Judging Freedom - Any Chance of Ukraine Victory is Vanishing w_ Col Daniel Davis

Episode Date: June 22, 2023

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So we've got a number one deluxe meal. Is there anything else I can get you? Yeah, I'd also like a good night's sleep. Maybe something like the I didn't struggle all night with my uncomfortable CPAP mask. Sir, I think what you're looking for is Inspire. It's an implant that works inside your body to treat sleep apnea without a CPAP. He sounds angry. Inspire. Sleep apnea innovation. Inspire is not for everyone. Talk to your doctor to see if it's right for you and review important safety information at inspiresleep.com. hi everyone judge andrew napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, June 22nd, 2023. It's about four o'clock in the afternoon here in the East Coast of the United States. Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Davis will be with us in just a moment. Why is it that most Americans really think the Ukraine offensive is prevailing?

Because the government lies right after this. Convenience. A vehicle break-in occurs every 36 seconds in America. The Headrest Safe gives you the power to store cash, jewelry, medication, and yes, even your concealed carry firearm. You'll never have to worry about taking your valuables with you again. Keep them safe with the Headrest Safe. Use promo code JUDGENAP and enjoy $50 off for a limited time at theheadrestsafe.com. Colonel, welcome here. Thank you very much for your time. You're so much appreciated by our audience and by me. Why does there seem to be almost a campaign of deception by American retired military personnel, official American military government spokespersons, and even the media to delude the public into believing that somehow Ukraine is

going to prevail in its offensive to push the Russians entirely out of Ukraine. And even if you listen to one of your former colleagues, General Hodges, out of Crimea. Well, you know, this is actually just the perpetuation of a longstanding performance, if you will. Because, I mean, I railed against this for a decade during the Iraq and Iran wars. You know, I was quite vocal about a lot of the deception and the lies that were being told during the Afghanistan campaign all the way up through to the end. And including by the architects of this thing in the aftermath, trying to explain it away, still always avoiding any culpability for the disaster that they performed. And now you see the same thing continue to go on without pause people are talking about at our government level in the

in some of the media and it's in among some of the retired uh air generals that this is the way we want it to be this is the outcome we prefer it's called information operations you want to carve the target audience into thinking the way that you want them to. But the problem is with that, it's one thing to have a narrative. It's the second thing to actually say this is black when it's actually white. And that's where we are. And I don't know, it seems like we just can't escape it. And we keep doing the same things over and over, especially in cases as we talked about

the last time we were together, when it's patently obvious that the things that they're claiming are simply not true, and yet they stick to it. It's really disturbing. Here's General Petraeus. I know you've seen it and the public has seen it, but I want it to get under your skin. You're such a gentleman, but I'd like it to get under your skin a little bit, Colonel. General Petraeus, this is about two and a half weeks ago on June 6th, basically saying the Ukrainians have what they need, the Russians don't have what they need, and the Ukrainians are going to prevail. Take a listen. for this. They'll be very distinctive because they will be using, employing Western tanks, Western infantry fighting vehicles in large measure for the first time in this war, certainly in this number. I think the Russians will prove to be more brittle than the expectation

is. Keep in mind, these units have been in combat for over a year, many of them. They have not been pulled offline to reconstitute by having forces replaced, equipment replaced and repaired, and then doing training before they go back. They just get individual replacements to fill the gap. They're not well-trained. They're not well-equipped. They're not well-led. And I think that these Ukrainian forces, which are well-trained, are well-equipped, are going to break through. And then you might see a real dynamism to the battlefield that could give real opportunities to the Ukrainians to exploit. Where does he get this from?

Wow, a real dynamism. And Ukrainians are well-tread, well-led, well-equipped. Okay, even their president doesn't agree with that. And the Russians are not well trained, not well equipped and not well led. Yeah, look, Judge, that is just factually inaccurate on almost every count that he lists off there. I mean, the Russians that are on the front line haven't been in constant combat for a year. They have been rotated off. They have been getting training. And it's abundantly clear. And it's even covered in some of the mainstream media about, you know, the New York Times, Washington Post, some of the

London papers. They're talking about how they are learning and they're improving and they've been training and they're getting much, much better. I mean, it's self-evident on the ground, but again, he keeps actually acting like they're just terrible and they're going to get rolled over. And then that the Ukraine side, which is really even stranger that he's basically suggesting that after a a few weeks or in some cases a few months of training that somehow they're going to be performing like nato trained troops would uh who have been you know careers or many years training is just bizarre i mean there's no better way to put it than that. And now that you're seeing on the battlefield play out that what he said was nonsense because none of those

things he said is coming to pass. How far east have the Ukrainians moved, if at all, since they started their offensive three weeks ago, Colonel? They had dug about seven kilometers deep into the Russian security zone, which is before the first main belt, after I believe it's 18 days. Today was the 18th day. And literally just hours ago, they actually made their first push that reached the first belt of the Russian defense. But it was a bloody disaster. They tried to do it at night. They were actually unloading large numbers of infantrymen in trucks and pickup trucks because so many of their armored vehicles are getting burned and they're trying to infiltrate them in. Well, that will get them up to the front line, but the problem is now that they're exposed and they are just

getting slaughtered in large numbers. Even though they made it to the front line, they have still not penetrated it anywhere. And Russia brought in its aviation as expected and just crushed that leading element. And they have pushed them back to where they started from today. So it's not far at all. You said they haven't reached the third belt. So there are three belts of defenses. And the Ukrainians haven't even gotten, I may have misspoken when I said the Ukrainians haven't even gotten. I may have misspoken when I said third. They haven't gotten to the first one yet.

That's correct. There's at least three. Some areas there's five in some of the more critical areas that Russia deems of significant importance. They've got five. We're talking 20, 30 kilometers in depth. And they just now in one place on the front reached the first one uh and they haven't penetrated it yet so and that's that's after 93 weeks and historically speaking if you can't even break through one layer of the enemy's defense after all that and of course they started off with their elite 47th uh mechanized brigade uh which had all the nato kit all the nato training and was just hit into a buzzsaw, didn't gain anything, that really tells you that there's not much chance for them to even penetrate much further in there

before they start losing even all their striking power. I want to raise your blood pressure again, Colonel. Forgive me. This is General Ben Hodges, retired four-star, former commander-in-chief of all American forces in Europe. And what he says to me is just incredible, but I'm not a military guy. I want you to comment on it. Take a listen, please. Ukraine needs long-range precision weapons. And I'm very frustrated that our administration has so far refused to provide the ATACOMs and other long range precision weapons, which would help Ukraine hit Russian targets in Crimea. Because at the end

of the day, Crimea is the decisive terrain. As long as Russia occupies Crimea, Ukraine will never be safe and Ukraine will never be able to rebuild its economy. So Crimea is the decisive terrain. And if the U.S. would provide these long-range weapons to Ukraine, then the Russians would have to begin to leave Crimea. I got to editorialize. It's inconceivable to me any circumstances under which the Russians would leave Crimea? Well, they're not going to. And it's, I mean, something close to, again, sorry for the same word, bizarre, that this person who's supposed to have been so much experienced in combined arms operations and maneuver warfare thinks that just the acquisition of long range missiles is somehow going to

change the dynamic. And look, you don't have to look any further than the Ukraine side to know that this is nonsense also, because Russia has been, I mean, since for the last couple of months and mostly for this year, almost every other day have been launching large numbers of missiles all over the Ukrainian territory. And it's damaging, it's limiting their ability, but obviously they're conducting an offensive. That will harm them. It in no way, shape, or form would change the dynamics and make Russia leave Ukraine. That's nonsense. It's absurd to even suggest. So Colonel Davis, what's the big picture here? We have two retired four-star generals,

one who also ran the CIA, and that one has an international reputation. I didn't know of General Hodges that much, but these are very, very high-ranking guys who achieved literally, absent wartime, the height of their military stature, four stars, is there wiggle room here? Is there a rational basis for what they say? Or are they just plain, by every fair, honest, objective, standard, wrong? I mean, I can't come to any conclusion other than that they are wrong, and demonstrably so. And that's what should really be starkly clear. Forget about all the stuff about the Afghan war, which was also very clear. You can't get any more clear than this. Almost everything that they have said, especially in relation to this offensive operation of Ukraine's side, is just clearly not even working. But when you see

that Ukraine has not, in all 16 months of this war, actually pushed Russia out of any place that it's decided to stop and fight, with the one exception of the Kherson operation in last September, where they caught Russia with their pants down. But everywhere that Russia stopped and is ready to fight, Ukraine has not succeeded anywhere to push them back. And now you want to say that you're going to suddenly penetrate 80 kilometers of the best defenses that really have been built since World War II on anywhere on the planet. It just boggles the mind how you think that they can do that when they don't have air superiority, they don't have air defense, and they have an inferiority in artillery rounds. How can anyone make that case? I just don't get it. We're going to take a break. When we come back,

the Pentagon spokesperson, at least for me, a new Pentagon spokesperson, a PhD in, well, whatever, I don't know, Colonel Davis will tell you. Wait till you hear what she has to say. Makes the two generals seem like they're holding back right after this. Oh, boy. The headrest safe is quick and easy to use. Some may even call it a game changer. The headrest safe acts as a safety net,

protecting your belongings while keeping them out of sight and out of bounds of others, serving us security while also keeping your valuables inbounds. That's what the Headrest Safe provides for me. Singh, the, at least to me, relatively new spokesperson for the Defense Department, I think that General, you're still with us, Colonel Davis. There you go. We lost you for a second. These things happen. Before we get to Dr. Singh, I think that General Milley recently acknowledged that the Russians have several hundred thousand troops to defend eastern Ukraine. How many troops, as best you know from public sources or your sources, does Ukraine have? Well, Ukraine has somewhere, depending on who you want to listen to, somewhere around 700,000 active duty troops. But those are scattered throughout the entire country.

I mean, they have to defend everywhere along the entire thousand kilometer front line. They have to defend Kiev. They have to defend all the way on the Western border. Also, it gets any penetration that Russia may come in from Belarus, if they come back at direction again. So they're mainly on the defense. For this offensive operation, though, they have, at least according to General Hodges, they allocated about 12 combat brigades. Some say 20 combat brigades, and that's about 30 to 50 000 depending on how that goes so at best it's 50 000 from before they started and certainly it's a lot less than that now so here we go again you've told us uh uh colonel shaffer has told us colonel mcgregor has told us even the intelligence guys have told us you want to win an offensive, you got to be at least two and probably three to

one. That is the advantage of the team conducting the offensive. Not only are the Ukrainians not two or three to one, it's about one to ten. Them the one and the Russians the ten. That tells me that the offensive is not driven by military necessity or even acceptability. It's driven by politics. Well, look, according to what we've been able to piece together from public sources, Ukraine's offensive last November, which was led by Zelensky, got between eight to ten to one advantage over the Russians in that northern part. That's why they had success at that point. Zeluzny recognizes the deficiencies he's got now, and he recommended against this offensive to wait until maybe the fall when they had more air power and possibly longer range missiles. They didn't listen to him, and it appears that they made a political decision and found a general that was willing to try to do it.

And the results are just fundamental. And really, they almost couldn't be any other way than what we've seen so far. Here's Dr. Singh, as promised, the relatively new Defense Department spokesperson with the DOD's take on the likely support that Ukraine has, equipment that Ukraine has, and the likely outcome of this offensive? I think our assessments have been pretty clear from the beginning. I think, you know, we know as you continue to see the fight that it continued to move to the east, it's become more of a grinding battle every day. You saw that in Bakhmut.

The Ukrainians can speak to their operations and more to the day-to-day on what's happening on the ground, but we know this is going to be a hard fight. We know this is going to take time, and we are confident that the Ukrainians have what they need. They have the combat power. They have the ability to be successful in their counteroffensive operations. We see them launching both defensive and offensive operations right now. But I would let them speak to more of that. Colonel, does Ukraine have the combat power to defeat an overwhelming Russian force? No, Jones, they don't. And I'm pretty sure that on some of your episodes here before this offensive started, we pointedly said that they didn't have that.

And really, you just laid it out right before this clip where they're going in trying to a one against 10. That's just in no accounting can that be a superiority and enough combat power. Why does the press just uncritically, almost as if they were indifferent to the truth, accept the type of statements that Dr. Singh just made without challenging her or doing their own independent research? I mean, it is insane, I would think, to say the Ukrainians have adequate combat power. Yeah, and that they're going to succeed and that we're confident of success. That is troubling to me because she was saying that, but she's just echoing what the other senior leaders of the Defense Department have said. Secretary Allen has said nearly the same thing

on a number of occasions about the Ukraine side as well, that they're confident of success, etc. But that really exposes, Judge, one of two problematic issues. And I don't know which one's worse. One is they actually don't know what they're talking about. And they actually believe what they're saying. And they think, well, because we gave them NATO tanks, they're going to have NATO capacity. I don't know if that's the truth or if they're just, again, trying to say, hey, this is what we want to be true. So we're going to say it. Maybe it'll become so oblivious to what's actually happening.

But if it's the first one, Judge, that's troubling, because if they think that this is actually going to work, these are the same people who are going to be in charge of our national defense. If God willing, God forbid, we should ever have to fight a major war against Russia, against China, North Korea, whoever. We don't want people that have that kind of knowledge and belief to be in charge of our people if that's what they think is going to succeed. This is terrifying. I mean, if Joe Biden gets reelected, who will be the Secretary of State? Victoria Nuland? I'm not sure where this takes us, but I want you to watch a statement

President Zelensky made just two days ago. I think this is terrifying. He's warning that the Ukrainian nuclear plant will be destroyed by the Russians. There's, in my view, no basis for that, but I'll let you comment on it. And I wonder if this is sort of false flag. I mean, he wants to set the blame first, but I'll let you, I don't want to attribute the

worst motivations to him. He's in a terrible situation. You don't know whether to believe him or not. But anyway, here's what he said. I'll read the subtitles for the benefit of our colleagues that are getting the show on audio only. Now, concerning the Zaporizhzhia plant, I remind those who have forgotten, this is the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. Everywhere in the world, IAEA, all countries, all leaders know what's happening here. Russia uses the nuclear power

plant as an element in its aggression. It occupies the plant. It uses it to cover the shelling of neighboring troops. It keeps weapons and troops there. Now, our intelligence has received information that Russia is considering a scenario of a terrorist attack at the nuclear power plant, a terrorist attack with radiation leakage. They have prepared everything for this. Unfortunately, I've repeatedly said, I've repeatedly had to remind that radiation has no state borders, and who it will hit is determined only by the wind direction. We share all available information with our partners, everyone in the world, all the evidence, Europe, America, China, Brazil, India, the Arab world,

Africa, all countries, absolutely everyone should know this. International organizations, absolutely everyone. There should never be any terrorist attacks on nuclear power plants anywhere this time it should not be like with kovka the world has been warned so the world can and must act glory to ukraine well look judge i mean like anything that ever happens i mean probably nobody could knows this better than you, all the courtroom drama that you've ever seen over your entire career. You always got to look at what's the motivation of the person alleged to do something here.

And Russia has everything to lose by such a thing. I mean, they're trying to capture this territory for Russians and try to make it part of the Russian Federation. What possible sense does it make to cause a nuclear disaster like Chernobyl when it's going to contaminate all the territory they're trying to fight over right now? And the other thing is they possess it right now, as Zelensky oddly did concede. Why would they send something like that when they already have possession of it? The concern I have is that I don't know if Zelensky is just doing it to try to scare people and trying to scare people in all these countries that he mentioned to try and support his side

better because they're afraid of what might happen. I mean, I don't know if he's trying to set up a false flag. It's always a dicey game, and I don't have enough information to say that. All I can say is that it's just inconceivable that Russia would do it because they would lose everything and gain nothing. Wow. And, of course, if the Ukrainians did it, it would terrify the West, and I guess his hope would be that NATO forces would directly enter the conflict, something he's been lobbying for for a year and a half now.

He has. Well, let's see what we need to do. The worst thing is to be joined on that. How do you think this ends? Your colleague, Colonel McGregor, emailed me and said he thinks it ends when a Ukrainian commander surrenders to a Russian commander because there'll be no Ukrainian government left to surrender. They'll either be dead or gone. I certainly hope it doesn't come to that because the loss of life and the devastation would be so much more than what we've even experienced so far. And I grieve badly for the Ukrainian people and all the soldiers that are having to fight a losing battle like this. In the piece that I wrote for 1945 that you cited earlier, I recommended that the Ukrainians to stop the offensive and go on the defensive now and start building more combat

power and more defensive positions to keep that very thing from happening. But if they keep going, then I'm afraid that they're not going to have a defensive position. And the risk is going to be that Russia then now comes in, conquers much more territory, and then they end up dictating in terms of negotiated surrender. Colonel Daniel Davis, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for joining us. Thanks, Judge. If you like what you saw, and I suspect you did, like, subscribe, and tell a friend. Tomorrow, Friday, Jack Devine, the guys you love to hate, followed by Colonel McGregor, one right after the other. Jack at 1.30 p.m. Eastern, Colonel McGregor at 2.30 p.m. Eastern.

Or as we get it, Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. You want to feel safe in your vehicle. With access to your firearm, that's both secure and convenient. The Headrest Safe keeps your firearm where you can access it and no one else can. It starts at theheadrestsafe.com. Thanks for watching!