Judging Freedom - COL. Douglas Macgregor: Is Iran a Threat to the US?

Episode Date: May 6, 2025

COL. Douglas Macgregor: Is Iran a Threat to the US?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

you Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, May 6, 2025. Colonel Douglas McGregor will be here with us in just a moment on is Iran Iran really a threat to the United States? But first this. While the markets are giving us whiplash have you seen the price of gold? It's soaring! In the past 12 months gold has risen to more than $3,000 an ounce. I'm so glad I bought my gold it's not too late for you to buy yours. The same experts that predicted gold at $3200 an ounce now predict gold at $4500 or more

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Capital. You'll have a great conversation and they'll send you very helpful information. Learn how you can store gold in your IRA tax and penalty free or have it sent directly to your doorstep. There's zero pressure to buy and you have a 100% risk-free purchase guarantee. It's time to see if gold is right for you. Call 800-511-4620, 800-511-4620 or go to learjudgenap.com and tell them your friend the judge sent you. Colonel McGregor, welcome here, my dear friend. Before we get to the area I want to explore with you, the Middle East and Ukraine and statements by the Secretary of Defense and Secretary of State

that Iran, I said Ukraine, I meant Iran, I'm gonna confuse myself. The Middle East and Iran and statements by the Secretaries of State and Defense that Iran poses a threat to the United States. Before we get there, some questions about Ukraine. Are you able to discern if Steve Witkoff, the president's emissary, not General Kellogg, the other emissary, but Steve Witkoff is making progress toward a resolution

of the special military operation? My perception is no. There's very little ultimately that Mr. Witkoff can do. And I think that's because of President Trump. President Trump has made so many contradictory statements recently that would lead the Russians to believe that he's not a reliable negotiating partner. That he doesn't have a true position

that rests on a foundation of careful thought and analysis. The president announced suddenly that he's going to support the Ukrainians with another $540 million package, and this is in part based on his meeting with this Baptist minister and this is in part based on his meeting with this Baptist minister who visited Ukraine and came back extraordinarily pro-Ukrainian and begged the president not to abandon Ukraine. You know, this is sort of emotional nonsense. It's not rooted in anything factual and is so divorced from American national interest and strategic interest, that the Russians shake their heads in disbelief and have decided they'll be polite, but they're going to finish this war

and it will finish on their terms. Going to run a clip for you that I know you've seen before here and elsewhere. It's a rather feeble Joe Biden in the one debate that he had with Donald Trump. But here's the point that he makes, and you tell me if it's that distinct from what Trump said on Sunday. So Chris, cut number nine.

The fact is that Putin is a war criminal. He's killed thousands and thousands of people. And he has made one thing clear. He wants to reestablish what was part of the Soviet empire, not just a peace, he wants all of Ukraine. That's what he wants. And then you think he'll stop there? Do you think he'll stop when he, if he takes Ukraine? What do you think happens to the Pol?

What do you think of Belarus? What do you think happens to those NATO? What do you think of Belarus? What do you think happens to those NATO countries? Now cut number 10, Chris. Ukraine there's been discussions they will have to give up some of the land. Russia will have to give up all of Ukraine because that's what they want. All of Ukraine, meaning they wouldn't keep any of the land that they've claimed. Russia would have to give up all of Ukraine because what Russia wants is all of Ukraine. And if I didn't get involved, they would be fighting right now for all of Ukraine.

Russia doesn't want the strip that they have now. Russia wants all of Ukraine. And if it weren't me, they would keep going. I guess this is the type of misstatement of which you spoke a few minutes ago because Colonel you have told us and so is almost everybody else on this Program that there is not a scintilla of evidence that Putin wants all of Ukraine In fact, there's much evidence to indicate to the contrary Yeah, I mean the tragedy here is that President Trump a few weeks ago said something very different

And he recognized that Ukraine was going to have ago said something very different, and he recognized that Ukraine was going to have to give something up in order to end this war, but at no point did he suggest what he did in this last statement. I think, again, President Trump is far too easily influenced by the last person that spoke with him. You cannot run a country this way. You can't govern this way. You cannot conduct foreign and defense policy this way.

How on earth can his emissaries, whether it's Kellogg or Woodcoff, have any credibility in the Kremlin? And what on earth does the Kremlin think when they hear something like that? something like that. Well, General Kellogg has no credibility anyway. The Russians regard him as a sort of a cartoon character cut out. Mr. Witkoff was taken seriously. I doubt now that he will ever be taken seriously again. And I think that Mr. Witkoff probably did the best he could

to represent what he thought President Trump's views were. But as we've just found out, his views then and his views now are not the same. So again, there's a problem that the president has with these tendencies to vacillate between one position and the other. And that is a prescription for disaster. It's a prescription for conflict and crisis. So at this point, I think we have become irrelevant. It's a prescription for disaster. It's a prescription for conflict and crisis. So at this point, I think we have become irrelevant.

The notion that he would say that if it were not for him, that the Russians would be fighting for all of Ukraine is ludicrous nonsense. It's delusional narcissism. It's a very dangerous thing. I mean, I like the man and I like many of his views when I thought he made sense, which was very different for several years ago from what I'm hearing now. But this, this is just nonsense, but it's dangerous because it leads people to assume that we are as reckless as a teenager with

TikTok that nothing lasts beyond the next election cycle, a great power that is governed in that way and led in that way is on the road to failure. And I think that's where we are. At the risk of gilding the lily, here's Donald Trump in that same debate with Joe Biden. And this is what he sold the American people on. Chris, cut number eight. It should have never happened. I will have that war settled between Putin and Zelensky as president-elect before I take

office on January 20th. I'll have that war settled. People being killed so needlessly, so stupidly, and I will get it settled and I'll get it settled fast before I take office. Now you are a career military man and an extraordinary military historian. You're not a psychiatrist. How does one get from that Donald Trump to the one we just played on Sunday morning on Meet the Press? Well, I think you get that way

because he is easily influenced by people that are around him that encourage him to believe that he in fact is what he described, the key figure that is standing between the President to Putin and Moscow and the conquest of all of Ukraine. That's just ludicrous nonsense, but somebody's ultimately planted that in his head. That appeals to him.

He likes that. You know, the sad part is that people don't have much confidence in themselves when they change positions that radically. And the reason for that is that he doesn't know very much about Ukraine or Russia. And he's dependent upon others to tell him things. You know, this is back to the discussion we had some time ago where you talked about the constitution.

Well, if I need to know something, I'll find someone to tell me the answer. You know, you can't do that as president of the United States, there's too much at stake. And right now, it should be pretty clear in everyone's mind that we have an interest in settling whatever differences we have with the Russians. That should be at the top of the agenda. That's where I thought he was headed.

And that made a lot of sense. Not sustaining this criminal regime in Kiev that is simply the opposite of everything that we in the United States purport to believe in. This is not a democratic state. These people are criminals. They've stolen 50 percent of everything that's been turned over to them and resold things on the black market. I mean, how many times do we have to see Mexican cartel members walking

around with javelin missiles or other sophisticated equipment that was picked up from Ukraine? I mean, this is outrageous nonsense, but I think it's a serious problem, and he's unfortunately fallen victim to this. You and I have spent a lot of time publicly and privately discussing the Constitution. You and I recently taped a segment for your show, your terrific show, McGregor, in which we talked about the Constitution and the rule of law and the laws of war. Again, I don't wanna gild the lily, but here's what President Trump said about the Constitution in this same interview with Kristen Welker of Meet the Press.

It's very upsetting. Cut number 11. In a nine to zero decision, the Supreme Court directed your administration to facilitate the return, you've talked about this in the past, of Kilmar Briego Garcia from a prison in El Salvador whose deportation your administration called an administrative error.

Do you have the power to bring Abrego Garcia back as the supreme president? Well, I have the power to ask for him to come back if I'm instructed by the attorney general that it's legal to do so. Your secretary of state says everyone who's here, citizens and non-citizens, deserve due process. Do you agree, Mr. President? I don't know. I'm not a lawyer.

I don't know. I was elected to get him the hell out of here, and the courts are holding me from doing it. But even given those numbers that you're talking about, don't you need to uphold the Constitution of the United States as president? I don't know. How can you possibly answer, I don't know, when asked, don't you need to uphold the Constitution of the United States? You and I can recite from memory the oath that he took to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. No, exactly. I mean, I think

he probably would have been better off had he said, I need to sit down with my advisory staff, the people who are more knowledgeable about the legal aspects of this, and determine whether or not the Constitution should be interpreted in that in that particular way. And we all know that the Constitution has over many, many years been interpreted in many different ways. Not all of us like that. I think I'm more of a constructionalist, if you're constructivist in my thinking about it, but we do know that the Constitution

has been open to interpretation in the past. I don't think he meant to say that he doesn't know if he's supposed to uphold the Constitution. I just don't think that's what he meant. I think he meant we need to go back and re-examine it. But again, judge, this is the larger problem across this administration. There is very little preparation and thinking that is going into action. Action is too impulsive. It's too sudden and frequently reckless.

This is the problem with war. We talk about bombing Iran, destroying Iran or stopping the Russians. We don't have any idea what a real war entails, not these brushfire colonial wars that we have fought in places like Iraq and Afghanistan over the last 25 years. We're talking about a war that is on the scale potentially of a great power war like the Second World War. We don't understand that you have things that are called mobilization and industries that

have to produce and access to manpower in order to fill the ranks of the armed forces. Nobody is thinking in those terms, and so a lot of statements are made on impulse and emotion. I don't know how you stop it because it starts with the president at the top. Switching gears to the Middle East and Iran Colonel. Over the weekend Prime Minister Netanyahu announced that the IDF would soon occupy all of Gaza. He threatened to attack Iran because a Houthi missile landed at Ben Gurion Airport and he threatened President Erdogan of Turkey

arguing that he has reason to believe this must mean Mossad but he didn't mention Mossad by name as a source that Turkey is resupplying Hezbollah. Where is he going with all this? Mr Netanyahu has right now in his mind and in the minds of his countrymen, the unconditional backing of the United States and access to the employment of the United States Armed Forces in whatever way he chooses. That's very important to understand. The man wants to settle in his mind accounts with all of his neighbors. That means they have to be subjugated, killed, destroyed if necessary in order to make the world safe for Israel and the greater Israel project. That's where he is. So he's unafraid and would

seem to be at a distance incautious, but for the reasons I just outlined, he's unafraid and would seem to be at a distance incautious, but for the reasons I just outlined, he's unafraid to challenge anybody because he thinks he can take on the world, at least in his part of the world, in the Middle East, because he has our unconditional backing. And this is very important to understand, Judge, because we're trying to resume talks with Iran. Anyone who thinks that the talks that we're trying to resume with Iran have any interest or importance to Mr. Netanyahu is wrong. Mr. Netanyahu has an agenda, and that agenda means to subjugate Iran, to take away its capacity to produce a nuclear weapon permanently. If that means destroying Iranian society, if it means killing the members of the Iranian government, that's fine.

That's where he is. When we talk about Gaza, he's not talking about simply moving into Gaza. He's talking about finishing off what there is left of the population in Gaza. And he's probably aware, because I'm sure the Mossad has provided him with this kind of intelligence, that if he goes in and butchers the rest of this population or sets out to,

that the Egyptian army on the other side will not sit and do nothing. They will become involved. And the King of Jordan has allegedly, privately said, if that happens, that he will support the Egyptians. Now that's the beginning of a regional war because neither the Iranians or the Turks or the Saudis or anybody else in the region are going to sit there quietly

and ignore what happens. Iran has a very close relationship with Egypt. There are agreements in place. The Chinese recently conducted exercise with the Egyptians to send a very strong signal that they are not going to sit by the wayside and do nothing in the event that the Egyptian state comes under attack by Israel. And the Israelis have talked about that

because they see the necessity of destroying everyone in their path in order to achieve their objective. So I don't know that we should expect much to come out of these talks between Iran and us. I would not be surprised in the least if the Gaza blows up, explodes, and what I just described happens and drags us into a much larger regional war, a war for which we really aren't prepared. Does Iran pose the remotest threat to the national security of the United States of America,

Colonel McGregor? No, no, and it has never posed a direct threat to us. Unfortunately, we've had every think tank in Washington that has been ultimately taken over and run by Zionists, and they have been promoting this notion for the last couple of decades, probably longer, that all evil and trouble in the Middle East begins with Iran, simply because Iran has been

in the forefront of resisting the Israelis. And anyone who resists the Israelis and what they want to do is the enemy and has to be destroyed. Therefore, it has to be demonized as much as possible. That's what's happened. I mean, you could talk to any number of people that I served with,

oh, well, let's just finish Iran off and get it over with. They're just a problem. And somebody said to me recently, well, look, they killed're just a problem. And somebody said to me recently, well, look, they killed our soldiers in Iraq. And I said to this man, what would we do if we were watching a foreign army in Northern Mexico essentially fight a Mexican insurgency?

What would we respond to do? I mean, what actions would we take? I said, certainly I think we would probably help the Mexicans against the foreign invader. It's in our interest to do so because we don't want a foreign invader who's hostile to us on our borders. I said, the same logic applies with the Iranians.

And by the way, the Iranians taught the Iraqis what to do, the Iraqi resistance, and they did it. That's part of the rationale that Mr. Netanyahu persuaded Trump was the justification for killing General Soleimani. General Soleimani had worked tirelessly to help us and support us in destroying ISIS. Soleimani was instrumental in bringing about an arrangement for peace in southern Iraq and getting Muqtada al-Sadr and a number of other people out of Iraq so that we could essentially get the Shiites to stop fighting us.

This is back when we had the surge, which really was not just a military surge that cost us a thousand lives, but hundreds of millions of dollars in cash were passed out to buy friends. All of that was part of it. Then suddenly we turn around and kill Soleimani, who is a legitimate member of the Iranian government, effectively the equivalent of senior national security advisor to the leadership of the country. And we acted as though this was justified. It wasn't. It was a mistake. I don't think we've ever had a true picture of Iran or what it does or doesn't do because the Iranians have always involved themselves if it was necessary to protect fellow Shiites. The Shiites are a minority in the Muslim world. There are Shiites in the Gulf. There's some Shiites

actually in Saudi Arabia, not many. Shiites in Yemen, as we know, Shiites in the Gulf, there's some Shiites actually in Saudi Arabia, not many, Shiites in Yemen as we know, Shiites in southern Lebanon. They have helped those people whenever they could. Now if you want to say that's terrorism directed at Israel because Israel has found itself at war with the people in southern Lebanon, you could take that position. But before the Israelis occupied southern Lebanon, there was no such thing as Hezbollah. In other words, much like our own behavior in Iraq and to a large extent, I would argue in Afghanistan, we have cultivated our own enemies.

The Israelis have cultivated their own enemies. But these people that are opposed to what the Israelis want to do to them are not necessarily interested in us. They never have been. In fact, Iran has bent over backwards to try and find some way to reconcile with us for the last 20 plus years. We've walked away from it because of Israeli pressure. By what conceivable legal, moral, or political justification would there be for international inspection of Iran nuclear capabilities, but no inspection of Israeli? Well, this is, ultimately there isn't.

I mean, we know that. And it's really Israel's monopoly that Israel wants to maintain because it's that monopoly on nuclear weapons that enables the Israelis to bully their neighbors. You know, if you attack us, we'll use a nuclear weapon against you. That's a pretty powerful incentive

for anybody around you to stay away. And I think that it, to some extent, extent has helped Israel but now I think it's a burden not an asset but the Israelis don't see it that way they see this as justified for a whole range of reasons that we don't need to go into that they think they deserve special treatment because of what happened to them 80 years ago. Again, this is another matter. I don't agree with that. I think that the Israelis, if they really do want some sort of arrangement,

they should join the international community. They should accept the International Atomic Energy Commission's views. They should work with the international community as well as within their own region, but they're not going to do that. They're special. They'll tell you all about it. All you have to do is ask them. I mean, think about it just as the Russian possession of a nuclear weapon is a restraint on our use of a nuclear weapon, wouldn't an Iranian possession of a nuclear weapon

bring stability to the Middle East and force restraint on the part of Israel? Well, that's right. And Israel doesn't wanna be restrained in any way. It wants complete freedom of action and expects us to provide it and enable it. Without us, they don't have that freedom of action. We have nuclear weapons in the hands of the Pakistan and enable it without us, they don't have that freedom of action.

We have nuclear weapons in the hands of Pakistan and in Indian hands, and thus far we've had no nuclear confrontation between those countries. So I think that you can argue that it has provided a measure of stability to the Indian subcontinent that has not excluded periodic skirmishes or attacks from either side, but it has prevented all-out war. So in that sense, I think you could make a pretty good argument for what you've just said that if anything, the presence of nuclear weapons tends on the whole to prevent all-out war. Now our audience is largely Now our audience is largely pro-peace, but Chris ran a poll. Over 1,500 people have responded. Just in the past hour, the question is, will Netanyahu drag Trump into a war with Iran?

Yes, 73 percent. No, 27 percent. Well, I think the 73 percent are very thoughtful and intelligent people. I think that's the great danger. Because you and I know whatever you may think about President Trump, we know from personal experience President Trump does not want a war with Iran. There's no question in my mind about that. The problem is feeling that way is probably not enough. That's the problem. Well, you told us earlier this is a bitter criticism. You made this observation, I don't

want to put words in your mouth. He seems to believe whoever he's been speaking to last. Yes, I think so. He can go to Camp David with this minister friend of his and come back and have an entirely different attitude about Ukraine. He's not talking to CIA or DNI or Defense Department or State Department. He's talking to a minister and she changes his mind entirely on Ukraine? Well, remember when we were talking at some point about Syria and there were two sets of missile strikes that President Trump launched into Syria and he was approached with

photographs of allegedly babies or a child or something that had been asphyxiated by some form of nerve gas by Syrian agents, whoever they were, whether they were government or otherwise. And suddenly he was enraged when he saw this picture. He's certainly not enraged by what's happening in Gaza. And what's happening in Gaza is far worse. And as it turned out, both times those missile strikes occurred, not only did they change nothing

and simply explode into the dirt, but it turned out that the justification for them was completely false, as the various investigating authorities in Great Britain and the United States and elsewhere in the world discovered. So he is influenced by things. He has strong emotions. I wish he would put some of those emotions to work in Gaza, where people are dying,

starving to death, being butchered and killed right now. And he hasn't done it. an hour ago, just about 40 minutes or so before we began taping this segment about the Houthis capitulating. Tell me if this is credible. Cut number 20. The Houthis have announced that they are not, or they've been announced to us at least, that they don't want to fight anymore. They just don't want to fight. And we will honor that. And we will we will stop the bombings. And they have capitulated. But more importantly, they we will take their word. They say they will not be blowing up ships anymore. And that's what the purpose of what we were doing. that's just news we just found out about that. Is that even why would they make such an announcement? Pardon me Colonel? I have

no way of knowing if any of that's true and he simply announced this first of all the word capitulation strikes me as being perhaps the wrong one, because after all, the Houthis have made it very clear from the beginning that what they were doing was to support their brethren in Gaza. And as long as their brethren in Gaza are being butchered and killed, it seems difficult for me to imagine why they would now simply stop because of a discussion with us. I'm not sure the president's gotten the whole story, but he likes to announce things that he thinks demonstrates a success story for himself and his administration. We'll have to wait and see.

I could go on and on and on from the interview because of his claim that gas prices are under $2 a gallon. I'm kind of tired of fact checking him. I think we can see the pattern here, Colonel, and we can see how dangerous it is. And when he surrounds himself with people that he likes, not people that are necessarily competent. I'm thinking of my former Fox colleague who's now the Secretary of Defense. This exacerbates things. This just feeds his ego and enables him, I'm not a shrink obviously, to change his mind radically based upon who has been whispering into his ear last. his mind radically based upon who has been whispering into his ear last.

Well, there's also something else. Uh, I'm sure you're aware of it, but apparently his son, Don Jr and Mr. Witkoff's son together were in cutter involved in some multi-billion dollar deal involving the Trump family digital exchange. Uh, I'm not sure I know the details, but there doesn't seem to be any self-awareness with the administration. There wasn't any self-awareness with the Biden administration. Biden's son was engaged in all sorts of heinous acts as we know, and that

didn't seem to make any difference. Now, Don Jr. is by no stretch of the imagination imagination someone who commits heinous acts, but certainly the appearance of cutting these kinds of deals along with Mr. Witkoff's son in a place like Qatar. And we know that Mr. Witkoff, when he was last in Qatar, ostensibly for the purpose of talking to the hoodies, or not the hoodies, excuse me, the representatives of Hamas

reached some sort of $700 billion plus deal or $700 million, excuse me, deal for real estate in New York City. I mean, there's too much aggrandizement on the financial side involved in Washington these days. It's not just the congressmen and women who are profiting from insider training. This kind of thing with wealthy people like the Trumps and Biden and his colleagues, all of this is very depressing for the rest of us. It's untoward, it's the sort of thing

that should not be done while you're holding office, especially somebody like Mr. Witkoff. I'm sure that he and Mr. Trump are doing a land office business. That's how they got billions of dollars. But is this the sort of thing one ought to be prosecuting while you are representing the United States? Of course not. Maybe now we know why Maybe now we know why Wittkopf is just the president's personal emissary rather than an officer of the United States requiring an FBI background check and confirmation by the United States Senate and compliance with certain ethical standards which would prohibit at least on their face the self-dealing of which is spoke. So much more for us to talk about, Colonel, but I've kept you long enough.

Thank you very much for your time. These conversations are not always happy, but they are always illuminating. And it is a pleasure and a privilege for me to be able to pick your brain on a subject about which you know so much. Thank you, Colonel. Thank you, Colonel. Thank you, Judge. Good to see you. Likewise. Coming up at three o'clock this afternoon on all of these topics, she has written an unbelievable piece called Washington at War about the battle

for Donald Trump's brain and heart among his inner circle. You won't want to miss that. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, three o'clock today. Trump's brain and heart among his inner circle. You won't wanna miss that. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, three o'clock today. Judges on the Palo Alto for Judging Freedom. You