Judging Freedom - Aren_t We at War in Ukraine_ - Phil Giraldi

Episode Date: February 28, 2023

Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, February 28, 2023. It's about 3.30 in the afternoon here on the East Coast of the United States. Phil Giraldi joins us now. Phil, you have a great article out. I love all of your work, of course, but you have a great article out aggressively challenging the, here's how I'll describe it, the mindset behind American foreign policy. But before I get to it, I want to talk about the work of somebody you and I know and admire, and that's Cy Hirsch. Do you have any more thoughts or ideas about the government's inability effectively to refute Hirsch? And the flip side of that coin is the media's utter silence on what Hersh revealed. What he revealed, of course, was the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline by CIA and American Navy personnel.

Yeah, well, it's really something remarkable to watch as it kind of, I dare say, unfolds, but it's not really unfolding all. I think what has happened is that this total clampdown on any kind of further investigation or commitment by the US government to reveal what it claims to know. None of this has happened. It's just total denial and a shutdown on it. And I think the reason for it, if you really think about it, is that this is a game changer. I mean, this is an undeniable act of war or even terrorism, depending on exactly how you want to define it. And this is done against a major ally in part, and also against a major power, nuclear power, with which the United States is not actually at war.

How do intelligence agents feel, whether they're in the business of gathering info like you were, or whether in the business of destroying things like obviously some parts of the CAA are, how do they feel when they're told they have to destroy an asset that belongs to an ally yeah now that's a good question i i i really kind of wonder how they came up with the people who actually did the job because uh you know most people that work for the government basically feel there are certain things that they have to do because they're expected to do them but this this goes way beyond that. And indeed, from Seymour Hersh's coverage, it's quite clear that these downside issues were discussed. It's not exactly like they were hidden. And so you had people pulling off this operation who were fully

aware of the potential escalation, the potential for this turning disastrous in terms of the human race. So there are people in the CIA more in the Phil Giraldi camp, like this is wrong and we shouldn't be doing it, as opposed to the Jack Devine camp, we'll do whatever the boss says, particularly if it can harm the Russians. Yeah, there certainly is that division. I have some friends of mine from the agency that we don't really talk much to each other anymore because they really did imbibe the russo phobia uh that uh is is motivating a lot of these people and certainly i think and if you look at the biden cabinet it's full of russell folks i mean essentially they're trying to to make a case that russia is responsible for all of this stuff that's gone on which is is is completely inaccurate you uh have written in this piece that

I mentioned a few minutes ago, talk about Russophobia, that we, I guess you mean the American government, you don't mean you and I and the people watching us now, are, quote, slaves to power brokers who hate Russia. So who are these power brokers that hate Russia? And what is the origin or basis of this hatred? Well, I think that the hatred is multifaceted. There are people kind of in our age group who were brought up with the Cold War and with the fact that we were sold the concept that Russia was manifestly evil. So there are a lot of people, my former agency colleagues are kind of my age, and some of them certainly have embraced that view. There are other issues that arise about Russia.

There are many Jewish organizations in the United States and elsewhere who basically view Russia in a very negative way due to history under the czars and this sort of thing. So I think a lot of those people are in power in the State Department and other places right now and who are preferring to see a very negative narrative about Russia. Do you think that one of the goals of American foreign policy with respect to Ukraine, even more so than driving the Russians out of Crimea, which I think is militarily impossible and would result in the use of nuclear weapons. But do you think that one of the Biden administration foreign policy team's goal is to drive Vladimir Putin from office, not knowing who or what would replace him? I think that's precisely one of their major objectives. Certainly the Defense Department has been quite candid, I think, in terms of saying think that's precisely one of their major objectives they they certainly the defense

department has been uh quite candid i think in terms of saying one of the objectives in in supporting ukraine is to weaken russia and to eliminate its ability to interfere in eastern europe so that's a that's an enunciated goal but I think a lot of the other stuff is basically to get rid of Putin. Because again, we get back to Putin. Putin, one of his first acts when he took over 20 years ago, was to get rid of a lot of the oligarchs. And a lot of the oligarchs were Jewish. And so certainly this was and is a motivating factor against Putin. And I think they would like to see him go and replace him, as they did in Ukraine, with somebody who was willing to kowtow to the United States. Well, they don't know who would replace Putin. predecessor, Dmitry Medvedev, was the president for a four-year period between Putin's first

two terms, and then he was prime minister or some nonsense for four years, and then they changed the Russian constitution, which let him succeed himself over and over again. But Medvedev was the nominal legal leader of the government. He's now the vice chair or deputy chair of their equivalent of National Security Council. You know who I'm talking about. Last week said that the Russian forces could go all the way to the Polish border, and it might be necessary or appropriate for them to go into Poland because Russia needs a buffer zone from the West. The reason I say this is if he's serious and if he means that he's a candidate to replace Putin, isn't it better the devil you know who seems rational compared to statements like

this than the devil who's threatening your very existence. That's an interesting way of posing it. Yeah, I think that is obviously what I would be thinking, and clearly you would be thinking, but we're perhaps more rational than anyone sitting in the White House at the moment. And I suspect that this is the kind of thing where, like they played it in Ukraine, where they got rid of the guy they didn't want. And then we had those telephone conversations with Victoria Nuland naming different people that we should support, or in fact, we should put into power. That's

what the discussion was about. And I don't think they think these things through beyond the next step. And I think that's part of the problem. I want to play a clip for you from Admiral Kirby right outside the White House. I think this is this morning, basically saying, well, I'll let you listen to what he says. You tell me if this makes any sense. How Mr. Zelensky goes about restoring his territorial integrity is a question for him to answer. It's an operation or operations that he must conduct. We're not getting involved in telling him how and when to do that. But we've never recognized Crimea as anything other than a part of Ukraine. But what they do going forward is going to be for them to decide. We want all of Ukraine's internationally recognized borders to be

restored. Isn't that crazy? We want all of Ukraine's international recognized international borders to be restored. What is he talking about? An invasion of Crimea? That's in effect what he is giving a green light to. And of course, in this case, his understanding of the history of Crimea would appear to be a bit weak. Because up until 1956, Crimea was part of Russia. And it had been conquered by Catherine the Great in the 18th century and was always a part of Russia. 300 years it's been a part of Russia. So the last 60 years undo that, apparently, and that was a fix done by Khrushchev for political reasons.

He wanted support from one power player or another, and then, so he made the change. Now, when Admiral Kirby makes statements like that, are they run past the CIA first before he gets out there and says, you know, we want Ukraine to be liberated to its original borders? No, I don't think so in a case like this. I rather suspect there were discussions in which there might have been a CIA person in the room sitting at the table and if called upon providing a viewpoint. But this is essentially a political decision. And what makes this particularly serious is, of course, if you push on this statement hard enough, it basically is very close to being a declaration of U.S. intervention in support of Ukraine against Russia,

a military intervention. That's rather scary. Paul Jay Last week I asked your former colleague, with whom you agree on nothing, Jack Devine, how, if at all, one could define victory in Ukraine from the Western perspective. It's a very interesting and longish answer, but I'd like you to comment on it, Phil. You push until the Russians cease and desist. I don't believe this piece, right? But I do think you'll reach a point where everyone's using up so much ammunition, so many soldiers have died, that you slow down the pace of war. No one wins. War could go on for a long time, but it will not go on for a long time at this level. And victory is not about Ukraine. It's the geopolitical risk of the world

today, and it's the China, Russia, and their allies, the alliance against the West. If Russia fails to accomplish its goal, he will go, and that will change the geopolitical. There's a bigger thing at play here than just the current day-to-day fighting. And I think there's a world that's going to be unstable if we allow Putin to go unchallenged. And I think we're doing a very good job of challenging him. There's a world that will be unstable if we allow Putin to go go unchallenged we're doing a good job of challenging him i read that to mean we want to get rid of him and we want to get russians out of uh out of the russian military out of ukraine how do you rate it well i read it that he basically is looking at a a bipartite world in which there's a winner and a loser. And I think this is a misreading of where the West's relationship with China and Russia were going before the United States and primarily the force this war to happen. And the thing is, Putin has argued quite credibly for many years now

that there are many different models in the world and everybody should be allowed to have their own model, their own culture, their own interests, and all that sort of thing. To me, that's a very reasonable approach. And the United States instead has been pushing for a unilateral model, which is governed by this rule of international law that are laws that are made up as you go along, rules that are made up as you go along. And I prefer the Putin model. President Putin spoke today in Russia to a gathering of FSB officers. Now, I guess that's their domestic intelligence service, FSB? Yes, it is. Okay. Because he said to them, and this is an English translation,

so there's an American idiom in here, raise your game against the Western agencies. What do you think he's talking about? Why would he issue an order or a goal like that in public? That would be like Joe Biden speaking to FBI agents, telling them, you know, there's a lot of Russian spies in northern New Jersey, go get them. Is that true? Right now we're covered with eight inches of snow. I don't know if it's true. Yeah. No, I think it's what he's telling them. Raise your game is a very specific kind of invocation in the military and intelligence circles. making a lot more noise in terms of presenting what they consider their case than the Russians

and their friends and sources have been doing to counter that. I think that's what he's saying. How active is the CIA physically on the ground? Maybe they don't do the spying on the ground. I don't know. Maybe it's all done electronically these days. How active is the CIA in Russia? That's a good question. CIA has always had some human sources in Russia that it has worked very hard to maintain contact with. I would suspect that that's still the case. Although I was also suspect that the numbers of these people and the ability to meet them on a regular basis has probably been greatly eroded. But, yeah, you get the best intelligence. Just, you know, think in terms of your own profession. You get the best information and you get the best intelligence if you're face to face and one question can lead to another question and to another response and then to another question. That's how it works to get good intelligence. Is it likely that Russian intelligence knew what the CIA and the Navy were up to before President Biden gave the order to blow up? You know, they pack, according to Cy Hirsch, they pack the explosives in June.

He gave the order to blow it up in September. They had to concoct some excuses to what they were doing in the water in September. But the explosives were there for three months. Question, is it likely Russian intelligence was aware that the explosives were there for three months? I don't think so. And the reason why I don't think so is because there would have been proactive things that the Russians could have done to maybe prevent what occur. They could have leaked stories about what was there on the seabed. They could have incurred... The water there was about 300 feet deep where the explosives were planted, I think. So the fact is they could have even invited people to go, journalists to go down and take a look.

There were a lot of proactive things that they could have done to prevent it, and they didn't do it. So I'd rather suspect, no, they didn't, though. But once the explosion was detonated and the environmental catastrophe and economic catastrophe was immediately apparent. Did Russian intel know that it was us? I hate to say us. You and I have nothing to do with it. It was the United States government. It was the Biden administration.

It was the CIA and the Navy. They might not have had evidence that would stand up in court. But nevertheless, they would have known this was the only available perpetrator, the only entity that had both the motive and the capability to do it. So I think they knew for sure who did it. But the question was, of course, apart from the ruins of pipelines on the seabed and possibly ability to reconstruct how it was done mechanically, they really didn't have what kind of proof they could use to go to the UN or go to mainstream media. Got it. Got it. Phil Giraldi, always a pleasure. Your wealth house of, storehouse of knowledge. Thank you very much for

joining us. Well, thank you. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom.