be maintained.
South of there is a different ballgame altogether. And I include in the south of there, the southern rim of India. Um,
and I include southwest Asia because I think China is going to make sure we don't come back once we're out. And I'm
confident we're going to be out substantially out. We'll sell B we'll sell battle groups and strike groups and things through the south or through the
North Arabian Sea and through the Indian Ocean in general. And maybe our relationship with the Indian Navy will stay solid because though Delhi is not
all that happy with it, the Indian Navy is very happy with operating with the US Navy. They're learning a lot from it and
the interoperability is growing. um that might become so obvious to the civilian leadership in Delhi though that it gets
curbed considerably. Not to say that India and the United States aren't going to stay fairly close. They are I think
just because of China if nothing else but it's going to be a different world.
It's going to be an entirely different world and we don't seem to recognize that Glenn. We don't seem to recognize it. And where we do recognize it, we're fighting it tooth and nail. Look at what
we just started doing with the Israelis being the line share of the bombing.
We're bombing the hell out of that railroad that China had finished all the way to the Persian Gulf and was going to come up into the belly of the Caucasus
and be its final southern road base road initiative. They're bombing it. They're bombing the be Jesus out of it now.
Every day they're bombing that railroad.
Um that's not because they want Iran to not have a railroad.
That's because they know where that railroad's going. And that railroad will obiate almost immediately in conjunction
with the other four, most of which in some way or other debouched into Europe, north, central, central, south.
That railroad will take 60% of the commerce that China now generates, which is probably about 40% of the world's
commerce off the seas where America has domain, if you will, or thinks it still
does, and put it on land. We don't want that. We don't want that at all any more than those Portuguese wanted it when they did it before some thousand years
ago and drove the Portuguese Portuguese off the water because they're charging too much for commercial shipping. So
they built a land route and the land route was cheaper by quite a margin and it put the Portuguese out of business.
We're going to get put out of business in terms of maritime supremacy because land is going to be the essence of economic contact. And these pipelines
prove it too. running north, south, and east, west. They're not over the water.
They're on land. U and I think that's where we're going. The straight over Muzra Baba Mandib straight will still be there
and commerce will still be flowing, but not nearly to the extent it is today because we're going over land because China is saying we're going over land.
I feel like this is the revenge of Halford Macker. That is the to an extent. Yeah.
Yeah. the the whole concern of the British. Yeah.
Look at what Putin's got to do. He's got to make a decision here. And I I see him thinking about it. Every now and then he'll make a remark or Sergey Lra will
make a remark that leads me to believe that they're thinking about it and they have people working on it. But which way does he go? I mean, with the Arctic
doing what it's doing right now, and I just read the latest report, man, are we getting sea ice melt four, five times
faster than we thought we would. Um, and that's got its own negative ramifications, too. But Russia's got the
longest navigable coastline. So, all of a sudden, Russia, who didn't have a warm water port, has a coastline that demands
maritime power. So, he's got to make a choice here. Um, I mean, he's got significant maritime power, principally
in his submarine fleet, but he's got it elsewhere, too. But I I suspect we're going to see Putin building more ice breakers in particular, and he already
has a hoorde of them, and other ships that can fly the Arctic as the Arctic becomes more pliable. And he's going to
have to think about becoming at least in that direction, a maritime power. So,
he's going to be both. He's going to be the world's biggest outside China land power and he's also going to be a maritime power. And I heard someone the other day, I think it was Doug McGregor,
I wanted to reach into the screen and shake Doug. I wanted to shake him. He said China had no maritime interest.
The largest deep water fishing fleet in the world. 6,000 ships fishing so ardently in the Antarctic that the
Antarctic Council had an emergency meeting over the depletion of the krill,
the basic building block of protein on the face of the earth. And so, I mean,
China has no maritime interest. Come on,
Doug. Wake up. You're too much a soldier. Um, I like Doug, so I'm just saying that because I want to hurl
rockets at him. China does have interest in the deep sea. very very integral
integral interest. We get focused on the South China Sea, the D-9 line, Taiwan and all that crap. Meanwhile, they are
fishing all over the world and they just built the world's state-of-the-art port on the west coast of Peru. Um, and
that's maritime. So, there is an interest there by that state which is the magnet of all this change really
because of its economic power. But Russia's got a decision to make. Do we go both ways?
Do we look east and west? Do we look north and south? Um do we just be remain a a major land power 10 time zones or
whatever? Or do we start courting people in the rest of the world? And that explains, I think, why Putin seems to
have this incredible affection, that's the wrong term, attraction to Donald Trump because he's the present
president, however, faultily of the United States. And Putin doesn't want to destroy that relationship. He's still
looking in that direction, and he's looking in the other direction, too. And he's looking north. So, he's got a real
tapestry to deal with. And I so far I've seen I think the competence in his administration and the people in general
even in the Duma and some that can handle this but can we replace Putin and
can we have a you know have a leader afterwards who might be even smarter than Putin or better at dealing with all
these multiple responsibilities that are falling on Russia.
They are the key geostrategic location outside China. And now that they're tacitly allied with China, they
present the world with a tremendous challenge. Europe to Europe in a a significant way. Europe has to
accommodate them and learn to live with them and benefit from that living. It can't fight them. It it'll be destroyed
if it fights them. It'll destroy itself if it tries to fight it. And that's that's my big concern about this US approach to China that's all bullets,
bayonets, and sanctions. It's stupid. It's just downright stupid. I think unlike the 19th or 20th century,
the the Chinese and the Russians aren't even though they are land powers,
they're not willing to seed the the oceans to the United States. And I think you're right that the Chinese
have both the road belt and the road that is they're going to focus on the sea as well. Uh but uh the Russians as well they I think they see their
territory is important to tie together the Eurasian continent as east west also north south especially with this international north south transportation
corridor which the US and Israel is as you said bombing now in Iran but uh they they also have the ambitions of being a
maritime power. You mentioned the Arctic route of course, but if you look at the way they are flirting with countries
like Indonesia, you you see that they do have some significant naval aspirations.
So they've been a naval power, a real one since Peter the Great at least, and they intend to remain one. Uh, and when
they sailed that oil tanker into I think it made port in Matanzas, Cuba. Um, that was in your face and all in the in the Monroe Doctrines, the Trump doctrine,
whatever you want to call it, call it what you want, in your face. I'm in Matanza floating war. And also two years
earlier when they sent Korskov, the frigot, and all my military mates said,
"Oh, that frigot, that's nothing. That frigot had hyper velocity missiles on it that would sink a US aircraft carrier in
a heartbeat um Kiraov I think her name was and they sent a a nuclear attack sub in there too. So the Monroe doctrine has
been dead ever since they did that if it weren't dead beforehand. So Putin knows what he's doing. He do he does it selectively. He does it for real
fundamental reasons that are positive for him and I would argue positive for what I'm talking about.
You have to accommodate this power shift, not fight it. Because if you fight it, you'll wind up in John
Mirshimemer's sandbox with the sucid trap and you'll get beaten,
but so will a lot of the world.
Well, this is the problem though, the the adjusting to the new world. I think this for for me this was the first thing I thought about when I read the article
by uh Krahammer back in 1990 when he wrote about the unipolar moment he coined the term you know because he he
had a very rational approach saying well so much power is concentrated now in the future probably the world will have a multipolar distribution of power and
then we'll embrace that but it doesn't work like this because you have leaders who are ideologically committed now to having one center power even after
realities have have changed So it's very difficult for but you know you have some you know even big brazinski you know the
national security advisor he uh he you know he wrote almost the bible on the unipolar moment with the grand chess board. However less focus he gets is on
this book on the on the choice. I think it was in 2012 when he recognized that well actually the distribution of power is becoming multipolar. America has a
choice. they can either accommodate it and carve out you know the position as a first among equals uh that is a very
favorable format for a multipolar world organized by the US or it can resist it but then see the rest of the world uh
essentially create a multipolar world in opposition to the US a balancing something along bricks and uh you know
so he he took at least some pragmatism with him but uh but at this point you know we already build an ideal
ideological structure around us being you know the hedgemony of the west is is the foundation of having peace and
stability in the world you know so this is uh we there's no adjusting to reality I mean people often leave out the human
aspect here that assuming that's also flaw by the way in political realism which uh yeah both me and Mimer belong
to that is it's often the assumption of the rational state I think uh it's not very professional at all.
And they forget people. They forget people. They don't read They don't read a lot of poetry.
I may be mistaken. John and I have never talked about that. I'd love to talk to about it. Do you read any poetry, John?
um anybody that reads good poetry and I'm talking about all over the world from Persia to China to you know the
English poets who we so tout all the time usually dwelling in the uh dwelling
in the 18th century 19th century 18th century mostly but um if you read poetry and you understand what poetry's power
is then you understand that there is an element to human life that is quite significant that has nothing to do with
rationality and everything to do with emotion, human emotion, which is probably one of the most unpredictable
things on the face of the earth. You never know when it's going to go up or down or do this or do that. Look at
economic crises, for example. Most economists who are worth a damn will tell you that the key to a really deep
economic crisis is when the people lose confidence in the system.
You can take all the statistics and put them out there and array them and say, "Oh, there's going to be a depression.
There's going to be a recession." If you still have the people's confidence, you can work your way through it. You can just see a few of those things
indicating something bad is coming and the people latch on to that, the people being the majority, and lose confidence
in the system and it completely collapses. That's really what happened in 29 to 32 in this country when we had
a great depression. Because if you look at the power indices and you look at what we had, you could see what we were going to do in World War II. You could
see why Yamamoto looked at Pearl Harbor burning, apocryphily or not, but very accurately said, "I fear what we've done
as awakened a sleeping tiger and filled it with a fearful resolve." He was absolutely right because he as a young
captain, he'd been in America. He had seen us from New York to California,
from Michigan to Texas, and he knew what we were capable of. And that's what we're talking about when we talk about confidence and people doing what they
have to do when they have to do it and doing it more based on emotion than on strategic calculation. Both are
necessary. Of course, the Mir Shimemers and the poets are necessary, but if you forget the poets, you're lost. You're
going down. that famous poem by Matthew Arnold which is not really touted much in the world of
literature except by the real cognacente and those lines at the end of that are
30 minutesjust a he wrote at the end of the 1800s in the romantic period and he predicted
everything that's happening today and the poem that's the most emotional in that sense is do beach where He
concludes with, "And we are here as on a darkling plane swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight where
ignorant armies clash by night." That's where we are. It's where we are today.
Of course, he was talking about the Huxley brothers and John Henry Cardinal Newman. Religion dying in the world and science taking over. But aren't we
looking at the same thing today in different clothing? Pete Hath is trying to bring religion back just like John
Henry Cardinal Newman did with the Catholic Church. But Newman was a lot smarter than Pete Hath. But we've we're
still in this same struggle. At least America is. And it's causing it to taint its foreign policy. Um, where else do
31 minutesyou get someone who calls the Pope's emissary in and chews him out for what Leo said and essentially tells him uh
apparently if it's being reported accurately and I have sources that tell me it is being reported accurately sources in the Vatican
that it's accurate that in fact we actually suggested we might want to do a null on the pope. You know, we might
want to move the Catholic Church to America like the French did. Um, that's how stupid and ignorant we are today.
We're playing in the past with forces that once unleashed are extremely dangerous and difficult to get back in
check again. And we have an idiot at the top. Um, and we're in this period that you and I were just discussing, however,
briefly. Um, and this is not the period where you want an idiot leading the country that's declining against the
country that's ascending. You just don't because then you get what you and me shammer are talking about. Well, I won't attribute it to you, but you get what
John's talking about. Inevitability of a war and we're going to lose. We're going to lose big time. My concern is the whole globe is going to lose because this is going to be nuclear.
Well, the problem is often when uh the social scientists put together theories,
but it assumes it's the same people when uh when we're rising as when we're declining. I think we need more
strategies and theories on how to manage decline because you know when site is rising with economically or yeah
whatever it's you know they usually then begin to embrace very cosmopolitan mindset openness all of this when there's decline it's in human nature you
retreat into the tribe then after this you will have more vicious nationalism into paranoia
yes very much so so you know when declining. It's not just we have to plan for weaker army um uh worse economy but
you also have to take into account a very tribal mindset uh more angry more vulgar more aggressive and uh more
hateful of adversaries. I mean um I I find it often shocking that people don't appreciate how how hateful we have
become. I mean, if you open any newspaper and read about our adversaries being the Chinese, the Iranians, the Russians, you know, forget about even
discussing rationally what their interests are, but the way they are portrayed, I mean, there's something horribly happening in our societies and
we can't even talk about it. It's quite fascinating. Um, and a man manifestation of that, a recent manifestation, not that it hadn't
manifested itself before, was the assassination of Charlie Kirk, which incidentally, Glenn, I don't know if you're following it at all, but we we
still don't know who did that. We know categorically that the person they arrested, the rifle they have in possession did not do the assassination.
So, what are they doing? What is the Trump administration doing with this incident, which doesn't rival the presidential assassination or even Dr.
King's assassination or Bobby Kennedy's assassination, but it was an assassination of a leading figure and it
associated itself directly with Israel and the US relationship with Israel in a way that many people in the intelligence
community in this country think is damning of Israel and damning of its prime minister. And yet, we're not even looking at it anymore. I I can't even find it anywhere in the press. Um,
this is terrible. that we do things like this, that we just hide these crimes and push them away when we can't find a
convenient scapegoat or, you know, Lee Harvey Oswald, for example. I'm not trying to compare Charlie Kirk with John
Kennedy, but it is the same kind of phenomenon and it's the same kind of symptom of decay of empire and decay of thinking and decay of brain power. Um,
it you could even go back to the Vietnam War and say that's where it started significantly for the empire.
Anyway, it's a mess. It's a mess. And we're not going to get out of it by fighting our way out, by sanctioning our way out, by challenging everyone in the
world to a duel. That's not going to work.
Yeah. It contributes to further polarization as well. I mean, if at least if there's openness and investigations then and airing out the
trouble problems, then uh a society can uh at least organize find consensus around the truth. because whenever it is
hidden then country will society will always polarize and follow convenient narratives instead. Um I I did want to
get back to something you said before though in terms of uh the consequences of of the Iran war. you mentioned that
uh uh if there is an Israel and I thought uh yeah this is an interesting point because it begs the question to
what extent uh there's permanent damage being done has already been done during this war which might not be over I would
bet it's not uh but do do you see Israel being in danger and can the Gulf states recover from this uh essentially go back to the way things were?
I think not. um especially your latter statement to the to the way things were. I think that's impossible.
If it's not impossible at this moment,
you and I are talking, Glenn, it's impossible because Iran is going to make it impossible. I think that's a fatal
plea. And I think NBS has already shifted the sovereign wealth funds plans away from Israel and towards Syria
instead. In fact, I have it on really good authority that he's already shifted all that investment he was going to make in a pipeline that would run up through
northern Saudi Arabia into Israel eventually, Hifa, and then across the Chahhan probably. And Israel was going
to benefit not only for trans shshipment fees, but also it was going to get its oil for, you know, now and forever, if you will, from Saudi Arabia that way.
Now, he's shifted all of that over to Syria. Quite a a decision if it has been made. And I, like I said, I have some
pretty good sources that tell me it has been made. That money is going to go that way. Now, well, that's going to dry Israel up unless the United States is
prepared to fund all of its petroleum where from wherever it might come. And that that also includes funding them
developing the oil field and gas field they stole in the Mediterranean from the Gazins. It belonged to them, but now
they're stealing it from Gaza and the one that they have in their own territorial water or their own economic zone. I forget which it is in the
eastern mid extreme eastern mid and they're stealing Lebanons. That's one reason he wants to go ahead with Lebanon because he doesn't want Lebanon ever to
recover to the point it could challenge it. This is all going to go to hell in the handbag very shortly because of the
moves that are being made by much more powerful countries in the oil and gas markets than Israel. In fact, Israel has
no power in those markets at all except what it can shoot or kill for. And it showed that with Mark Rich and Glen Core and all that stealing from Sodom Zay,
stealing from Syria when we had the war with Iraq. the real reason for the war with Iraq. If you've read Glenn Gary
Vogler's book and also Dennis Fritz's book, Deadly Betrayal, you know that the war was fought for Israel as much as
anything else, which is why Israel was pitching for it. So, I think their days are very, very numbered. If they were to
suddenly shift to find the political oomph and the political will to shift to a one-state solution that
included a truly democratic state since Lud took over, Israel has not been a democracy. That's all a farce.
But if they were to shift and if they were to accommodate despite the power of the wound, as Yaser Aarat used to say
all the time, despite that, if they were to shift and have a real democracy that treated its citizens roughly the same
across the spectrum of citizens that would then generate, then Israel could survive, I think, and Palestine could
come back in a significant way. the right of return, the return to the 67,
all the UN resolutions could be fulfilled. It isn't going to happen because of crooks like Tony Blair and Donald Trump. But that is something that
could happen if we can get rid of this detritus that is plaguing us now. These grifters, these money hungry bastards.
If we could get rid of them and get some decent leadership across the board,
including in the UN, new secretary general is desperately needed. and a revamping and revising of the UN Security Council is desperately needed.
And the first thing I'd do is kick Britain off. I wouldn't even let Britain be a member of the UN Security Council anymore. They're just there on our
toenails, if you will, standing on our toenails and hurting our feet. So if we could do these things, we could do them in a decade, maybe a decade and a half,
and we could get the world squared away again, as it were, and maybe at least partially salvage some of our reputation and some of our power in the world that
we've twittered away. I don't think it's going to happen. I don't think it's going to happen.
No, I saw a comment by Tucker Carlson today in which was arguing that why is it that no president um well why is that
every single president is more interested in govern governing the world instead of governing the United States?
I thought that was interesting especially when it came to Trump because I thought he was the ultimate president who would essentially you know say okay
I will abandon the empire to save the republic but I haven't seen that in any way. If anything, he seems to be doubling down on the mistakes which he
was uh criticizing when he was in opposition, but then you know follows the same policies
which in my international relations book which kind of focuses on Fred Hartman's the relations of nations which is a
terrific book in its sixth edition. It's still a ter terrific book. Um those are
small people. People like that are small people. They're the people that throw the rocks in the cogs of international
relations. I like that phrase, too. Fred used it at at Newport at the Naval War College when he was there lecturing. The
relations of nations. Not only is it sort of poetic, it also says it better. What are international relations? Well,
they're the relations of nations.
And one of the first prerogatives of a smart power that it should avail itself of 100% of the time is never have more enemies than you can handle.
Look at what we've done. We've created an enemy out of the whole freaking planet.
It's incredible the terrible leadership we've had since roughly HW Bush. Uh it's
probably unprecedent I can't say that because there were some really poor times in there but we weren't so hardpressed by international relations
and power but we've had some terrible presidents. Um probably more terrible ones than great ones. Certainly more
terrible than great ones. Um but we we've been damned for a generation here and we need to get undamned.
We've been damned in our Congress. Now we're damned in our Supreme Court, too.
I was looking at some of the opinions expressed the other day. We, you know,
we have this amendment going to change the Constitution with a very short amendment that would just
eliminate the effects of Citizens United and the decisions before it, which would be a terrific boon to our political
process to get all this black money out of it. Um, and we've been stunned at how fast it's moving. We already have 26
states. We only need 39. I think twothirds of the states, twothirds of the Congress, threequarters of the states. Um, I think we're going to get
it and we're probably going to get it within the next five or six years, which will be a real boon to our political process. But five or six years, you can destroy yourself.
Uh, and with this kind of leadership we have right now, we just might do that. Yeah. I was speaking to Judge Npalitano.
actually had him on this program and uh he expects a civil war in uh so there's a lot of pessimism going but uh you know
in what you mentioned with the institutions and all being corrupted under this power is one thing but but also the international system one should
ask whether or not uh um empire hedge money becomes a curse because if you go back to the 1990s
uh you know not only was the US admired by the whole world almost but the leading foreign policy your strategy by China, Russia was to get along as well
as possible with the United States. It's a, you know, well, I wouldn't only put the US in this category. The Europeans have been no better themselves. I mean,
they were also seen as a preferable partner to a lot of countries. But the way you see now, uh, essentially all of this being reversed, the power
diminished, uh, the reputation diminished.
I I have a feeling if we hadn't gone down Crowhammer's path of uh you know not not just the hedgemony of the US but this effort of
having the hedgemony of the political west uh it it could have been very different but you know we are where we
are and uh I I I did want to ask you though how you see again I just want to get back to the ceasefire again to go full circle here.
How what do you make how do you make sense of this? Because as the ceasefire is now in place, we also see troops being mobilized or sent to the region.
Uh is this is this just as a insurance like reassurance? Because in Iran, of course, they're not trusting for good
reason much of the diplomacy. They see it as being very deceptive. Is this primarily an effort by Trump to get out
of a horrible war he didn't want to be in or do you see Trump also buying time for a possible escalation? Uh I mean it
doesn't necessarily have to be one or the other. It could be of course you know trying to end the war or taking advantage to ramp it up. But how do you make sense of this ceasefire?
I think there are two ways to look at it and more than two but two principal ways to look at it. one it's another subtrauge just like you suggested and I
46 minutesthink probably Abbasi the foreign minister of Iran is looking at it that way right now and maybe Peshkin the president and maybe the speaker of the
mariss and others too I would if I were they and that that that is simply to say Netanyahu's objection strenuous you know
I I'm going to keep my war going in Lebanon to hell with you and your new diplomacy was all orchestrated ahead of
time and he is playing the bad guy and the guy whose badness would give the impression to the Iranians that this was
a genuine effort. And so what we're going to do is two or three days from now, we're going to blow the hell out of them again. Um or maybe even make an
assault on the uranium power. I think that's what we were doing earlier. By the way, we lost some very expensive
aircraft. We lost some people we haven't even reported yet. We lost assets in a way that made us look as stupid
really Glenn as stupid militarily as Jimmy Carter's military looked like in what was it 78 or whatever that we
pulled off Operation Eagle Claw and we had the helicopter pick up and run into the C130 in the desert in Iran, crash and burn and kill eight or nine people.
This was even dumber than that. So that had to be a shock to old PD Eggs and a shock as it was reported to Trump too.
But there doesn't seem to be any dissension there. They're still working together, sadly enough. And so that's one thing that could be happening. We
could be trying to lull the Iranians again into something that they think we're going to cease fire. They're think we're going to do diplomacy and we're
going to hit them again in whatever way we can. That's one possibility. The other possibilities were serious about this. We're serious. And Donald Trump
finally figured out after that story broke in the New York Times and elsewhere about how he made his decision
to start the war. BB was the sole counselor. Everyone else from General Kaine to JD Vance to Marco Rubio Pete Haggith was a sycopant all the way.
But everyone else was cautioning and BB was saying just do it. You'll see they'll collapse. they'll collapse. Go ahead and do it. I think that's probably
a pretty accurate summary of what the decisionmaking environment was like.
So, is he really serious? And being serious would mean figure out a way you can get out of this war and declare victory and to hell with Netanyahu.
If he's really serious, then we have some hard negotiation ahead of us and so do the Iranians. Um, I mean, I got their
10 points right here. same 10 points I would have laid out if I were they reparations end of all sanctions gone
from southwest Asia you know all these things will that be negotiable will they be able to work out something if they do go
49 minutesto genuine diplomacy in Pakistan or wherever they might do it I think I think it would if we had a team on our
side led by a president on our side who were serious about finding finally serious about stopping a war. Um, but I
don't think that's going to happen. I think we're more likely to find a muddle through or the first thing I described,
we're we're trying to fool them again and strike them in the middle of it or we'll get somewhere down the road and strike them again because Trump will get
mad and angry and realize he can't negotiate his way out. Not in any way that'll look good. And we're coming on the midterms and right now all the polls
show the Republicans are going to take a shellacking.
And I do mean a shellacking. So I mean if it's a free a reasonably free and fair election, which is a question too.
If it's an election period is a question. Um so I we don't have anything good to look
forward to except maybe in the second possibility if some success were to be achieved. And meanwhile, Glenn Hexith is
preacher packing. I call it old southern term. You put the good strawberries on the top and the rotten ones on the bottom. He's preacher packing the
military in all ranks. He's getting Christian nationalists everywhere he can in the rank structure so that when time
comes for the military to make a decision one way or the other with regard to the elections or whatever,
he'll have at least a sizable contingent in the military that'll take his side.
Is that the reason behind the all the purge, the firing of the general? You see this as being uh building a Trump loyal army?
Absolutely. and the way he's recruiting the states he's recruiting from the Christian nationalist counties he's
recruiting from the evangelical base he's recruiting from the conversions at the end of advanced individual training
51 minutesin the army for example they go to the river and baptize 60 or 70 recruits in the name of Jesus and God
you can't make this stuff up I mean this is something I was watching you've probably seen this movie uh Orlando
Bloom sort of grew to maturity in it. Um it's about the Crusades. Uh Ridley Scott did the movie and it takes a lot of
license with Rishard Cordelon and the crusaders and and Salahadin and the
confrontation between the crusaders and Salahedin on two or three occasions. one where he takes Jerusalem of course and
or Orlando Boom Bloom is allowed to march the uh citizens out because he's been such a great fighter and everything
has respect for him and all. So it's Hollywood but the times and the customs and the actions of the crusaders I think
are very well displayed. They were there for money and profit. They were there for money, profit, and land. Oh, I'm here for the pope. Where's the pope?
Where's the pope? Have you got him here with you? Oh, he's not here. I'm here for money and profit and land. I mean that that and even if the pope were there, he'd say, "Of course you're
looking for money, profit, and land for the Catholic Church." So, you know, Pete Hexth has this warped interpretation of
the Crusades, but that's what he believes. I'm convinced that's what he believes. And when he gets down on his knees and prays in front of the troops
and begs them to get down with him and pray, he's serious. He's serious. That's a dangerous man.
Well, if this is preparing for well,
what could essentially become a civil war, it's quite uh Yes.
Yeah. quite quite troubling. But u could be a civil war with with different segments waring in it. You could have
the Christian nationalists, the Dominionists, the dispensationalists and such looking to achieve Armageddon a
little a little closer to home. And you could have genuine Christians in there who take to the streets or whatever too
to protest that manipulation of and ultimate denigration of Jesus Christ.
Because there are some like that who are really getting angry at Hegath and angry at people like John Hegy sending money to settlers on the West Bank even now.
Um and there are other people who are getting very very angry at the MAGA crowd and some of the MAGA faithful getting very very angry at the people
getting angry with them. So you have the potential for a lot of different people out there on the streets and we have 400 million guns in this country.
more guns than people is quite an extraordinary statistic. H well,
some of them were floating across the Canadian border underneath drones. You heard about that one? No.
54 minutesThese entrepreneurs up there in Wisconsin and Minnesota, they put 10 or 12 Smith and Wesson P38s or whatever
under a drone in a bag. They only cost maybe $400 or $500 in in the US. They float them across to a buddy's backyard,
drop them in the backyard, pick them up later, and sell them in Toronto for two grand a piece.
It's It's the invasion of Canada.
Yeah, that's what you get for these new technologies. It's driving the FBI crazy.
Well, thank you for taking time. We're almost out of time. So, uh, it's, uh,
yeah, I wish there would be some more happy news, more optimism given that the war possibly came to an end and the
ceasefire still is in place. One would hope. Yeah, we would have some optimism, but uh, I don't see it quite yet. But,
um,
55 minutesI don't either. And I tell you, the place I would most not like to be because I'd probably get so angry I'd get myself killed real quickly. it is in Lebanon where they're just killing men,
women, children, anybody that happens to be under their bonds.
Yeah. Yeah. So BBC reported on it that Israel had struck Hezbollah command centers across the country. And this
Well, what you're seeing is just residential buildings being blown up with women, children, and men. Yeah.
Scattered. So it's quite horrible. I have a couple of friends there who tell me that it is absolutely the worst they've seen and they've been there for
a long time. So, they've seen a lot of bad times.
You don't know where to go. You don't know where to turn. You walk out in the street and there's a bomb.
Just feels like everyone can see where this is going and no one is trying to,
you know, go for course correction. It's not just the middle Middle East. You can say the same about Europe. I I can see where this is going going. That is the
war against Russia. This is going to escalate very soon. And uh it's just it's very predictable where we're going
to go and again nothing. It's quite depressing.
There are some people out there with gasoline cans just sprinkling it. Yeah.
Well, thank you for the time. Thanks again. However morose it was
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Fri Apr 10, 2026 3:40 am
Max Blumenthal : Israeli Agents in the White House.
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom
Apr 9, 2026
Transcript
Undeclared wars are commonplace.
Tragically, our government engages in preemptive war, otherwise known as aggression, with no complaints from the
American people. Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government.
To develop a truly free society, the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected.
What if sometimes to love your country you had to alter or abolish the government? What if Jefferson was right?
What if that government is best which governs least?
What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong? What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom
than to live as a slave? What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now?
Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Npalitaniano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, April 9th, 2026.
My dear friend and colleague Max Blumenthal joins us now. Max, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much uh for your time today.
Is there a ceasefire between the United States and Iran as we speak?
No, there's not a ceasefire. And it looks to me, having lived through the last three years and seeing how pauses
in, for example, the Gaza genocide were exploited for Israel to remobilize and rearm that. We're witnessing something
similar as US Marines are being deployed to the region. And as Israel was on the verge of running out of interceptors and
Iran had really consolidated its momentum, the United States
via Pakistan attempted to create the impression of a ceasefire.
Now, this allowed Donald Trump to game the markets, and we're seeing that some White House insider has placed a close
to1 billion dollar bet on the price of Brent crude going down as Donald Trump sent oil prices tumbling with his
announcement of his acceptance of Iran's uh National Security Council's 10point
plan as a baseline for discussions and negotiations.
But the more revealing part of this ceasefire was how the United States government looks like the state
department had provided Pakistan's Shabbaz Sharif Pakistan's leader with
the framework or the the terms that were agreed upon for the ceasefire as a draft
and Sharif or someone in his office posted the draft including the header that said uh terms for Sharif.
And then they edited the the tweet on X,
but everyone could see that he had basically been fed these terms. These terms explicitly included Lebanon as part of the ceasefire.
So the United States had agreed to include Lebanon. Iran had agreed to include Lebanon through Pakistan. So
what does Israel do? Commits one of the worst massacres in history in Lebanon.
massacring over 250 people, wounding over 1,200 people. There are families lining up outside hospitals to identify the bodies of over 90 people today.
They were bombing not just the Daha section of Beirut, which is the Shia majority area where Hezbollah has had
some offices and they can always justify mass destruction and killings of civilians on that basis that it's majority Shia. They were bombing areas
4 minuteslike Ain Moresci uh the the Cornesh in the center of Beirut, areas where opponents of Hezbollah live. They killed a famous Lebanese poet and her husband.
Entire families were killed inside their homes. They bombed a funeral in a cemetery with a 500 pound bomb. The
entire purpose of this was to sabotage the ceasefire and to provoke Iran into
defending its ally in Lebanon. And what does the White House go and do?
Including JD Vance, the so-called restrainer. JD Vance said, "Oh, well, those terms uh they were actually AI.
That was all AI generated slop."
In other words, there never was. They're basically denying that there ever was a ceasefire deal that included Lebanon. So
the the 10 points that the United States sent to uh Sharif uh
no these weren't 10 points. Iran's National Security Council which advises Iran's leader
right uh Maba Kamei introduced a 10-point proposal for what Iran sought to elicit
from the talks and these are basic basically this is the framework for Iran's sovereignty going forward and
Sharif posted the terms that had already been agreed upon in order for this sessation of hostility abilities to have
discussions in Islamabad. And those terms explicitly included Lebanon. I mean, you can just go to his ex account
and see it right there. And then once Israel decides we don't want to include Lebanon, we want we want to blow up all of Lebanon. Like they attacked the
entire country and attacked civilians explicitly. Like it was a performative slaughter. Here's
once they did that, the the Trump administration was forced to pull back.
And it shows you the entire dynamic which is that Israel determines when the US goes to war and when the US stops under Trump.
Here's the US chief negotiator who as we speak is somewhere between Washington and Islamabad. And on his plane are the
two people that foreign minister Iraqi told him not to bring. Yeah.
Um uh Kushner and Woodoff. Uh but here's the vice president saying just what you said, Max. Oh.
It was a just a misunderstanding. Chris, cut number 22.
I actually think and there's a lot of bad faith uh negotiation and a lot of bad faith, you know, propaganda going
on. I think this comes from a legitimate misunderstanding. I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon and it just didn't. We never
made that promise. We never indicated that was going to be the case. What we said is that the ceasefire would be focused on Iran and the ceasefire would be focused on America's allies, both
Israel and the Gulf Arab states. That said, the Israelis, as I understand it,
again, I'm supposed to get a fuller report when I get on the plane, have actually offered to be um frankly to
check themselves a little bit in Lebanon because they want to make sure that our negotiation is successful. That's not because that is part of the ceasefire. I
think that's the Israelis trying to set up us up for success and we'll of course see how that unfolds in the next few days. But look, if Iran wants to let
this negotiation fall apart in a conflict where they were getting hammered over Lebanon, which has nothing to do with them and which the United
States never once said was part of the ceasefire, that's ultimately their choice. We think that would be dumb, but that's their choice.
There truth in what he just said. I mean, we were told JD Vance was the one who engineered this ceasefire, uh, you
know, working with China, which has normal diplomatic relations with Iran and somewhat normal relations with the US. So, they're like a key broker here.
But you can see from his comments that he's very poorly informed, and these comments are disqualifying for JD Vance as a president and that he is lying.
He's just lying through his teeth because the terms are right there on Prime Minister Sharif's ex account and
it included Lebanon and Lebanon does not have nothing to do with Iran or the broader conflict. It was Israel that
decided to launch a ground invasion into Lebanon after it secured US support,
basically secured the US as a proxy force for attacking Iran. So, it's Israel that launched the assault on Lebanon and made Lebanon a part of the
war. It is Hezbollah that's defending Lebanon from Israel. And it is Israel that decided to blow up the ceasefire by
attacking Lebanon. And so, JD Vance is not only being dishonest, he's presenting a version of reality that is
flips on its head what Israel is doing before everyone's eyes. And so this is disqualifying for Vance. I feel very
concerned about Vance supposedly offsetting the uh ideologically Zionist negotiators
Witoff and Kushner who are going to Islamabad. I don't even know if JD Vance will be present there. And of course he's he's what what it was he it looked
like he was speaking from Hungary from Budapest. Um because he was sent off to campaign for Orban to get him out of the
way. Um, so how much latitude does he even have here?
Here's uh Netanyahu insisting that uh Lebanon had
was not part of the deal but boasting about his bombs and killings. Chris
number 19. I have said that the I've insisted that the ceasefire with Iran
does not include Lebanon. And this is what is happening today. We have dealt the biggest blow
that has suffered since the pager operation. We targeted 100 command sites headquarters in . They didn't know what happened.
Let's see. Are those places that you articulated a funeral home, a park,
the famous uh Cornesh, a shopping center, and residential neighborhoods in the suburbs, command centers. Come on.
Well, they thought they were going to score this master stroke. And so they dialed up their explosives. They launched a 100 sortizes, a 100 strikes,
sorry, 100 strikes with 65 jets in and they thought they were going to get Hezbollah general secretary Naim
Kasum and they failed and wound up blowing up several apartment buildings filled with civilians just as they did
in order to kill Ali Larajani who was the key negotiator for Iran when Israel assassinated him. It attacked, I think,
five separate locations, slaughtering well over 50 civilians. So, what Israel has done is continued to expose itself
as a mass killing machine, which is not doing well on the ground in southern
Lebanon. Israel's ground invasion has been stalled. It's objectives have been rolled back. They're announcing that
they're not actually going to seek to occupy all the land up to the Latani River. They're taking lots of casualties. There have been complaints
from the Israeli general command that the army is essentially falling apart and that reservists aren't showing up.
It's effectively a mercenary army where soldiers have to be paid to show up.
They've lost helicopters. They're concealing losses. The maravas are getting hit by FPV drones for the first
time. We didn't see this at this level during the last round. And now they're going to try to take Bint Jubel,
which is a real uh strong point, a central node of Hezbollah's Radwan forces. And Israel was unable to take
this area in the 2006 war. It actually wasn't even held off. It was held off by local Hezbollah guardsmen. So what
they're doing is compensating or I should say overcompensating for their losses on the ground. Israel as a military isn't so great on the ground.
You know, they have some good special forces, but they're essentially an assassination and killing machine that relies entirely on US firepower. And so
all they're able to do is these performative slaughters in order to blow up the ceasefire while they continue to control Donald Trump and hold his administration by the shortened curies.
I realize that uh the IDF and the Israeli government is very heavy-handed with respect to censorship.
Yeah.
But do you know from any sources how badly uh Israel has been damaged by uh Iranian missiles and drones?
Well, it wouldn't be Israel per se given the way that Iran has gone about targeting. It would be the US. And this
is what's something key to understand here about how Iran is waging this war.
Um the US is hiding I I would I would use the term hiding or it's it's it's
sheltering its F-35s at the Nevatim air base and some other key aerial assets at Bengurion International Airport.
Israel's air defenses are much more concentrated and therefore more effective than what we've seen in Saudi Arabia where the US has lost Awax uh aerial radar systems on the ground.
They've lost C130 Hercules transport planes on the ground. They've lost multi they've lost billion-dollar
radar systems that are their eyes and ears in at Alu Date air base. And you'll see like these these bases will be hit and THAAD systems aren't even going off.
Um Patriot missiles aren't even in the air. Neat team air base remains a mystery to us though where the F-35s are
being housed and when you see it come under attack it's often from a Kuramshar missile with cluster warheads. So maybe
the um you know the propellant system of the missile will get intercepted but the cluster warheads come down on Nevatim air base and they hit something there
but we don't know what it is. The censorship is so extreme and you remember judge you interviewed uh Jeremy Lefredo
who was reporting for the gray zone when he was arrested inside Israel and initially put on trial for spying. Uh fortunately he was able to get out.
these charges were completely bogus. And what had he done? One of the only things he did was he went outside Neatine Air
Base, well outside. He never tried to get in and took a picture of a ballistic missile that had landed nearby during I
think it was Operation True Promise 2 that Iran waged in retaliation for Israeli attacks. So that tells you how
strict the censorship is that if anyone even attempts to take pictures of the attacks on Neatoon, they face spying charges, treason, and could go to jail
for life. So we don't know if the F-35s have been hit. But then we have to ask the question, why did an F-15E
go down in Iran? If the F-35 is supposed to be sort of the undefeable stealth
aircraft, could it be because they've lost several of them on the ground?
Again, we don't know. This is up to uh you know, oent open source sleuths,
other reporters.
Another question, why is Planet Labs Planet the major satellite imaging company that contracts with the Pentagon
refusing to release images of the region? It's because they're hiding losses on the ground. And Iran's attacks on these airfields.
um striking US aerial assets before they're even in the air have been very effective and the cover up is underway.
The um New York Times yesterday had a lengthy what it called uh investigative
piece um purporting to recount the backstory on Trump's decision to uh attack Iran.
What is your understanding of what the backstory is? Well, this was published
by two kind of beltway access reporters who were publishing a book, I think,
called Regime Change. It's sort of an excerpt from their book. It's kind of uh impressive how they got it out so quickly. I guess neither of them have
kids because I I don't know how they do this, but uh
it tells the same story that we told at the Greyzone last year. So it really rings true for me. Last year, Ana Pararm
and I reported uh based on sourcing inside the White House that Trump was being briefed with
these um you specifically by the Mossad
director David Barnea and the Israeli Army uh chief of staff. and they were
briefing the head of SentCom and CIA director John Ratcliffe and telling them that Iran was a week away from getting a nuclear weapon and that they needed the
latitude to go in and kill then leader that Iran's then leader uh Ali Kame who
was killed on the first day of this assault operation Epstein Fury on Iran on February 28th and that John Ratcliffe
was basically serving as the Mossad stenographer and that Trump was not really pushing back on any of the
disinformation being fed to him. This is what we were told the New York through the New York Times took place on February 11th when Netanyahu was in town
here in Washington. He was being treated like the president had massive um secret service escorts. They were shutting down highways around DC. You could see
helicopters in the air. We all knew why he was here. I knew a war was on the horizon when he was here. And we subsequently learn from this report that
Netanyahu actually went into a situation room briefing with the head of the Mossad behind him on sort of like a a
live live stream and he sat at the head of the table and Trump sat to the side
which is very unusual. And Netanyahu told Trump, "Iran is a week away from a nuclear weapon. You must let us go in.
they uh Iran will start attacking the United States soon and we need to kill Iran's leader and once we decapitate its
leadership then the Iranians will rise up in the streets and it will be a quick lightning blitzkrieg regime change will
take place overnight. Trump nodded his head and quietly Marco Rubio, Sentcom
Chief Dan Kaine, JD Vance, all the others who were privy to this meeting.
Even Susie Wilds, who had worked on Benjamin Netanyahu's 2020 campaign, they said this is absolute
They they they all said that and none of them stood up to Trump because they're all yes men and women. Everyone's afraid of Trump. And so Trump authorized the
war and here we are uh well over a month later and the and the United States has lost the war. The US has abs the US lost the war within the first week.
What does Trump have to show for the six weeks of uh of killing and destruction?
No regime change, no destruction or removal of uh enriched uh uh enriched
uranium, no neutering of ballistic missiles. And the straight of hormones totally under the control of the
Iranians. Open when they want it, close when they want it, charge a toll when they want it.
Exactly. Iran is stronger than before.
Now, Iran has suffered uh heavy destruction to its infrastructure through terrorist attacks carried out by the US-Israeli coalition.
Three major steel plants attacked,
prochemical plants attacked, bridges and so forth. But this hasn't weakened Iran as a sovereign power. Iran is stronger
because of its assertion of control over the straight of Hormuz where 20% of commerce passes through. And now they're
implementing a toll system. As the Financial Times just reported, the tolls are being paid through cryptocurrency.
And I know Trump is trying to get in on the action because all he cares about is enriching himself. So he would want for
World Liberty Financial to be one of the crypto conduits for crypto. This is the one of
the corruption channels that's presided over by Trump's sons and the Witco sons as well as Tether in which Trump's
commerce secretary Howard Lutnik owns a I think 5% stake and his son
essentially oversees all the business dealings of Tether in El Salvador.
Tether is the main stable coin. So Trump's actually trying to just get in on this toll system rather than which
would consolidate Iran's strength and recognize Iran as a legitimate
powerful country among the community of nations. And when I say Iran, I also mean the Islamic Republic, which means that Iran
has achieved sanctions relief. And it didn't achieve sanctions relief under the Democrats who sought to use the JCPOA through the reformist leadership
of Hassan Roani and Javad Zarif as a means of containing Iran and actually weakening Iran as a regional if not
world power. They received sanctions relief through the assertion of the IRGC and the military power and prowess of
Iran and the strength of the mobilization of the Iranian public in support of this war. They they achieved
sanctions relief under Trump, a Republican president who is essentially controlled by Israel. And if that
dynamic holds, then this will strengthen the Islamic Republic and the revolutionary class of Iran against
those who have sought uh you know negotiating with the West as a way out and it will fully discredit I think it
fully discredits the West and particularly the US as a negotiating partner just as this ceasefire discredited discredits it just as Donald
Trump's uh satanic yet idol so far idol threats to destroy an entire civilization discredits it.
Where where um where are the American scientists on this? Where's your friend Congressman Randy Fine on this? They can't be very happy.
I mean, Mark Leavvin is more is one of the more influential figures here. this someone as talentless as the carnival
barker Mark Levin has emerged as a really in influential figure because he's speaking on behalf of Netanyahu and
obviously they were furious about the ceasefire and so they got the Lebanon massacre and I think they have successfully blown
up the ceasefire. However, we have to pay attention to the dynamics inside Iran where there are signs going up
inside metro stations in Thran declaring that le we will not abandon Lebanon um
at rallies calls for retaliation against Israel for what they've done in Lebanon.
But Iran has already retaliated with something more powerful which is to ensure the continued closure of the Straight of Hormuz which Donald Trump
can do nothing about. and they still have the Babel Mandeb card to lay on the table which would further harm the
global economy. The price of crude has just gone up and Donald Trump's approval has just gone down once again. So Iran
may not even have to retaliate against Israel to do damage. Spain is opening up an embassy in Thran. Iran is moving out
of the diplomatic isolation that's been imposed on it for 47 years. They have a key channel to Pakistan. They're opening
up diplomatic channels all around the world because everyone has to deal with them in order to have an economy. Uh and
France is moving to open up a diplomatic channel to Lebanon to include it as part
of any ceasefire deal. So, and and and of course, and you've talked about this with your other guests in more detail,
Trump has fully destroyed NATO. NATO can never come back from this. And Mark Rut looks like the biggest clown. He's discredited himself in front of the
American public as he's here in Washington for the semi-secret Bilderberg meeting over at the Salamander Hotel. Perfect uh name for a gathering of reptilian shape shifters.
Where are the Democrats on this? And what is there of an anti-war movement in the United States?
Great question. I mean, there is an anti-war movement that's out in the streets today. They've been in front of the White House, and the Democrats have
done everything they can to distance themselves from it. Chuck Schumer,
I bet in his heart of hearts, supported this war when it started. And now that it's going poorly, he's attacking Trump from the neocon right for not doing
26 minutesenough damage to Iran and not doing enough harm to Iran's sovereignty and basically saying it's a stupid war simply because Iran is winning, not
because it's slaughtering people inside Iran, uh destroying their infrastructure. We've almost heard nothing from them. There's been so
little action on a war powers resolution. There's been so uh so little that I I start to question
if the Democrats actually wanted to go Trump in this war into this war because they thought it would harm him and that they want the war to continue because it
will weaken Trump which shows how unprincipled they are. You can also look at someone else who's been one of the more outspoken Democrats in the Senate,
Chris Murphy on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who we you know it seemed like he was against it. Then as soon as Trump moved towards a ceasefire,
Chris Murphy is on the uh you know all over the networks attacking Trump and saying that he's weak and that he has
surrendered to Iran. So the Democrats represent nothing but partisanship here and they're not doing what they did
during the Iraq war, which is to send their own constituents, the union members, the moveon.org or push
organizations out into the streets to supplement the anti-war movement because I think they might actually want this war to continue. So, this has been
discrediting to the Democrats. People are looking for leadership. The Democratic Party base is not only
against this war, but solidly against Israel. Against Israel. A new Pew poll shows a majority of Americans have a
negative view of Israel. The support for Israel within the Democratic Party is like in the single digits. But which candidate will rise from the pack to
actually give voice to this consensus among the Democratic base? So far uh maybe Roana, but the rest are on the
side of the donor class that represents the Zionist 1%. And this is this means that a major civil war is brewing for the DNC. And this will be a key issue.
Let's consider how Netanyahu is destroying Trump's presidency. Israel's destroying Trump's presidency. He got way too close to this freneommy. I
wonder if that golden pager that Netanyahu gave him will explode if Donald Trump moves too far away. And he
remember that Netanyahu destroyed Joe Biden and Netanyahu destroyed Kla Harris because neither of them could withdraw
themselves from this predatory relationship with Israel.
Well, as we came on air, Melania Trump issued a statement saying she did not have a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein,
but she also said that every woman uh who was abused by Epstein or his friends
should testify publicly. I guess that uh also means the woman who accused her
husband of abusing her uh when she was 9 years old. But when she was asked her
opinion about the war, she said it's all about the children. Chris cut number nine.
Madam first lady, can you tell us your message to children who find themselves in war zone during this holy week?
Well, all of this is happening for their future. So they will be saved in years to come.
My husband is trying to kill Iranians to save their children. Did you know about the 175 girls that were incinerated in their school?
Yeah. And I love the lounge music in the background as the camera pans back to the former game show host who's president. It's like he's just going to be like, "Hatcha,"
right? He wearing a leisure suit there and smoking like a bubble pipe with surrounded by Playboy bunnies. I mean,
that's his world. Melania Trump was asked, "Uh, do you have a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein?" She should be asked if she has a relationship with
Donald Trump because it's my understanding that they haven't lived together for some time, for years. This is all for show. He seems to get more
private time with Laura Loomer than his own wife.
Wow. who is now become uh uh real perfect visualization
of the decline and collapse of the R2P doctrine. You remember that the responsibility to protect doctrine in
which the United States has this has to use its vast air power in order to stop the next holocaust and save the children
of uh you know the ethnic Albanians or the Bosnians or to save the children of Syria by bombing the evil dictator back
to the stone age. that was initially marketed by a New Yorker correspondent in
Yugoslavia named Samantha Power who then became sort of a fixture at Harvard University's Kennedy School and then in the Obama administration
and now it's being articulated by a former catalog bride named uh Melania
Trump. So it really shows how Donald Trump is not expressing some new
crim like war criminal rhetoric or pre presenting a new doctrine of US imperial
power. He's simply lifting the mask on what has always been a criminal empire
and exposing the false justifications of spreading freedom and democracy as a gigantic hoax. and there's simply
nothing left there except raw power, raw force and threats to wipe out civilizations which are even alienating his own base as well as one of the only
constituencies in this country that was willing to get out in the streets and cheer for this war. I'm talking about
Persian expats from Westwood LA and suburban Washington DC. They now see that Trump wants to destroy all of Iran.
Resa Palvi, their leader, the clown prince based in PTOAC, Maryland, who has not been to Iran since he was a small
boy, just unfollowed Donald Trump on Twitter X. And that should tell you something.
Wow, Max, you're such a wealth of information and analysis and personal courage. Thank you, my dear friend. If
anybody wants to know why I called you the golden boy, all they have to do is listen to you. Thank you. My best to Anya and to your uh children. I won't
tell her about that crack you made about uh these people can only write a book if they don't have kids, but it's probably true. All the best to you, my friend.
Thank you so much. Great seeing you, Judge. Thanks a lot.
Sure. Coming up tomorrow, Friday, the end of the day to the end of the week,
our intelligence community roundt with Larry Johnson and Scott Ritter. You
don't want to miss it. J Npalitano for judging freedom.
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom
Apr 9, 2026
Transcript
Undeclared wars are commonplace.
Tragically, our government engages in preemptive war, otherwise known as aggression, with no complaints from the
American people. Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government.
To develop a truly free society, the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected.
What if sometimes to love your country you had to alter or abolish the government? What if Jefferson was right?
What if that government is best which governs least?
What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong? What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom
than to live as a slave? What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now?
Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Npalitaniano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, April 9th, 2026.
My dear friend and colleague Max Blumenthal joins us now. Max, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much uh for your time today.
Is there a ceasefire between the United States and Iran as we speak?
No, there's not a ceasefire. And it looks to me, having lived through the last three years and seeing how pauses
in, for example, the Gaza genocide were exploited for Israel to remobilize and rearm that. We're witnessing something
similar as US Marines are being deployed to the region. And as Israel was on the verge of running out of interceptors and
Iran had really consolidated its momentum, the United States
via Pakistan attempted to create the impression of a ceasefire.
Now, this allowed Donald Trump to game the markets, and we're seeing that some White House insider has placed a close
to1 billion dollar bet on the price of Brent crude going down as Donald Trump sent oil prices tumbling with his
announcement of his acceptance of Iran's uh National Security Council's 10point
plan as a baseline for discussions and negotiations.
But the more revealing part of this ceasefire was how the United States government looks like the state
department had provided Pakistan's Shabbaz Sharif Pakistan's leader with
the framework or the the terms that were agreed upon for the ceasefire as a draft
and Sharif or someone in his office posted the draft including the header that said uh terms for Sharif.
And then they edited the the tweet on X,
but everyone could see that he had basically been fed these terms. These terms explicitly included Lebanon as part of the ceasefire.
So the United States had agreed to include Lebanon. Iran had agreed to include Lebanon through Pakistan. So
what does Israel do? Commits one of the worst massacres in history in Lebanon.
massacring over 250 people, wounding over 1,200 people. There are families lining up outside hospitals to identify the bodies of over 90 people today.
They were bombing not just the Daha section of Beirut, which is the Shia majority area where Hezbollah has had
some offices and they can always justify mass destruction and killings of civilians on that basis that it's majority Shia. They were bombing areas
4 minuteslike Ain Moresci uh the the Cornesh in the center of Beirut, areas where opponents of Hezbollah live. They killed a famous Lebanese poet and her husband.
Entire families were killed inside their homes. They bombed a funeral in a cemetery with a 500 pound bomb. The
entire purpose of this was to sabotage the ceasefire and to provoke Iran into
defending its ally in Lebanon. And what does the White House go and do?
Including JD Vance, the so-called restrainer. JD Vance said, "Oh, well, those terms uh they were actually AI.
That was all AI generated slop."
In other words, there never was. They're basically denying that there ever was a ceasefire deal that included Lebanon. So
the the 10 points that the United States sent to uh Sharif uh
no these weren't 10 points. Iran's National Security Council which advises Iran's leader
right uh Maba Kamei introduced a 10-point proposal for what Iran sought to elicit
from the talks and these are basic basically this is the framework for Iran's sovereignty going forward and
Sharif posted the terms that had already been agreed upon in order for this sessation of hostility abilities to have
discussions in Islamabad. And those terms explicitly included Lebanon. I mean, you can just go to his ex account
and see it right there. And then once Israel decides we don't want to include Lebanon, we want we want to blow up all of Lebanon. Like they attacked the
entire country and attacked civilians explicitly. Like it was a performative slaughter. Here's
once they did that, the the Trump administration was forced to pull back.
And it shows you the entire dynamic which is that Israel determines when the US goes to war and when the US stops under Trump.
Here's the US chief negotiator who as we speak is somewhere between Washington and Islamabad. And on his plane are the
two people that foreign minister Iraqi told him not to bring. Yeah.
Um uh Kushner and Woodoff. Uh but here's the vice president saying just what you said, Max. Oh.
It was a just a misunderstanding. Chris, cut number 22.
I actually think and there's a lot of bad faith uh negotiation and a lot of bad faith, you know, propaganda going
on. I think this comes from a legitimate misunderstanding. I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon and it just didn't. We never
made that promise. We never indicated that was going to be the case. What we said is that the ceasefire would be focused on Iran and the ceasefire would be focused on America's allies, both
Israel and the Gulf Arab states. That said, the Israelis, as I understand it,
again, I'm supposed to get a fuller report when I get on the plane, have actually offered to be um frankly to
check themselves a little bit in Lebanon because they want to make sure that our negotiation is successful. That's not because that is part of the ceasefire. I
think that's the Israelis trying to set up us up for success and we'll of course see how that unfolds in the next few days. But look, if Iran wants to let
this negotiation fall apart in a conflict where they were getting hammered over Lebanon, which has nothing to do with them and which the United
States never once said was part of the ceasefire, that's ultimately their choice. We think that would be dumb, but that's their choice.
There truth in what he just said. I mean, we were told JD Vance was the one who engineered this ceasefire, uh, you
know, working with China, which has normal diplomatic relations with Iran and somewhat normal relations with the US. So, they're like a key broker here.
But you can see from his comments that he's very poorly informed, and these comments are disqualifying for JD Vance as a president and that he is lying.
He's just lying through his teeth because the terms are right there on Prime Minister Sharif's ex account and
it included Lebanon and Lebanon does not have nothing to do with Iran or the broader conflict. It was Israel that
decided to launch a ground invasion into Lebanon after it secured US support,
basically secured the US as a proxy force for attacking Iran. So, it's Israel that launched the assault on Lebanon and made Lebanon a part of the
war. It is Hezbollah that's defending Lebanon from Israel. And it is Israel that decided to blow up the ceasefire by
attacking Lebanon. And so, JD Vance is not only being dishonest, he's presenting a version of reality that is
flips on its head what Israel is doing before everyone's eyes. And so this is disqualifying for Vance. I feel very
concerned about Vance supposedly offsetting the uh ideologically Zionist negotiators
Witoff and Kushner who are going to Islamabad. I don't even know if JD Vance will be present there. And of course he's he's what what it was he it looked
like he was speaking from Hungary from Budapest. Um because he was sent off to campaign for Orban to get him out of the
way. Um, so how much latitude does he even have here?
Here's uh Netanyahu insisting that uh Lebanon had
was not part of the deal but boasting about his bombs and killings. Chris
number 19. I have said that the I've insisted that the ceasefire with Iran
does not include Lebanon. And this is what is happening today. We have dealt the biggest blow
that has suffered since the pager operation. We targeted 100 command sites headquarters in . They didn't know what happened.
Let's see. Are those places that you articulated a funeral home, a park,
the famous uh Cornesh, a shopping center, and residential neighborhoods in the suburbs, command centers. Come on.
Well, they thought they were going to score this master stroke. And so they dialed up their explosives. They launched a 100 sortizes, a 100 strikes,
sorry, 100 strikes with 65 jets in and they thought they were going to get Hezbollah general secretary Naim
Kasum and they failed and wound up blowing up several apartment buildings filled with civilians just as they did
in order to kill Ali Larajani who was the key negotiator for Iran when Israel assassinated him. It attacked, I think,
five separate locations, slaughtering well over 50 civilians. So, what Israel has done is continued to expose itself
as a mass killing machine, which is not doing well on the ground in southern
Lebanon. Israel's ground invasion has been stalled. It's objectives have been rolled back. They're announcing that
they're not actually going to seek to occupy all the land up to the Latani River. They're taking lots of casualties. There have been complaints
from the Israeli general command that the army is essentially falling apart and that reservists aren't showing up.
It's effectively a mercenary army where soldiers have to be paid to show up.
They've lost helicopters. They're concealing losses. The maravas are getting hit by FPV drones for the first
time. We didn't see this at this level during the last round. And now they're going to try to take Bint Jubel,
which is a real uh strong point, a central node of Hezbollah's Radwan forces. And Israel was unable to take
this area in the 2006 war. It actually wasn't even held off. It was held off by local Hezbollah guardsmen. So what
they're doing is compensating or I should say overcompensating for their losses on the ground. Israel as a military isn't so great on the ground.
You know, they have some good special forces, but they're essentially an assassination and killing machine that relies entirely on US firepower. And so
all they're able to do is these performative slaughters in order to blow up the ceasefire while they continue to control Donald Trump and hold his administration by the shortened curies.
I realize that uh the IDF and the Israeli government is very heavy-handed with respect to censorship.
Yeah.
But do you know from any sources how badly uh Israel has been damaged by uh Iranian missiles and drones?
Well, it wouldn't be Israel per se given the way that Iran has gone about targeting. It would be the US. And this
is what's something key to understand here about how Iran is waging this war.
Um the US is hiding I I would I would use the term hiding or it's it's it's
sheltering its F-35s at the Nevatim air base and some other key aerial assets at Bengurion International Airport.
Israel's air defenses are much more concentrated and therefore more effective than what we've seen in Saudi Arabia where the US has lost Awax uh aerial radar systems on the ground.
They've lost C130 Hercules transport planes on the ground. They've lost multi they've lost billion-dollar
radar systems that are their eyes and ears in at Alu Date air base. And you'll see like these these bases will be hit and THAAD systems aren't even going off.
Um Patriot missiles aren't even in the air. Neat team air base remains a mystery to us though where the F-35s are
being housed and when you see it come under attack it's often from a Kuramshar missile with cluster warheads. So maybe
the um you know the propellant system of the missile will get intercepted but the cluster warheads come down on Nevatim air base and they hit something there
but we don't know what it is. The censorship is so extreme and you remember judge you interviewed uh Jeremy Lefredo
who was reporting for the gray zone when he was arrested inside Israel and initially put on trial for spying. Uh fortunately he was able to get out.
these charges were completely bogus. And what had he done? One of the only things he did was he went outside Neatine Air
Base, well outside. He never tried to get in and took a picture of a ballistic missile that had landed nearby during I
think it was Operation True Promise 2 that Iran waged in retaliation for Israeli attacks. So that tells you how
strict the censorship is that if anyone even attempts to take pictures of the attacks on Neatoon, they face spying charges, treason, and could go to jail
for life. So we don't know if the F-35s have been hit. But then we have to ask the question, why did an F-15E
go down in Iran? If the F-35 is supposed to be sort of the undefeable stealth
aircraft, could it be because they've lost several of them on the ground?
Again, we don't know. This is up to uh you know, oent open source sleuths,
other reporters.
Another question, why is Planet Labs Planet the major satellite imaging company that contracts with the Pentagon
refusing to release images of the region? It's because they're hiding losses on the ground. And Iran's attacks on these airfields.
um striking US aerial assets before they're even in the air have been very effective and the cover up is underway.
The um New York Times yesterday had a lengthy what it called uh investigative
piece um purporting to recount the backstory on Trump's decision to uh attack Iran.
What is your understanding of what the backstory is? Well, this was published
by two kind of beltway access reporters who were publishing a book, I think,
called Regime Change. It's sort of an excerpt from their book. It's kind of uh impressive how they got it out so quickly. I guess neither of them have
kids because I I don't know how they do this, but uh
it tells the same story that we told at the Greyzone last year. So it really rings true for me. Last year, Ana Pararm
and I reported uh based on sourcing inside the White House that Trump was being briefed with
these um you specifically by the Mossad
director David Barnea and the Israeli Army uh chief of staff. and they were
briefing the head of SentCom and CIA director John Ratcliffe and telling them that Iran was a week away from getting a nuclear weapon and that they needed the
latitude to go in and kill then leader that Iran's then leader uh Ali Kame who
was killed on the first day of this assault operation Epstein Fury on Iran on February 28th and that John Ratcliffe
was basically serving as the Mossad stenographer and that Trump was not really pushing back on any of the
disinformation being fed to him. This is what we were told the New York through the New York Times took place on February 11th when Netanyahu was in town
here in Washington. He was being treated like the president had massive um secret service escorts. They were shutting down highways around DC. You could see
helicopters in the air. We all knew why he was here. I knew a war was on the horizon when he was here. And we subsequently learn from this report that
Netanyahu actually went into a situation room briefing with the head of the Mossad behind him on sort of like a a
live live stream and he sat at the head of the table and Trump sat to the side
which is very unusual. And Netanyahu told Trump, "Iran is a week away from a nuclear weapon. You must let us go in.
they uh Iran will start attacking the United States soon and we need to kill Iran's leader and once we decapitate its
leadership then the Iranians will rise up in the streets and it will be a quick lightning blitzkrieg regime change will
take place overnight. Trump nodded his head and quietly Marco Rubio, Sentcom
Chief Dan Kaine, JD Vance, all the others who were privy to this meeting.
Even Susie Wilds, who had worked on Benjamin Netanyahu's 2020 campaign, they said this is absolute
They they they all said that and none of them stood up to Trump because they're all yes men and women. Everyone's afraid of Trump. And so Trump authorized the
war and here we are uh well over a month later and the and the United States has lost the war. The US has abs the US lost the war within the first week.
What does Trump have to show for the six weeks of uh of killing and destruction?
No regime change, no destruction or removal of uh enriched uh uh enriched
uranium, no neutering of ballistic missiles. And the straight of hormones totally under the control of the
Iranians. Open when they want it, close when they want it, charge a toll when they want it.
Exactly. Iran is stronger than before.
Now, Iran has suffered uh heavy destruction to its infrastructure through terrorist attacks carried out by the US-Israeli coalition.
Three major steel plants attacked,
prochemical plants attacked, bridges and so forth. But this hasn't weakened Iran as a sovereign power. Iran is stronger
because of its assertion of control over the straight of Hormuz where 20% of commerce passes through. And now they're
implementing a toll system. As the Financial Times just reported, the tolls are being paid through cryptocurrency.
And I know Trump is trying to get in on the action because all he cares about is enriching himself. So he would want for
World Liberty Financial to be one of the crypto conduits for crypto. This is the one of
the corruption channels that's presided over by Trump's sons and the Witco sons as well as Tether in which Trump's
commerce secretary Howard Lutnik owns a I think 5% stake and his son
essentially oversees all the business dealings of Tether in El Salvador.
Tether is the main stable coin. So Trump's actually trying to just get in on this toll system rather than which
would consolidate Iran's strength and recognize Iran as a legitimate
powerful country among the community of nations. And when I say Iran, I also mean the Islamic Republic, which means that Iran
has achieved sanctions relief. And it didn't achieve sanctions relief under the Democrats who sought to use the JCPOA through the reformist leadership
of Hassan Roani and Javad Zarif as a means of containing Iran and actually weakening Iran as a regional if not
world power. They received sanctions relief through the assertion of the IRGC and the military power and prowess of
Iran and the strength of the mobilization of the Iranian public in support of this war. They they achieved
sanctions relief under Trump, a Republican president who is essentially controlled by Israel. And if that
dynamic holds, then this will strengthen the Islamic Republic and the revolutionary class of Iran against
those who have sought uh you know negotiating with the West as a way out and it will fully discredit I think it
fully discredits the West and particularly the US as a negotiating partner just as this ceasefire discredited discredits it just as Donald
Trump's uh satanic yet idol so far idol threats to destroy an entire civilization discredits it.
Where where um where are the American scientists on this? Where's your friend Congressman Randy Fine on this? They can't be very happy.
I mean, Mark Leavvin is more is one of the more influential figures here. this someone as talentless as the carnival
barker Mark Levin has emerged as a really in influential figure because he's speaking on behalf of Netanyahu and
obviously they were furious about the ceasefire and so they got the Lebanon massacre and I think they have successfully blown
up the ceasefire. However, we have to pay attention to the dynamics inside Iran where there are signs going up
inside metro stations in Thran declaring that le we will not abandon Lebanon um
at rallies calls for retaliation against Israel for what they've done in Lebanon.
But Iran has already retaliated with something more powerful which is to ensure the continued closure of the Straight of Hormuz which Donald Trump
can do nothing about. and they still have the Babel Mandeb card to lay on the table which would further harm the
global economy. The price of crude has just gone up and Donald Trump's approval has just gone down once again. So Iran
may not even have to retaliate against Israel to do damage. Spain is opening up an embassy in Thran. Iran is moving out
of the diplomatic isolation that's been imposed on it for 47 years. They have a key channel to Pakistan. They're opening
up diplomatic channels all around the world because everyone has to deal with them in order to have an economy. Uh and
France is moving to open up a diplomatic channel to Lebanon to include it as part
of any ceasefire deal. So, and and and of course, and you've talked about this with your other guests in more detail,
Trump has fully destroyed NATO. NATO can never come back from this. And Mark Rut looks like the biggest clown. He's discredited himself in front of the
American public as he's here in Washington for the semi-secret Bilderberg meeting over at the Salamander Hotel. Perfect uh name for a gathering of reptilian shape shifters.
Where are the Democrats on this? And what is there of an anti-war movement in the United States?
Great question. I mean, there is an anti-war movement that's out in the streets today. They've been in front of the White House, and the Democrats have
done everything they can to distance themselves from it. Chuck Schumer,
I bet in his heart of hearts, supported this war when it started. And now that it's going poorly, he's attacking Trump from the neocon right for not doing
26 minutesenough damage to Iran and not doing enough harm to Iran's sovereignty and basically saying it's a stupid war simply because Iran is winning, not
because it's slaughtering people inside Iran, uh destroying their infrastructure. We've almost heard nothing from them. There's been so
little action on a war powers resolution. There's been so uh so little that I I start to question
if the Democrats actually wanted to go Trump in this war into this war because they thought it would harm him and that they want the war to continue because it
will weaken Trump which shows how unprincipled they are. You can also look at someone else who's been one of the more outspoken Democrats in the Senate,
Chris Murphy on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who we you know it seemed like he was against it. Then as soon as Trump moved towards a ceasefire,
Chris Murphy is on the uh you know all over the networks attacking Trump and saying that he's weak and that he has
surrendered to Iran. So the Democrats represent nothing but partisanship here and they're not doing what they did
during the Iraq war, which is to send their own constituents, the union members, the moveon.org or push
organizations out into the streets to supplement the anti-war movement because I think they might actually want this war to continue. So, this has been
discrediting to the Democrats. People are looking for leadership. The Democratic Party base is not only
against this war, but solidly against Israel. Against Israel. A new Pew poll shows a majority of Americans have a
negative view of Israel. The support for Israel within the Democratic Party is like in the single digits. But which candidate will rise from the pack to
actually give voice to this consensus among the Democratic base? So far uh maybe Roana, but the rest are on the
side of the donor class that represents the Zionist 1%. And this is this means that a major civil war is brewing for the DNC. And this will be a key issue.
Let's consider how Netanyahu is destroying Trump's presidency. Israel's destroying Trump's presidency. He got way too close to this freneommy. I
wonder if that golden pager that Netanyahu gave him will explode if Donald Trump moves too far away. And he
remember that Netanyahu destroyed Joe Biden and Netanyahu destroyed Kla Harris because neither of them could withdraw
themselves from this predatory relationship with Israel.
Well, as we came on air, Melania Trump issued a statement saying she did not have a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein,
but she also said that every woman uh who was abused by Epstein or his friends
should testify publicly. I guess that uh also means the woman who accused her
husband of abusing her uh when she was 9 years old. But when she was asked her
opinion about the war, she said it's all about the children. Chris cut number nine.
Madam first lady, can you tell us your message to children who find themselves in war zone during this holy week?
Well, all of this is happening for their future. So they will be saved in years to come.
My husband is trying to kill Iranians to save their children. Did you know about the 175 girls that were incinerated in their school?
Yeah. And I love the lounge music in the background as the camera pans back to the former game show host who's president. It's like he's just going to be like, "Hatcha,"
right? He wearing a leisure suit there and smoking like a bubble pipe with surrounded by Playboy bunnies. I mean,
that's his world. Melania Trump was asked, "Uh, do you have a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein?" She should be asked if she has a relationship with
Donald Trump because it's my understanding that they haven't lived together for some time, for years. This is all for show. He seems to get more
private time with Laura Loomer than his own wife.
Wow. who is now become uh uh real perfect visualization
of the decline and collapse of the R2P doctrine. You remember that the responsibility to protect doctrine in
which the United States has this has to use its vast air power in order to stop the next holocaust and save the children
of uh you know the ethnic Albanians or the Bosnians or to save the children of Syria by bombing the evil dictator back
to the stone age. that was initially marketed by a New Yorker correspondent in
Yugoslavia named Samantha Power who then became sort of a fixture at Harvard University's Kennedy School and then in the Obama administration
and now it's being articulated by a former catalog bride named uh Melania
Trump. So it really shows how Donald Trump is not expressing some new
crim like war criminal rhetoric or pre presenting a new doctrine of US imperial
power. He's simply lifting the mask on what has always been a criminal empire
and exposing the false justifications of spreading freedom and democracy as a gigantic hoax. and there's simply
nothing left there except raw power, raw force and threats to wipe out civilizations which are even alienating his own base as well as one of the only
constituencies in this country that was willing to get out in the streets and cheer for this war. I'm talking about
Persian expats from Westwood LA and suburban Washington DC. They now see that Trump wants to destroy all of Iran.
Resa Palvi, their leader, the clown prince based in PTOAC, Maryland, who has not been to Iran since he was a small
boy, just unfollowed Donald Trump on Twitter X. And that should tell you something.
Wow, Max, you're such a wealth of information and analysis and personal courage. Thank you, my dear friend. If
anybody wants to know why I called you the golden boy, all they have to do is listen to you. Thank you. My best to Anya and to your uh children. I won't
tell her about that crack you made about uh these people can only write a book if they don't have kids, but it's probably true. All the best to you, my friend.
Thank you so much. Great seeing you, Judge. Thanks a lot.
Sure. Coming up tomorrow, Friday, the end of the day to the end of the week,
our intelligence community roundt with Larry Johnson and Scott Ritter. You
don't want to miss it. J Npalitano for judging freedom.
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Fri Apr 10, 2026 6:24 pm
Trump’s unusual public outbursts amidst Iran talks; tension with Pope revealed | Janta Ka Reporter
Janta Ka Reporter
Apr 10, 2026
Donald Trump has launched a blistering attack on his own supporters for their criticism over the Iran conflict. Trump's long social media post launching personal attacks on some of the prominent supporters of the Republic party came just hours before the scheduled ceasefire talks between the US and Iran in Islamabad. Meanwhile, Iran has made it clear that Lebanon must be included in the ceasefire for the talks to move forward. Rifat Jawaid examines the real reason for Trump's frustration.
Transcript
Donald Trump has reacted furiously to his supporters who condemned him for his insanity over Iran. And the people who
he has lashed out at in a lengthy social media post are some of the most prominent influencers who helped him get
reelected as the president of the US for the second time. This comes amidst reports of Trump threatening the
Vatican. Yes, the Vatican. because Pope Leo I 14th decided to declare the USIsraeli attacks on Iran unjust.
Meanwhile, the Pakistani defense minister has stirred a hornet's nest by calling Israel the cancer of the Middle
East. This would be the broad focus of my video today. Also in this video, BBC caught manufacturing consent for the
bombing of Iran yet again. So, please stay tuned.
Donald Trump, arguably the most deranged occupant of the White House ever, has written a lengthy social media post
targeting some of the prominent faces of his own MAGA movement. Remember yesterday I showed you the videos of Tucker Carlson, Megan Kelly, Joe Rogan,
and Dave Smith condemning Trump for taking his country to a war to please his Israeli master. This didn't go down
well with Trump as he wrote a lengthy social media post on Truth Social launching a blistering personal attack
on these MAGA supporters. He wrote, and I quote, "I know why Tucker Carlson,
Meghgan Kelly, Candace Owens, and Alex Jones have all been fighting me for years, especially for the fact that they
think it is wonderful for Iran, the number one state sponsor of terror, to have a nuclear weapon, because they have one thing in common, low IQ's.
They are stupid people. They know it.
Their families know it. And everyone else knows it, too. Look at their past.
Look at their record. They don't have what it takes and they never did. They have all been thrown off television,
lost their shows and aren't even invited on TV because nobody cares about them.
They are nut jobs, troublemakers, and will say anything necessary for some free and cheap publicity. Now they think
they get some clicks because they have third rate podcasts, but nobody is talking about them and their views are
the opposite of MAGA or I wouldn't have won the presidential election in a landslide. MAGA agrees with me and just
gave CNN a 100% approval rating of Trump. Not hand flailing fools like Tucker Carlson who couldn't even finish
college. He was a broken man when he got fired from Fox and he's never been the same. Perhaps he should see a good
psychiatrist. Or Megan Kelly, who nastily askked me the now famous only Rosie O'Donnell question. Or crazy
Candace Owens, who accuses the highly respected first lady of France of being a man when she's not and will hopefully
3 minuteswin lots of money in the ongoing lawsuit. Actually, to me, the first lady of France is a far more beautiful woman
than Candice. In fact, it's not even close or bankrupt Alex Jones who says some of the dumbest things and lost his
entire fortune as he should have for his horrendous attack on the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims ridiculously claiming it was a hoax.
These so-called pundits are losers and they always will be. Now, fake news CNN,
the failing New York Times, and all of the other radical left news organizations are hailing them and giving them positive press for the first time in their lives. They are not MAGA.
They are losers just trying to latch on to MAGA. As president, I could get them on my side anytime I want to. But when
they call, I don't return their calls because I'm too busy on world and country affairs. And after a few times,
they go nasty. just like Marjgerie Traitor Brown. But I no longer care about that stuff. I only care about doing right for our country. MAGA is
about winning and strength in not allowing Iran to have nuclear weapons.
MAGA is about making America great again. And these people have no idea how to do that. But I do because the United
States is now the hottest country anywhere in the world. President Donald J. Trump. End quote.
The fact that this man spends such a long time writing this lengthy post shows just how important he thinks their
criticism is. He's essentially a maniac whose only objective as the US president is to make a lot of money and serve his
Israeli masters at any cost. As long as Tucker Carlson, Megan Kelly, Marjgerie Taylor Green, Joe Rogan, and David Smith
supported him, they were his favorite people. The moment they slammed him for his call to end the Iranian
civilization, he decided to launch personal attacks on them. Not just MAGA supporters. Now it has emerged that
Trump also threatened the Vatican because Pope Leo I 14 recently called his military aggression against Iran
unjust. Watch this clip of the Pope first to understand what he has said. I
would simply say um once again what I said in the Urb message on Sunday asking
all people of goodwill to search always for peace and not violence to reject war
especially a war which many people have said is an unjust war. The pope had also earlier criticized Trump's other
policies including the murder of Americans by the ICE thugs. Now NBC is reporting this.
And now to the Pope and his relationship with the Trump administration. There are conflicting reports from Vatican sources in the Pentagon over an unusual meeting that took place earlier this year.
Maryanne Ahern is here to explain why the Pentagon met with the Vatican officials in the first place. Maryanne Marian. Shortly after Pope Leo's January
speech to diplomats visiting the Vat Vatican, Pentagon officials requested a meeting with those who represent the
Pope in Washington DC. The disagreement today, what was the tone and the message?
In January, Pope Leo spoke of the importance of international humanitarian law when he addressed the diplomatic core.
War is back in vogue and a zeal for war is spreading.
Shortly after that speech, a meeting was requested by the Pentagon with Vatican officials based in Washington DC. That's
highly unusual. As first reported by the Free Press, the Pentagon offered quote a
bitter lecture, warning that the United States has the military power to do whatever it wants and that the church
had better take its side. A Vatican source also tells NBC 5 the meeting was most unpleasant and confrontational.
Far from being intimidated, the Pope has just tweeted this, and I quote, "God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who
is a disciple of Christ, the prince of peace is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop
bombs. Military action will not create space for freedom or times of peace which comes only from the patient
promotion of coexistence and dialogue among peoples. End quote. We are in this situation because of Israel, a settler
colony which has long compromised this man called Trump. As reported by the New York Times, Netanyahu forced Trump to
drag the US military into a war that should have never been launched in the first place. While the US continues to
function as an Israeli colony, Pakistan Defense Minister Kaja Muhammad AF has called Israel a cancer of the Middle East. He wrote on Twitter and I quote,
"Israel is evil and a curse for humanity. While peace talks are underway in Islamabad. Genocide is being
committed in Lebanon. Innocent citizens are being killed by Israel. First Gaza,
then Iran, and now Lebanon. Bloodletting continues unabated. I hope and pray people who created this cancerous state
on Palestinian land to get rid of European Jews burn in hell. End quote.
As expected, the Israelis reacted furiously to his tweet. Faced with growing criticism and perhaps
unnecessary spotlight on the peace talks being held in Pakistan, AI seems to have deleted his tweet. But he has indeed
triggered fresh debate on the malign nature of the settler colony which is causing so much damage to world peace.
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Kamar has finally taken credit for the ceasefire agreed between Trump and Iran.
Yesterday, he said this from Saudi Arabia. This prompted independent MP Zaras Sultana to take a dig at him with
this video to illustrate Star's real contribution to the ceasefire.
Today Stamar was in Katar where he said this.
Well, the overarching impression here is the importance um as they see it as um us standing with them as an ally, as a
friend of theirs at a point of need. Um and there's been reflection on the work we've done with them over the last six to seven weeks on collective
self-defense. Here in Qatar, we've got a joint squadron. So a real sense of here we are as an ally standing with our allies when it matters most to them.
Obviously the discussion moved very quickly to the ceasefire. A sense that it's fragile that more work is needed
that the straight up moves has to be part of the solution. A very strong sense that can't be tolling or restrictions on that navigation. And so
u we come away from here with um a real desire on their part to work more closely with us on defense resilience on economic resilience. That's really
important to us because this is impacting us back at home on our economy. So it's very important we do that together. Had a discussion with
President Trump last night um and um set out to him the views um of the region here. These Gulf states are the
neighbors of Iran and therefore if the ceasefire is to hold um and we hope it will. It has to involve them.
Estama did contribute to this conflict first by providing the UK air base for American B2 bombers to use for refueling
and reloading. And now journalist Matt Kennard has revealed the movement of UK spy drone over Lebanon just before
Israeli terrorist launch indiscriminate bombings there. Then declassified reported that the UK's complicity in the
massacre of the Iranians was far deeper than what has been reported so far.
Elsewhere, Israeli Broadcasting Corporation, also known as the BBC, once again indulged in his genocidal propaganda as it interviewed an
anonymous Iranian, yes, anonymous Iranian, to manufacture consent in favor of the mass murder of the Iranians.
According to this anonymous Iranian, 80%
Iranians are unhappy that US and Israeli terrorists have stopped the mass murder of their loved ones.
Watching from afar, how are you feeling about this current ceasefire?
So, uh, basically, uh, in terms of the ceasefires, of course, when the ceasefire came through, um, I would say
at least 80% of Iranian people, they've been very angry. They've been very disappointed because u what we want is
the war to continue and get rid of this uh cancerous regime. Um and when the ceasefire cames there was some disappointment.
uh what what the ceasefire tells us that the IRGC is already collapsing and there is already a gap uh within their systems
because they have been divided inside the country within the regimes uh for the groups that are wanting ceasefires
and the group that antisfires and if the regime has already shown weakness by entering this negotiation
which reflect pressures on them and I have a strong belief in um President Trump's that he knows what he's doing
and he knows this regime is cancerous and if you don't remove the cancer it will come back.
Now you tell me why this rogue entity should not be banned forever.
I will leave you with this video of Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez who had just won the global change award. If there is
anyone who deserves this award, it's Sanchez.
The peoples are not only those who live in safety and comfort like us. The peoples refers mainly to those suffering
and living through hardship, but those are the people the United Nations was created for. Those are the people that multilateralism was supposed to serve.
So we must ask ourselves what good are our ws and institutions if injustice continues to spread unchecked
across continents. If we keep destroying the beautiful planet we inherited. If
wars and violence are on the rise again threatening the future of our children and grandchildren. numbers and
statistics are of little relief to those who continue to suffer to those we the peoples who look to us with hope. That's
it from me. Thank you very much for your support of this platform and our journalism. If you haven't subscribed to my channel, please do so because that's
one of the many ways you can support independent journalism. God bless you all.
Janta Ka Reporter
Apr 10, 2026
Donald Trump has launched a blistering attack on his own supporters for their criticism over the Iran conflict. Trump's long social media post launching personal attacks on some of the prominent supporters of the Republic party came just hours before the scheduled ceasefire talks between the US and Iran in Islamabad. Meanwhile, Iran has made it clear that Lebanon must be included in the ceasefire for the talks to move forward. Rifat Jawaid examines the real reason for Trump's frustration.
Transcript
Donald Trump has reacted furiously to his supporters who condemned him for his insanity over Iran. And the people who
he has lashed out at in a lengthy social media post are some of the most prominent influencers who helped him get
reelected as the president of the US for the second time. This comes amidst reports of Trump threatening the
Vatican. Yes, the Vatican. because Pope Leo I 14th decided to declare the USIsraeli attacks on Iran unjust.
Meanwhile, the Pakistani defense minister has stirred a hornet's nest by calling Israel the cancer of the Middle
East. This would be the broad focus of my video today. Also in this video, BBC caught manufacturing consent for the
bombing of Iran yet again. So, please stay tuned.
Donald Trump, arguably the most deranged occupant of the White House ever, has written a lengthy social media post
targeting some of the prominent faces of his own MAGA movement. Remember yesterday I showed you the videos of Tucker Carlson, Megan Kelly, Joe Rogan,
and Dave Smith condemning Trump for taking his country to a war to please his Israeli master. This didn't go down
well with Trump as he wrote a lengthy social media post on Truth Social launching a blistering personal attack
on these MAGA supporters. He wrote, and I quote, "I know why Tucker Carlson,
Meghgan Kelly, Candace Owens, and Alex Jones have all been fighting me for years, especially for the fact that they
think it is wonderful for Iran, the number one state sponsor of terror, to have a nuclear weapon, because they have one thing in common, low IQ's.
They are stupid people. They know it.
Their families know it. And everyone else knows it, too. Look at their past.
Look at their record. They don't have what it takes and they never did. They have all been thrown off television,
lost their shows and aren't even invited on TV because nobody cares about them.
They are nut jobs, troublemakers, and will say anything necessary for some free and cheap publicity. Now they think
they get some clicks because they have third rate podcasts, but nobody is talking about them and their views are
the opposite of MAGA or I wouldn't have won the presidential election in a landslide. MAGA agrees with me and just
gave CNN a 100% approval rating of Trump. Not hand flailing fools like Tucker Carlson who couldn't even finish
college. He was a broken man when he got fired from Fox and he's never been the same. Perhaps he should see a good
psychiatrist. Or Megan Kelly, who nastily askked me the now famous only Rosie O'Donnell question. Or crazy
Candace Owens, who accuses the highly respected first lady of France of being a man when she's not and will hopefully
3 minuteswin lots of money in the ongoing lawsuit. Actually, to me, the first lady of France is a far more beautiful woman
than Candice. In fact, it's not even close or bankrupt Alex Jones who says some of the dumbest things and lost his
entire fortune as he should have for his horrendous attack on the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims ridiculously claiming it was a hoax.
These so-called pundits are losers and they always will be. Now, fake news CNN,
the failing New York Times, and all of the other radical left news organizations are hailing them and giving them positive press for the first time in their lives. They are not MAGA.
They are losers just trying to latch on to MAGA. As president, I could get them on my side anytime I want to. But when
they call, I don't return their calls because I'm too busy on world and country affairs. And after a few times,
they go nasty. just like Marjgerie Traitor Brown. But I no longer care about that stuff. I only care about doing right for our country. MAGA is
about winning and strength in not allowing Iran to have nuclear weapons.
MAGA is about making America great again. And these people have no idea how to do that. But I do because the United
States is now the hottest country anywhere in the world. President Donald J. Trump. End quote.
The fact that this man spends such a long time writing this lengthy post shows just how important he thinks their
criticism is. He's essentially a maniac whose only objective as the US president is to make a lot of money and serve his
Israeli masters at any cost. As long as Tucker Carlson, Megan Kelly, Marjgerie Taylor Green, Joe Rogan, and David Smith
supported him, they were his favorite people. The moment they slammed him for his call to end the Iranian
civilization, he decided to launch personal attacks on them. Not just MAGA supporters. Now it has emerged that
Trump also threatened the Vatican because Pope Leo I 14 recently called his military aggression against Iran
unjust. Watch this clip of the Pope first to understand what he has said. I
would simply say um once again what I said in the Urb message on Sunday asking
all people of goodwill to search always for peace and not violence to reject war
especially a war which many people have said is an unjust war. The pope had also earlier criticized Trump's other
policies including the murder of Americans by the ICE thugs. Now NBC is reporting this.
And now to the Pope and his relationship with the Trump administration. There are conflicting reports from Vatican sources in the Pentagon over an unusual meeting that took place earlier this year.
Maryanne Ahern is here to explain why the Pentagon met with the Vatican officials in the first place. Maryanne Marian. Shortly after Pope Leo's January
speech to diplomats visiting the Vat Vatican, Pentagon officials requested a meeting with those who represent the
Pope in Washington DC. The disagreement today, what was the tone and the message?
In January, Pope Leo spoke of the importance of international humanitarian law when he addressed the diplomatic core.
War is back in vogue and a zeal for war is spreading.
Shortly after that speech, a meeting was requested by the Pentagon with Vatican officials based in Washington DC. That's
highly unusual. As first reported by the Free Press, the Pentagon offered quote a
bitter lecture, warning that the United States has the military power to do whatever it wants and that the church
had better take its side. A Vatican source also tells NBC 5 the meeting was most unpleasant and confrontational.
Far from being intimidated, the Pope has just tweeted this, and I quote, "God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who
is a disciple of Christ, the prince of peace is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop
bombs. Military action will not create space for freedom or times of peace which comes only from the patient
promotion of coexistence and dialogue among peoples. End quote. We are in this situation because of Israel, a settler
colony which has long compromised this man called Trump. As reported by the New York Times, Netanyahu forced Trump to
drag the US military into a war that should have never been launched in the first place. While the US continues to
function as an Israeli colony, Pakistan Defense Minister Kaja Muhammad AF has called Israel a cancer of the Middle East. He wrote on Twitter and I quote,
"Israel is evil and a curse for humanity. While peace talks are underway in Islamabad. Genocide is being
committed in Lebanon. Innocent citizens are being killed by Israel. First Gaza,
then Iran, and now Lebanon. Bloodletting continues unabated. I hope and pray people who created this cancerous state
on Palestinian land to get rid of European Jews burn in hell. End quote.
As expected, the Israelis reacted furiously to his tweet. Faced with growing criticism and perhaps
unnecessary spotlight on the peace talks being held in Pakistan, AI seems to have deleted his tweet. But he has indeed
triggered fresh debate on the malign nature of the settler colony which is causing so much damage to world peace.
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Kamar has finally taken credit for the ceasefire agreed between Trump and Iran.
Yesterday, he said this from Saudi Arabia. This prompted independent MP Zaras Sultana to take a dig at him with
this video to illustrate Star's real contribution to the ceasefire.
Today Stamar was in Katar where he said this.
Well, the overarching impression here is the importance um as they see it as um us standing with them as an ally, as a
friend of theirs at a point of need. Um and there's been reflection on the work we've done with them over the last six to seven weeks on collective
self-defense. Here in Qatar, we've got a joint squadron. So a real sense of here we are as an ally standing with our allies when it matters most to them.
Obviously the discussion moved very quickly to the ceasefire. A sense that it's fragile that more work is needed
that the straight up moves has to be part of the solution. A very strong sense that can't be tolling or restrictions on that navigation. And so
u we come away from here with um a real desire on their part to work more closely with us on defense resilience on economic resilience. That's really
important to us because this is impacting us back at home on our economy. So it's very important we do that together. Had a discussion with
President Trump last night um and um set out to him the views um of the region here. These Gulf states are the
neighbors of Iran and therefore if the ceasefire is to hold um and we hope it will. It has to involve them.
Estama did contribute to this conflict first by providing the UK air base for American B2 bombers to use for refueling
and reloading. And now journalist Matt Kennard has revealed the movement of UK spy drone over Lebanon just before
Israeli terrorist launch indiscriminate bombings there. Then declassified reported that the UK's complicity in the
massacre of the Iranians was far deeper than what has been reported so far.
Elsewhere, Israeli Broadcasting Corporation, also known as the BBC, once again indulged in his genocidal propaganda as it interviewed an
anonymous Iranian, yes, anonymous Iranian, to manufacture consent in favor of the mass murder of the Iranians.
According to this anonymous Iranian, 80%
Iranians are unhappy that US and Israeli terrorists have stopped the mass murder of their loved ones.
Watching from afar, how are you feeling about this current ceasefire?
So, uh, basically, uh, in terms of the ceasefires, of course, when the ceasefire came through, um, I would say
at least 80% of Iranian people, they've been very angry. They've been very disappointed because u what we want is
the war to continue and get rid of this uh cancerous regime. Um and when the ceasefire cames there was some disappointment.
uh what what the ceasefire tells us that the IRGC is already collapsing and there is already a gap uh within their systems
because they have been divided inside the country within the regimes uh for the groups that are wanting ceasefires
and the group that antisfires and if the regime has already shown weakness by entering this negotiation
which reflect pressures on them and I have a strong belief in um President Trump's that he knows what he's doing
and he knows this regime is cancerous and if you don't remove the cancer it will come back.
Now you tell me why this rogue entity should not be banned forever.
I will leave you with this video of Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez who had just won the global change award. If there is
anyone who deserves this award, it's Sanchez.
The peoples are not only those who live in safety and comfort like us. The peoples refers mainly to those suffering
and living through hardship, but those are the people the United Nations was created for. Those are the people that multilateralism was supposed to serve.
So we must ask ourselves what good are our ws and institutions if injustice continues to spread unchecked
across continents. If we keep destroying the beautiful planet we inherited. If
wars and violence are on the rise again threatening the future of our children and grandchildren. numbers and
statistics are of little relief to those who continue to suffer to those we the peoples who look to us with hope. That's
it from me. Thank you very much for your support of this platform and our journalism. If you haven't subscribed to my channel, please do so because that's
one of the many ways you can support independent journalism. God bless you all.
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Part 2 Anti-Anti-Nazi Barbarian Hordes are Knocking Down
by admin » Fri Apr 10, 2026 7:03 pm
Pepe Escobar: Iran's Retaliation CHOKES Hormuz, DECIMATES Saudi Oil as Trump Retreats
Danny Haiphong
Streamed live 110 minutes ago
Pepe Escobar discusses the breaking developments emerging from the wreckage of the Iran war, including Iran's bombshell strikes on Saudi Arabia causing a massive fallout for global oil, Trump fuming over Iranian moves on the Strait of Hormuz, and the ongoing desperation of Israel to keep a losing war going.
Transcript
Welcome back everyone. It's your host Danny Hiong. As you can see, I'm joined by geopolitical analyst and independent journalist Pepe Escobar. Pepe, good to see you again.
Good to see you, Danny. Uh, greetings. Uh, midnight in Buddhist Southeast Asia. Greetings to you and to our audience.
Yeah, very much appreciated you taking the time out in this uh early morning for you. Everyone, hit the like button.
That helps boost the show. Pepe, let's get started, okay, with this debacle. Okay, we have a debacle now. Uh,
everyone, even the western mainstream,
everyone's saying the US has suffered a major, at the very minimum, a strategic defeat. The very minimum, that's what
we're talking about here. And we have a number of developments. I just want to outline so people get a sense of what's
going on. So, uh, Donald Trump is still very much obsessed with the straight of Hormuz. He's saying that Iran is doing a
very poor job in allowing oil to go through it and that's not the agreement that they had. Well, here is what Drop
Site News had to say about what Iran is actually doing. is asserting major control and that there are 2,000 at
least ships still stranded and that Iran has told basically every single tanker other than the ones it is giving permission to through its toll system
that they have to stay put.
Now, this also comes Pepe. I don't know if you saw the news. I found this very big. There's
reports uh Saudi Arabia is accusing Iran hours after the ceasefire of hitting their major oil pipeline, the East West
pipeline that's supposed to be alternative to the straight of Hormuz.
Uh, not only this, but there's other production facilities that they claim were hit at this time, hours after the
ceasefire, amounting to 1.3 million barrels per day, slashed from Saudis oil production. Iran is saying they didn't
do that. Iran Well, but we do know that Iran did hit Saudi Arabia in the days earlier before uh the ceasefire was
struck. And we also have news that uh Iran is holding out on talking to the United States at all until a ceasefire in Lebanon is reached and until frozen
funds are released by the United States in Qatar. So Pepe, help us outline what is going on here. It still feels like
the US is trying to force Iran to capitulate before talks even happen and Iran has essentially said no.
Exactly. First of all, because uh it was uh the Trump administration who was begging for a ceasefire and not only
this past few days, they start begging for a ceasefire after three or four days of operation epic [ __ ] Well, uh
before uh our conversation only a few minutes ago, I was trying to establish where is the Iranian delegation.
Nobody knows for sure. The Pakistanis basically are saying that uh an Iranian
military plane arrived uh at a military airport in Rahul Pindi.
Rao Pindi and Islam Ababad are sister cities. If you go just to give you an idea if you go by taxi from one to another something like 20 . So
they are actually there theoretically they are at the Serena. We can call the Serena town in Islamabad and ask them
look are they there or not. Okay, nobody has done that so far. And then when you look the whole spectrum of Iranian official and semiofficial media, no,
they have not left Iran. And uh theoretically they are at Iman Kmenini
airport for hours. Now it's what? Now it's uh around 9:00 and 8:30 uh at night
in waiting and waiting for the these two points that were stressed by Galibbath uh in some of his recent posts.
First of them is Lebanon is exactly that's the one perfect uh the ceasefire
in Lebanon and the release of Iran's blocked assets. Dizzy runs blocked assets. Uh this is very very important
because it it's not a lot of money but it is substantial. 7 billion dollar held
in Qatar but this is was collected by South Korea and it's related to US sanctions.
So now we have South Korean ammy service with the banking people in Qatar scrambling in the middle of the night to
unblock the seven billion dollars until tomorrow morning. I wonder if they'll be able to do that especially because same
Saturday morning is a bank holiday or something. So so this is where we are. We don't know if they are in Pakistan.
We are not so sure if they are at the airport in um uh Thran and these two
items they won't be unblocked in the next few hours. So for this um uh
negotiation and of course they the the Pakistanis they did a a Hollywood spectacle at the Gina center. It's a
really nice enormous in Islamabad decoration you know um beautiful chairs you name the space for the media and all
that but nobody knows if this thing is going to happen actually so this is where we are at the moment a major
cliffhanger apparently uh Vance is on the way Vance should arrive in the next few hours right and the whole setup is
already there like there is a wow it's it's larger in life you the usual when
um there is a presidential uh u American presidential visit anywhere in the world.
So uh so Danny uh this is all part of the information war because we have
information war on both sides and both sides are trying to pose as uh okay we are in the driver's seat. We all know
who is in the driver's seat by now in terms of inflicting a strategic defeat
on the empire. We all know what's going on. But and of course when you pay attention to what Vance said before he left the US,
right, which was uh the tone was uh not as uh
Baboon of Barbaria style, but it was threatening still.
And this is something that I had reconfirmed yesterday and correct me if I'm wrong, Danny, and all of you in the
audience. Right at the beginning when Vance was became vice president, he may have
mentioned that we should bomb Iran. I don't know if this is true or not. So,
this requires a little bit of uh I I didn't have time to do this before.
And obviously, he changed his mind along the way. And apparently, but of course this is also not confirmed. He was
against Operation Epic [ __ ] until the last minute. But this this is if we trust the New York Times and of course
we don't trust the New York Times. So it's all in the balance. What is clear
is that he is playing there's a big big power play related to his presidential ambitions.
He obviously wants to get the credit uh as a peacemaker.
Of course, his chances are, I would say, from a zero to 10, probably 0.5,
but but this is what he seeing. Of course, this is uh everything to do with his own career path.
So, all these variables play, right? uh the Pakistani variable is uh is immensely complicated but fascinating.
Uh for instance, I linked in my telegram uh a brilliant article by one of my best friends in Islamabad, Junide Ahmed.
Junide is is a professor of Islamic studies, but he's a very very good geopolitical analyst. And basically he
says that even if this is uh to be very diplomatic uh an unelected
military juna in disguise that's what it is because the big big guy in this government in Pakistan now is field
marshall aim is not the prime minister Shabbaz Sharif definitely not but they
were very very clever to position themselves I wouldn't say as mediators they were not as the goetweens between
the the Americans basically chose Pakistan to be their go between the principal goetweens to talk to Iran
because they knew that Iran wouldn't talk to them directly and indirectly they would not trust Egypt they would not trust Saudi Arabia they would not
trust Turkey but Pakistan is a different story so obviously Trump administration has been using Pakistan And the Pakistanis very very clever they you
know they wow they leveraged that to the max and now their new geopolitical
standing in the world went shot up like that you know and when you compare to India the Indians are basically crying
at the moment nobody nobody nobody's even paying attention to to India but the problem is the the lost in once
again the lost in translation elements In this back and forth of passing messages,
we still don't know for sure if the Pakistanis sent to the Americans the real Farsy
translation in English from Farsy of the 10pointer or the Americans got it and obviously
they are lying. There are two possibilities. the uh Iranians got the 15 pointer, you know, was very the
translation from English to far in the 15 pointer. They they read it and they they knew it already, right? But the 10p
pointer because this this enormous uh discussion on what's really in the 10p pointer, but it's so easy. Go to x.
The 10pointer was on x for days, right?
in English for every everybody knew what's what the tenpointer was you know so the white house cannot come up with the I know this was not in the 10pinter
no that's it it's there so this is just I would say two or 3% of the
the maze we are all in and of course without knowing this thing is going to happen in Islamabad tomorrow
yeah and the same goes too for Pepe for what's going on in the straight of four news. Uh how long has it been since Iran
has announced and been working with vessels there around this toll which you know uh Fox News here I'll just play
this they they are very surprised they just found out that this was going on along with the president uh where they're getting insiders who are telling
them that the straight of moves is under effective IRGC control Israeli intelligence they didn't know that
you'll see you'll see right now Incredible.
Iran is indeed demanding fees for the few vessels it's allowing to pass through the straight of Hormuz. This official adds the straight is effectively under full IRGC control.
They decide who gets to go through, but more importantly who doesn't.
So, uh, that's been going on for quite some time, but Donald Trump came out,
you know, he said, "I heard that they're charging tolls." And as I put up before, uh, that's not part of the agreement,
you know. Uh so all these developments though, Pepe, it seems to point to uh the United States seems, you know, now
Donald Trump, I don't know if you saw it's the same kind of game. It's the United States under Trump trying to look
very big. We'll see in what's going to happen. Maybe they're privy to the fact that the Iranians are just
hanging out at the airport. Uh we have a reset going. We're loading up ships with the best ammunition, even at a high level, uh, to do a complete decimation.
So, this doesn't bode well for talks. It seems like the level of ignorance or or maybe playing ignorance and also threats.
Both Danny uh ignorance, feain ignorance or outright ignorance, which is even
worse. And what is obvious is that nobody among the the circle of
sickopants s lickers etc is passing real life information to Trump. It's it's
it's mindb boggling and because he doesn't read anything obviously he he cannot fact check anything and obviously
he doesn't fact check anything. This is extremely extremely worrying. This proves once again that he does he has no
clue about the overall big picture in the local chess board in the Persian
Gulf and in the straight of Hormuz. Uh people in the middle of the
14 minutesthe Sahara desert already know by now that there is a toll pool in the street of Hermus. uh many of us explain how it
works that you need to get authorization from the RGC Navy. You have to pay the toll boost. You can pay in U1, in
crypto, in petrol U1, you name it. Then you get a signal, then you cross and all that. And they are fine tuning this.
Every day there is a different set of regulations. And in this past 24 to 48
hours, very very few tankers cross through. There was a Russian tanker yesterday. This was immensely
interesting. This Russian tanker was coming uh from east to west in the straight
over Moose and he went all over uh all the way to Kar which is in the northwest to load
to load uh uh to load itself with uh oil and then send it somewhere else.
Probably uh it could be part of the Russian shadow fleet. He could be a
totally legal legal uh Russian tanker but probably is going to India on the
way back. China they don't need that from Russian tankers. They have their own uh let's say China shadow fleet
which is not a shadow fleet. China they have at least 26 27 28 tankers that keep doing the back and forth through or move
with no problem. And of course uh the fine adjuning of the toll booth is
already a process. It started with what we're having now very very important because uh Iran
constituted a new uh navigational route for the tankers. Before that they had to
c they usually cross the straight of Hormuz in the middle of the of the straight uh let's say equidistance to the Iranian shore and the Omani shore.
Now they have to navigate very close to Iranian territorial waters
u between Cashem Island the big the big island and Larak the mini one. So this
is uh tankers navigating not in international waters but Iranian territorial waters and that provides the
jeridical framework for them to install a toll booth. Absolutely. This was brilliant. And why they cannot go
through uh the middle of the straight because it's mind. Yeah. They are minded so nobody can cross it.
Wait wait wait. The Navy though P Hegth and Donald Trump told me that it was eliminated. It was it was
obliterated and now they're obliterated.
That's strange how you know it's just it's it's absolutely it's mindblowing.
Well, uh, you know, Pepe, uh, I wanted to now, you know, uh, get into how we got to this point, uh, because as you know, the, um, the Gulf countries, uh,
you have Saudi Arabia complaining about the damage to, uh, to its oil facilities. You have the UAE and Bahrain
pushing, pushing, pushing, saying that the straight of Hormuz needs to be out of Iran's control. And we also have the report that you referenced earlier where
you had Donald Trump for weeks, the Trump administration was actually leaning on uh uh Pakistan to convince
the Iranians to agree to a pause in fighting where it would reopen the straight of Hormuz. Its crucial role was to be an intermediary and sell this to Iran. And then you wrote Pepe, you know,
about the the conditions that led us here in your latest article, Barbaria strategically surrender civilization wins.
How did this surrender come? Because a lot of people are very concerned that all the United States is doing is similar to a Ukraine situation, seeking a pause, getting a pause and rearming.
Uh Iran doesn't seem so concerned. Maybe you could talk about what you outlined here uh given these uh given these conditions.
Yes, this is strategically uh surrender is temporary.
Uh obviously if you put this on on on a headline the headline goes on forever right but if you read the article it's
there for the moment they were desperate because of operational matters running out of weapons the Americans and the
best cult in West Asia. So they need an operational pause. This does not mean that in two weeks they will be able to rearm you know to the fullest.
Th these weapons are are not available anywhere for that matter. But they are at the same time of course they will
never have what it takes for a ground invasion of Iran wherever that is. Car island uh straight of Hormuz cash
south east in Baluchistan. No, but they could try they could try of course to
establish a beach head somewhere. Let's say for instance in Kashm Island. How this thing would survive, nobody knows.
And every uh serious military analyst says no. This is absolutely suicidal.
But considering that we have the push-up clown uh secretary of forever rose over there and never underestimate his
stupidity and for the moment he is leading the Pentagon until the moment where he's going to be thrown under the bus by Trump. Everybody knows that probably sooner rather than later.
So uh the problem is uh everybody also knew that the Americans are trying to find a messenger and they settled on
Pakistan um at least two weeks ago at at least at least because this back and forth started
with a few messages. It picked up speed when they had that first meeting in Islamabad the four Muslims that was early last week. uh Egypt, Saudi Arabia,
Turkey and Pakistan. Obviously nothing happened. So the next day the foreign
minister of Pakistan had to pick up u uh step on a plane and go to Beijing to talk to Wangi and the Chinese were saying, "Okay, you didn't do anything.
Uh okay, let's release a statement."
Very vague, very bland, but at least we have a statement and we continue to work in the background. So they released that
blend statement. Nothing happened. But they continued the back and forth in the background. The Pakistanis and the Chinese were only uh in the background.
But when we had that absolutely ghastly,
this is going to be in the history books till the end of time of the threat to erase a civilization and the new deadline.
This is when the Chinese at the last minute picked up the phone to talk to Iran
because what we had so far was basically the Muslim countries talking to each other but not to Iran.
So the Chinese told the essentially the Chinese this was confirmed to me by a
Chinese military source. Essentially the Chinese basically which is something that the Chinese
never do. So this proves to all of you that now they took an enormous risk and now they have skin in the game. Why?
because essentially because of all these negotiations with the Muslim countries
uh and they could not offer anything uh serious to Iran. Iran was not even paying a serious attention to it. They
start to pay attention when they saw the possibility of a deranged uh baboon of barbaria actually bombing Iran to smitherines.
And that's when the Chinese also start to pay attention directly. So they told the Iranians look we will be your guarantor whatever happens from now on.
What we don't know uh Danny none of us and nobody anywhere knows is how deep is
are these Chinese guarantees? What do they imply? We don't know. I was trying to find this among some of the best Chinese analysts this past two days.
Nobody's talking about it.
So this means there is a a an order coming from Beijing. No, we cannot talk about this because this is a national
security matter and they consider Iran a national security matter,
right? because of this strategic partnership, because of the deal that they made the infrastructure and energy, because they're top member of bricks,
because they are the most important corridor in central Eurasia, the zillions of of so obviously the Chinese have to secure their own interests,
Iranian and Chinese.
So, so this is where we are and this I would say this is a a key turning point
because it was the number one argument to convince the Iranians to go to the table in Islamabad.
And then there is the this is another very complicated story which I've been not sleeping trying to get the real version and it's practically impossible.
The best that I can tell you Danny and all of you is there is no split at the
top in Team in the guise of the security council.
There are 13 members in the security council. Only two are considered reformists.
One of them is the president Beskin.
The other 11, they are IRGC aligned resistance and that's it. We're going
all the all all the way with our war. So there is no split. This is [ __ ] This is Zionist propaganda everywhere.
But they needed uh of course there were there were a lot of very serious discussions.
Should we go to Islamabad or not? Is this a trap? In the end, the defining factor for them to go to Islamabad was China.
But then when they settled, okay, we we're going to send a high level delegation to Islamabad, we're going to
send um Arashi was already negotiation and Galibbath himself and the Americans
know Galibah and they were trying to seduce Galibbath this past few months as well. But then at the last minute there
was another uh uh uh plot twist. Lebanon we all when I say we I would say the
whole planet now knows because you can actually go to X and see this posted on X by the prime minister of Pakistan.
Lebanon is included in the ceasefire in English for everybody to read it. So obviously immediately afterwards the the
White House start lying. The Israelis start lying. The absence syndicate conglomerate start lying. And of course
from the beginning because the desk hated the possibility of this uh ceasefire table in Islamabad. They went
on a mad rampage on Lebanon that revolted the whole planet literally.
But the the problem is once again they do these things because they can get away with it.
Nobody's going to say anything. Can you imagine the UN condemning what they did in Lebanon? No, it would never happen.
But that changed the game once again because the Iranians said, "Ah, we had agreed with everything. We agreed to
something that we would never agree before. After all, we are in the driver's seat. We were convinced by our
allies that we should go give it another try and go to Islamabad and you changed the rules of the game only a few hours
after we agreed with the possibility of a ceasefire and that's where we are now.
So I I I I would say these two uh small items are just a detail compared to the enormity of the whole thing you know and
it's very very easy to unblock the this money in Qatar takes a phone call and to
unblock uh uh not unblock and to make uh Lebanon part of the whole thing it takes another
phone call. Apparently there was a phone call but the desk cult they don't follow. We don't we all know they don't
follow anything. So how do you re them in?
Yeah. No it's so the Iranians have a point. The Iranians are the Iranians are playing it very cool. They in fact they agreed to
the framework of the ceasefire which is they didn't have to.
No no they they didn't have to. And I I guess I'm curious about this what I've been thinking about Pepe in terms of you
know there are many who are you know your your your uh assessment your informed assessment of what happened with China and Iran contradicts
what some people believe happened which is that China forced Iran uh no no never do that to this is not the way
they work. No. Yeah. And uh then the other part of this is uh then why you know a lot of people have been who watch this show say well why then would Iran
do this at all if they don't have to if they're in the driver's seat and I want to ask you about the idea of a diplomatic capital because in this
driver's seat in this position of strength now they have an opportunity to go in front of internationally through
these meetings uh with a sessation of of hostilities and fire without the ability for the collective west to say look at
how how uh look at what Iran is doing militarily. They can say, "Well, look at our points. Look at what we want. Uh what do you all think about this?"
Because I don't think they believe the United States is uh positioned or wants to or what do you even think about meeting a lot of these demands? But now
it seems like Iran has the opportunity to show who it really is to the rest of the world. I think that's an interesting point. I'm wondering uh that's what I've
been thinking about when I think about well why would you pause if and they have the ability to restart you know without as you said the United States
having the capacity to truly rearm maybe a here and there but to truly rearm it takes takes years for some of this stuff
to be built and then to produce and then sent over. So, um, you know, uh, I'm curious to what you think about this idea of a diplomatic capital at this
stage of the war with all these other variables, including the prospect of it just restarting. Anyway, uh you know what's your about this?
They are playing it diplomatically uh in a very meticulous way. So we can we we
can have an idea of uh the tone of the conversations among the 13 big guys on
top. Uh it must have been quite something. You know these are very welleducated people. Some of them are
military command. Galibbath is a former IRGC military commander as well. So these people they have military
education and philosophical education and and they became politicians high ranking politicians as well. So these
are well uh probably they see it uh in in parallel.
Number one, they have accumulated an absolutely astounding amount of
political capital all across the world in a matter of months, a little over a month. They won't they are not going to
waste it. On the contrary, they have to build on it. Can you imagine that you have discussions virtually in every
continent and even uh across the west that Iran now is becoming or returning to the status of a big power.
Can can you imagine something like this only 40 years 40 days ago? This this is
already a gamecher in itself. So from the point of view of as as much as we can talk about global
uh public opinion there is a consensus we could say maybe in 78 of the planet
that Iran not only is winning the war but it's staring down a superpower by themselves.
Right?
Can you imagine this in terms of accumulated political capital? Nobody has this nowadays anywhere. and and not
even in this past few few years. China is different. China is uh geo economic power but Iran is conquering this political
capital in the battlefield under attack under fire. Wow. This is the the number one test you know for the emergence of
so they are already now uh not much more than a midranking
power. It's between mid-ranking and big power already. The three tops are still
there but Iran is ascending almost almost reaching their status would reach their status if they have let's say uh
an economic revolution in this next few years which they have because they they have the manpower and they have the intelligence and they can rebuild very
very fast and also with help of their allies.
Yeah. So they have to pay attention to this long-term picture and of course their new role internationally. At the
same time when they look at the degree of devastation inflicted on them by the abstent
syndicate which is immensely serious they have to think about their internal um their domestic problems. And of
33 minutescourse because they know that the war is not finished. This is a pause. The war will be back right. And when the war will be back,
there will be even more devastation and especially in their civilian infrastructure. Yeah.
So, uh can you imagine the the how difficult it is for for these guy for these 13 guys to put all that in perspective and the levers and okay,
where should we calibrate this thing? Uh how far can we go here? How much can we defer? uh if we play this
diplomatically, are we going to increase our political capital everywhere? The fact that they are going to Islamabad is
already be seen all over the world as yes, they're going there just to show us once again that the Americans don't respect anything. So that's very very
good. The problem is the the post Islamabad because then the war will be back and obviously uh Baboon of Barbaria
already told everyone yes will be back with all the missiles that nobody has seen all that all that crap. Right.
Right.
But but the calculations for the Iranian leadership are extremely complex. From a military point of view, they um they are
not extremely worried because the invisible cities, most of the
underground cities, probably 80% of them are still underground and invisible. So everything is still there. They have
their missile capability is practically intact. Contrary to what uh push-up clown is saying in in DC, there was a
message from the Iranians to the Pakistanis two or three days ago. They were saying, "Look, we still have 15,000 missiles,
probably more, and 40,000 drones." And these are the last
generation drones, which are incredibly lethal. And they are shahids that became jerans in Russia and now back to Iran.
So they are a a hybrid of Shahid and Jeran with the latest equipment, jamming devices, you name it. And you know they have warheads of 90 kilos of explosives.
These are absolutely lethal.
So they are not worried. Uh and of course and they they can reposition a lot of stuff for the restart of the war.
And of course considering that the war is practically certain will restart the destruction of Israel now can go to the
next stage considering there are no more whatever gods uh David sling arrow
whatever that's it it's over they they don't have practically anything left their preoccupation of course uh is u
how much extra are we going to suffer in this next stage of the war.
So this is probably the number one military uh calculation. Yeah.
Are they expecting anything from Islamabad? No. First of all, because when when you compare the 15 pointer with the 10pointer,
I mean it's like rain on different planets. I think Yeah. planets. Exactly. Exactly.
Um, for instance,
there's a there's a a a psychological element
through all this. Uh, apparently there's not going to have um they're not going to be on the same u room once again.
They're going to be in separate rooms with separate tables with goetweens just like the previous two negotiations. So
nothing has changed, but the fact that Vance is going to be there and if if Vance thinks that he has a an
absolutely mega Netflix photo opportunity or even a dialogue on the sidelines with
Galibbah, this might happen and this would be a face-to-face dialogue that changes everything. changes everything
just like it changed in the past when Pakistani was um when the Pakistanis were the goetweens
in uh preparing the Nixon trip u to China when the Kissinger met with Shu
and Lie in person first preparing Nixon's trip and Kissinger was like wow
because Shu and Lie was on another level you know and then when he came back to Josh. Look, you have to go there. You have to talk to this guys face to face.
We are in a completely different situation now. But if Vance after all,
apparently he studied in Yale. Let's see if he learned something. I'm sure I'm sure if he if he learn a little bit, he
will understand that he can come out of this with a new stature. Are the Iranians batting on it? No.
But this is something that might happen.
And of course, are they going to deviate from the 10p pointers? No.
So this means that it's going to be a very very very tough indirect dialogue again. Are the
Americans ready to compromise? Uh from everything that we have been hearing,
Danny, uh I don't think so. They might compro They might compromise in maybe
they might compromise on uh alleviating sanctions at the UN because this is not directly an American decision. It's
going to be a UN Security Council decision. If the Americans do not vote,
okay, no more UN sanctions, but American sanctions they will they are forever. We all know that, right? Right. Please go ahead.
No, yeah, yeah. No, great points, Pepe.
uh and you know the United States has been massaging the idea of sanctions relief in other instances I feel like to maybe prepare the way to to give a
little but the yeah it it really feels like an image problem for the United States because uh in the back rooms we
don't know what they're saying but they're probably saying something to the extent of uh uh expletives about some of the things we talk about and how they
can't change them but in the in public this is the empire they cannot be made to look like it's losing But there's some breaking news Pepe we can react to
verify our friend DD DD geopolitics following flight radars said that two Iranian Mirage Airlines
passenger planes are now in route to Pakistan likely carrying the Iran negotiation team although we don't know.
Um meanwhile Israeli Israeli media reports say that a ceasefire announcement in Lebanon is expected
although I have not been able to track but where that is. So maybe get a little closer to this. Uh
this means that the Pakistani media was lying. That's not good. It's not good at all.
And and the Iranian um uh official and semiofficial media. They were all saying the same thing. They are here at Iman
Kmeni airport and they are waiting. So apparently this was correct.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I guess we'll have to see uh what transpires from here,
Pepe. But uh you know on uh on the another note uh maybe you could talk about the position of the Gulf countries
now you know uh we see media they have anointed Iran. I mean we see in the New York Times everywhere you referenced it.
Iran is now a a global power a regional power. it has from this war which the
United States has said it has won Iran has come out stronger even the most anti-Iran uh commentary is acknowledging this fact
like for example the Guardian uh Iran wounded but uh you know uh strategically strong you know like there's all these
comments about this but uh the Gulf countries are still taking a very hard line right now uh they they it seems
like they feel embarrassed they see it all over analysts from the UAE. You see it in the statements from the governments of the
UAE of Bahrain. Uh they're all taking a very hard line position against Iran. Uh I'm curious on what you think is uh is
at play here for them given that a lot of these demands that Iran has uh affect them quite gravely. For example, getting
rid of the US's military presence in the region which is at the top of that list.
Mhm. Well, the first thing which is already immense, the GCC is already broken.
We have two GCC members, Carter and Omen,
who have already proclaimed themselves to be, if not
anti-Iran, not only non anti-Iran, but neutral, and they want an accommodation.
This is already gigantic.
very complicated. Kuwait and Bahrain is collapsing essentially and everything of
value in terms of American installations is practically destroyed.
Uh what our friends uh in our Iraqi scholar friends have been saying for quite a while, it might happen sooner or
later. Bahrain will be absorbed by somebody probably Saudi Arabia soon or it could be reinccorporated to uh Iran after all it was part of Iran before.
43 minutesThe big big if is uh Saudi Arabia,
UAE they are at war practically against Iran, not all the Emirates,
for instance, Sarah. No, nothing. I'm talking about Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
So, the Iranians are going to go all out on the UAE. There's no question about that. probably uh not immediately but soon.
After all, they have already managed to destroy the Dubai business model. So the next step will be to destroy the Abu Dhabi oil revenues.
So this leaves us with a Saudi Arabia.
Nobody knows exactly what they are playing and if they have already made if
NBS already made up his mind to try to diversify his interests and step away
from Abraham Accords, IMAC, all that convoluted crap.
If he does that, that's an enormous risk because he may lose all his money, which
as we all know is in London and in New York.
The relationship between Saudi Arabia and with Russia and China is very close with both.
So they are certainly the background talk is heavy and the Chinese and the Russians are
probably telling MBS uh pay attention to which way the wind is blowing
right so they're still hedging and uh what they published officially I think
was one or two days ago is a list of all their installations that were hit and
45 minuteswhat they are losing and apparently the figure is they are losing the export of
700,000 barrels a day. So it's not over 1 million million 1.4 four and all that,
but still 700,000 is a lot. And we still don't know for sure
who attacked the East West pipeline that goes to Yamu and bypasses the straight of this is not clear yet.
No. No. At all at all at all. Iran. Yeah. Saudi Arabia says it's Iran. Iran says it's not.
RGC said no it was not us.
Yeah. Yeah. And Iran I mean Iran has hit Saudi Arabia and as they hit the refiners has hit that area but uh strategically it seems like yeah and it
seems strategic the way that they were hitting it rather than uh this this attack which was uh I mean crippling
big joker right uh um Danny the big joker is okay which way Saudi Arabia will lean midterm short term nobody can
tell midterm right and of course in terms of the street of Hormuz If this new mechanism well if no this new mechanism will hold,
will the Emirates resign themselves to pay the toll to export their own oil through Iranian uh territorial waters?
Definitely not. And that's why they are they're they're seething right. Yes. Yeah, they are on a time bomb.
Absolutely.
uh and this might explain from the beginning why they chose this position of basically allying with
the US and at war with the Iran. There will be serious consequences for MBZ.
There's no question about that. For the moment, this is not the number one priority for the IRGC, but soon it will.
Yeah. But you know that the bottom line is uh GCC bye-bye internal collapse
split from the inside right.
Yeah. Now it's it is looking very bad for the Gulf especially considering uh
all of these talks are going to revolve around many issues that affect them that none of them I I mean what's so
interesting what you said earlier about Qatar and Oman. I mean, Oman's not so much of a surprise, but it's so interesting that Qatar changed its tune very quickly after what Iran did to it.
They're opportunists to energy to to its energy,
hyper opportunists. When you go to Qatar and you interact with some of these people and I have some friends who had
interactions with members of the royal alani family, they are hyper opportunists, right?
So that's it. They saw which way the wind is blowing literally in their own country after Iran hit their
Iran really really took it to their uh I forget what the name of the company was but name of the facility but
they damaged it quite significantly Rasnafar I think it's Rasnafar yeah the Rasar energy
so they lost 17% of their LG export volumes this is immense and of course
and and the ripple effects everywhere are gigantic. Exactly. So after that, of course, I said that convinced them.
Yeah.
A little bit of course want they know what's happening with Dubai airport. They don't want the same thing to happen to Dha, which now
Doha now is going to be the number one airport in the in the Persian Gulf, period.
It's already the most modern. Uh it's quite pleasant as a as a huge airport and it's going to be the number one
event for Katar Airways swimming business. Emirates. Oh my god. And Etihad they are in deep deep trouble both.
Yeah. Yeah. Uh I guess Pepe as we uh get toward the hour here maybe you can talk
about now that the balance of forces are where they are how does this impact the
uh Russia, China, Iran kind of ascendancy now that you have uh major uh
power uh brokers within the decay and collective west anointing Iran being in
this position of global power. Now, how does this change things for the entirety? Because a lot of people were
uh I think pessimistic before February 28th about the multipolar world and then uh they saw what happened to Iran in day
one and now we're in six weeks later uh and the mainstream media can't stop talking about Iran being a global power.
So, how does this change things for the rest of the world really? because there's a straight of hormuz and then there's of course the bigger development
surrounding these big changes which is uh Iran being part of this uh now my major part maybe one of the leading
parts of this uh changing world well this it's another history lesson isn't it Danny
um the multipolar world would never be born in in bricks meeting rooms it's what they have been talking over
and over again, you know, all all these summits and the sheras and you name it.
Uh well, I have been following this uh deeply. I was a firm believer that this would happen. I did, you know, I had a
lot of effort to try to explain the importance of the role of bricks in the multipolar world. But no, it would the
multipolar world has to be born through a major conflration on the battlefield
under fire against all odds and you turn the game around in 40 days. This is what nobody expected, but this is exactly
what is already happening. And of course, behind several levels of support,
Russia and China.
So, uh it's it's crazy because I am in the last stretch of my life a as a an analyst, a
reporter, a gnome and all that. I will never believe I could never believe that one day I'll be talking about the actual
primacy of the new primac triangle Russia Iran and China.
Primacov was Russia India China when he coined this expression in the at the end of the millennium. So now we have in
front of us this new priac triangle as the real drivers of
on the way a more solid path towards multipolarity and
it has to be under fire. The only language that the empire understands is force
and they will never admit resistance and sovereign resistance. For instance, in the case of Russia, they have to respect
Russia because Russia is a nuclear power.
The Americans never see Russia as a sovereign resistant nation against the West which is every
centuries trying to go there and smash Russia to bits.
But in the case of Iran is much more complicated because it's not a nuclear power. It was declared by the Americas.
I just go there in a weekend we finish it all and look what's happening.
So in terms of a historical game changer, this okay, people be studying this until the 25th century and it
happened so fast. And if until a few weeks ago,
we could uh uh basically agree with the judgment of Emmanuel Todd two years ago when he
published his book uh the defeat of the west in France.
The main thesis of the book was that Trump is going to have to manage the strategic defeat of the US in Ukraine. Now,
wow. Trump will have to manage two strategic defeats, one in Ukraine and another one in Iran.
It's too much for uh the brain of a fouryear-old, you know. He doesn't even know he he he cannot understand the
dimension of the whole thing in front of him you know.
o what do we have? We have these uh childish viferations these tantrums.
But you know the the big big picture is what's leading even people which are part of the western system saying look
now it's another story. Now we have another big power emerging. Yeah.
How can he possibly Danny, how can he possibly sell this to domestic public opinion in in the US, not to mention the rest of the planet? He can't.
No. No. Not only can he not, Pepe, but uh I don't know if you saw the reports about the domestic situation in the United States because of this war, but uh inflation.
Well, I saw I saw Melennia saying I had nothing to do with Epstein.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, people were joking, uh, well, Trump lost to Iran so badly that now he's trying to bring back
up Epstein in order to distract people from it. Um, but there's a degree truth, by the way.
Yeah, there's a degree of truth from to that. But then there's also the uh how do you sell what happened with the Iran
war and and every consequence that's come from it when one of the bigger consequences for just people in the
United States has been the 3.3% uh increase in inflation over the last month which a whopping 21.2%
increase in this inflationary um environment has been gasoline. So, so people are I mean chi China was sharing
videos of you know young girl just crying her eyes out because she had just had to pay something like5 plus dollars
a gallon for gas doesn't have money for rent. I mean this is this is the environment that the Trump administration's uh decision people call
it a war of choice. I don't know what I think the United States Empire at the at the end of the day uh they don't really see war on Iran in general as a choice
but certainly the timing and the way that it happened is definitely a choice and that's what uh has led to these uh
uh disastrous uh uh blowback conditions and uh the Trump I don't know how the Trump administration comes back from
this as an entity but uh and a future politically but um nonetheless it seems
like Trump and his team want to really like supercharge these so-called negotiations to get to whatever they're
going to get from them. And I just don't see that. This could go on either for a very long time or it could just not happen at all. It I don't think there's
an in between to that. I don't think there's an in between. Let me ask you, let me ask you, Danny, the host,
what do you see that the Trump administration could get considering they have zero cards in their hands?
I no the only thing that the Trump administration can get is I if they have I don't know I haven't seen it yet in
two different terms of Donald Trump but if the Trump administration can hire someone who can make a defeat look like a victory through some kind of PR spin
that's the only thing I think because they're going to have to I can't imagine Iran is going to uh even forget
capitulation but like concessions I don't know why why Iran or what Iran would consider conceding other than some
version of what it has laid out to the United States. Maybe it could be written differently, but nonetheless, the tolls
that the straight of horn moves, all of this, I don't see Iran uh the military presence in the region. Uh the you they'll be like, "Oh, you can spin it however you want, but you got to do it."
Uh and Iran is not going to stop demanding it and stop talking about it in that way. So really, the United States has nothing other than maybe
hopefully for them uh if for the Trump administration, they better hope they can uh do this uh find a way to actually
effectively communicate that they have won from a massive defeat. But we haven't seen it and it's not all they
can do is thump their chests and talk about how big and powerful they are and uh everyone kind of side eyes it because
it doesn't make any sense. And I feel like we're we're going to get a lot of that coming up. And who knows? Uh we
could very well be in a a military situation again, you know, a hot war again soon. I tend to think though I you
know, Scott Ritter, Larry Johnson, they were on my show and I tend to believe them when they say uh it's unclear whether the US even has anything left to
target. And if they start targeting what they claim they're going to target,
well, it's kind of game over. And I and and personally I believe that's part of the reason why China entered and Pakistan entered because they saw the
writing on the wall that uh if the United States even hit one iota of Iran's infrastructure that it said it was going to wipe it away then Iran
would have done the same thing back to the Gulf countries and then what do you have then? you have a complete disaster for not only the global economy but the
players involved the United States Pakistan who knows there some people were saying and I believe this too that they were scared that Saudi Arabia was
going to invoke the mutual defense pack and they don't want any part of that so um anyway that's it's a very bad terrain
and I feel like from the United States's perspective it's it's just a bad situation you know um what you just mentioned Danny It's
part of Pakistan's calculations. They cannot allow anything happening that would force
Saudi Arabia to call their mutual defense back. We are terrified of the possibility. Absolutely.
Yeah. I mean, how Yeah. what I mean it's a disaster like um to have to dive into it was for the whole whole Gulf
countries you know these countries that are run by monarchies that just sit on top of uh their the their top global commodity the oil and the gas and all
this and they don't have anything else they barely even they have no domestic support and they rely on uh they rely on
the chaos and they rely on the US and they rely on Israel very very bad position to be in when uh the US and Israel did this with Iran and and now.
So overall though, yeah, from the US's perspective, it's not spin, you know, it's not, oh,
this is trying to say that Iran has just absolutely bludgeoned the United States.
The truth is is that the US kind of did this to itself and Iran just had the capacity to to to make it happen and
yeah to resist and they did and and now the US has to face the the and bear the fruits of what that means which is
trying to weasle your way out of a mess that you made on your own. But I don't see it. I don't see that's why the next few days to a week plus are going to be
very interesting I think. But any final comments, Pepe? I know we're over the hour, so any final comments? Oh, no.
That's uh that's about it because we we have to wait uh if something comes out of Islamabad. Oh, none of us is betting
that something will come out, but maybe a rabbit out of a hat at the last minute.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just put up some of these super chats. Uh you should add Iranian Lego videos to your intro outro. Yes, Lego videos. You bet.
I would, but I heard people are getting uh censored for putting them up on YouTube, so that's why I haven't done it yet. Yes, but apparently they censored
uh the Lego guys account somewhere. I don't know if it's in YouTube or somewhere. So, everybody has on YouTube. On YouTube,
but they are everywhere the Lego videos.
Right. Right. Right. So, thank you all for the generosity. Without further ado,
everyone, I want you to know that um you can go to the video description and find Pepe Escobar's uh Telegram and X as well
as a link to this article that we shared today. And um be sure to hit the like button. Um, uh, be sure to, uh,
ubscribe, all of that video description to support this channel, all the sources. I will be back, but I am traveling soon. I'll let you know what's
going on. Um, and I will publish some interviews in the meantime. Are you coming to Asia? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Asia. Good. We're gonna be a while.
Yeah. Yep. And I'll announce what's going on uh uh when I arrive. All right,
everybody. Hit the like button as you go. That helps boost this conversation. And I will see you all again soon. Bye-bye. Thanks, Danny.
Bye-bye. Thanks, Danny
Danny Haiphong
Streamed live 110 minutes ago
Pepe Escobar discusses the breaking developments emerging from the wreckage of the Iran war, including Iran's bombshell strikes on Saudi Arabia causing a massive fallout for global oil, Trump fuming over Iranian moves on the Strait of Hormuz, and the ongoing desperation of Israel to keep a losing war going.
Transcript
Welcome back everyone. It's your host Danny Hiong. As you can see, I'm joined by geopolitical analyst and independent journalist Pepe Escobar. Pepe, good to see you again.
Good to see you, Danny. Uh, greetings. Uh, midnight in Buddhist Southeast Asia. Greetings to you and to our audience.
Yeah, very much appreciated you taking the time out in this uh early morning for you. Everyone, hit the like button.
That helps boost the show. Pepe, let's get started, okay, with this debacle. Okay, we have a debacle now. Uh,
everyone, even the western mainstream,
everyone's saying the US has suffered a major, at the very minimum, a strategic defeat. The very minimum, that's what
we're talking about here. And we have a number of developments. I just want to outline so people get a sense of what's
going on. So, uh, Donald Trump is still very much obsessed with the straight of Hormuz. He's saying that Iran is doing a
very poor job in allowing oil to go through it and that's not the agreement that they had. Well, here is what Drop
Site News had to say about what Iran is actually doing. is asserting major control and that there are 2,000 at
least ships still stranded and that Iran has told basically every single tanker other than the ones it is giving permission to through its toll system
that they have to stay put.
Now, this also comes Pepe. I don't know if you saw the news. I found this very big. There's
reports uh Saudi Arabia is accusing Iran hours after the ceasefire of hitting their major oil pipeline, the East West
pipeline that's supposed to be alternative to the straight of Hormuz.
Uh, not only this, but there's other production facilities that they claim were hit at this time, hours after the
ceasefire, amounting to 1.3 million barrels per day, slashed from Saudis oil production. Iran is saying they didn't
do that. Iran Well, but we do know that Iran did hit Saudi Arabia in the days earlier before uh the ceasefire was
struck. And we also have news that uh Iran is holding out on talking to the United States at all until a ceasefire in Lebanon is reached and until frozen
funds are released by the United States in Qatar. So Pepe, help us outline what is going on here. It still feels like
the US is trying to force Iran to capitulate before talks even happen and Iran has essentially said no.
Exactly. First of all, because uh it was uh the Trump administration who was begging for a ceasefire and not only
this past few days, they start begging for a ceasefire after three or four days of operation epic [ __ ] Well, uh
before uh our conversation only a few minutes ago, I was trying to establish where is the Iranian delegation.
Nobody knows for sure. The Pakistanis basically are saying that uh an Iranian
military plane arrived uh at a military airport in Rahul Pindi.
Rao Pindi and Islam Ababad are sister cities. If you go just to give you an idea if you go by taxi from one to another something like 20 . So
they are actually there theoretically they are at the Serena. We can call the Serena town in Islamabad and ask them
look are they there or not. Okay, nobody has done that so far. And then when you look the whole spectrum of Iranian official and semiofficial media, no,
they have not left Iran. And uh theoretically they are at Iman Kmenini
airport for hours. Now it's what? Now it's uh around 9:00 and 8:30 uh at night
in waiting and waiting for the these two points that were stressed by Galibbath uh in some of his recent posts.
First of them is Lebanon is exactly that's the one perfect uh the ceasefire
in Lebanon and the release of Iran's blocked assets. Dizzy runs blocked assets. Uh this is very very important
because it it's not a lot of money but it is substantial. 7 billion dollar held
in Qatar but this is was collected by South Korea and it's related to US sanctions.
So now we have South Korean ammy service with the banking people in Qatar scrambling in the middle of the night to
unblock the seven billion dollars until tomorrow morning. I wonder if they'll be able to do that especially because same
Saturday morning is a bank holiday or something. So so this is where we are. We don't know if they are in Pakistan.
We are not so sure if they are at the airport in um uh Thran and these two
items they won't be unblocked in the next few hours. So for this um uh
negotiation and of course they the the Pakistanis they did a a Hollywood spectacle at the Gina center. It's a
really nice enormous in Islamabad decoration you know um beautiful chairs you name the space for the media and all
that but nobody knows if this thing is going to happen actually so this is where we are at the moment a major
cliffhanger apparently uh Vance is on the way Vance should arrive in the next few hours right and the whole setup is
already there like there is a wow it's it's larger in life you the usual when
um there is a presidential uh u American presidential visit anywhere in the world.
So uh so Danny uh this is all part of the information war because we have
information war on both sides and both sides are trying to pose as uh okay we are in the driver's seat. We all know
who is in the driver's seat by now in terms of inflicting a strategic defeat
on the empire. We all know what's going on. But and of course when you pay attention to what Vance said before he left the US,
right, which was uh the tone was uh not as uh
Baboon of Barbaria style, but it was threatening still.
And this is something that I had reconfirmed yesterday and correct me if I'm wrong, Danny, and all of you in the
audience. Right at the beginning when Vance was became vice president, he may have
mentioned that we should bomb Iran. I don't know if this is true or not. So,
this requires a little bit of uh I I didn't have time to do this before.
And obviously, he changed his mind along the way. And apparently, but of course this is also not confirmed. He was
against Operation Epic [ __ ] until the last minute. But this this is if we trust the New York Times and of course
we don't trust the New York Times. So it's all in the balance. What is clear
is that he is playing there's a big big power play related to his presidential ambitions.
He obviously wants to get the credit uh as a peacemaker.
Of course, his chances are, I would say, from a zero to 10, probably 0.5,
but but this is what he seeing. Of course, this is uh everything to do with his own career path.
So, all these variables play, right? uh the Pakistani variable is uh is immensely complicated but fascinating.
Uh for instance, I linked in my telegram uh a brilliant article by one of my best friends in Islamabad, Junide Ahmed.
Junide is is a professor of Islamic studies, but he's a very very good geopolitical analyst. And basically he
says that even if this is uh to be very diplomatic uh an unelected
military juna in disguise that's what it is because the big big guy in this government in Pakistan now is field
marshall aim is not the prime minister Shabbaz Sharif definitely not but they
were very very clever to position themselves I wouldn't say as mediators they were not as the goetweens between
the the Americans basically chose Pakistan to be their go between the principal goetweens to talk to Iran
because they knew that Iran wouldn't talk to them directly and indirectly they would not trust Egypt they would not trust Saudi Arabia they would not
trust Turkey but Pakistan is a different story so obviously Trump administration has been using Pakistan And the Pakistanis very very clever they you
know they wow they leveraged that to the max and now their new geopolitical
standing in the world went shot up like that you know and when you compare to India the Indians are basically crying
at the moment nobody nobody nobody's even paying attention to to India but the problem is the the lost in once
again the lost in translation elements In this back and forth of passing messages,
we still don't know for sure if the Pakistanis sent to the Americans the real Farsy
translation in English from Farsy of the 10pointer or the Americans got it and obviously
they are lying. There are two possibilities. the uh Iranians got the 15 pointer, you know, was very the
translation from English to far in the 15 pointer. They they read it and they they knew it already, right? But the 10p
pointer because this this enormous uh discussion on what's really in the 10p pointer, but it's so easy. Go to x.
The 10pointer was on x for days, right?
in English for every everybody knew what's what the tenpointer was you know so the white house cannot come up with the I know this was not in the 10pinter
no that's it it's there so this is just I would say two or 3% of the
the maze we are all in and of course without knowing this thing is going to happen in Islamabad tomorrow
yeah and the same goes too for Pepe for what's going on in the straight of four news. Uh how long has it been since Iran
has announced and been working with vessels there around this toll which you know uh Fox News here I'll just play
this they they are very surprised they just found out that this was going on along with the president uh where they're getting insiders who are telling
them that the straight of moves is under effective IRGC control Israeli intelligence they didn't know that
you'll see you'll see right now Incredible.
Iran is indeed demanding fees for the few vessels it's allowing to pass through the straight of Hormuz. This official adds the straight is effectively under full IRGC control.
They decide who gets to go through, but more importantly who doesn't.
So, uh, that's been going on for quite some time, but Donald Trump came out,
you know, he said, "I heard that they're charging tolls." And as I put up before, uh, that's not part of the agreement,
you know. Uh so all these developments though, Pepe, it seems to point to uh the United States seems, you know, now
Donald Trump, I don't know if you saw it's the same kind of game. It's the United States under Trump trying to look
very big. We'll see in what's going to happen. Maybe they're privy to the fact that the Iranians are just
hanging out at the airport. Uh we have a reset going. We're loading up ships with the best ammunition, even at a high level, uh, to do a complete decimation.
So, this doesn't bode well for talks. It seems like the level of ignorance or or maybe playing ignorance and also threats.
Both Danny uh ignorance, feain ignorance or outright ignorance, which is even
worse. And what is obvious is that nobody among the the circle of
sickopants s lickers etc is passing real life information to Trump. It's it's
it's mindb boggling and because he doesn't read anything obviously he he cannot fact check anything and obviously
he doesn't fact check anything. This is extremely extremely worrying. This proves once again that he does he has no
clue about the overall big picture in the local chess board in the Persian
Gulf and in the straight of Hormuz. Uh people in the middle of the
14 minutesthe Sahara desert already know by now that there is a toll pool in the street of Hermus. uh many of us explain how it
works that you need to get authorization from the RGC Navy. You have to pay the toll boost. You can pay in U1, in
crypto, in petrol U1, you name it. Then you get a signal, then you cross and all that. And they are fine tuning this.
Every day there is a different set of regulations. And in this past 24 to 48
hours, very very few tankers cross through. There was a Russian tanker yesterday. This was immensely
interesting. This Russian tanker was coming uh from east to west in the straight
over Moose and he went all over uh all the way to Kar which is in the northwest to load
to load uh uh to load itself with uh oil and then send it somewhere else.
Probably uh it could be part of the Russian shadow fleet. He could be a
totally legal legal uh Russian tanker but probably is going to India on the
way back. China they don't need that from Russian tankers. They have their own uh let's say China shadow fleet
which is not a shadow fleet. China they have at least 26 27 28 tankers that keep doing the back and forth through or move
with no problem. And of course uh the fine adjuning of the toll booth is
already a process. It started with what we're having now very very important because uh Iran
constituted a new uh navigational route for the tankers. Before that they had to
c they usually cross the straight of Hormuz in the middle of the of the straight uh let's say equidistance to the Iranian shore and the Omani shore.
Now they have to navigate very close to Iranian territorial waters
u between Cashem Island the big the big island and Larak the mini one. So this
is uh tankers navigating not in international waters but Iranian territorial waters and that provides the
jeridical framework for them to install a toll booth. Absolutely. This was brilliant. And why they cannot go
through uh the middle of the straight because it's mind. Yeah. They are minded so nobody can cross it.
Wait wait wait. The Navy though P Hegth and Donald Trump told me that it was eliminated. It was it was
obliterated and now they're obliterated.
That's strange how you know it's just it's it's absolutely it's mindblowing.
Well, uh, you know, Pepe, uh, I wanted to now, you know, uh, get into how we got to this point, uh, because as you know, the, um, the Gulf countries, uh,
you have Saudi Arabia complaining about the damage to, uh, to its oil facilities. You have the UAE and Bahrain
pushing, pushing, pushing, saying that the straight of Hormuz needs to be out of Iran's control. And we also have the report that you referenced earlier where
you had Donald Trump for weeks, the Trump administration was actually leaning on uh uh Pakistan to convince
the Iranians to agree to a pause in fighting where it would reopen the straight of Hormuz. Its crucial role was to be an intermediary and sell this to Iran. And then you wrote Pepe, you know,
about the the conditions that led us here in your latest article, Barbaria strategically surrender civilization wins.
How did this surrender come? Because a lot of people are very concerned that all the United States is doing is similar to a Ukraine situation, seeking a pause, getting a pause and rearming.
Uh Iran doesn't seem so concerned. Maybe you could talk about what you outlined here uh given these uh given these conditions.
Yes, this is strategically uh surrender is temporary.
Uh obviously if you put this on on on a headline the headline goes on forever right but if you read the article it's
there for the moment they were desperate because of operational matters running out of weapons the Americans and the
best cult in West Asia. So they need an operational pause. This does not mean that in two weeks they will be able to rearm you know to the fullest.
Th these weapons are are not available anywhere for that matter. But they are at the same time of course they will
never have what it takes for a ground invasion of Iran wherever that is. Car island uh straight of Hormuz cash
south east in Baluchistan. No, but they could try they could try of course to
establish a beach head somewhere. Let's say for instance in Kashm Island. How this thing would survive, nobody knows.
And every uh serious military analyst says no. This is absolutely suicidal.
But considering that we have the push-up clown uh secretary of forever rose over there and never underestimate his
stupidity and for the moment he is leading the Pentagon until the moment where he's going to be thrown under the bus by Trump. Everybody knows that probably sooner rather than later.
So uh the problem is uh everybody also knew that the Americans are trying to find a messenger and they settled on
Pakistan um at least two weeks ago at at least at least because this back and forth started
with a few messages. It picked up speed when they had that first meeting in Islamabad the four Muslims that was early last week. uh Egypt, Saudi Arabia,
Turkey and Pakistan. Obviously nothing happened. So the next day the foreign
minister of Pakistan had to pick up u uh step on a plane and go to Beijing to talk to Wangi and the Chinese were saying, "Okay, you didn't do anything.
Uh okay, let's release a statement."
Very vague, very bland, but at least we have a statement and we continue to work in the background. So they released that
blend statement. Nothing happened. But they continued the back and forth in the background. The Pakistanis and the Chinese were only uh in the background.
But when we had that absolutely ghastly,
this is going to be in the history books till the end of time of the threat to erase a civilization and the new deadline.
This is when the Chinese at the last minute picked up the phone to talk to Iran
because what we had so far was basically the Muslim countries talking to each other but not to Iran.
So the Chinese told the essentially the Chinese this was confirmed to me by a
Chinese military source. Essentially the Chinese basically which is something that the Chinese
never do. So this proves to all of you that now they took an enormous risk and now they have skin in the game. Why?
because essentially because of all these negotiations with the Muslim countries
uh and they could not offer anything uh serious to Iran. Iran was not even paying a serious attention to it. They
start to pay attention when they saw the possibility of a deranged uh baboon of barbaria actually bombing Iran to smitherines.
And that's when the Chinese also start to pay attention directly. So they told the Iranians look we will be your guarantor whatever happens from now on.
What we don't know uh Danny none of us and nobody anywhere knows is how deep is
are these Chinese guarantees? What do they imply? We don't know. I was trying to find this among some of the best Chinese analysts this past two days.
Nobody's talking about it.
So this means there is a a an order coming from Beijing. No, we cannot talk about this because this is a national
security matter and they consider Iran a national security matter,
right? because of this strategic partnership, because of the deal that they made the infrastructure and energy, because they're top member of bricks,
because they are the most important corridor in central Eurasia, the zillions of of so obviously the Chinese have to secure their own interests,
Iranian and Chinese.
So, so this is where we are and this I would say this is a a key turning point
because it was the number one argument to convince the Iranians to go to the table in Islamabad.
And then there is the this is another very complicated story which I've been not sleeping trying to get the real version and it's practically impossible.
The best that I can tell you Danny and all of you is there is no split at the
top in Team in the guise of the security council.
There are 13 members in the security council. Only two are considered reformists.
One of them is the president Beskin.
The other 11, they are IRGC aligned resistance and that's it. We're going
all the all all the way with our war. So there is no split. This is [ __ ] This is Zionist propaganda everywhere.
But they needed uh of course there were there were a lot of very serious discussions.
Should we go to Islamabad or not? Is this a trap? In the end, the defining factor for them to go to Islamabad was China.
But then when they settled, okay, we we're going to send a high level delegation to Islamabad, we're going to
send um Arashi was already negotiation and Galibbath himself and the Americans
know Galibah and they were trying to seduce Galibbath this past few months as well. But then at the last minute there
was another uh uh uh plot twist. Lebanon we all when I say we I would say the
whole planet now knows because you can actually go to X and see this posted on X by the prime minister of Pakistan.
Lebanon is included in the ceasefire in English for everybody to read it. So obviously immediately afterwards the the
White House start lying. The Israelis start lying. The absence syndicate conglomerate start lying. And of course
from the beginning because the desk hated the possibility of this uh ceasefire table in Islamabad. They went
on a mad rampage on Lebanon that revolted the whole planet literally.
But the the problem is once again they do these things because they can get away with it.
Nobody's going to say anything. Can you imagine the UN condemning what they did in Lebanon? No, it would never happen.
But that changed the game once again because the Iranians said, "Ah, we had agreed with everything. We agreed to
something that we would never agree before. After all, we are in the driver's seat. We were convinced by our
allies that we should go give it another try and go to Islamabad and you changed the rules of the game only a few hours
after we agreed with the possibility of a ceasefire and that's where we are now.
So I I I I would say these two uh small items are just a detail compared to the enormity of the whole thing you know and
it's very very easy to unblock the this money in Qatar takes a phone call and to
unblock uh uh not unblock and to make uh Lebanon part of the whole thing it takes another
phone call. Apparently there was a phone call but the desk cult they don't follow. We don't we all know they don't
follow anything. So how do you re them in?
Yeah. No it's so the Iranians have a point. The Iranians are the Iranians are playing it very cool. They in fact they agreed to
the framework of the ceasefire which is they didn't have to.
No no they they didn't have to. And I I guess I'm curious about this what I've been thinking about Pepe in terms of you
know there are many who are you know your your your uh assessment your informed assessment of what happened with China and Iran contradicts
what some people believe happened which is that China forced Iran uh no no never do that to this is not the way
they work. No. Yeah. And uh then the other part of this is uh then why you know a lot of people have been who watch this show say well why then would Iran
do this at all if they don't have to if they're in the driver's seat and I want to ask you about the idea of a diplomatic capital because in this
driver's seat in this position of strength now they have an opportunity to go in front of internationally through
these meetings uh with a sessation of of hostilities and fire without the ability for the collective west to say look at
how how uh look at what Iran is doing militarily. They can say, "Well, look at our points. Look at what we want. Uh what do you all think about this?"
Because I don't think they believe the United States is uh positioned or wants to or what do you even think about meeting a lot of these demands? But now
it seems like Iran has the opportunity to show who it really is to the rest of the world. I think that's an interesting point. I'm wondering uh that's what I've
been thinking about when I think about well why would you pause if and they have the ability to restart you know without as you said the United States
having the capacity to truly rearm maybe a here and there but to truly rearm it takes takes years for some of this stuff
to be built and then to produce and then sent over. So, um, you know, uh, I'm curious to what you think about this idea of a diplomatic capital at this
stage of the war with all these other variables, including the prospect of it just restarting. Anyway, uh you know what's your about this?
They are playing it diplomatically uh in a very meticulous way. So we can we we
can have an idea of uh the tone of the conversations among the 13 big guys on
top. Uh it must have been quite something. You know these are very welleducated people. Some of them are
military command. Galibbath is a former IRGC military commander as well. So these people they have military
education and philosophical education and and they became politicians high ranking politicians as well. So these
are well uh probably they see it uh in in parallel.
Number one, they have accumulated an absolutely astounding amount of
political capital all across the world in a matter of months, a little over a month. They won't they are not going to
waste it. On the contrary, they have to build on it. Can you imagine that you have discussions virtually in every
continent and even uh across the west that Iran now is becoming or returning to the status of a big power.
Can can you imagine something like this only 40 years 40 days ago? This this is
already a gamecher in itself. So from the point of view of as as much as we can talk about global
uh public opinion there is a consensus we could say maybe in 78 of the planet
that Iran not only is winning the war but it's staring down a superpower by themselves.
Right?
Can you imagine this in terms of accumulated political capital? Nobody has this nowadays anywhere. and and not
even in this past few few years. China is different. China is uh geo economic power but Iran is conquering this political
capital in the battlefield under attack under fire. Wow. This is the the number one test you know for the emergence of
so they are already now uh not much more than a midranking
power. It's between mid-ranking and big power already. The three tops are still
there but Iran is ascending almost almost reaching their status would reach their status if they have let's say uh
an economic revolution in this next few years which they have because they they have the manpower and they have the intelligence and they can rebuild very
very fast and also with help of their allies.
Yeah. So they have to pay attention to this long-term picture and of course their new role internationally. At the
same time when they look at the degree of devastation inflicted on them by the abstent
syndicate which is immensely serious they have to think about their internal um their domestic problems. And of
33 minutescourse because they know that the war is not finished. This is a pause. The war will be back right. And when the war will be back,
there will be even more devastation and especially in their civilian infrastructure. Yeah.
So, uh can you imagine the the how difficult it is for for these guy for these 13 guys to put all that in perspective and the levers and okay,
where should we calibrate this thing? Uh how far can we go here? How much can we defer? uh if we play this
diplomatically, are we going to increase our political capital everywhere? The fact that they are going to Islamabad is
already be seen all over the world as yes, they're going there just to show us once again that the Americans don't respect anything. So that's very very
good. The problem is the the post Islamabad because then the war will be back and obviously uh Baboon of Barbaria
already told everyone yes will be back with all the missiles that nobody has seen all that all that crap. Right.
Right.
But but the calculations for the Iranian leadership are extremely complex. From a military point of view, they um they are
not extremely worried because the invisible cities, most of the
underground cities, probably 80% of them are still underground and invisible. So everything is still there. They have
their missile capability is practically intact. Contrary to what uh push-up clown is saying in in DC, there was a
message from the Iranians to the Pakistanis two or three days ago. They were saying, "Look, we still have 15,000 missiles,
probably more, and 40,000 drones." And these are the last
generation drones, which are incredibly lethal. And they are shahids that became jerans in Russia and now back to Iran.
So they are a a hybrid of Shahid and Jeran with the latest equipment, jamming devices, you name it. And you know they have warheads of 90 kilos of explosives.
These are absolutely lethal.
So they are not worried. Uh and of course and they they can reposition a lot of stuff for the restart of the war.
And of course considering that the war is practically certain will restart the destruction of Israel now can go to the
next stage considering there are no more whatever gods uh David sling arrow
whatever that's it it's over they they don't have practically anything left their preoccupation of course uh is u
how much extra are we going to suffer in this next stage of the war.
So this is probably the number one military uh calculation. Yeah.
Are they expecting anything from Islamabad? No. First of all, because when when you compare the 15 pointer with the 10pointer,
I mean it's like rain on different planets. I think Yeah. planets. Exactly. Exactly.
Um, for instance,
there's a there's a a a psychological element
through all this. Uh, apparently there's not going to have um they're not going to be on the same u room once again.
They're going to be in separate rooms with separate tables with goetweens just like the previous two negotiations. So
nothing has changed, but the fact that Vance is going to be there and if if Vance thinks that he has a an
absolutely mega Netflix photo opportunity or even a dialogue on the sidelines with
Galibbah, this might happen and this would be a face-to-face dialogue that changes everything. changes everything
just like it changed in the past when Pakistani was um when the Pakistanis were the goetweens
in uh preparing the Nixon trip u to China when the Kissinger met with Shu
and Lie in person first preparing Nixon's trip and Kissinger was like wow
because Shu and Lie was on another level you know and then when he came back to Josh. Look, you have to go there. You have to talk to this guys face to face.
We are in a completely different situation now. But if Vance after all,
apparently he studied in Yale. Let's see if he learned something. I'm sure I'm sure if he if he learn a little bit, he
will understand that he can come out of this with a new stature. Are the Iranians batting on it? No.
But this is something that might happen.
And of course, are they going to deviate from the 10p pointers? No.
So this means that it's going to be a very very very tough indirect dialogue again. Are the
Americans ready to compromise? Uh from everything that we have been hearing,
Danny, uh I don't think so. They might compro They might compromise in maybe
they might compromise on uh alleviating sanctions at the UN because this is not directly an American decision. It's
going to be a UN Security Council decision. If the Americans do not vote,
okay, no more UN sanctions, but American sanctions they will they are forever. We all know that, right? Right. Please go ahead.
No, yeah, yeah. No, great points, Pepe.
uh and you know the United States has been massaging the idea of sanctions relief in other instances I feel like to maybe prepare the way to to give a
little but the yeah it it really feels like an image problem for the United States because uh in the back rooms we
don't know what they're saying but they're probably saying something to the extent of uh uh expletives about some of the things we talk about and how they
can't change them but in the in public this is the empire they cannot be made to look like it's losing But there's some breaking news Pepe we can react to
verify our friend DD DD geopolitics following flight radars said that two Iranian Mirage Airlines
passenger planes are now in route to Pakistan likely carrying the Iran negotiation team although we don't know.
Um meanwhile Israeli Israeli media reports say that a ceasefire announcement in Lebanon is expected
although I have not been able to track but where that is. So maybe get a little closer to this. Uh
this means that the Pakistani media was lying. That's not good. It's not good at all.
And and the Iranian um uh official and semiofficial media. They were all saying the same thing. They are here at Iman
Kmeni airport and they are waiting. So apparently this was correct.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I guess we'll have to see uh what transpires from here,
Pepe. But uh you know on uh on the another note uh maybe you could talk about the position of the Gulf countries
now you know uh we see media they have anointed Iran. I mean we see in the New York Times everywhere you referenced it.
Iran is now a a global power a regional power. it has from this war which the
United States has said it has won Iran has come out stronger even the most anti-Iran uh commentary is acknowledging this fact
like for example the Guardian uh Iran wounded but uh you know uh strategically strong you know like there's all these
comments about this but uh the Gulf countries are still taking a very hard line right now uh they they it seems
like they feel embarrassed they see it all over analysts from the UAE. You see it in the statements from the governments of the
UAE of Bahrain. Uh they're all taking a very hard line position against Iran. Uh I'm curious on what you think is uh is
at play here for them given that a lot of these demands that Iran has uh affect them quite gravely. For example, getting
rid of the US's military presence in the region which is at the top of that list.
Mhm. Well, the first thing which is already immense, the GCC is already broken.
We have two GCC members, Carter and Omen,
who have already proclaimed themselves to be, if not
anti-Iran, not only non anti-Iran, but neutral, and they want an accommodation.
This is already gigantic.
very complicated. Kuwait and Bahrain is collapsing essentially and everything of
value in terms of American installations is practically destroyed.
Uh what our friends uh in our Iraqi scholar friends have been saying for quite a while, it might happen sooner or
later. Bahrain will be absorbed by somebody probably Saudi Arabia soon or it could be reinccorporated to uh Iran after all it was part of Iran before.
43 minutesThe big big if is uh Saudi Arabia,
UAE they are at war practically against Iran, not all the Emirates,
for instance, Sarah. No, nothing. I'm talking about Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
So, the Iranians are going to go all out on the UAE. There's no question about that. probably uh not immediately but soon.
After all, they have already managed to destroy the Dubai business model. So the next step will be to destroy the Abu Dhabi oil revenues.
So this leaves us with a Saudi Arabia.
Nobody knows exactly what they are playing and if they have already made if
NBS already made up his mind to try to diversify his interests and step away
from Abraham Accords, IMAC, all that convoluted crap.
If he does that, that's an enormous risk because he may lose all his money, which
as we all know is in London and in New York.
The relationship between Saudi Arabia and with Russia and China is very close with both.
So they are certainly the background talk is heavy and the Chinese and the Russians are
probably telling MBS uh pay attention to which way the wind is blowing
right so they're still hedging and uh what they published officially I think
was one or two days ago is a list of all their installations that were hit and
45 minuteswhat they are losing and apparently the figure is they are losing the export of
700,000 barrels a day. So it's not over 1 million million 1.4 four and all that,
but still 700,000 is a lot. And we still don't know for sure
who attacked the East West pipeline that goes to Yamu and bypasses the straight of this is not clear yet.
No. No. At all at all at all. Iran. Yeah. Saudi Arabia says it's Iran. Iran says it's not.
RGC said no it was not us.
Yeah. Yeah. And Iran I mean Iran has hit Saudi Arabia and as they hit the refiners has hit that area but uh strategically it seems like yeah and it
seems strategic the way that they were hitting it rather than uh this this attack which was uh I mean crippling
big joker right uh um Danny the big joker is okay which way Saudi Arabia will lean midterm short term nobody can
tell midterm right and of course in terms of the street of Hormuz If this new mechanism well if no this new mechanism will hold,
will the Emirates resign themselves to pay the toll to export their own oil through Iranian uh territorial waters?
Definitely not. And that's why they are they're they're seething right. Yes. Yeah, they are on a time bomb.
Absolutely.
uh and this might explain from the beginning why they chose this position of basically allying with
the US and at war with the Iran. There will be serious consequences for MBZ.
There's no question about that. For the moment, this is not the number one priority for the IRGC, but soon it will.
Yeah. But you know that the bottom line is uh GCC bye-bye internal collapse
split from the inside right.
Yeah. Now it's it is looking very bad for the Gulf especially considering uh
all of these talks are going to revolve around many issues that affect them that none of them I I mean what's so
interesting what you said earlier about Qatar and Oman. I mean, Oman's not so much of a surprise, but it's so interesting that Qatar changed its tune very quickly after what Iran did to it.
They're opportunists to energy to to its energy,
hyper opportunists. When you go to Qatar and you interact with some of these people and I have some friends who had
interactions with members of the royal alani family, they are hyper opportunists, right?
So that's it. They saw which way the wind is blowing literally in their own country after Iran hit their
Iran really really took it to their uh I forget what the name of the company was but name of the facility but
they damaged it quite significantly Rasnafar I think it's Rasnafar yeah the Rasar energy
so they lost 17% of their LG export volumes this is immense and of course
and and the ripple effects everywhere are gigantic. Exactly. So after that, of course, I said that convinced them.
Yeah.
A little bit of course want they know what's happening with Dubai airport. They don't want the same thing to happen to Dha, which now
Doha now is going to be the number one airport in the in the Persian Gulf, period.
It's already the most modern. Uh it's quite pleasant as a as a huge airport and it's going to be the number one
event for Katar Airways swimming business. Emirates. Oh my god. And Etihad they are in deep deep trouble both.
Yeah. Yeah. Uh I guess Pepe as we uh get toward the hour here maybe you can talk
about now that the balance of forces are where they are how does this impact the
uh Russia, China, Iran kind of ascendancy now that you have uh major uh
power uh brokers within the decay and collective west anointing Iran being in
this position of global power. Now, how does this change things for the entirety? Because a lot of people were
uh I think pessimistic before February 28th about the multipolar world and then uh they saw what happened to Iran in day
one and now we're in six weeks later uh and the mainstream media can't stop talking about Iran being a global power.
So, how does this change things for the rest of the world really? because there's a straight of hormuz and then there's of course the bigger development
surrounding these big changes which is uh Iran being part of this uh now my major part maybe one of the leading
parts of this uh changing world well this it's another history lesson isn't it Danny
um the multipolar world would never be born in in bricks meeting rooms it's what they have been talking over
and over again, you know, all all these summits and the sheras and you name it.
Uh well, I have been following this uh deeply. I was a firm believer that this would happen. I did, you know, I had a
lot of effort to try to explain the importance of the role of bricks in the multipolar world. But no, it would the
multipolar world has to be born through a major conflration on the battlefield
under fire against all odds and you turn the game around in 40 days. This is what nobody expected, but this is exactly
what is already happening. And of course, behind several levels of support,
Russia and China.
So, uh it's it's crazy because I am in the last stretch of my life a as a an analyst, a
reporter, a gnome and all that. I will never believe I could never believe that one day I'll be talking about the actual
primacy of the new primac triangle Russia Iran and China.
Primacov was Russia India China when he coined this expression in the at the end of the millennium. So now we have in
front of us this new priac triangle as the real drivers of
on the way a more solid path towards multipolarity and
it has to be under fire. The only language that the empire understands is force
and they will never admit resistance and sovereign resistance. For instance, in the case of Russia, they have to respect
Russia because Russia is a nuclear power.
The Americans never see Russia as a sovereign resistant nation against the West which is every
centuries trying to go there and smash Russia to bits.
But in the case of Iran is much more complicated because it's not a nuclear power. It was declared by the Americas.
I just go there in a weekend we finish it all and look what's happening.
So in terms of a historical game changer, this okay, people be studying this until the 25th century and it
happened so fast. And if until a few weeks ago,
we could uh uh basically agree with the judgment of Emmanuel Todd two years ago when he
published his book uh the defeat of the west in France.
The main thesis of the book was that Trump is going to have to manage the strategic defeat of the US in Ukraine. Now,
wow. Trump will have to manage two strategic defeats, one in Ukraine and another one in Iran.
It's too much for uh the brain of a fouryear-old, you know. He doesn't even know he he he cannot understand the
dimension of the whole thing in front of him you know.
o what do we have? We have these uh childish viferations these tantrums.
But you know the the big big picture is what's leading even people which are part of the western system saying look
now it's another story. Now we have another big power emerging. Yeah.
How can he possibly Danny, how can he possibly sell this to domestic public opinion in in the US, not to mention the rest of the planet? He can't.
No. No. Not only can he not, Pepe, but uh I don't know if you saw the reports about the domestic situation in the United States because of this war, but uh inflation.
Well, I saw I saw Melennia saying I had nothing to do with Epstein.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, people were joking, uh, well, Trump lost to Iran so badly that now he's trying to bring back
up Epstein in order to distract people from it. Um, but there's a degree truth, by the way.
Yeah, there's a degree of truth from to that. But then there's also the uh how do you sell what happened with the Iran
war and and every consequence that's come from it when one of the bigger consequences for just people in the
United States has been the 3.3% uh increase in inflation over the last month which a whopping 21.2%
increase in this inflationary um environment has been gasoline. So, so people are I mean chi China was sharing
videos of you know young girl just crying her eyes out because she had just had to pay something like5 plus dollars
a gallon for gas doesn't have money for rent. I mean this is this is the environment that the Trump administration's uh decision people call
it a war of choice. I don't know what I think the United States Empire at the at the end of the day uh they don't really see war on Iran in general as a choice
but certainly the timing and the way that it happened is definitely a choice and that's what uh has led to these uh
uh disastrous uh uh blowback conditions and uh the Trump I don't know how the Trump administration comes back from
this as an entity but uh and a future politically but um nonetheless it seems
like Trump and his team want to really like supercharge these so-called negotiations to get to whatever they're
going to get from them. And I just don't see that. This could go on either for a very long time or it could just not happen at all. It I don't think there's
an in between to that. I don't think there's an in between. Let me ask you, let me ask you, Danny, the host,
what do you see that the Trump administration could get considering they have zero cards in their hands?
I no the only thing that the Trump administration can get is I if they have I don't know I haven't seen it yet in
two different terms of Donald Trump but if the Trump administration can hire someone who can make a defeat look like a victory through some kind of PR spin
that's the only thing I think because they're going to have to I can't imagine Iran is going to uh even forget
capitulation but like concessions I don't know why why Iran or what Iran would consider conceding other than some
version of what it has laid out to the United States. Maybe it could be written differently, but nonetheless, the tolls
that the straight of horn moves, all of this, I don't see Iran uh the military presence in the region. Uh the you they'll be like, "Oh, you can spin it however you want, but you got to do it."
Uh and Iran is not going to stop demanding it and stop talking about it in that way. So really, the United States has nothing other than maybe
hopefully for them uh if for the Trump administration, they better hope they can uh do this uh find a way to actually
effectively communicate that they have won from a massive defeat. But we haven't seen it and it's not all they
can do is thump their chests and talk about how big and powerful they are and uh everyone kind of side eyes it because
it doesn't make any sense. And I feel like we're we're going to get a lot of that coming up. And who knows? Uh we
could very well be in a a military situation again, you know, a hot war again soon. I tend to think though I you
know, Scott Ritter, Larry Johnson, they were on my show and I tend to believe them when they say uh it's unclear whether the US even has anything left to
target. And if they start targeting what they claim they're going to target,
well, it's kind of game over. And I and and personally I believe that's part of the reason why China entered and Pakistan entered because they saw the
writing on the wall that uh if the United States even hit one iota of Iran's infrastructure that it said it was going to wipe it away then Iran
would have done the same thing back to the Gulf countries and then what do you have then? you have a complete disaster for not only the global economy but the
players involved the United States Pakistan who knows there some people were saying and I believe this too that they were scared that Saudi Arabia was
going to invoke the mutual defense pack and they don't want any part of that so um anyway that's it's a very bad terrain
and I feel like from the United States's perspective it's it's just a bad situation you know um what you just mentioned Danny It's
part of Pakistan's calculations. They cannot allow anything happening that would force
Saudi Arabia to call their mutual defense back. We are terrified of the possibility. Absolutely.
Yeah. I mean, how Yeah. what I mean it's a disaster like um to have to dive into it was for the whole whole Gulf
countries you know these countries that are run by monarchies that just sit on top of uh their the their top global commodity the oil and the gas and all
this and they don't have anything else they barely even they have no domestic support and they rely on uh they rely on
the chaos and they rely on the US and they rely on Israel very very bad position to be in when uh the US and Israel did this with Iran and and now.
So overall though, yeah, from the US's perspective, it's not spin, you know, it's not, oh,
this is trying to say that Iran has just absolutely bludgeoned the United States.
The truth is is that the US kind of did this to itself and Iran just had the capacity to to to make it happen and
yeah to resist and they did and and now the US has to face the the and bear the fruits of what that means which is
trying to weasle your way out of a mess that you made on your own. But I don't see it. I don't see that's why the next few days to a week plus are going to be
very interesting I think. But any final comments, Pepe? I know we're over the hour, so any final comments? Oh, no.
That's uh that's about it because we we have to wait uh if something comes out of Islamabad. Oh, none of us is betting
that something will come out, but maybe a rabbit out of a hat at the last minute.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just put up some of these super chats. Uh you should add Iranian Lego videos to your intro outro. Yes, Lego videos. You bet.
I would, but I heard people are getting uh censored for putting them up on YouTube, so that's why I haven't done it yet. Yes, but apparently they censored
uh the Lego guys account somewhere. I don't know if it's in YouTube or somewhere. So, everybody has on YouTube. On YouTube,
but they are everywhere the Lego videos.
Right. Right. Right. So, thank you all for the generosity. Without further ado,
everyone, I want you to know that um you can go to the video description and find Pepe Escobar's uh Telegram and X as well
as a link to this article that we shared today. And um be sure to hit the like button. Um, uh, be sure to, uh,
ubscribe, all of that video description to support this channel, all the sources. I will be back, but I am traveling soon. I'll let you know what's
going on. Um, and I will publish some interviews in the meantime. Are you coming to Asia? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Asia. Good. We're gonna be a while.
Yeah. Yep. And I'll announce what's going on uh uh when I arrive. All right,
everybody. Hit the like button as you go. That helps boost this conversation. And I will see you all again soon. Bye-bye. Thanks, Danny.
Bye-bye. Thanks, Danny
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 40634
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Return to United States Government Crime
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 8 guests