Latest / International Flavor: Where the Truth Tastes Better / Iran, Odessa, Hormuz, and the Fiscal Cliff | International Flavor

Transcript

Iran, Odessa, Hormuz, and the Fiscal Cliff | International Flavor · International Flavor: Where the Truth Tastes Better

• 0:00
  Hello. Happy Monday to everyone. I am
• 0:04
  Samuel Trap. This is International
• 0:06
  Flavor. You are listening to DAM Radio
• 0:10
  coming to you live from the Lake Ozark
• 0:12
  Real Estate Art Studio.
• 0:15
  And uh we do this oh Monday through
• 0:18
  Thursday for you from 7:30 to 9:00.
• 0:25
  Uh, and then on Friday we do another
• 0:28
  iteration of Civic Outlaws. I encourage
• 0:31
  you to go to civicoutlaws.com,
• 0:33
  see our current events and all of the
• 0:36
  shows out there that have been done in
• 0:38
  the past. And then I encourage you to go
• 0:40
  out to internationalflavor.com
• 0:44
  and check out the show from there with
• 0:47
  all the uh interesting rhetoric as they
• 0:51
  call it, the political babble, as uh
• 0:55
  some may also call it. And I also
• 0:58
  encourage you to listen as much as
• 1:00
  possible to damradio.com/live
• 1:03
  ormpodcast.
• 1:05
  Should you choose to listen not at the
• 1:09
  proper slotted window, you can go to
• 1:11
  damradio.com/scchedu
• 1:14
  to get the
• 1:17
  goods to get the goodies and find out
• 1:19
  when all of the shows are uh up and
• 1:22
  coming and what the schedule says. uh as
• 1:27
  far as going uh deep into the lunacy of
• 1:33
  the day and there's plenty of that to go
• 1:36
  about. Um
• 1:38
  tell you what, I got a lot done this uh
• 1:41
  somewhat cold but otherwise beautiful
• 1:45
  weekend and maybe I'm a whining over uh
• 1:50
  the cold because it really wasn't all
• 1:52
  that bad. I helped a uh helped a uh
• 1:55
  sister
• 1:58
  build a bathroom. Well, her husband, she
• 2:01
  was there, too. And so, I suppose I was
• 2:03
  helping the both of them. H Yeah, that's
• 2:06
  probably true. And uh if you haven't
• 2:08
  built a bathroom lately, I encourage you
• 2:10
  to get in the mood. It's a lot of fun.
• 2:12
  And uh it's even more fun when it's out
• 2:15
  in the middle of nowhere. So, there you
• 2:17
  go. I encourage you to go out to the
• 2:18
  middle of nowhere and create a bathroom.
• 2:21
  Could be a lot of fun. So, do it. I
• 2:24
  listened to plenty
• 2:28
  of
• 2:30
  commentary of talk and uh researched a
• 2:33
  couple of things. One of the most
• 2:38
  I I I don't know revealing I suppose is
• 2:41
  how things are so different and yet the
• 2:47
  same. I tell you what uh I I've
• 2:52
  everybody knows that I have not been for
• 2:56
  the illusion that
• 2:59
  the the
• 3:01
  for the illusion of war or the uh what
• 3:05
  do they always used to say in my church
• 3:07
  class when I was in Sunday school? In
• 3:10
  that time there shall be wars and rumors
• 3:12
  of wars. And if you're Monty Python and
• 3:15
  you can say uh and during those times a
• 3:18
  man shall steal another man's hammer and
• 3:21
  no one will be able to tell where it is.
• 3:24
  They left that thing which they only
• 3:26
  remembered a few days before but they
• 3:29
  can't remember where it is now. If
• 3:31
  you're going to be quoting scripture and
• 3:33
  talking about the future, you know,
• 3:34
  Montipython is a good source source for
• 3:38
  all of your entertainment value. or you
• 3:43
  can listen to all of the countries that
• 3:46
  are speaking today. So I listen to let
• 3:50
  me give you a a broad smattering as it
• 3:54
  were of people that I spoke about or
• 3:57
  spoke I didn't speak to any of them. I
• 3:58
  listened to over the weekend or on
• 4:03
  Friday. I listened to a guy named uh
• 4:06
  Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson
• 4:10
  who was a former chief of staff of the
• 4:12
  US Secretary of State. Um and he had a
• 4:16
  long, you know, military career and also
• 4:18
  worked at the White House. He's an
• 4:20
  interesting individual that was a a
• 4:24
  a seriously good um speech or or
• 4:30
  discussion. And I listened to Richard
• 4:31
  Wolf, a professor from New York
• 4:34
  that uh another half an hour with him. I
• 4:38
  did another John Mirshimer round. Uh I
• 4:42
  did a
• 4:44
  one with uh Rachel
• 4:48
  Blevens who I like to listen to.
• 4:51
  Uh Alex Christophoru, Dr. Muhammad
• 4:54
  Mirandi. Uh, and the name of and this he
• 4:57
  was with a guy named um
• 5:01
  what was that guy's name? Sy I remember
• 5:03
  Cyrus Jansen. Cyrus Jansen is a uh a
• 5:08
  young politically ch politically
• 5:11
  motivated. I don't know if he's
• 5:12
  challenged. He challenges the politics.
• 5:16
  That is for sure. Um he always seems to
• 5:18
  have an economic angle which I kind of
• 5:21
  like. and he interviewed a guy named
• 5:23
  Muhammad Mirandi and uh Mirandi
• 5:28
  he so he's from kind of inside uh well
• 5:31
  he is in Iran and he he knows some
• 5:33
  things there was the uh the fuel equals
• 5:38
  the blood of war there was uh uh that
• 5:41
  was the Alex Christopher one and the
• 5:43
  Houthies are entering the war there's a
• 5:46
  so and then I watched a big gay uh or
• 5:48
  watched one called uh the big game,
• 5:53
  March 30 of 2026. And it says the game
• 5:57
  is uh for Adessa.
• 6:00
  And uh this was a Russian language
• 6:02
  version. So I listened to two Russian
• 6:03
  language ones. There's this one which is
• 6:06
  uh uh
• 6:09
  a big game over Odessa. Now, I think I
• 6:14
  may start with that uh with with where
• 6:19
  I'm all of those things, they could fill
• 6:22
  an entire week of uh of talking,
• 6:25
  especially with me. And uh I I watched
• 6:28
  the you know, Trump talking about the
• 6:31
  the the gifts that he received from u
• 6:35
  from
• 6:37
  Iran. Nonsensical.
• 6:40
  uh that's that he didn't get any gifts
• 6:42
  from them. Those Pakistani
• 6:45
  gifts, the gifts came to Pakistan, but
• 6:49
  well, if you want to claim them as your
• 6:50
  own, I suppose you could. And but it's
• 6:54
  10 ships that get to go through the
• 6:56
  straits of Hormuz, but they're going to
• 6:58
  Pakistan. They're Pakistani ships. They
• 7:01
  paid in Ywan to get out. And uh uh and
• 7:05
  that is uh the funny part of it all is
• 7:09
  is that the the mistruths that are being
• 7:13
  talked about the whole way through the
• 7:15
  bombing. I watched one the Rachel
• 7:17
  Blevens one really got me
• 7:22
  going a little bit and that has not a
• 7:24
  whole lot to do with Iran. It had had to
• 7:28
  do with uh Lebanon and had to do with
• 7:33
  the the killing of journalists that
• 7:35
  nobody in the West is talking about. And
• 7:38
  she was pretty upset about it. And she
• 7:40
  wasn't interviewing anyone and and
• 7:42
  rightly so. Uh she showed some pictures
• 7:45
  and some stuff like that that uh that
• 7:47
  were that came
• 7:49
  into that u area. Yeah, I'm going to see
• 7:53
  if I can find this um
• 7:57
  find this commentary. Oh, yeah. There's
• 8:00
  the No, that's Alex. And let me find
• 8:07
  that's the circular Zalinski.
• 8:11
  Zalinski's cruising the Middle East
• 8:14
  looking for gas. Okay, he's looking for
• 8:19
  gas. And so all of these things have
• 8:21
  kind of come together into a big circle.
• 8:26
  And so it's it's uh this is not good.
• 8:30
  Okay. So so let's let's do a quick
• 8:33
  little review of all of these. So
• 8:37
  basically we're going to start with um
• 8:41
  the framework which is if you listen to
• 8:44
  Wolf and Wilkerson which you know I made
• 8:47
  an effort to do so and and they speak
• 8:50
  with with real numbers they they give
• 8:52
  you real stories and I want to go all
• 8:55
  the way around through this circle about
• 8:58
  where the mistake of Iran that I believe
• 9:02
  is happening before our very eyes. Now,
• 9:05
  I had my own theory upon this and and
• 9:08
  you've heard bits and pieces of it
• 9:10
  before and and nobody knows what the
• 9:13
  hell Trump is thinking. He don't know
• 9:15
  what he's thinking. He changes it every
• 9:17
  morning and and it it it just changes,
• 9:20
  you know. I think it is something that
• 9:23
  has to do in part like when I heard uh
• 9:28
  Joe um
• 9:30
  Kent, the the guy who left the uh
• 9:35
  service of of the president here a
• 9:37
  couple of weeks ago, Middle Eastern guy
• 9:39
  that said it was a big mistake to go
• 9:41
  into Middle East. I agree with that
• 9:43
  analysis completely. By the way, I also
• 9:47
  believe that my thought process doesn't
• 9:49
  matter anyway. Uh not as not not any
• 9:53
  more than anybody else's. And where you
• 9:55
  choose to get your information is up to
• 9:57
  you. But the fact is is I'm fairly
• 10:01
  well-versed in in in all of this stuff.
• 10:04
  And
• 10:06
  I am a cynical and a
• 10:13
  disbeliever. I I do not believe the
• 10:16
  excuses that government gives to work
• 10:19
  just because the government gives them.
• 10:22
  I never say, "Oh, gee, this politician
• 10:26
  is better to listen to than that
• 10:29
  politician." You know, I have my
• 10:30
  thoughts on the matter and I try to
• 10:32
  listen to them, but I think they're all
• 10:34
  full of crap and uh they don't they
• 10:37
  don't tell you the truth no matter what
• 10:38
  anyway. It's like they don't have the
• 10:41
  capacity because they're always trying
• 10:43
  to sell you something. It's like the
• 10:45
  used car dealer on just because he
• 10:48
  happens to be telling you the truth
• 10:50
  about this particular thing don't mean
• 10:52
  you should believe him about everything,
• 10:54
  you know. And that's the same for
• 10:56
  political commentators. That's the same
• 10:58
  for people on CNN. It's you know the
• 11:01
  same for people who aren't same for
• 11:05
  people who do not have the
• 11:09
  right or the desire
• 11:12
  uh either the right or the desire to uh
• 11:15
  speak with you
• 11:18
  on what they think. Not what their not
• 11:23
  what their backers think. Not what the
• 11:25
  big money man thinks that's that's
• 11:28
  supporting them. Not that. but what they
• 11:31
  actually think themselves. And uh you
• 11:34
  cannot take the money and the backing
• 11:37
  out of a of a national politician and
• 11:41
  hell you can barely do it out of a state
• 11:43
  politician although your chances are a
• 11:45
  little bit better and of that. But you
• 11:49
  can't believe what they say because it's
• 11:50
  always being presented to you through
• 11:53
  someone else's lens, not yours. Unless
• 11:56
  you're the guy backing them, you know,
• 11:57
  if you're the if you've bought yourself
• 11:59
  a politician, well, more power to you,
• 12:02
  you know, good luck to you. But, but I
• 12:04
  don't trust you anymore and I trust
• 12:06
  them. You have the goal of increasing
• 12:08
  your own power. So, just understand that
• 12:11
  when I when I listen to these or when I
• 12:14
  spout this off myself, at least for me,
• 12:18
  I'm not beholden to somebody else's
• 12:21
  opinion. I'm not. and you can convince
• 12:24
  me to change mine, but not just by
• 12:27
  telling me that's, you know, what I need
• 12:29
  to do. That's not going to happen. So,
• 12:32
  I've always thought this is an is is an
• 12:35
  economic when when when
• 12:38
  Venezuela happened, everybody knows I
• 12:40
  went, what the hell are we doing? And
• 12:42
  then and then immediately after that we
• 12:46
  end up in a uh unsustainable action
• 12:50
  another one in the Middle East. And the
• 12:53
  Middle East it's you know almost always
• 12:56
  about encircling Iran and taking out the
• 13:00
  biggest
• 13:02
  biggest largest
• 13:05
  oil
• 13:06
  uh interest in the world. You know Iran.
• 13:10
  Well, arguably Russia now, but the
• 13:13
  biggest in the Middle East, right? And
• 13:15
  uh and the biggest block to the US
• 13:19
  controlling the oil out of the Middle
• 13:21
  East. Why do you think we're there? Why
• 13:24
  do you think we've ever been there?
• 13:26
  We've been there to control the oil.
• 13:30
  Period. There's no other reason for us
• 13:32
  to be there. None whatsoever. And why do
• 13:36
  we need bases all over the Middle East?
• 13:38
  The only reason to justify it is oil,
• 13:42
  okay, and other uh natural um products.
• 13:47
  You know, aluminum's over there in
• 13:49
  pretty big supply. Took a huge hit. Uh
• 13:52
  there there's plenty of other natural
• 13:54
  resources over that way. So I always
• 13:57
  thought that and and when the the the
• 14:01
  pieces all fell together after the
• 14:04
  straight to Hormuz was closed this time
• 14:08
  and this has been a long time in the
• 14:09
  making if you believe some of the uh
• 14:12
  Iranian
• 14:14
  uh strategists that are speaking that
• 14:17
  you know this is and now they're talking
• 14:20
  about closing the Red Sea which will be
• 14:22
  another 15 to 20% of uh global
• 14:26
  uh supply of oil through the world
• 14:30
  controlled by the Houthis or able to be
• 14:33
  shut off by the Houthies.
• 14:36
  And uh you have the continued killing of
• 14:41
  people um in Israel uh and in Lebanon by
• 14:45
  the Israelis whether you believe those
• 14:47
  stories or not. So it's important to
• 14:49
  listen to somebody like Richard Wolf who
• 14:52
  uh has a vested interest in all of those
• 14:54
  things. Um, and at any rate,
• 15:00
  the theory that I've always had is this
• 15:03
  is an affront to China and and it's and
• 15:07
  because the one in Venezuela was far too
• 15:11
  obvious. They lied to us about why they
• 15:13
  were there. You know, we aren't there
• 15:15
  for narco terrorism and to blow anybody
• 15:17
  up. And those that were paying attention
• 15:19
  knew that was from the
• 15:21
  beginning because that is the smallest
• 15:25
  of the five biggies that are allegedly
• 15:29
  controlling narco terrorism. And uh you
• 15:33
  know that is nothing but the the we have
• 15:36
  a bigger a bigger appendage than you and
• 15:39
  so we can go in and dictate what you're
• 15:41
  going to do with your oil. And it only
• 15:44
  came clean by Trump afterward because he
• 15:47
  has to tell about his victory. And his
• 15:50
  victory all has to do with oil. And so
• 15:53
  he gets to go, "Look, we have the oil."
• 15:56
  Nothing has changed there. By the way,
• 15:58
  they have the next corrupt person in
• 16:00
  line. You know, if you want to call it
• 16:02
  corrupt, you know, that's how their
• 16:04
  country is run. That's just the way it
• 16:06
  is. And maybe it'll change someday, but
• 16:08
  that's not our gig. And by the way,
• 16:09
  they're still over there pounding. We're
• 16:12
  not completely out of that debacle, you
• 16:14
  know. It's not like we walked away. You
• 16:16
  know, Trump said, "I'm going to control
• 16:19
  these people. Me, Marco Rubio's going to
• 16:22
  run Marco Rubio's going to run
• 16:25
  Venezuela." And they think they're still
• 16:27
  doing it. So, but then we move straight
• 16:30
  into the and that is leg number one
• 16:34
  knocked out from under allegedly uh
• 16:36
  China. Okay? because they had a hundred
• 16:39
  billion invested in that infrastructure
• 16:42
  that Trump gets to probably claim his
• 16:44
  own too. And so now they're trying to do
• 16:47
  the same thing in Iran. That's why US
• 16:50
  took the opportunity to follow along
• 16:53
  after Netanyahu declared his intentions
• 16:55
  and gave them the date for when and time
• 16:59
  for when he was going to uh to attack.
• 17:02
  And according to Rubio, you know, we we
• 17:05
  knew he was going to do it and was a
• 17:07
  good opportunity for us to follow along.
• 17:10
  So those two things pretty much sealed
• 17:12
  the deal for me. Uh knowing that this is
• 17:14
  an anti-China, anti-Russia measure,
• 17:18
  which I've talked about before. Um but
• 17:21
  this is here's the collapse part. Let's
• 17:24
  talk about the economy first and the war
• 17:27
  second. Because what distinguishes this
• 17:30
  from every prior US conflict is not just
• 17:32
  that another
• 17:35
  voluntary
• 17:36
  war, you know, a war that we don't need
• 17:38
  to fight, frankly, that we have no
• 17:41
  business fighting right now.
• 17:44
  Another voluntary a war of choice that
• 17:48
  that we this is our choice to go to war.
• 17:50
  It's not a necessity. This is not a
• 17:54
  anything like that for us. Meanwhile,
• 17:57
  the the people who are in the two big
• 17:59
  wars in the world, the Russians and the
• 18:02
  Iranians, and arguably the Chinese, if
• 18:06
  you're going to economic throw it in
• 18:08
  there, you have three existential threat
• 18:13
  wars, or at least two. Russia and Iran,
• 18:16
  those are existential threats. We're
• 18:19
  we're going to destroy you. NATO and
• 18:22
  America are going to attempt to destroy
• 18:25
  Russia. They miscalculated that. Now
• 18:29
  Israel and America and now Ukraine
• 18:33
  are going to destroy Iran.
• 18:37
  These are existential threats to the the
• 18:40
  the countries of Russia and Iran. They
• 18:44
  must fight. They were not brought into
• 18:47
  this as a voluntary elective war.
• 18:50
  Although that is what they try to sell
• 18:52
  you as this is Putin's war, this is uh
• 18:56
  the Ayatollah's war. They were going to
• 18:58
  attack us first. So we had to attack
• 19:01
  them. Russia was going to attack us
• 19:04
  first. So we had to build up Ukraine and
• 19:07
  supply those nuts with all kinds of
• 19:09
  weapons so they could engage their hate
• 19:12
  of uh their hatred of Russia and and all
• 19:15
  things Russian. By the way, over the
• 19:16
  weekend I I met a bunch of fellows from
• 19:19
  Latvia and uh uh they're speaking
• 19:22
  Russian and I went up to him and started
• 19:24
  speaking Russian. Tell you what, the
• 19:27
  hatred of Russia is alive and well with
• 19:29
  all those Baltic states because those
• 19:31
  boys, they were looking anywhere but at
• 19:35
  me when I went and and I said, "Do you
• 19:37
  guys speak Russian?" I said, "You're
• 19:39
  speaking I hear you're you know, you're
• 19:41
  over here speaking Russian." It was
• 19:43
  really funny cuz they were speaking
• 19:44
  Russian until I walked up. They all were
• 19:47
  speaking Russian. Why? Because they come
• 19:49
  from various areas of of of Latafia,
• 19:52
  Lithuania, any of those Baltics, maybe
• 19:54
  Bellarus, maybe uh somewhere in there,
• 19:57
  and they all speak Russian, but they
• 19:59
  don't want to. And so if you come up as
• 20:01
  an American and you're speaking uh uh
• 20:03
  Russian to them and uh they know that
• 20:06
  they're speaking Russian, they want to
• 20:08
  show you that they aren't speaking
• 20:10
  Russian because you're not supposed to
• 20:12
  like Russia, you're supposed to hate
• 20:14
  them, especially here in America. We're
• 20:16
  supposed to feel sorry for them because
• 20:18
  Russia is pounding them. And geez,
• 20:20
  Russia's the big bad wolf. And uh it's
• 20:25
  I think it's ridiculous that you hate
• 20:28
  it's like us hating Mexicans. Us hating
• 20:31
  and we don't but I mean hating Mexicans
• 20:33
  because they speak Spanish, you know,
• 20:36
  it's nonsense. So we're going to
• 20:38
  discount Spanish and that's they they
• 20:40
  they're still doing it. That shit's
• 20:42
  alive and well. So at any rate, the war
• 20:46
  is uh has has begun and it's economy
• 20:52
  first, war second. Okay? And that the
• 20:55
  war has begun inside a structurally weak
• 20:59
  system already. This is comes clear from
• 21:03
  Richard Wolf. you should listen to this
• 21:04
  his theory because it was strong and it
• 21:07
  is maybe that should be an anchor for
• 21:10
  for everybody's thought process because
• 21:13
  for Wolf this isn't a military question
• 21:17
  at all and for me it's really not either
• 21:19
  it's an economic one more specifically a
• 21:23
  question about whether the United States
• 21:26
  still has the financial architecture
• 21:30
  necessary
• 21:32
  to sustain the kind of war that it has
• 21:36
  chosen to enter.
• 21:39
  It's arithmetic, people.
• 21:42
  The United States entered this conflict
• 21:45
  already, carrying over a trillion dollar
• 21:49
  in annual deficit.
• 21:52
  Already, our credit rating from all
• 21:54
  three bureaus has been downgraded to
• 21:58
  double A. Not AA. We're double A. While
• 22:02
  we're already dependent on borrowing to
• 22:05
  fund not only domestic programs but the
• 22:08
  entire global military posture
• 22:13
  and you know we have a fragile
• 22:15
  structure. You may not believe it but
• 22:17
  it's fragile. Trump comes into office.
• 22:20
  He says I'm going to fix all this and
• 22:23
  we're going to bring in pots of
• 22:24
  money by uh tariffs. We're going to
• 22:28
  bring in all these tariffs. and he
• 22:31
  starts bringing in the money. People
• 22:32
  start anticipating the money. The Wall
• 22:34
  Street starts betting on the money and
• 22:38
  possibilities
• 22:40
  begin to emerge that goes, "Oh my gosh,
• 22:45
  he might actually pull something off. He
• 22:47
  may pull something off. He might
• 22:50
  actually reduce the deficit." Not so
• 22:54
  young people. He immediately spent
• 22:57
  whatever he thought he was going to do
• 22:59
  by now think about this size increase in
• 23:04
  a military budget which in 2024
• 23:09
  was 800
• 23:12
  um billion right which is a huge
• 23:16
  number.
• 23:18
  Okay maybe not quite 900. Okay, this is
• 23:21
  8 almost 900.
• 23:24
  And
• 23:26
  guess what? I mean, this year
• 23:30
  1.5
• 23:31
  trillion dollar.
• 23:34
  Imagine that number. Okay, now you have
• 23:36
  to imagine that number because you
• 23:38
  couldn't fit it in a warehouse.
• 23:41
  All the cash, he couldn't fit it in
• 23:43
  there. Not even in cryptocurrency.
• 23:46
  Anyway, that uh
• 23:50
  amount of money 900, let's call it 900
• 23:54
  just to have a nice round number. What's
• 23:56
  it take to get from 900 to 1,500
• 24:03
  billion, right?
• 24:05
  900 billion to,500 billion. That is a
• 24:09
  67%
• 24:12
  increase in the Department of War. 67%
• 24:19
  in one year. Now, where's that money
• 24:23
  going? Same old it went to
• 24:26
  before the military-industrial complex.
• 24:28
  That's where it's going. And you enter
• 24:30
  and you you up it. Then you figure out
• 24:34
  you can't live within that number. And
• 24:37
  so you immediately ask Congress because
• 24:39
  you got to start another war and you're
• 24:41
  already way above this. By the way,
• 24:44
  you need another 200
• 24:48
  billion. You have almost doubled just
• 24:52
  just for Iran, by the way. And you have
• 24:54
  now doubled almost doubled your military
• 25:00
  budget in one year. Meanwhile, your
• 25:04
  tariffs are uh are reversed by the
• 25:08
  Supreme Court. And everybody who's paid
• 25:11
  a tariff over the last year and a half
• 25:14
  wants it back.
• 25:17
  They want that money back. And judges
• 25:19
  are saying they're going to have to pay
• 25:21
  that money back. Where's it going to
• 25:23
  come from? You already don't have it. By
• 25:26
  the way, you have a double A rating. By
• 25:29
  the way, this means your interest rates
• 25:31
  are going to go up. Meanwhile, the
• 25:35
  economic balance is going down. And so,
• 25:39
  according to most economists, you have
• 25:42
  stagflation
• 25:44
  means interest rates are going up. But,
• 25:47
  but guess what else is going up at the
• 25:49
  same time? Inflation. That's what's
• 25:52
  happening. And that is happening. And
• 25:55
  how does Trump save it? He has to win
• 25:59
  and he has to win and do something about
• 26:02
  China and do something and in his own
• 26:05
  mind you know and he's already stuck in
• 26:08
  a in a in a war that according to all
• 26:11
  popular um commentators even unpopular.
• 26:16
  This is this is now mainstream. He can't
• 26:18
  win this war. It's it's it's not going
• 26:20
  to be won. Which is my fear that when
• 26:22
  you can't win, what do you do? You
• 26:24
  escalate. And everybody's escalating.
• 26:27
  Everybody's making it more uh
• 26:31
  troublesome to continue, right? And uh
• 26:34
  so you're going to up it. Who are the
• 26:36
  most likely to throw a nuclear bomb in
• 26:39
  this scenario?
• 26:42
  It's freaking Netanyahu. I'm telling
• 26:44
  you, it's Netanyahu. That guy loves his
• 26:47
  escalation and he has the glory of God
• 26:49
  behind him. So there you have it. Um
• 26:53
  that is the hundred billions in new
• 26:56
  commitment simultaneously losing revenue
• 26:59
  that he had expected on tariffs been
• 27:02
  struck down. This in plain language is
• 27:05
  something that most war analysts don't
• 27:07
  touch anyway. It's the fiscal limits of
• 27:10
  the empire. The US is not choosing to
• 27:12
  fight. It's choosing to fight at a not
• 27:15
  only is it choosing to fight. is
• 27:17
  choosing to fight at a time when it has
• 27:19
  to borrow to do so. And when borrowing
• 27:22
  is now more expensive, more uncertain,
• 27:25
  and you got the war driving the
• 27:28
  spending. Spending increases borrowing.
• 27:30
  Borrowing pressures interest rates.
• 27:32
  Higher interest rates feed inflation. If
• 27:35
  inflation constrains domestic stability,
• 27:38
  domestic stability limits how far the
• 27:41
  war can go because the popularity of
• 27:44
  this war is minimal. the the only people
• 27:47
  out there raising sabers.
• 27:50
  Get this. Trump has a new uh press
• 27:52
  secretary. Guess who it is? Mark
• 27:54
  Leavvin. Well, I can't figure out what,
• 27:57
  you know, I can't figure out how to tell
• 27:58
  people how they're going to love this
• 28:00
  war. So, listen to Mark Leavvin. Get on
• 28:03
  and listen to Mark Leavvin. No, he's not
• 28:05
  skewed at all. Not remotely. He says,
• 28:09
  "Got to have 15,000 soldiers over there.
• 28:11
  You ain't getting into Iran with 15,000
• 28:14
  soldiers." Well, you want some gnats on
• 28:16
  a on a horse? There you go. You want a
• 28:19
  couple hundred thousand? The American
• 28:21
  people will string you up for doing
• 28:23
  that. And a lot of them are ready to do
• 28:26
  so over 15,000. This is foolish. This is
• 28:29
  stupid. And it has nothing to do with
• 28:32
  us. Zalinsky realizes it. Why do you
• 28:35
  think he's in Saudi Arabia and uh uh
• 28:37
  Qatar and uh where else did he go this
• 28:41
  weekend? Uh Bahrain. He went to all
• 28:44
  these places trying to figure out how to
• 28:46
  replace his uh natural gas because he
• 28:49
  can't get it. Why? Because they get
• 28:51
  Europe gets a lot of its uh supply
• 28:53
  through the Straits of Hormuz Suez Canal
• 28:56
  through Iranian uh channels that are
• 28:58
  going to be turned off in the Red Sea by
• 29:01
  the Houthies or through uh Straits of
• 29:04
  Hormuz. And what did Russia do this past
• 29:07
  weekend, by the way? They shut off the
• 29:10
  gas supply. Now they're trying to claim
• 29:13
  in the in Europe that oh by the way this
• 29:15
  means that we're defeating Russia. Well
• 29:18
  maybe so maybe it does. I don't think
• 29:20
  so. But maybe so I I'll give you I'll
• 29:23
  give you
• 29:25
  some time to expand that theory because
• 29:28
  I see it differently. Even if you bombed
• 29:31
  a couple of gas infrastructure places
• 29:33
  right inside of Russia and Ukraine is
• 29:36
  attempting to do that because they're
• 29:38
  very frightened of Russia's new uh
• 29:41
  satellite system which are going to
• 29:43
  level the recent advantages of the
• 29:46
  playing field because Elon Musk was able
• 29:49
  to cut off Russian access to Starlink
• 29:52
  that they had stolen through a bunch of
• 29:54
  terminals that were coming through uh uh
• 29:58
  Ukrainian sources, Right. And so now
• 30:02
  Russia has their own and it's working
• 30:05
  and it's working well. And so now they
• 30:08
  can now remember the warning of Zilinski
• 30:12
  going down into the Middle East and
• 30:14
  telling these countries that look what's
• 30:16
  going on. Don't you get it? Russia is
• 30:18
  taking satellite pictures and giving
• 30:21
  targeting data
• 30:23
  to Iran.
• 30:26
  Oh my god. And the world's up in arms
• 30:28
  over this.
• 30:30
  What has NATO and the United States been
• 30:32
  giving Ukraine for five years nearly?
• 30:36
  Well, we're in the fifth year that that
• 30:38
  or longer actually because where do they
• 30:41
  get all of their intelligence? It's not
• 30:43
  it's not developed by some grand
• 30:45
  Ukrainian military intelligence service.
• 30:48
  No, it's handed to them by England, by
• 30:51
  America. We are giving all of the
• 30:53
  targeting data. where where who gave the
• 30:55
  pictures of the airplanes back uh uh
• 30:58
  back last uh summer or whenever it was
• 31:01
  that they bombed the Russian airfields.
• 31:03
  Remember that with the drones that came
• 31:05
  out who provided that information? So,
• 31:09
  and and that's where the Lavrov speech
• 31:11
  came in that I watched this weekend.
• 31:13
  That was that was extremely interesting.
• 31:16
  I tell you what, there's some very very
• 31:18
  smart people analyzing this and and I
• 31:21
  listen to a lot of them and all I get to
• 31:23
  do is spout it back out to you hopefully
• 31:27
  picking and choosing all of those
• 31:29
  together. Um Wolf says this is this war
• 31:34
  is going to take us over a fiscal cliff.
• 31:38
  And that's not rhetoric, people. It's
• 31:40
  recognition that the US is approaching a
• 31:42
  point where the ability to finance its
• 31:45
  domestic obligations and global military
• 31:50
  uh excursions simultaneously are going
• 31:53
  to break down. Now let's talk about that
• 31:56
  the political dem
• 31:59
  dimension because this is where Wolf u
• 32:03
  observes
• 32:05
  New York and Mom Donnie. Now, I'm not
• 32:08
  sure if you're aware of this, but think
• 32:10
  about this. The Brit all the way to New
• 32:14
  York. You want to know how
• 32:18
  how
• 32:20
  terrible
• 32:22
  the
• 32:24
  impressions are of what Trump is doing
• 32:28
  right now. Take this as an example. If
• 32:32
  if if you think that Trump is going to
• 32:37
  sweep into
• 32:39
  the elections in uh November
• 32:43
  without some serious problems, there's
• 32:47
  something you need to think about. Um
• 32:49
  Trump's own Mara Lago went Democrat his
• 32:53
  area. And by the way, he used a mail-in
• 32:56
  ballot.
• 32:57
  How do you like that? He used a mailin
• 33:00
  ballot in Mara Lago is what everybody's
• 33:04
  reporting now. Did I see him do a
• 33:07
  mail-in ballot? Nope. But he didn't go
• 33:09
  to the he didn't go to the field to to
• 33:12
  uh or didn't go to the uh u polling
• 33:15
  place to uh vote. He sent in a m mail
• 33:19
  and ballot and uh and the candidate that
• 33:22
  he backed I mean in his own friends and
• 33:25
  neighbors area of Mara Lago didn't vote
• 33:28
  for him didn't vote for Trump's dude and
• 33:31
  a Democrat took that uh that district
• 33:34
  and if you want to see what's happening
• 33:36
  I mean go back to the mom Donnie and and
• 33:38
  and Wolf brought this up and this is
• 33:40
  something I knew the pieces and parts
• 33:43
  but I'd never heard it put together like
• 33:46
  this way. So, I want you to uh to
• 33:50
  to
• 33:52
  this was not my my original idea, not
• 33:56
  remotely. And the fact that the new guy
• 34:00
  uh what is his name? Manny, I think the
• 34:03
  new um
• 34:05
  ruler, if you want to call him that, of
• 34:07
  New York, that he said during his
• 34:11
  election campaign, here's what he said.
• 34:14
  He said that if Netanyahu
• 34:18
  came to New York, he would have him
• 34:21
  arrested. He's Muslim. He's young. He
• 34:25
  isn't the same old same old. Certainly
• 34:29
  not in the state of New Well, in the
• 34:32
  city of New York or the state of New
• 34:33
  York. And according to Wolf,
• 34:38
  he was backed like 60 70%
• 34:43
  by the Jewish population in New York.
• 34:48
  Said that they supported this guy.
• 34:51
  That's how bad it is for Trump. They
• 34:54
  elected a socialist. They elected a
• 34:57
  Muslim. And uh they're all Jewish. And
• 35:00
  so he's he he he brought it home. I
• 35:03
  mean, this is unbelievable. And he will
• 35:05
  he's not just speaking as an economist.
• 35:08
  He he's um you know, he's a resident in
• 35:13
  New York. He talked quite a bit about
• 35:15
  it. And they asked him to get into Iran.
• 35:17
  He goes, "No, no, no." He goes, "I'm not
• 35:19
  an expert in Iran. I don't I don't he I
• 35:23
  I see the economic signs of what's going
• 35:26
  on and I know what the United States is
• 35:28
  up against before they ever get to enemy
• 35:31
  one in Iran is being able to avoid this
• 35:34
  fiscal cliff. I mean, it was an
• 35:36
  interesting argument. You get a chance,
• 35:37
  you should go listen to him. Guy's name
• 35:39
  is Wolf, Professor Wolf. He's uh was on
• 35:43
  a some talk show or another with a good
• 35:46
  guy. Next one is a guy named Wilkerson.
• 35:48
  Now, Wilkerson was former former
• 35:50
  military uh he was a military insider.
• 35:54
  He was up there pretty high. What he
• 35:57
  describes is something even more
• 35:59
  alarming. Now, this was a punch in the
• 36:02
  face, too. He said
• 36:05
  that he is embarrassed over the
• 36:08
  military. Now, frankly, I don't find any
• 36:10
  of them to be uh to be remotely u
• 36:13
  believable. Anyway,
• 36:16
  he says that it's operational
• 36:19
  incoherence at the highest military
• 36:22
  levels of leadership. He he didn't mince
• 36:25
  his words at all. Um he said this is the
• 36:29
  worst performance he has ever seen from
• 36:31
  US leadership call. This is not casual
• 36:34
  criticism. It's a a criticism from a guy
• 36:38
  who spent a career inside of it. And why
• 36:42
  does he say this? It it's because and
• 36:45
  and this is my about the whole
• 36:47
  thing. My complaint is the exact same.
• 36:51
  What's the mission people? Really, what
• 36:55
  is the mission? Does anybody have a
• 36:58
  clear idea of what the mission is? You
• 37:03
  know, there are objectives. There are
• 37:04
  things that you can do. you know, there
• 37:06
  uh you know, when I'm I'm Sergeant Trap
• 37:09
  running through the the the the woods of
• 37:11
  Germany or running through the deserts
• 37:13
  of Iraq and I I receive my my set of
• 37:17
  orders. What's the mission? What's the
• 37:19
  mission? The mission has objectives like
• 37:22
  that you're going to take, you know,
• 37:23
  you're going to do this, but it also has
• 37:25
  the overall mission. And nobody knows
• 37:28
  what the mission is, which means they
• 37:30
  hardly know what the objectives can be
• 37:33
  to fulfill that mission because and it
• 37:36
  certainly is going to lead people to not
• 37:38
  be
• 37:40
  as committed. You don't know what your
• 37:42
  mission is. You don't just say,
• 37:44
  "Sergeant trap, take that hill or take
• 37:46
  the Straits of Hormuz." All right, good
• 37:48
  luck to you. You know,
• 37:52
  our mission is to take that or is our
• 37:55
  the mission is the abstract. The mission
• 37:57
  is how do we clean up, you know, what
• 38:00
  what influence can we have to clean up
• 38:03
  the economic mess that's been made by uh
• 38:08
  the United States and Israel jointly
• 38:10
  attacking Iran with nothing but an air
• 38:15
  power thinking that they're going to
• 38:17
  collapse in a weekend. And here we are
• 38:20
  in week five, you know, and
• 38:25
  slated now to go a couple more months.
• 38:27
  Rubio said, "Oh, a couple more months.
• 38:30
  Couple another 200 billion. Why don't
• 38:33
  Why don't we jump into that cuz you're
• 38:35
  spending it anyway, even though the uh
• 38:38
  even though the uh
• 38:41
  uh Congress hasn't approved it, we're
• 38:43
  we're way over 39 billion now. Well, on
• 38:46
  our way to 40 billion because without a
• 38:49
  mission, objectives are disconnected.
• 38:52
  You know, you don't know what they are.
• 38:53
  These disconnected actions in a war
• 38:56
  environment produce drift. You begin in
• 38:58
  one stated goal. What's the goal? Well,
• 39:01
  we don't know because first it was
• 39:04
  decapitation, then it was no, no, no,
• 39:06
  no, no. It's nuclear containment. Then
• 39:08
  it's, you know, regime, then it's wait,
• 39:11
  we have to secure shipping lanes. Look
• 39:13
  what they've done. They've done
• 39:16
  The the straits of Hormuz were open five
• 39:20
  weeks ago, weren't they?
• 39:24
  How are you going to secure the shipping
• 39:25
  lanes when you're the ones who destroyed
• 39:28
  them? You're the ones who closed them?
• 39:31
  What did you expect them to do? Sit
• 39:33
  there with their thumbs inserted and and
• 39:35
  and just wait? This is exist existential
• 39:39
  to them. So the the US has no
• 39:42
  objectives. Therefore, it doesn't have a
• 39:44
  mission. You can't take all those
• 39:45
  objectives and tie them together. This
• 39:48
  is catastrophic
• 39:49
  in military terms because without a
• 39:52
  mission,
• 39:54
  you know, all they're doing is buying
• 39:56
  time. Okay, but buying time to do what?
• 40:00
  He was quizzed about this and I didn't
• 40:02
  like his answer. He said, "Buying time
• 40:04
  to buy time." Well, I don't agree with
• 40:06
  that. They're buying time because they
• 40:08
  don't know what else to do. And they're
• 40:10
  buying time to create a a scenario where
• 40:15
  per perhaps Trump,
• 40:17
  you know, like a a a blind squirrel
• 40:20
  getting that uh nut anyway is going to
• 40:23
  come out and and and Heg Seth and these
• 40:26
  two geniuses are going to are going to
• 40:28
  come to some level of success. But if
• 40:31
  the economic and military systems are
• 40:33
  both under strain, you don't just have a
• 40:36
  difficult war, you got a misaligned
• 40:38
  system. The economic base, no way can
• 40:42
  comfortably support military expansion,
• 40:45
  especially when it is not anything
• 40:49
  guided by a clear strategic endpoint.
• 40:54
  This is this is frightening on many
• 40:57
  layers, not the least of which is
• 40:59
  Netanyahu.
• 41:01
  Um,
• 41:03
  he said, you know what, Wilkerson, he's
• 41:06
  the I think, you know, I was the only
• 41:09
  one stupid enough to say anything like
• 41:11
  this before or maybe not as controlled
• 41:14
  as others to say it, but he said the
• 41:16
  same thing. He said uh that
• 41:20
  he is of the same opinion that it's far
• 41:23
  more likely that Netanyahu will u be the
• 41:27
  one to continue to uh increase
• 41:32
  continue to oneupsmanship has to play
• 41:35
  it. And tell you what these are
• 41:38
  frightening times. And when you go to
• 41:41
  people like John Mirshimer, these are
• 41:43
  your more uh traditional role players.
• 41:46
  You know, we have uh Muhammad Morandi,
• 41:49
  Sergey Lavough gave a speech. Um John
• 41:53
  Mirshimer talks about the structural
• 41:55
  defeat, the logic of it. Muhammad
• 41:57
  Morandi talks about Hormuz and the
• 42:02
  plans. Lavough talks about the complete
• 42:06
  legal collapse of the all the systems.
• 42:10
  And uh Vladimir Solivan company last
• 42:13
  night, that was the last thing that I
• 42:15
  watched. two and a half hours of uh
• 42:18
  escalation psychology. So let's begin to
• 42:21
  talk about Odessa because remember
• 42:24
  Venezuela
• 42:25
  now straits of Hormuz the third one the
• 42:28
  third pillar Odessa Black Sea port in
• 42:32
  Ukraine.
• 42:34
  This is important because that port for
• 42:39
  Zalinski to get liquid natural gas or
• 42:43
  any other petroleum products, it must
• 42:47
  come through two sources. Either the
• 42:51
  Turk stream is how some of the oil parts
• 42:54
  can come up. It's got he's got a slight
• 42:57
  potential to get it through the uh uh
• 43:00
  the Greek one, whatever the name of that
• 43:02
  was. it comes uh roundabout way, but uh
• 43:06
  both Serbia and Hungary are blocking
• 43:08
  their portions off. And then
• 43:10
  Transnistria is cutting off the the
• 43:13
  approach to Ukraine through uh Malddova.
• 43:17
  And now the port of Odessa, which has
• 43:19
  been bombed heavily for months, is being
• 43:23
  destroyed. The infrastructure, the
• 43:25
  ability to bring in regular ships is
• 43:29
  really, really curtailed. and Ukraine
• 43:33
  with Russia blocking off natural gas and
• 43:38
  gas and fuel going outside of the
• 43:41
  country. They've stopped it until the I
• 43:43
  forget the date, June 30th or July 30th.
• 43:46
  They they've they've just cut it off.
• 43:47
  Said we're going to use it for our own
• 43:49
  our own purposes, not yours, not anybody
• 43:52
  else's. And so
• 43:55
  Zilinsky knows he can't get it from
• 43:57
  America because America's going to need
• 43:59
  theirs. He knows he can't get it through
• 44:01
  the the Red Sea. He can't get it through
• 44:04
  the uh uh uh Suez Canal. He cannot get
• 44:08
  it through the Straits of Hormuz. He
• 44:11
  can't have it shipped to him by anybody
• 44:12
  except through the Black Sea. And so
• 44:15
  he's over there trying to get that done.
• 44:17
  and he's down there raising alarms and
• 44:19
  saying now Russia has put these big
• 44:21
  satellites up that are competing with u
• 44:25
  uh the internet capabilities that we've
• 44:29
  they've had about a six-month period
• 44:31
  where they've been not as beat up before
• 44:34
  because Russia did have to figure out
• 44:36
  and and move forward on the plans
• 44:39
  quicker than they intended to release uh
• 44:41
  their Sputnik um system to allow them to
• 44:46
  use the internet, but now they have a
• 44:49
  series and more and more are going up.
• 44:52
  You know, they're they're putting up
• 44:53
  quite a few every week and it's designed
• 44:56
  to have 900 and as it keeps happening,
• 44:59
  they keep expanding. And so, uh,
• 45:01
  Ukraine, rightly so, is frightened, very
• 45:05
  frightened. Uh, they're not they're no
• 45:07
  longer the, uh, no longer the preferred
• 45:11
  model. uh Rubio has a uh conversation
• 45:15
  with Kayakalis, the foreign uh foreign
• 45:18
  minister for uh uh the EU and that
• 45:22
  didn't go well according to all
• 45:24
  accounts. He basically told her, you
• 45:26
  know, you're on your own. You know,
• 45:28
  we're we're not doing anything. We
• 45:29
  aren't escalating against Russia. You
• 45:31
  want to escalate against Russia, you go
• 45:33
  right ahead. But we're not. Well, they
• 45:35
  are indirectly, but uh uh this this
• 45:38
  problem is there's a no- win framework.
• 45:42
  The the cal the calamity of it all
• 45:46
  is
• 45:49
  we don't have the natural capacity to
• 45:52
  get it done right now without
• 45:56
  edging right up to the fiscal cliff. Um
• 46:02
  let's see. Let's let's talk about uh
• 46:05
  let's go to Mirshimer. He doesn't argue
• 46:08
  from ideology, morality, sympathy. He
• 46:12
  talks about power distribution and the
• 46:15
  dynamics of escalation.
• 46:17
  and he said something. And by the way,
• 46:20
  all virtually all of these people and
• 46:24
  and any realistic person in military
• 46:27
  channels in the United States is say
• 46:30
  coming to the same conclusion but for
• 46:32
  different reasons and it is the United
• 46:35
  States has entered into a war it cannot
• 46:38
  win. Okay. But the reasoning behind what
• 46:42
  he says, he said that the war, you know,
• 46:45
  this one is built on a familiar American
• 46:48
  assumption, shock, awe, decapitation,
• 46:54
  internal regime collapse.
• 46:56
  Remove leadership, destabilize command,
• 47:00
  and the system will fail. It's the same
• 47:03
  logic that drove us into Iraq, Libya,
• 47:06
  Afghanistan, earlier interventions, none
• 47:10
  of which worked, by the way, long term.
• 47:13
  And that model fails here for similar
• 47:15
  reasons. But Iran is even worse for them
• 47:19
  because Iran is not structurally
• 47:21
  vulnerable in the same way that those
• 47:24
  places were. Decapitation strategy
• 47:27
  failed. The regime held on. The
• 47:30
  population has not collapsed. In fact,
• 47:32
  the opposite is occurring. Military
• 47:35
  retains operational capacity which they
• 47:37
  do. And once that initial phase failed,
• 47:42
  the war is into something far more
• 47:44
  dangerous for the western side more than
• 47:47
  the uh Iranian side. A protracted
• 47:51
  conflict. And in this long conflict,
• 47:55
  Iran holds the advantage at nearly every
• 47:59
  level of escalation because they do.
• 48:03
  Escalation is not symmetrical. It
• 48:05
  doesn't affect both sides equally.
• 48:08
  One step upward in every step upward
• 48:11
  more strikes, more pressure, more force.
• 48:14
  You know, they say they they sent 850
• 48:19
  tomahawks.
• 48:21
  850 so far into Iran. 850.
• 48:29
  Those things are not cheap. Not
• 48:32
  remotely. And how many more we got to
• 48:35
  keep lobbing at them.
• 48:38
  Not
• 48:40
  the numbers aren't going to add up for
• 48:42
  very long. We can't, you know, we can't
• 48:44
  give them what we can't continue that
• 48:46
  for any serious amount of time.
• 48:51
  So the balance shifts in favor of the
• 48:54
  actor whose tools are best suited for
• 48:56
  that environment. Each one of those
• 48:58
  Blackhawks is in the is in the millions,
• 49:00
  multi-million, tens of millions of
• 49:02
  dollars, right? Each one that airplane
• 49:05
  that got destroyed, the uh spy airplane,
• 49:08
  the flying command center, one of 15 in
• 49:11
  the military, is nearly a billion dollar
• 49:15
  for one plane. And by the way, you can't
• 49:18
  just repurpose another airplane, you
• 49:21
  know, with that type of technology. You
• 49:23
  can't do it. Iran's tools are not
• 49:27
  conventional dominance. What do they
• 49:29
  have instead? They can disrupt the
• 49:30
  energy supply. Clearly, they are uh
• 49:34
  regional
• 49:36
  um exploitation of vulnerabilities of
• 49:39
  the GCC states. No problem. and
• 49:42
  asymmetrical strikes. They can they can
• 49:45
  continue to strike the Straits of Hormuz
• 49:48
  with their little um uh mini subs, their
• 49:51
  mine laying equipment. They could close
• 49:53
  that sucker off for a long time. And no
• 49:56
  taking of an island in in the Car Island
• 49:59
  isn't going to help. 15,000 20,000
• 50:02
  soldiers sent over. Those are not going
• 50:05
  to help. You ain't taking over the Iran
• 50:08
  with 20,000 soldiers. 90 million people
• 50:11
  live there. Uh let's see. The geographic
• 50:16
  depth, the geography there favors Iran
• 50:19
  big time, just like it favored uh
• 50:22
  Afghanistan and the people that were
• 50:24
  fighting there.
• 50:26
  um
• 50:28
  the the what John Mirshimer said his one
• 50:31
  of his quotes that I'm going to give to
• 50:32
  you is we are the Titanic heading toward
• 50:37
  the iceberg
• 50:39
  and the iceberg is not military defeat.
• 50:43
  It's systemic disruption because Iran
• 50:46
  does not need to defeat the United
• 50:48
  States militarily.
• 50:50
  It only needs to impose increased costs,
• 50:55
  economic costs, regional costs,
• 50:59
  logistical costs to make this
• 51:02
  continuation of this war as
• 51:05
  unsustainable as the one in Iraq, as
• 51:08
  unsustainable
• 51:10
  as those in Syria, the against the
• 51:13
  Houthis, that against anybody,
• 51:15
  Afghanistan, I mean, pick it that
• 51:18
  against Vietnam for that matter. matter.
• 51:20
  And so this takes you to what Morandi
• 51:23
  and now Mirandi,
• 51:26
  I tell you what, he's defining all of
• 51:29
  this. He shifts the battlefield
• 51:31
  completely. And he was on an interview.
• 51:34
  Who was he on with? What was that guy's
• 51:36
  name? I told it to you earlier. Uh
• 51:39
  Sirill Jansen. You get a chance, you
• 51:40
  should watch this. The uh or go out and
• 51:43
  listen to him at least get the words
• 51:44
  from from somebody uh there. He says uh
• 51:48
  the war is being misinterpreted
• 51:51
  certainly because analysts are looking
• 51:54
  at air strikes,
• 51:56
  troop deployments and activity on the
• 51:59
  basis but those aren't the decisive
• 52:01
  basis. He says that the factors that are
• 52:05
  decisive the straits of Hormuz control
• 52:08
  of Hormuz is not geographic it's
• 52:11
  capability based and that's a critical
• 52:14
  correction that you need to understand.
• 52:17
  Western thinking assumes that control
• 52:19
  means ships, fleets, presence. Mirandi
• 52:23
  rejects that entirely. He says that the
• 52:27
  control comes from Iran's long range
• 52:31
  missile systems, their underground
• 52:34
  infrastructure, and the distributed
• 52:37
  strike capability. In other words, you
• 52:39
  don't need to occupy Hormuz to control
• 52:43
  it.
• 52:44
  you only need to threaten it credibly
• 52:46
  and Iran can do that from hundreds of
• 52:49
  kilometers inland. Okay, this means
• 52:53
  naval superiority is far less relevant
• 52:55
  and they're sitting ducks in there
• 52:57
  anyway according to our own Navy. Uh
• 52:59
  base positioning is vulnerable. Did you
• 53:02
  realize and and do you know that
• 53:04
  American soldiers stationed in uh um
• 53:08
  countries uh in of the GCC aren't
• 53:12
  staying on their bases anymore? They're
• 53:13
  staying in local hotels. There's they're
• 53:17
  a lot of those bases are are destroyed
• 53:20
  or partially destroyed and they're
• 53:22
  having to find different living
• 53:23
  arrangements for people.
• 53:26
  It's all over the place. And Miranda
• 53:28
  pushed it for his argument goes a little
• 53:30
  bit further. He says
• 53:32
  the United States is operating, this is
• 53:35
  one of his quotes, on an outdated
• 53:37
  military assumption. Says 20th century
• 53:40
  thinking in a system that has already
• 53:42
  gone past it. Aircraft carriers, forward
• 53:45
  bases, concentration of assets. If these
• 53:48
  were useful, they would have used them
• 53:50
  already. But they lost them all quickly
• 53:53
  to Iran. And you layer that onto what we
• 53:56
  already know from other
• 53:58
  actually credible reporting. US
• 54:01
  surveillance assets degraded. They've
• 54:04
  taken out some 10 12 multi- multi-
• 54:08
  hundreds of millions of dollars in radar
• 54:11
  equipment taken out in the first two
• 54:14
  weeks. Radar systems have been targeted.
• 54:16
  Refueling infrastructure is hit. This is
• 54:20
  not random.
• 54:22
  They are targeting visibility
• 54:24
  sustainment. Escalation transforms the
• 54:28
  shortterm crisis into a long-term global
• 54:32
  economic dis disruption. Which brings us
• 54:35
  back to Wolf, right? Wolf, the economic
• 54:39
  system cannot absorb a long-term
• 54:42
  disruption, can it?
• 54:45
  So now we have Mirshimer, Mirandi, and
• 54:49
  Wolf. Those are kind of a closed route.
• 54:52
  Then you got a guy who talks now Lavough
• 54:54
  and he's pretty well spoken. I mean,
• 54:57
  this is a guy who's dealt with all of
• 54:59
  this for 26 years. Okay? He's not
• 55:02
  talking tactics. He's talking procedure.
• 55:05
  He says that the wars are being
• 55:06
  initiated during negotiations themselves
• 55:11
  and that destroys diplomacy itself. And
• 55:14
  this is far more important than it
• 55:16
  sounds. People, this is important
• 55:19
  because this is what the rest of the
• 55:21
  world thinks of us, not what we're over
• 55:24
  here saber rattling and talking about
• 55:26
  how wonderful we are because we outsmart
• 55:29
  everyone.
• 55:31
  It's deeper than that. Do you know
• 55:34
  Carney was on uh the the prime minister
• 55:36
  of Canada was on again talking about how
• 55:40
  um they can't support what the US is
• 55:43
  doing here even though there's no way
• 55:44
  they can support what Iran has been
• 55:47
  doing for years. And he says but that
• 55:49
  doesn't mean you know we don't stand
• 55:51
  with them that this is incorrect. This
• 55:54
  what is going on it it shouldn't be
• 55:57
  going on. This is not this is not in
• 56:01
  accordance with the the the UN charter.
• 56:04
  It's not in accordance with anything.
• 56:06
  The rulesbased
• 56:08
  scenario
• 56:10
  doesn't exist because we don't follow
• 56:13
  the rules. We and we truly do not nor
• 56:17
  have we for a very very long time. And
• 56:22
  uh now it's a a blatant
• 56:26
  flaunting of any international rules. We
• 56:29
  haven't looked at them in forever. There
• 56:31
  you don't have any UN threat. These are
• 56:36
  according to many terms and not just
• 56:38
  Lavrov. A lot of people in Europe too
• 56:41
  have said these are illegal wars.
• 56:44
  illegal war in Venezuela, illegal war
• 56:47
  against with Israel again and US against
• 56:51
  Iran. It was illegal last year and you
• 56:54
  know and of course the rules don't apply
• 56:58
  if you're the biggest bully on the
• 57:00
  block. And so uh but his his statement
• 57:03
  goes further than that. He says
• 57:07
  diplomacy isn't just communication. You
• 57:10
  know, you're negotiating.
• 57:13
  During the negotiation, you bomb the
• 57:15
  hell out of Iran. Yeah, that's going to
• 57:17
  help, isn't it? As as Ukraine, while
• 57:20
  you're meeting with the Russians, uh
• 57:22
  Boris Boris Johnson comes and says, "No,
• 57:26
  no, no, no, no. You can't do that. We
• 57:28
  disagree.
• 57:30
  We disagree." And so you you pull all
• 57:33
  the cards off the table and you take
• 57:35
  your toys and you go home saying, "No,
• 57:36
  we'll beat them on the field." Well,
• 57:38
  good luck to you. You haven't done so so
• 57:40
  far. This war could have been over four
• 57:42
  years ago if not for that idiot.
• 57:45
  It would have been done. Ukraine would
• 57:47
  have taken it. It might have started
• 57:49
  again, you know, after people got
• 57:51
  involved, but at least there would have
• 57:53
  been something. This
• 57:56
  many many people, I am one of them, are
• 57:59
  afraid that this is going to turn into a
• 58:01
  prolonged and worse world war,
• 58:07
  economic war, real war, depending on,
• 58:11
  you know, who you get. So, um, get your
• 58:14
  food storage ready. Things aren't going
• 58:18
  to be easy in my own humble opinion. And
• 58:21
  uh uh I tell you what, the future
• 58:24
  negotiations are meaningless because
• 58:26
  nobody trusts us anymore at all. During
• 58:30
  the middle of negotiations, we bomb the
• 58:33
  crap out of you. During uh discussions,
• 58:35
  you know, we support something else.
• 58:38
  Lavough explicitly pointed to the same
• 58:41
  pattern that we all know. Iraq, Libya,
• 58:44
  Syria, Iran. Each intervention framed a
• 58:47
  little bit differently but the similar
• 58:49
  trajectory escalation followed by
• 58:52
  long-term destabilization.
• 58:54
  And he introduced one other one. This
• 58:57
  one has energy control as the policy
• 59:01
  objective.
• 59:03
  He circled back to where I came from.
• 59:06
  Venezuela and energy sector control. Not
• 59:09
  incidental. It's right to my thought
• 59:12
  process. This goes right where I've been
• 59:14
  thinking ever since Venezuela. The
• 59:18
  conflicts are increasingly aligned with
• 59:20
  control of energy flow and
• 59:22
  infrastructure. So Venezuela, Iran,
• 59:26
  Ukraine are all connected not as
• 59:29
  identical conflicts but as
• 59:33
  I don't know separate nodes in a system
• 59:37
  of pipelines, shipping, resource access
• 59:41
  are all central and maybe his framing uh
• 59:45
  is politically aligned. Of course it is.
• 59:47
  He supports Russia, but it definitely
• 59:50
  you can see the economic layer quite a
• 59:53
  bit separately from the military layer.
• 59:57
  And you know, if the Houthis can control
• 1:00:00
  access to the Red Sea, if Iran can
• 1:00:03
  control the Straits of Hormuz,
• 1:00:06
  what can we do to get around it? I mean,
• 1:00:09
  seriously, what is the endg game? Nobody
• 1:00:13
  has said it. There was it was a a a meme
• 1:00:16
  shown yesterday of Trump, somebody
• 1:00:17
  asking him basically the same question.
• 1:00:20
  What is the Mgame end game and he said,
• 1:00:22
  "You're not a very nice person." That's
• 1:00:25
  what Trump said to the guy. You're not a
• 1:00:27
  very nice person. Well, you know, that's
• 1:00:30
  cuz you can't answer that question. We
• 1:00:32
  don't know what the endgame is. is is
• 1:00:35
  and and there's more people and and this
• 1:00:37
  is this is nonsense because
• 1:00:39
  unfortunately
• 1:00:41
  I think people are starting to believe
• 1:00:43
  this and it's stupidity truthful is the
• 1:00:48
  the straits of hormuz are going to now
• 1:00:50
  be called the Trump straight. I mean,
• 1:00:52
  geez, we have the Gulf of Trump, you
• 1:00:54
  know, downstairs, you know, down
• 1:00:56
  downstairs
• 1:00:58
  of uh u you know, the Gulf of Mexico is,
• 1:01:01
  you know, the Gulf of Trump, you know,
• 1:01:03
  the the the Gulf of America. I mean, who
• 1:01:06
  gives us a crap? You know, what what
• 1:01:09
  it's called? What difference does it
• 1:01:11
  make? You know, but that's the important
• 1:01:14
  part for a lot of people. And and what
• 1:01:18
  is, you know, who's going to rule? Okay.
• 1:01:21
  Who's going to rule Iran?
• 1:01:23
  Trump says me.
• 1:01:26
  Who's going to rule Venezuela? Well, me.
• 1:01:29
  You know, we'll we'll pick we we'll pick
• 1:01:31
  the next leader. You know, I get to pick
• 1:01:34
  the next leader.
• 1:01:36
  I mean, what kind of stupidity and
• 1:01:38
  arrogance is that? I get to pick the
• 1:01:40
  next leader. It's me.
• 1:01:43
  I'm king of the world. Who's the next
• 1:01:45
  leader of Greenland? Oh, yeah. Me. Who's
• 1:01:47
  the next leader of Cuba? Oh, me. Hey,
• 1:01:49
  we'll send Marco. We'll send a little
• 1:01:51
  Marco down there to uh uh make sure that
• 1:01:53
  he rules it for a little while. Where in
• 1:01:55
  the hell is JD Vance in all this?
• 1:01:59
  Tell you what, I think the boys been
• 1:02:00
  sidelined. Uh Soliv Yof was uh that was
• 1:02:04
  a raw raw show. I'm telling you, those
• 1:02:07
  guys were on a roll and they were they
• 1:02:10
  were talking two and a half hours, but
• 1:02:12
  it was a joy to watch. Um and they have
• 1:02:14
  and and you know what I really like
• 1:02:15
  about that show? Um
• 1:02:18
  I like the format. And I've told you
• 1:02:19
  that before. I really love the fact that
• 1:02:21
  they have so many people to lean upon.
• 1:02:24
  Um he has one guy in particular. I wish
• 1:02:26
  I could remember his name off top of my
• 1:02:28
  head, but I can't. And he's on there.
• 1:02:32
  Oh, nearly every Sunday, I'd say. There
• 1:02:35
  there's a couple of my favorites. One's
• 1:02:36
  a Ukrainian lawyer who uh basically is
• 1:02:40
  is in Russia now, and I forget his name.
• 1:02:42
  Very very well spoken, very uh
• 1:02:46
  professional looking guy. and I like
• 1:02:48
  listening to him. And then there's an
• 1:02:50
  artist that he brings in. And he's some
• 1:02:54
  he's a a a political discourse person
• 1:02:58
  and an artist. And so it's always funny
• 1:03:01
  to me. I'm sitting there going, "Why in
• 1:03:02
  the world does an artist coming in here?
• 1:03:04
  That'd be like, you know, me picking uh
• 1:03:06
  uh Tom Hanks is my uh or or what's her
• 1:03:10
  name that went over to uh Ukraine. um uh
• 1:03:17
  the hot ex-wife of uh of u well crap I
• 1:03:23
  can't remember his name either I'm
• 1:03:25
  running out of names on these actresses
• 1:03:27
  that I really like and uh you know I
• 1:03:29
  like their movies their politics suck
• 1:03:31
  you know and I have friends who won't
• 1:03:33
  watch particular movies because this
• 1:03:35
  person is is too political I don't give
• 1:03:38
  a crap you know I I like a movie or I
• 1:03:41
  don't like a movie based on what I'm
• 1:03:42
  watching you know like u Tom Hanks. He's
• 1:03:45
  got some good movies. He was in Big What
• 1:03:48
  was he when uh he was in um
• 1:03:51
  the You've Got Mail movie, whatever that
• 1:03:54
  was, where he met um Meg, was it me
• 1:03:56
  Ryan? And you know, he had some Yeah, I
• 1:03:59
  liked him in uh um
• 1:04:03
  Saving Private Ryan. You know, that was
• 1:04:06
  probably a bit overboard, but I like
• 1:04:07
  that movie. And uh but I hated him in
• 1:04:10
  that idiotic one with the with the
• 1:04:13
  volleyball, you know, and he's stuck on
• 1:04:15
  an island, you know. That was a that was
• 1:04:17
  that movie was slow and stupid,
• 1:04:21
  but I liked him in Forest Gump. Forest
• 1:04:23
  Force Gump. I think it was it was I try
• 1:04:25
  not to judge people based on their
• 1:04:27
  politics. Anyway, I've uh deviated from
• 1:04:30
  my original brief, but let's get to it.
• 1:04:33
  So the panel in Saliv talked about DEC
• 1:04:36
  how come how come
• 1:04:39
  Ukraine can target decision centers? How
• 1:04:41
  come the US and Lavrov talked about this
• 1:04:44
  too because this offends me and I and
• 1:04:46
  and you know listening it it offends me
• 1:04:49
  and I've talked about it before. The
• 1:04:51
  decapitation strikes are offensive.
• 1:04:56
  I I I think that's horshit. Period. and
• 1:04:59
  and uh Trump and company and Heg Seth
• 1:05:03
  the you know the the JV quarterback um
• 1:05:06
  you know jumping up and talking about oh
• 1:05:08
  just kill them we'll we'll do what we do
• 1:05:11
  the best we go out and we kill individ
• 1:05:13
  they they go after individuals to kill
• 1:05:16
  now anywhere else that would be murder
• 1:05:18
  but if you but if you're you know in the
• 1:05:20
  Pentagon or in the White House you know
• 1:05:23
  it's perfectly uh uh feasible you know
• 1:05:26
  CIA kill missions that's all right you
• 1:05:28
  know why Can't we do it? Well, in that
• 1:05:29
  case, why in the hell did you waste
• 1:05:31
  everybody's time bringing Maduro here to
• 1:05:34
  put in a in a prison? Why didn't you
• 1:05:36
  just freaking kill him and be done with
• 1:05:38
  it? That's that's decapitation. What uh
• 1:05:41
  how come you can justify it all over all
• 1:05:44
  over uh you know, Iran just killing
• 1:05:47
  named individuals along with uh Benjamin
• 1:05:50
  Netanyahu and you can't uh you couldn't
• 1:05:54
  justify it in Venezuela. What difference
• 1:05:55
  it make? If this is how we're running
• 1:05:58
  the world, then fine. And this is what
• 1:06:00
  all the Russian commentators are
• 1:06:01
  thinking. Why are we doing the same
• 1:06:03
  thing? When this these become legitimate
• 1:06:06
  targets, why aren't we doing the same?
• 1:06:10
  I now these are people who are not
• 1:06:13
  political people. Um I mean they are,
• 1:06:16
  but I mean they're not uh government
• 1:06:18
  officials. These are politicians, right?
• 1:06:21
  Or political commentators, I mean. And
• 1:06:24
  uh the the politicians, they're they're
• 1:06:26
  a little better behaved. You know, your
• 1:06:29
  Lavrovs of the world, he brings up
• 1:06:31
  questions and and he might bring up the
• 1:06:33
  question, well, if decapitation strikes
• 1:06:35
  are, you know, the future,
• 1:06:38
  then why aren't we engaging in them as
• 1:06:41
  well in Ukraine? You know, why aren't we
• 1:06:44
  most countries? you you you realize the
• 1:06:50
  depth of evil that you are committing if
• 1:06:54
  you're not in trying to engage in
• 1:06:57
  discussion. And you could say, well, you
• 1:07:00
  can't have a discussion with these type
• 1:07:02
  of people. You can't have a discussion
• 1:07:03
  with Zilinski.
• 1:07:05
  You can't have a discussion with anybody
• 1:07:07
  in the West if you're from Russia. You
• 1:07:10
  are a non- entity. You won't even claim
• 1:07:13
  to un to know Russian when you damn well
• 1:07:16
  do. You you you you you won't you won't
• 1:07:19
  even accept the language.
• 1:07:22
  So I don't know the escalation doctrine.
• 1:07:26
  Europe is unwilling to act. NATO is
• 1:07:29
  hesitant. The US is stretched. This is
• 1:07:32
  all the perception that Western
• 1:07:34
  deterrence doctrines are weak and
• 1:07:36
  they're they're getting weaker all of
• 1:07:39
  the time. So
• 1:07:42
  if you pull all these together from
• 1:07:44
  Mirshimer which says that escalation
• 1:07:46
  favors Iran Morandi the mechanism is
• 1:07:49
  energy plus the asymmetrical reach we
• 1:07:52
  have lavro diplomacy is broken soliv
• 1:07:56
  and company escalation is now normalized
• 1:07:59
  decapitation is normal and from part one
• 1:08:01
  when I spoke about this way back when
• 1:08:04
  the US system is already constrained
• 1:08:08
  economically
• 1:08:09
  That means there's no clean path
• 1:08:13
  forward. There is no end game. Nobody
• 1:08:17
  knows what it is. Nobody's told us what
• 1:08:20
  the endg game is. You know why? Cuz they
• 1:08:23
  don't know themselves. Trump doesn't
• 1:08:26
  know what the endgame is. I've heard so
• 1:08:29
  many different stories about what it is.
• 1:08:31
  Nuclear deterrent. They were going to
• 1:08:33
  Lindsey Graham. They were going to push
• 1:08:35
  a button. They were going to blow up.
• 1:08:37
  There was we had to attack him first.
• 1:08:39
  Guys in
• 1:08:43
  reality and Lindsey Graham rarely
• 1:08:46
  collide in the same uh same environment
• 1:08:49
  there. You know, um escalation
• 1:08:53
  increases risk, but they're stuck in it.
• 1:08:56
  Deescalation
• 1:08:58
  looks like defeat. negotiation
• 1:09:02
  has no credibility because you're either
• 1:09:04
  going to kill people while they're
• 1:09:06
  negotiating or bomb around them and then
• 1:09:11
  the time
• 1:09:14
  just keeps expanding the economic
• 1:09:18
  pressures time. This is a closed
• 1:09:21
  strategic environment. This is not
• 1:09:25
  things are not open right now and
• 1:09:26
  there's no way out of this loop. None.
• 1:09:32
  Now, I wanted to bring up because this
• 1:09:34
  is important. This this isn't a
• 1:09:36
  battlefield problem. It's a structure
• 1:09:38
  problem. Structure doesn't collapse all
• 1:09:40
  at once. They just collapse as soon as
• 1:09:42
  everything, you know, is is made so much
• 1:09:46
  worse. And think about this. The global
• 1:09:48
  system, I brought this all together for
• 1:09:50
  you. energy, Odessa,
• 1:09:54
  uh, the port on the Black Sea for
• 1:09:56
  Ukraine, Iran, straits of Hormuz,
• 1:10:00
  um, the Houthis in the Red Sea, the the
• 1:10:03
  straight down at the bottom there that
• 1:10:05
  connects two together, they can control
• 1:10:06
  both sides of that and block that up.
• 1:10:08
  Nobody's getting out. So what happens
• 1:10:11
  when the rest of the world is operating
• 1:10:14
  on the reality already that there's no
• 1:10:17
  clean strategic pathway because they are
• 1:10:21
  Europe is Asia is everywhere is there's
• 1:10:24
  talk that Australia had doesn't have
• 1:10:26
  enough uh that they've caused limits
• 1:10:28
  Philippines they've put limits in the
• 1:10:30
  amount of gas you can buy like you can't
• 1:10:32
  buy you can't fill up your car you can
• 1:10:34
  only buy five gallons right um is is
• 1:10:37
  what they're saying and uh that that
• 1:10:40
  these realities are occurring. And so
• 1:10:44
  what happens when the rest of the world
• 1:10:46
  is already operating on that reality? I
• 1:10:49
  told you last week about India and the
• 1:10:52
  uh uh times of India and the
• 1:10:57
  uh Palmy
• 1:10:58
  Sharma I can't remember her name Paul
• 1:11:01
  Sharma I believe that very very good um
• 1:11:04
  on times of India or or whichever one it
• 1:11:07
  was. And there was another one that I
• 1:11:09
  listened to that uh um is important to
• 1:11:12
  look at because these are global these
• 1:11:14
  are
• 1:11:16
  these are big- time events and where
• 1:11:18
  this energy come from. So what happens
• 1:11:20
  when the rest of the world is operating
• 1:11:22
  on the reality
• 1:11:24
  the war is no longer contained in
• 1:11:26
  military band boundaries. It's already
• 1:11:29
  moved into the global systems. Europe is
• 1:11:34
  under extreme pressure. Asia is under
• 1:11:37
  extreme pressure and China is even under
• 1:11:40
  pressure. So is Russia and but Russia is
• 1:11:43
  benefiting enormously by the cost of oil
• 1:11:46
  going up. Hundreds of millions of
• 1:11:48
  dollars increase today. They're almost
• 1:11:50
  selling at full cost of oil right now.
• 1:11:53
  Regardless, remember Trump had to lift
• 1:11:55
  sanctions against Iran and against
• 1:11:58
  Russia. Crazy. um
• 1:12:03
  energy markets, supply chains,
• 1:12:04
  diplomatic alignment and economic
• 1:12:07
  survival because a lot of other thing no
• 1:12:10
  helium coming through straight to
• 1:12:12
  Hormuse, no fertilizer coming through
• 1:12:15
  any of those areas and and India is
• 1:12:18
  horribly dependent on that fertilizer
• 1:12:22
  and uh their their planting season is
• 1:12:24
  upon us right now and in this
• 1:12:27
  environment the rest of the world is
• 1:12:30
  already adapting in real time. So are
• 1:12:32
  we, by the way, with our extra$120 an
• 1:12:35
  hour. An hour a gallon and our gasoline
• 1:12:39
  prices where, you know, we're doing the
• 1:12:41
  same thing. Filled up my tank the uh
• 1:12:45
  yesterday, Saturday, what which one of
• 1:12:47
  the two days? $108.
• 1:12:50
  $108.
• 1:12:52
  And uh it wasn't long ago at all that it
• 1:12:56
  cost me 70. So, uh, you know, uh, less
• 1:13:00
  less than a month or two,
• 1:13:04
  108, you know, okay, it's only 30 bucks,
• 1:13:07
  40, whatever. It's not the end of the
• 1:13:09
  world, is it? How many times is that
• 1:13:11
  going to happen? And gee, what about uh
• 1:13:14
  how much is it going to cost me now?
• 1:13:16
  Because I can't uh well, can't I I won't
• 1:13:20
  pay uh uh $4.80 80 cents a gallon for
• 1:13:24
  Supreme once every three uh tanks. I
• 1:13:28
  won't do it. I haven't
• 1:13:31
  I'm not going to pay 140. That's crazy.
• 1:13:34
  And uh but well, apparently I will at
• 1:13:37
  some point because it ain't going to go
• 1:13:38
  down. The prices are not going to go
• 1:13:40
  down. The rest of the world is starting
• 1:13:42
  to deal with this. What's the Zalinski
• 1:13:45
  signal? Right. This is his government
• 1:13:47
  scrambling for fuel.
• 1:13:50
  This is the clearest most visible
• 1:13:52
  example of what's happening when the uh
• 1:13:55
  logistics and not the ideology
• 1:13:59
  is beginning to drive your policy in
• 1:14:01
  Zalinski has been traveling through
• 1:14:03
  Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE
• 1:14:06
  uh not only for diplomatic theater but
• 1:14:09
  for something else fuel. That is all
• 1:14:12
  confirmed. Ukraine faces a severe diesel
• 1:14:17
  shortage. 90% of its fuel deficit is
• 1:14:21
  specifically tied to diesel which is
• 1:14:25
  absolutely
• 1:14:27
  essential for military operations and
• 1:14:30
  basic infrastructure. So what does he
• 1:14:33
  do? He goes to the Gulf. He signs
• 1:14:36
  defense agreements. He offers drone
• 1:14:38
  expertise. He sends Ukrainian drone
• 1:14:42
  specialists to assist the Gulf States.
• 1:14:46
  And in return, what is he after?
• 1:14:49
  Diesel supply agreements, energy
• 1:14:52
  cooperation,
• 1:14:54
  long-term logistic support. Now, think
• 1:14:56
  about that. Ukraine, the centerpiece of
• 1:15:00
  Western military support, allegedly that
• 1:15:03
  we helped create a millionman army for
• 1:15:06
  over the last 20 years, is now bartering
• 1:15:11
  its own battlefield expertise for fuel.
• 1:15:14
  Does that show strength or is that a
• 1:15:17
  logistics strain of grand proportion?
• 1:15:22
  Because this is happening at the same
• 1:15:24
  time that Ukraine is entangled in its
• 1:15:26
  own energy dispute with Europe itself.
• 1:15:30
  Pipeline disruption,
• 1:15:32
  diesel export suspension, no electricity
• 1:15:35
  coming in from Slovakia or Hungary.
• 1:15:38
  Ukraine needs this energy flow. So now
• 1:15:41
  you have a country fighting a war,
• 1:15:42
  losing access to uh energy routes,
• 1:15:45
  negotiating abroad for fuel and
• 1:15:47
  pressuring or receiving pressure from uh
• 1:15:51
  its own
• 1:15:53
  wouldbe allies.
• 1:15:56
  You know, they're fighting literally
• 1:15:57
  with Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, all the
• 1:16:00
  everybody down there because they don't
• 1:16:02
  want they don't want to let them have
• 1:16:04
  any Russian uh Russian
• 1:16:07
  petroleum or gas products.
• 1:16:11
  Odessa I've already talked about. It's a
• 1:16:15
  fuel intake point, a logistics hub, and
• 1:16:18
  a maritime lifeline. And England has put
• 1:16:22
  butt tons of money into that over the
• 1:16:24
  last 30 years. And now it's just being
• 1:16:26
  blown up in front of them. If Ukraine is
• 1:16:28
  seeking fuel from the Middle East, it's
• 1:16:30
  got to run through that maritime route,
• 1:16:32
  be stored, and then transported inland.
• 1:16:35
  And so if you blow up Odessa
• 1:16:38
  and its surrounding logistics corridors,
• 1:16:41
  they're all critical nodes. What has
• 1:16:42
  Russia been attacking over the last
• 1:16:44
  month? Odessa, shipping,
• 1:16:48
  and all rail. There was a a story I saw
• 1:16:52
  a couple of days ago that said that
• 1:16:54
  literally 90%
• 1:16:57
  of Ukrainian
• 1:17:00
  uh rail lines are
• 1:17:04
  uh delayed
• 1:17:06
  like massive delays days long in delays
• 1:17:09
  and Russia is blowing up they're
• 1:17:11
  targeting engines diesel and electric
• 1:17:16
  railroad train engines and they're
• 1:17:19
  blowing them up. It's not a coincidence.
• 1:17:22
  This is this is this is how r Russia is
• 1:17:26
  getting more money. They didn't even
• 1:17:28
  have to fire a shot and they they
• 1:17:29
  suddenly are getting, you know, suddenly
• 1:17:31
  the oil prices are are are making it
• 1:17:34
  again. The global energy system is so
• 1:17:37
  much under strain that uh uh maybe it
• 1:17:40
  doesn't affect us. It does. I just told
• 1:17:42
  you about my extra dollar in in at least
• 1:17:46
  per gallon in in gas. Um,
• 1:17:51
  India talks about
• 1:17:56
  escalation versus deterrence, diplomacy
• 1:17:58
  versus force. The system is unstable and
• 1:18:01
  must be navigated.
• 1:18:05
  India maintaining access to energy flows
• 1:18:09
  trying to through Russia continue
• 1:18:12
  trading relationships and avoiding
• 1:18:14
  direct alignment either with Iran or
• 1:18:18
  with the United States and it's still
• 1:18:21
  receiving some energy through Hormuz.
• 1:18:25
  It's not universally closed. It's open
• 1:18:28
  for India, China, Pakistan and the yuan.
• 1:18:32
  If you pay and you want it's restricted
• 1:18:35
  for those who are aligned with the west.
• 1:18:38
  That isn't chaos. That's targeted
• 1:18:41
  economic warfare and it control. It
• 1:18:43
  reveals something very crucial. The
• 1:18:46
  global system is no longer binary. It is
• 1:18:49
  not the west versus its adversaries.
• 1:18:51
  It's a fragmented multi-polar
• 1:18:56
  network and countries are acting based
• 1:18:58
  on their own survival not ideology.
• 1:19:03
  Same pattern as Venezuela
• 1:19:05
  different justification.
• 1:19:08
  You know, we you know, this is the US is
• 1:19:12
  creating.
• 1:19:14
  What was that that you always used to
• 1:19:15
  put? Your your
• 1:19:18
  your body's writing, your body's right,
• 1:19:20
  you No, no. Your hand is writing checks
• 1:19:23
  your body can't keep or something like
• 1:19:24
  that, some famous movie. But but this is
• 1:19:27
  what we're doing in America. We we we
• 1:19:29
  sling the same old crap. New language
• 1:19:33
  for Venezuela. Narco terrorism. That was
• 1:19:36
  brand new. You know, something we get a
• 1:19:38
  claim that we're fighting for, right?
• 1:19:41
  And it proves something important when
• 1:19:43
  you switch to oil. The stated objective
• 1:19:46
  is not the real objective because if it
• 1:19:49
  were, removing the leadership would have
• 1:19:52
  ended the operation.
• 1:19:54
  What's the real line here? Energy.
• 1:19:57
  Venezuela, Iran, Ukraine. That's it.
• 1:20:04
  So what's the most important critical
• 1:20:06
  piece of all of this?
• 1:20:09
  The narrative being presented
• 1:20:11
  domestically
• 1:20:13
  is still being spouted out as if the
• 1:20:19
  objectives are clear. They are not. They
• 1:20:22
  can't tell you today the same thing that
• 1:20:25
  they told you yesterday. We're going to
• 1:20:28
  take Car Island. Oh, so that's the
• 1:20:30
  objective. Was it ever the objective
• 1:20:33
  before you started decapitating Iran?
• 1:20:36
  No, it wasn't. The Straits of Hormuz.
• 1:20:39
  We're need to open the Straits of
• 1:20:41
  Hormuz. Well, if you if you hadn't have
• 1:20:43
  bombed in the first place, you'd dumb
• 1:20:46
  It would still be open.
• 1:20:50
  It was open before you started bombing.
• 1:20:53
  So, you know, that is not your
• 1:20:55
  justification.
• 1:20:57
  Um you if you knew what your if what
• 1:21:00
  your objectives were were before you
• 1:21:03
  bombed perhaps you could have achieved
• 1:21:04
  them. You said it was first it was
• 1:21:07
  decapitation. We need to get rid of this
• 1:21:09
  regime. Second we need to get rid of uh
• 1:21:12
  nuclear weapons. They're after nuclear
• 1:21:14
  weapons. Third uh we have to deter them
• 1:21:17
  from attacking us.
• 1:21:20
  They haven't attacked us. You know they
• 1:21:22
  might have attacked
• 1:21:24
  Israel. Jesus who'd blame them. Israel's
• 1:21:27
  bombing the crap out of them every day.
• 1:21:29
  And uh and and other places. Israel is
• 1:21:32
  on a hunt to take over far more land
• 1:21:34
  over there. You know, Gaza became what?
• 1:21:37
  Trump Tower um Trump Tower 2 or
• 1:21:40
  something uh way back a year and a half
• 1:21:43
  ago. And now they're trying to Well,
• 1:21:44
  fine, he can have Gaza. We'll take
• 1:21:46
  Lebanon.
• 1:21:48
  This is nuts. They just keep expanding
• 1:21:50
  and nobody questions it at all. Killing
• 1:21:53
  of journalism, journalists, any of that.
• 1:21:56
  There are no trusted mediators. We have
• 1:21:58
  shifting war goals. We have logistical
• 1:22:00
  strains um and no stable negotiations.
• 1:22:04
  But we're still acting as if everything
• 1:22:06
  is manageable and we're in the right
• 1:22:08
  framework.
• 1:22:10
  What we are watching now unfortunately
• 1:22:14
  are a is is not a series of disconnected
• 1:22:19
  crises
• 1:22:21
  but a single system under a vast amount
• 1:22:25
  of pressure.
• 1:22:27
  Uh, you know, when you see Ukraine
• 1:22:30
  scrambling for fuel, sending its
• 1:22:33
  president across the Gulf to secure
• 1:22:36
  diesel, trying to keep basic operations
• 1:22:40
  running, while at the same time, the
• 1:22:42
  straight to Hormuz is being selectively
• 1:22:44
  controlled with global energy flow so
• 1:22:48
  disrupted and prices rising around the
• 1:22:50
  world that they're limiting it in
• 1:22:53
  Pakistan,
• 1:22:55
  in in many, many countries. ries they
• 1:22:58
  are limiting the amount of fuel you can
• 1:23:01
  put in your car
• 1:23:03
  and uh uh you know Venezuela is in play
• 1:23:08
  still under different justification but
• 1:23:10
  the same patterns and all this is
• 1:23:13
  unfolding and the domestic narrative
• 1:23:16
  continues to present this war the Trump
• 1:23:19
  admission administration
• 1:23:22
  continues to present this war as
• 1:23:25
  controlled bold, strategic
• 1:23:28
  and contained, but it isn't. And the
• 1:23:32
  rest of the world has already adjusted
• 1:23:35
  to that reality.
• 1:23:38
  The only question is how long will it
• 1:23:41
  take the US to do the same?
• 1:23:46
  Seriously, uh when I mean those of us
• 1:23:50
  who are paying for gas, we're already
• 1:23:52
  doing it. We're already adjusting. We
• 1:23:56
  are curtailing trips. We are not uh you
• 1:24:00
  know planning different over the summer.
• 1:24:02
  You know what we're going to do. You
• 1:24:05
  know
• 1:24:07
  this is where we go back to John
• 1:24:09
  Mirshimer because he doesn't argue from
• 1:24:11
  ideology or from pre preference. He
• 1:24:14
  talked about the structure. Remember he
• 1:24:16
  talked about escalation and his
• 1:24:18
  conclusion wasn't subtle.
• 1:24:21
  Not at all. The US has entered a war it
• 1:24:24
  cannot win.
• 1:24:26
  Not because it doesn't have military
• 1:24:28
  capability in a conventional sense, but
• 1:24:30
  because the structure of the conflict
• 1:24:33
  favors the opponent. the as you continue
• 1:24:37
  to escalate the assumptions that shaped
• 1:24:41
  the the opening phase of the war,
• 1:24:43
  leadership, decapitation,
• 1:24:45
  sustained bombing, internal pressure
• 1:24:48
  would cause collapse and ruin just like
• 1:24:51
  they thought would happen in Russia. And
• 1:24:54
  uh uh you know these mistaken beliefs
• 1:24:58
  have already proven false. Iran has not
• 1:25:02
  collapsed. Its leadership has not
• 1:25:05
  disintegrated.
• 1:25:06
  Its command structure is resilient and
• 1:25:10
  its ability to continue to launch
• 1:25:12
  strikes demonstrates that the initial
• 1:25:15
  phase of the war has not produced any
• 1:25:18
  decisive outcome that is expected. And
• 1:25:21
  once that fails, the conflict won't
• 1:25:24
  reset. It'll transform into a protect
• 1:25:28
  protracted conflict. And the question is
• 1:25:32
  no longer who can strike harder in the
• 1:25:34
  short term, but who can sustain pressure
• 1:25:37
  over the long term while imposing costs
• 1:25:40
  on the other side. And this is where me
• 1:25:44
  where I say and where Mir Shimemer
• 1:25:48
  argues that Iran holds the cards because
• 1:25:51
  as you move up the escalation ladder,
• 1:25:54
  the nature of the conflict shifts away
• 1:25:56
  from conventional dominance and multi
• 1:25:59
  hundreds of million dollar missiles to
• 1:26:02
  small drones that cost 5,000
• 1:26:05
  and are, you know, inflicting damage
• 1:26:09
  like crazy. and the huge amount of
• 1:26:12
  underground arsenal still in place by
• 1:26:15
  and by the way I watched an interesting
• 1:26:17
  show on that that said that for oh yeah
• 1:26:20
  we took a hexath we got 95% of all their
• 1:26:23
  stuff we destroyed them last year we
• 1:26:25
  killed everybody well if you have it how
• 1:26:27
  in the hell are they still bombing the
• 1:26:28
  crap out of you where is the Iron Dome
• 1:26:32
  in Israel why in the world are we able
• 1:26:34
  to blow that crap up why can't Israel
• 1:26:37
  come up with you know Netanyahu says
• 1:26:39
  he's going
• 1:26:40
  activate another 400,000. He activated
• 1:26:42
  300,000 uh not two and a half, three
• 1:26:45
  months ago and a third of them didn't
• 1:26:47
  show up. What makes you think the
• 1:26:50
  400,000 are going to show up? And how
• 1:26:53
  many of those will come in? If it's 2/3,
• 1:26:55
  well, that only gives you what, 240 or
• 1:26:57
  so?
• 1:26:59
  Um or 250, who knows? Somewhere in
• 1:27:01
  there. But uh uh but even then, what are
• 1:27:05
  you fighting for? you know, uh, they're
• 1:27:08
  getting blown up all over the place once
• 1:27:10
  the phase, you know, the the conflict is
• 1:27:12
  going to be a protracted. It was going
• 1:27:14
  to be 3 4 days. Oh jeez, it'll be done
• 1:27:16
  in a weekend and time for me to go see
• 1:27:18
  Xi Jinping and uh, put him in his place.
• 1:27:22
  Say, sorry, energyy's mine. Here's some
• 1:27:25
  more tariffs for you if the uh, Supreme
• 1:27:28
  Court doesn't overturn them.
• 1:27:31
  I don't know, friends and neighbors. Um
• 1:27:34
  things are looking not all that positive
• 1:27:37
  as the war continues to escalate with
• 1:27:42
  zero off rampage.
• 1:27:45
  We got nothing. I encourage you to go
• 1:27:49
  listen to uh um
• 1:27:53
  the Professor Wolf
• 1:27:56
  video on your own. I think that is a was
• 1:28:00
  a hell of a good um
• 1:28:04
  discussion that he had there. Um I
• 1:28:06
  believe that was with Professor Dyson,
• 1:28:08
  the guy from Norway. It was pretty cool.
• 1:28:10
  Die Sen, I think it's called.
• 1:28:16
  Well, I'm Samuel Trap. This is
• 1:28:18
  International Flavor. We come to you uh
• 1:28:21
  every Monday through Thursday.
• 1:28:24
  Hopefully it's a little warmer in uh you
• 1:28:27
  know and over the weekend it was a
• 1:28:30
  little little on the on the nippley side
• 1:28:33
  for me. Did I say nipple? Oh, horror
• 1:28:36
  story. Uh at any rate, I encourage you
• 1:28:40
  to listen to uh what do we got coming up
• 1:28:42
  here? Um Shield Maidens of Missouri
• 1:28:45
  coming up right after me. It's going to
• 1:28:48
  be good stuff. Hope you listen. Hope you
• 1:28:50
  join us in every day this week and on
• 1:28:52
  Friday with civic outlaws. Very
• 1:28:55
  interesting topics. Got a few extremely
• 1:28:58
  cool meetings going on in that regard
• 1:29:01
  this week with some influential and
• 1:29:04
  interesting people. So I shall try to
• 1:29:08
  keep you posted come Friday. So I hope
• 1:29:10
  you have a very good uh mid Missouri day
• 1:29:13
  this happy Monday and I will see you
• 1:29:17
  tomorrow at 7:30. A very nice day.