Judging Freedom - Alastair Crooke : Trump Went TACO on Greenland — Will He on Iran?

Episode Date: January 26, 2026

Alastair Crooke : Trump Went TACO on Greenland — Will He on Iran?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Undeclared wars are commonplace. Pragically, our government engages in preempted 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 Napolitano here for judging freedom. Today is Monday, January 26th, 2026th. Alster Crook will be with us in just a moment. Will Trump chicken out on Iran just as he did on Greenland? But first this. History tells us every market eventually falls. Currencies collapse.

And look at where we are now. 38 trillion in national debt. Stocks at record highs defying gravity. So what happens next? Groceries, gas, housing, everything. going up and this dollar it buys less every day when the system breaks your stocks won't save you and your dollars won't either but one thing will gold i've set it on my show for years gold survives collapse central bankers know this and billionaires know it that's why they're buying more is it too

late to buy or is it just the right time call my friends at lear capital to find out ask Get the free information. There's no pressure, and that's why I buy my gold and silver from Lear. And right now, you can get up to $20,000 in bonus medals with a qualified purchase. Call 800, 511, 4620, or go to Learjudgeonap.com. Alistair, good day to you, my friend. Thank you, as always, for accommodating my schedule. Before we get to Trump and Greenland and Iran and what his plans may be and this taco, Trump always chickens out an American phrase that, of course, he detests. Is there any noticeable international reaction that you are able to glean to these police murders in Minnesota, in Minneapolis, in the name of removing undocumented democracy? from the country?

Oh, certainly. It's being followed very carefully around the world. And they're trying to understand and read into it what it is going to mean. The reaction to it is that the, if you like, the American state is fragmenting and coming apart. And in its fragmentation, it is becoming violent, increasingly violent, within its to its own people. And they can see that also, you know, the huge polarization that this is giving rise to. I mean, this is a polarization which suggests in this coming period that there will be no real consensus in the United States. about the next steps, economic, political, social,

that it's going to become much more a disputatious, fractionalized, polarized society. And people are worried about that, concern for America, concern for what it means for themselves and their countries. But basically that. Unpredictability, increasing, anxiety about what that is going to mean and also fear that something, you know, some

a decision will be taken, which might have out of this chaos that might have huge geopolitical consequences and turn everything upside down. Can you draw a line between the killings on the speedboats and the fishing boats in the Caribbean and the killings in the streets of Minneapolis? We should be able to draw a line between it in one way in the sense that they, of course, it's claimed that they were drug dealers. We have no way of knowing they were or whether they were completely innocent. Possibly they were completely innocent.

In which case, both aspects are. potentially illegal. But you cannot, and in the case of, if you like, the Caribbean, clearly then that would be war crimes. In the place of internal killings in Minnesota, they're not war crimes, but they're crimes. They can be crimes and they can be part of, if you like, civil conflict, but they are not in the same bracket as a clear war crime.

But, I mean, what is the difference? Does it make much difference? The point is the consequences of the death has its effect on the whole of society, whether it was in Caribbean or inside. Okay, you know, we can pass the legal definitions endlessly. and talk about humanitarian values and things. It's not about that. It is about, if you like, really this sort of explosion of society,

a sort of emotional and ideological explosion of a society and its sort of fragmentation into its component parts. Why do you think Donald Trump has lusted after Greenland, and why did he dial back at least publicly that lust from and after his time in Davos last week? Well, I mean, I just don't believe, you know, that it's strategically necessary for the United States to own Greenland. They have a treaty dating back to 51, which gives them what they need. they already have early warning. America has early warning bases on Greenland.

It has missile capabilities on Greenland. You know, there's everything there. So if it's not really that strategic in a geopolitical sense, I think it has another exigency. And that is basically, you know, this is something we're coming up to the, is it the anniversary or has it passed just of his first since inauguration? We're coming up to some other timelines and he needs, you know, wins. He wants something that looks good, that stand out, newsworthy, that people will welcome in base.

And, you know, to say, well, you know, I bought, I've acquired Greenland. And that's bigger than Alaska. When we bought Alaska, it's bigger than the purchase of Louisiana. I'm the person who's given made America bigger than it has ever been before. Now, I may be being too cynical, but really, I think it is about a demonstration of power, of dominance. You know, we saw that very clearly in Davos. I mean, he did demonstrate complete dominance over the Europeans, and they were psychophantic in their response to this dominance, which does not bode well for Europe. But, I mean, he does get the sense of dominance.

Why did he back down? I think he was quite clear, and it's very important when we come to talk about Iran, too. what happened on that day when he announced the tariffs of 10% in Europe, rising to 25% in June, was that there was a real judder in the bond market. Yes. And we had judder in the bond market, but the stock market turned red, almost across the board. And this was, if you think back to Liberation Day, when he announced those tariffs, and also the bond market went into paroxysm of anxiety at that point.

And we had Besson, taking the first plane down to Moralago to say to Trump, now, could we row back on this a bit, please, Mr. Trump, because, you know, otherwise the bond market is really going to go into a crisis mode, a liquidity crisis. So I think that was what was important. And it's important, I think, I know you probably want to separate the topics in the sense. This is also important when we look at Iran and the pressures on Trump about whether to take action, military action against Iran. I think one of the biggest, if you like, countercurrents, there are two big countercurrents that are not military, not strategic in that sense. One of the countercourns is the bond market, because for sure some form of conflict with Iran. And Iran will respond.

I mean, I've been in touch. I keep in touch with Tehran during the spirit. You know, it is very clear the message they have sent to Mr. Trump and through Arab states and others. And they say, if we are attacked either by the United States alone or by Israel or by both, all out war, it's going to be full war and we will close Hormuz for months, months. So look what that will do to the energy market. Look what that will do. to the economic stability of America and Europe, because it will also extend probably to Gulf states as well,

because anyone who has given assistance to an attack on Iran will be targeted too. They've made that very clear. So they are preparing not for a little war or anything. There's no in-between us. They are saying, if you're a attack, a standoff attack, whatever, we will respond, and we will respond against Israel and against American bases in the region, i.e. American casualties, body bags.

And so I think, you know, these things, and you put it against, first of all, a very fragile bond market and you put it against his very weak and sliding approval ratings. Well, the disapproval ratings are, I'm told now, the New York Times say are at 47 percent, which has got a hurdle to overcome that sort of, those sort of figures. So the currents, it seems to me, you know, are moving against the idea of an attack because we all know that Trump doesn't want to be a loser, doesn't want to appear weak. He wants a quick win, almost a stunt.

I can call that attack on the four nuclear sites in Iran, really more or less a stunt, because, I mean, much of it was attacked by Tomahawk missiles, which do not have penetrating capacity. They are not, you know, bunker, Buster bombs, they are very ancient conventional missiles. And yes, they could block the entrances to two of those, but they can't land tires and so on and is for harm.

But they're not bunker busters. And so, you know, it was not really something that was serious. Now we're keep being told. Yes, but there's an armada assembling, biggest amada ever. But it isn't actually a threat in that sense, because it now composes two carrier groups, not just one, Gerald Ford, the Lincoln has joined it,

and their associated aircraft. But just as we saw in Yemen, the carriers were forced back. they fausts right back from Yemen because the Yemenis fired missiles towards them. And so there's no way those carriers will come any closer than, I don't know, a long distance. I'm not a military person. But the military people that I follow, like Will Scriber and others, say there's no way they can be get close. Now, all told in that conglomeration of shape.

ships that is forming off Iran, you probably have something of the order of 350 Tomahawk missiles available on those ships. Now, I'm told, you know, these are very slow missiles. They fly at the speed of an ordinary aircraft, not hypersonic, and they have quite a powerful warhead of about 1,000 kilos, but 300, but don't forget Iran is the size of Europe. What is 300 missiles across military bases, across deeply buried missile sites, right across the extent of Iran with its huge population and huge expanse? you wonder and a standoff attack,

is that going to, what is it going to achieve? Where's the stunt? Where's, you know, the Maduro, in, boom, out. I've got him, he's in court tomorrow. Is that going to be possible? You know, I'm not sure that, I'm not sure it is going to be possible to do something. Will it make a great impact

if there's a standoff attack from, say, 600 miles away on the headquarters of the IRGC. I mean, first of all, Iran says any attack, and we will respond against Israel and American bases. So you're not going to get a quick, easy stunt, you know, that there's an outstanding, it's headline, it's a big win. You could get something that turns very quickly ugly, and I would think that is not something that Trump would be really wanting at this moment,

which is rating it at that and with the weakness in the bond market was apparent during Davos. I don't think he's necessarily going to want that. So I'm not sure. Now, there's always a possibility that the commanders above somewhere, whoever has a greater say in the process. policy will instruct that he goes ahead with it. But really, I mean, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that if Trump, if you like his superior command, insists that he must attack Iran,

this could be a suicide of Trump politically. It could end up in him going into the midterms and losing the House and maybe even losing the Senate. And that means he ends up in court. he loses the Senate and the House. So, and, you know, if his approval ratings was sky high, that might be one thing, but to say to him, you've got to do this now. I mean, at this rate, you could say that's inviting him to political suicide and an unpleasant

political suicide with investigations and indictments and other things possibly coming towards him. So I think for those reasons in Iran, they know that an attack is possible, but equally, they think that it may not happen. And the other reason for thinking that is because there's been a shift in Israeli intelligence. And that's highly important. The latest intelligence assessments coming out of Israel. Ronan Bergman has given the details of this. And they say, you know, there was, it was not a success. The insurrection didn't succeed in fragmenting the state at all. It didn't succeed. But what was interesting was what they said afterwards. They said two things.

One was, well, perhaps it never would have succeeded. In other words, they're saying perhaps this insurrection tactic, which has failed, was actually not well conceived enough to bring, why would it have brought down the whole state? And then they said the last sentence was, perhaps it would never have done. And that is a big, big question saying, you know, well, you can't, it's not, you know, there's nothing that we can do in Israel, America, to bring down the state because you can't do it by aerial attack alone. There's no question of putting boots in the ground.

So how do we bring back the states? And maybe it's not, you know, our premise, a predicate that the state was a house of country. and was ready to collapse because of the insurrection was proved wrong. And it was a flawed intelligence, a flawed assessment. And so maybe it's never going to happen like that. So I think all of these things, if you put them together, of course there's pressure from many quarters in the United States and in Israel for the destruction of Iran. It's been there for a long, long time.

It will continue. But on the other hand, at this time, when you look at the approval ratings, what's happening in the bond market, in the economy, what's happening in Israel and the thinking of Israel, I mean, I think that, you know, it's going to be a balance, and we will see. I don't completely rule it out. But I think the momentum for the moment is against it.

And I think that is a view also that is shared by many in Iran. Chris has posted, Chris, you could put that back up. That is a chart of his disapproval ratings. It was 47% until this latest killing in Minnesota. Now it's at 56%. Very difficult to govern when your approval rating is that low. Since we came on air, the New York Times has reported that, that, and I want to ask you about what Netanyahu wants with Iran and what Netanyahu needs

with respect to attacking Iran before he runs for re-election for the umpteenth time later this year. However, Israel has said, this is the Times reporting just about 10 minutes ago, that it will reopen the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, a move that would allow Palestinians who fled the enclave during the two-year war to return home. for the first time. So question one, if this is accurate, what does it tell you? Question two, what does Netanyahu want Trump to do militarily with Iran? What does Netanyahu need Trump to do militarily with Iran before he seeks re-election again in a couple of months? Okay, well, I'll deal with Netanyahu first, if I may, and then come back to the question

of Gaza. which is very important also. I think that here you have, you know, you have to recognize the divergency of aims. The United States, more or less, aim is expressed by the Israel first lobby. It is regime change to get rid of the Ayatollah and what they call the Muller, which is an accurate description, because in fact, the policy and of Iran is entirely made by the Supreme National Security Council, which is composed of the government and technicians and army and IRGC, but not anyone from Com or not any of the clerics involved.

Really, his aim is to bring about the West name, and we hear the word of Pahlavi, if you like, son of the last Shah, and is he whom they would like to install? I think this is just a decoy, because actually we know what Israel wants. It wants the dismemberment of the state. They're already working with the Kurds, and the Baluchis and the Azeris on constitutions.

So one of the reasons the Kurds came into the south was like what we saw between Russia and Ukraine, in Kursk, they took a piece of Russia's territory as a negotiating tool to declare it as their own land. And that's what the Kurds were being set up to do in that border on the western side of Iran, coming across from Kurdistan and some coming across from Syria, to set up a self, if you like,

generating self-organized autonomy in that area. So the aim of Netanyahu is to turn it into Assyria, make it like a Syria where you have different ethnicities in war with one another, where there's no powerful central government, where the whole state is weak. Now, they use and they talk about Pahlavi as being a possible, they only are using this really

quite cynically because they know that's what the West likes and they don't want to hear this. And I'm very sure that this is being used by Israel to give it a sort of veneer of something, understandable for the West, oh yes, he'll come back in and it'll be all neatly done. They're not wanting a neat solution. They want actually a complete Balkanization of Iran. Well, what's the significance, if any, to opening that border with Egypt and allowing Palestinians to return? Well, it also is about

allowing the Palestinians to leave. And this is something that Netanyahu is particularly concerned about, that he will get some of the other leadership of Hamas coming in and other people who are, if you like, opposed to the occupation of Palestine, by Israel, coming in militarily equipped, militarily trained members coming in to reinforce Hamas. Presumably they think they may be coming from Syria, from Lebanon. Who knows, from Iraq, quite likely, from Qatab Hezbollah, or somewhere like that. So they're very concerned about that.

They've always felt that there was a plan afoot. I don't know the details of what they think exactly, but they thought there was always a plan that there would be an invasion of Israel by the resistance forces. They believed that the Radwan, up until the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, Israel had an assessment, the forces, the elite forces of Hezbollah who are called the Radwan forces,

were planning to come and invade the Galilee and take part of the Galilee. Now, of course, Netanyahu's aim is, the opposite is to actually insert the settlers back into Gaza and to take it over and for the army to start attacks again. So this is directly seen as inimicable to Israel's interest, as is this whole process. And in the Israeli press in the last two days, there is a lot of talk about Netanyahu's now going to put pressure on Trump to say he wants the IDF to go back into bombing Gaza again,

the IDF and the Air Force to go in and attack Gaza and to bomb Gaza. And he says, they say, in the Hebrew press anyway, they say, they expect that Trump will give the green light to that. I'm not so sure. I don't think he probably will be so keen on that. But they're also, the Nenayneu's deeply unhappy with the idea that the Turks could be involved, they increasingly see them as an enemy and adversary, and Gata, the sort of paymaster, the money bags of the Muslim Brotherhood being involved in Gaza. All of this is an netto-neton

Yahoo. So he's very concerned about that and opening the gates. They may try and use it to push Palestinians out of the gate. But who's going to come in and who's going to be allowed to come? Alastair, thank you very much, my dear friend. Always very informative, very instructive, much appreciated. We'll look forward to seeing you next week. Thank you so much, Judge. Thank you.

All my best to you. Coming up later this morning at 10 o'clock, Ray McGovern, and at 1130, Larry Johnson, And it won this afternoon, our friend Sheriff David Hathaway, former deputy director of the Drug Enforcement Administration, has some very interesting observations on ICE in Minnesota, which Secretary Christie Nome will not appreciate hearing. And at two o'clock on all of this, Scott Ritter,

Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom.