Judging Freedom - Col. Douglas Macgregor: US Foreign Policy on the Brink

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

Col. Douglas Macgregor: US Foreign Policy on the BrinkSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday, July 12th, 2024. Colonel Douglas McGregor joins us now. Colonel McGGregor, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for your time. What good can come from the saber rattling we heard out of Washington, D.C. this week as NATO purported to be celebrating its 75th anniversary? Well, I can't imagine much good coming out of any of it because on the one hand, you have the possibility that Moscow actually takes some of this seriously and thinks that we're prepared to do things we're not. And that's been a problem, Judge, as you know, for a very long time. The other aspect is that they just end up looking ridiculous. They're essentially paying tribute to what is effectively a dementia patient in charge of, as everybody says, the greatest alliance in the world. anything, I don't want to get into Kosovo, but just look at Ukraine. All it's doing is provoking a needless, useless war. And Colonel, unless I read it incorrectly, now they're intimating they want to move into Asia. I didn't know the North Atlantic went over

there. Well, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was transformed a long time ago into a Trojan horse for American military, political, and economic influence. Over the last 50 years, we've seen the Europeans voluntarily convert themselves into vassal states of the greater American empire. That's one of the problems that we have right now is that Europeans, in most cases, have almost no defense establishment, very, very little defense industry. So they look to us almost 100 percent. We, on the other hand, have also made our forces almost unusable in any operation except against weak, incapable opponents. And the problem that we're up against right now is we continue to behave as though Russia is something it's not, as though Russia is weak, Russia is small, and Russia ultimately has no choice but to effectively bow to our influence and power. That's not going to happen. And as Mr. Orban,

who was in Moscow, recently said, if you pursue this, you will awaken the wrath of Moscow on a grand scale. You will get the strategic response from Russia that you do not want. But his warnings keep falling on deaf ears, and the dementia patient continues to make ridiculous statements that are totally unsupportable in public. Here's President Putin addressing that very issue, Colonel, on June 28th, cut number one. In 2019, we announced that we would neither produce these missiles nor deploy them,

as long as the United States does not deploy such systems anywhere around the globe. We now know that the United States is not only producing these missile systems, but has brought them to Europe,mark to use in exercises not long ago it was reported that they are in the philippines it is unclear whether they have taken these missiles out from the philippines or not in any case we need to respond to this and decide on our further steps in this regard. It appears that we need to begin producing these attack systems and then, based on the actual situation, decide on where to deploy them to ensure our security if necessary.

I would say you're 100% correct. The Russians take this saber-rattling very seriously. Yeah, the standard missile series that we've got, it's a very good class of missiles. Fortunately, the president of the Philippines decided that he did not want to become the Zelensky of Asia, and so he asked us to withdraw those missiles from the Philippines. So I think at least in Asia for the moment, things are relatively calm unless we do something incredibly stupid to provoke others. That's not the case in Europe right now. And he's correct. And I don't know what we're going to gain by any of it. It's almost as though, you know, President Biden is on top of the defense industry

and the military, and together they're collectively a rogue agent. And they're careening down the side of a mountain in some sort of a racing looks at what he just described, the Finns, the Swedes, let alone the Romanians, Bulgarians, everyone else on the eastern border with Russia, has to conclude that going along with us with this offensive force posture directed at Moscow is essentially suicidal. President Orban made what I thought was a terrific trip. He visited Kiev, he visited Moscow, he visited Beijing, and Brussels went apoplectic to the extent that they can. The now-retired or about-to-leave, I'm not sure when he leaves office,

Secretary General Stoltenberg wasn't very happy with it when President Orban came to D.C. I don't think Joe Biden shook hands with him. What did he do? He got on a plane and flew to Mar-a-Lago. Maybe he knows something we don't. But here's General Stoltenberg on July 7 downplaying, undermining what Prime Minister Orban attempted to do. Cut number 11. Prime Minister Orban, he made it clear when he came to Moscow that he didn't go there on behalf of NATO, different NATO allies interact with Moscow in different ways.

What matters for me is that all allies have agreed that we need to do more for Ukraine, both with this new training and assistance that NATO will provide to Ukraine, but also with the long-term pledge. And I also expect that by the summit that starts next week, allies will make new announcements of more air defence and more ammunition.

So, yes, Hungary have, also Prime Minister Orbán has been in Moscow, but that doesn't change the common decisions you have made as NATO. At one point he said he may be the head of the EU for six months, but he doesn't have a mandate. Orbán snapped right back, I don't need a mandate. I'm on a mission of peace. Colonel, I'm pretty sure his reference to the long-term pledge was a reference to language used by the American State Department that, and this is crazy, but this is what they said, NATO's path, excuse me, Ukraine's path to NATO is inevitable and irreversible. If you can bite your your tongue i'll let you take it from there

i think we have to understand that the dementia patient is really a metaphor for the west at this point right president biden is is not entirely sure where he is at any given point in time excuse me he's not even sure of his audience or the people he's talking to. Stoltenberg is such a shameless puppet of the United States and what it wants to pursue strategically that even in Norway, they've begun to notice. And the Norwegians have been among the, in my judgment, the most foolish of the people in Scandinavia with regard to Russia. Stoltenberg's father, by the way, was a very distinguished gentleman who did much good work. He, the current Stoltenberg, is obviously not in that category, and he's about to be replaced by Mark Rutte from the Netherlands, who is even worse than Stoltenberg. It's interesting to me that the people that we

have selected to be our talking heads for NATO, and that's what we do, we ultimately do make those decisions in Washington. We picked this Norwegian, and now we're picking a Dutchman. Two states of, what, less than five million people that have almost no armed forces by the standards of, say, Russia, Turkey, or the United States, and we're letting them be our spokespersons. The whole thing is a travesty, and I hope the Europeans are paying attention. I'm beginning to get indications from people in Finland and Sweden that they are waking up. They've suddenly figured out that these missiles that Putin is talking about could end up on their soil without any notice whatsoever, any notification, without permission necessarily, and could be aimed and fired at Russia.

So I think they're finally figuring out that this is utterly ridiculous because there is no evidence that the Russians have the slightest interest in going into Finland, Sweden, or Denmark or anywhere else. But I don't think anything is going to change until the dementia patient finally steps away. When he steps away, I think you will see the ability of others to step forward and say, we've gone as far as we can, we need to back down. And when I say back down, I mean back down, stop the nonsense. There's no one interested in a war with Russia who is sane in Europe or the United States today. Except in the United States, correct me if I'm

wrong, that neocon mentality seems to dominate in both parties. Put aside Trump, I think that world changes if he becomes president. But if Joe Biden goes away in the next couple of weeks, the neocon mentality, I think, still prevails. You could be right, but I do think we could see change even before the election. People at the top of the Democratic Party may not be people that I would vote for, but they're not stupid. And they realize that they've got a tiger by the tail. The tiger may be demented and the tiger is over the hill and tiresome, but they want the tiger to stop roaring. I think that's pretty clear. Well, if you didn't see this last night,

maybe you'll chuckle or maybe you'll have pity. Cut number two. Ukraine will prevail in this war and we'll stand with them every single step of the way. That's what the compact says, loudly and clearly. And now I want to hand it over to the president of Ukraine who has as much courage as he has determination. Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin. President Putin. He's going to beat President Putin. President Zelensky. I'm so focused

on beating Putin, we got to worry about it. Anyway, Mr. President. I'm better. You are a hell of a lot better. Thank you so much. First, I thought it was a tasteless joke. And then I thought, you know, Joe Biden doesn't have the wit to offer a joke tasteless or otherwise. But the earlier part of the speech is equally as dangerous in my view as his mental slip, still preaching that Ukraine will prevail. Does the rest of NATO honestly believe this? No. As I've said this to you before, I think others that you've interviewed

have made these points, like Larry Johnson and Scott Ritter. I served at a pretty high level in NATO. I was fortunate to work for some really wonderful people who were the equivalent of four stars in the British and German armies. I still am reasonably well connected. And what I can say is that behind the scenes, people are extremely uncomfortable. They don't like any of it. And if you look at the opinion polls in Europe, they have turned decisively against a confrontation with Russia. Even Schultz, who is another lackey for Washington, has stated publicly that under no circumstances will any German soldiers or any German in uniform go to Ukraine? Even in Poland, where there was

initial enthusiasm for this crazy crusade against Russia, people have now stepped back and said, no, we really don't want to end up a smoking ruin like Ukraine. And I think that's the bottom line. Look at what's happened in Ukraine, multiply it by a hundred times, and that could be Eastern Europe in a very short period of time. And the question is, why? What for? What are we trying to achieve? And all this business about democracy versus fascism or communism is nonsense. If there is a fascist or communist right now in Eastern Europe, his name is Zelensky. And we know that because we know what his secret police does. We know what his state is up to. We know what he's done to churches.

And we have an appreciation for the rampant organized crime in Ukraine, which is just shameless. The human trafficking, the disappearance of tens of thousands of children and women into the underworld where they're exploited and ultimately killed. This is what we're propping up. People know that. It can't go on. Well, we know that President Zelensky, he's not even the president anymore. He is the head of the government de facto, would never consent to any kind of a ceasefire because that would mean he'd have to get rid of martial law, the exposition

of what you're talking about, and there'd have to be elections. And of course, there's no way he'd be elected. I don't even know if he would physically survive any election campaign. Colonel, President Biden boasted, maybe it was at the NATO conference, that we have 100,000 troops in Europe. What are we doing with 100,000 troops in Europe? Are they a tripwire? Well, 100,000 troops in Europe, and I assume he's talking about ground forces, although I may be wrong on that. It sounded like he was, but who knows what he meant? Well, those 100,000 ground forces are a drop in the bucket. You're talking about a minimum of eight to 900,000 Russian troops that oppose you. You've got 100,000 American troops and they

are going to be the core of a European force that's going to attack Russia? Well, that's absurd. You know, they're strung out along perhaps a thousand kilometers from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Slovakia, Moldova, down to Romania. Who are we kidding? I mean, it's too widely dispersed. It's not effectively organized. It's not adequately trained at this point. I don't know what the morale and discipline are like, but the things I'm hearing from our behavior in Poland of our troops doesn't encourage me to see much good there. It can't be a tripwire because the Russians are certainly not going to attack Poland. They're not going to attack those Baltic literal states. They've never had any intention of doing so.

But what Putin has made very clear and the Russian government, not just President Putin, but Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister, is if we allow missiles and aircraft to be launched from territory that is NATO territory, in any of those states that I mentioned, then he will regard or Russia will regard the source of those missiles as legitimate targets. So within the space of an hour, we could see dozens of airfields, airports and troop cantonments, storage areas, command and control sites, essentially vaporized in a hail of missiles. So I don't think there's much of a tripwire there. I think we're just kidding ourselves. We're kidding the American people.

It reminds me of watching our responses to emergencies around the world. One of the first things we do is usually send an aircraft carrier group. And then we have these wonderful pictures of the carrier at sea and the planes taking off and landing. And Americans are proud and they think something's happening. In reality, the people ashore could care less, has no impact whatsoever ashore. I think we're doing things for the same reason in Europe right now. We're trying to have a PR impact for the people back home. Because you know, Judge, there are always foolish Americans that are members of what I call the bombs away club. They think that our greatness is served when we bomb hapless opponents.

What we've got to understand is up until now, we have been attacking people who cannot defend themselves. If we are drawn into a direct confrontation with the Russians, which looks eminently possible, given the stupid remarks that we're making, then you're going to be up against a force that can fight back on a dramatic scale. We need to wake up. We need to understand it and ask ourselves, why? Why? What is the purpose? What do we gain from this? And the Ukrainian people aren't going to gain anything. That state, that nation is destroyed.

Colonel, before we segue to Israel and Gaza, Professor Ted Postol, whom you and I respect this morning, reports that Ukraine has attacked a Russian nuclear warning system at Orsk, O-R-S-K. Is this a credible report? And if it is, how dangerous is this? Do they ask Tony Blinken and Lloyd Austin before they can do something like this? It doesn't sound as though they do. And frankly, it's really the CIA that's running the operation there. So the real question is, has Ambassador Burns had anything to do with this? Because we have, as President Putin and Sergei Lavrov pointed out, provided targeting information

and overhead surveillance and intelligence to the Ukrainians. My fear is that this was not accidental. Remember, your viewers will remember, a few months ago, they struck another early warning radar in the strategic nuclear defense structure in Russia. Now that's being repaired, and that was not an accident. We've done it again. And as Ted Postal likes to point out, and he's been saying this for many years, our early warning system, much of which is space-based, is infinitely better and more accurate than the Russian system. In fact, he very astutely and other clear-minded people

suggested that we sit down with the Russians to ensure they have a better early warning system, because the fear has always been that if they don't, they could mistake something for an incoming intercontinental ballistic missile warhead when it's not, in which case you could get an accidental nuclear exchange. Well, that's his concern here. We're damaging the structure on the ground on which Russian national security depends very heavily. That is a dangerous thing to do because that puts the Russians in the position of having very little time to make a decision when they get a report that missiles have been launched against Russia. They have to wait till these come over the horizon and they can make an identification. And now you're talking, what, 10 minutes, 11 minutes

to make a decision whether or not you're going to respond in kind. And this is the thing that you and I have discussed from the beginning. The problem with the use of any nuclear weapon is that each side looks in the mirror and says, I better use it before I lose it. If I don't use this, I won't have it. And then I'm going to lose the war. Well, in truth, there will be no winner in any kind of nuclear exchange, as President Putin has pointed out. But you're tempted into that dead end, if you will, of decision making. And that's what he's talking about. And he's 100 percent right.

Colonel, the most reputable medical journal in the world, The Lancet, has reported that the likely deaths in Gaza, when everybody is counted, will be 186,000 dead. Professor Mearsheimer, using his sources, says it'll be closer to a quarter of a million. The Lancet figure is 8% of the population. The Mearsheimer figure is about 10% of the population. Is this enough to demonstrate war crimes? Oh, I don't think there's any question about that anymore. The Israelis continue to bombard Gaza every night. And you ask yourself, where are the targets? What are they hitting? I mean, there's nothing to hit.

And if the goal is to destroy Hamas, I doubt very seriously that Hamas has put itself anywhere where it could possibly be destroyed by the IDF Air Force. Instead, I think you're just killing civilians. And remember, this was the critical turning point. After 7 October, it became more and more clear with each passing week that the Israeli goal had nothing to do with retribution for 7 October. It was a campaign to systematically destroy or kill the population of Gaza. So I think these numbers are very, very reasonable. I don't doubt it. Now we have people

being told in the United States that no news media will publish any figures that don't come from the Israelis effectively. And that, of course, is wonderful because the Israelis can downplay all of this because their great fear is that we in the West, people of conscience, however much we may like the Israelis, and I certainly am someone that has always been very supportive of them, but however much we may feel affection for them and support them, this is unacceptable. That's their great fear. Now, we'll see what happens because I think Mr. Netanyahu should be here in a couple of weeks and see if it makes any impact. As long as the money continues to flow from the lobby into the re-election

campaign funds of people sitting on the Hill, it may not make any difference. I certainly haven't seen that. But there's another casualty figure that we need to get, and we don't have it. That's the casualty figures for the Israelis. Because remember, Israel has really only about six and a half million people from whom they can draw manpower for the Israeli Defense Force. We think there are maybe 70,000 plus seriously injured Israeli soldiers. To this has to be added an estimated 5,000 Israeli dead or more. That's more than they've lost in any of the previous wars. So yeah, this is obviously criminal what's happened in Gaza. There's no more debate about that. But on the other hand, look at the situation in Israel.

How long can they sustain this? Because of course their economy is in ruins. And now we continue to hear about preparations to go into southern Lebanon. So this is poised to do one of two things, either implode or to go ballistic, if you will, and engulf the entire region. Let me add to your warning about the problems in Israel, the growing chasm between the IDF and Prime Minister Netanyahu. I mean, over the weekend, Haaretz reported, using as sources officials in the IDF, as well as official IDF and Netanyahu government documents, that there's no question but that the Hannibal directive was ordered on October 7th, and it now appears that more than half the 1,200 Israelis who died on that day were murdered by the IDF, civilians and military. Our friends and colleagues, Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate,

when they reported that, were back in October, were ridiculed by mainstream media. They're not waiting in vain for an apology. My point is that piece that came out in Haaretz was provoked by sources within IDF. Question, is IDF exhausted? Is it sick and tired of Netanyahu? Does it recognize that Hamas cannot be beaten? Is the last thing in the world it wants to do to go after Hezbollah? All right, four questions. My apologies. I'm off my high horse. My impression is that the Israeli soldiers are still convinced that they need to finish

the job in Gaza and exterminate whatever remains. I mean, there's really that kind of mentality among Israeli soldiers. That's been made clear to me. Now, when you move to higher levels and you're talking about the professional military leadership of the Israeli Defense Force I think they have serious concerns but just as we have been waiting for someone somewhere who cares about the lives of Ukrainians to step forward inside the Ukrainian military and remove zelens, who obviously could care less what happens to Ukraine. We have a similar situation in Israel. I would not hold my breath waiting for the Israeli Defense Force leadership

to remove Netanyahu. First of all, he continues to enjoy very, very strong support. I don't see them doing that. I could be wrong, but for the moment, I think it's impossible. Now, everything is going to turn right now for Israel in the future on what they do in southern Lebanon, Judge. If they press ahead with the attack on Hezbollah, all bets are off. It becomes a regional war, and at that point, you may see a willingness to step in and say, we've gone too far. But right now, I don't see it. If it becomes a regional war, what does the United States do? Air power and naval power,

but I would imagine not troops on the ground. That would be suicidal. What are we going to send? You know, the Army is down to, what, 450,000. And when you start going through the lists of troops and capabilities, you have very few fighting troops. You know, this is what people don't understand. You see a big number, 200,000, you immediately assume, well, this is a huge force with great capability, but you look more carefully at it, you're lucky to get out of 200,000, 50,000 combat troops. So we don't have much in the way of combat power, the people that actually go forward, close with, and destroy the enemy, and that's our problem. So no, we're not going to send them, but we will try to lean heavily on air and naval power. But again, you know, you're living in the missile age today.

Missiles can now reach targets at great range. The day of hiding at sea in the Mediterranean with your carrier battle group or off the shore in the Indian Ocean and living invulnerable, invincible lives out there is over. All of these things are targetable. They can all be found. They can all be targeted. And everybody says, well, they can't sink a carrier. You don't have to sink a carrier. All you have to do is put its flight deck out of business.

Worse, you can damage the nuclear reactor aboard, in which case it can do nothing anyway. Then it becomes a magnet for help and assistance from other ships in the fleet who are trying to save the carrier. So then you have the opportunity to sink lots of targets or destroy even more. This is a disaster waiting to happen, Judge. I pray that it doesn't. We don't need to go down this road. But I see no one, no one exercising any kind of control or influence over the Israelis, certainly not over Mr. Netanyahu, because as he points out regularly, he controls our Congress. He says that.

And thus far, I'd say there's a lot of evidence to support that he's correct. I agree with you on that. So what does he want when he comes in two weeks that he doesn't already have? I think he wants to command the audience and signal that we have to support him and what he will bill as the final stage of the conflict. When you listen to him, he's talking about moving to the next steps. That means southern Lebanon and also finishing off Gaza and potentially his enemies in the region. And he talks about the militias in Iraq, the militias in Syria, the militias in southern

Saudi Arabia or southern the Arabian Peninsula, the Houthis. He talks about finishing everything. In other words, this is the final conflict. And that also means Iran. And I think he's going to try and extract from people, privately at any rate, absolute assurance that they will support him in his war with Iran and that we will come into that. He may not want much from us, but he wants to know that we will send our intercontinental bomber force over there and level as much of Iran as possible. And remember, you and I know there are lots of people in the Senate at any rate, and some in the House who are only too happy to do that. If they can find a reason to destroy Iran, they will use it. And I think that's going to be the topic of discussion behind the

scenes. Maybe he's worried about this. Another statement from President Biden, listen to the last, it's not very long, but listen to the last few words out of his mouth, cut number eight. In the coming months, the United States and our partners intend to provide Ukraine with dozens of additional tactical air defense systems. The United States will make sure that when we export critical air defense interceptors, Ukraine goes to the front of the line. They will get this assistance before anyone else gets it. Wow. Does that upset Prime Minister Netanyahu when he complains that the 2,000-pound bombs have stopped? Ukraine goes to the head of the line.

They get assistance before anybody else? A couple of things. The Ukrainians are not using the 2,000-pound bombs. He is. In other words, the Ukrainians have no air force that can deliver those munitions. I don't think he's really concerned about that because ultimately he is very confident that he commands the obedience of Washington and its armed forces. So, no, I don't think he's worried about that. But here's something the Americans need to understand.

We don't have any hot assembly lines rapidly producing Patriot missiles, ATACA missiles or any other missile for that matter. In other words, we're very dependent on what already exists. And the deliveries that we're now promising to Ukraine and other states are all the way out into 2026. We don't have the capacity that you see in Russia. The Russians are running factory establishments, manufacturing base there for the military, 24 hours a day with three ships. That's what you do when you go to war. We're not really at war. This is the big bluff. This is what's so dangerous. And that was the problem. The neocons love to talk about the 1930s. I normally don't, but that was Britain's problem in the 1930s. And it was to some extent the French problem. They couldn't bluff their way out of things, and ultimately the Germans attacked and exposed them for what they were, a paper tiger.

I think that could happen in the Middle East as well. I hope not, but again, we don't have the depth in terms of munitions and capabilities to manufacture. We don't have what we call a surge capability, where you can say, I need 500 of these missiles or rockets by the end of the week and can produce them. We don't. That's the problem. So whatever we've got is coming out of our existing arsenal, our depots, direct from the factories as they slowly but ponderously produce these things.

Colonel, I wish someday the State Department and the Defense Department would listen to you, but that might not happen until January 20th of 2025. I'm not sure anybody will listen then either, Judge. I agree, but you have a lot of foolish people at the top right now who have this false impression of us. We do in both parties, in both campaigns, on both sides. In fact, I would say, Judge, the only candidate who has spoken bluntly about this and the criticality of stopping it for the reasons I've outlined is RFK Jr. Yeah, not on Gaza,

but on Ukraine. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. He understands the larger implications of the Middle East. Yes. He's just someone who, like me, has great affection for Israel. I do, too. It's just that I can't support what's been going on in Gaza. That's it. I just can't. No person with a sense of morality can support what's going on in Gaza. Colonel, thank you very much. A pleasure, as always. Thank you for accommodating my schedule. I'm off for the next two weeks. Well, you're vacationing in Florida.

I absolutely hate you. I hope you have a miserable time on Lake Como. We'll see you at the end of the month, sir. Thank you. All the best to you. Okay. Bye-bye. Well, my dear friends, I am off for the next two weeks, but you'll be hearing from us.

We'll be posting videos, shorts and videos. And, of course, my electronic equipment will be in my suitcase should there be breaking news in my end of the world. Thank you very much. Thanks for watching. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.