Judging Freedom - COL. Lawrence Wilkerson : Can Iran Defeat Israel in a Regional War?

Episode Date: January 29, 2026

COL. Lawrence Wilkerson : Can Iran Defeat Israel in a Regional War?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Undeclared wars are commonplace. Pragically, our government engages in preemptive war, otherwise known as aggression, with no complaints from the American people. Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government. To develop a truly free society, the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected. What if sometimes to love your country you had to alter or abolish the government? the government? What if Jefferson was right? What if that government is best, which governs least?

What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong? What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom than to live as a slave? What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now? Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for judging freedom. Today is Thursday, January 29th, 2006. Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson will be with us in just a moment. What will be the consequences of a regional war between Israel and Iran? But first this. History tells us every market eventually falls. Currencies collapse. And look at where we are now. 38 trillion in national debt. Stocks at record highs defying gravity. So what happens next? Groceries, gas, housing. Everything's going up and this dollar, it buys less every day.

When the system breaks, your stocks won't save you and your dollars won't either. But one thing will. Gold. I've set it on my show for years. Gold survives collapse. Central bankers know this and billionaires know it. That's why they're buying more. Is it too late to buy or is it just the right time?

Call my friends at Lear Capital to find out. Ask questions, get the free information. There's no pressure. And that's why I buy my gold and silver from Lear. And right now, you can get up to $20,000 in bonus medals with a qualified purchase. Call 800, 511, 4620 or go to Learjudgeonap.com today. Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, welcome here, my dear friend. Thank you, as always, for accommodating my schedule.

before we get to the United States planning to attack Iran at the behest of Israel and the likely consequences of a regional war to Minnesota. Why did George W. Bush create the Department of Homeland Security? Because Newt Gendritch sent him an email that finally broke his decision out as he was pondering with most of his cabinet. against it, fearably so in Donald Rumsfeld's case. And Powell was not for it either, two principal members of his cabinet, but Newt sent him an email and convinced him that he needed a Homeland Security Department. I can't imagine that he thought it would be the largest police department in the

world and that these masked unidentified, unidentifiable thugs would be breaking down doors without warrants, yanking people out of their bedrooms and their underwear, capturing children and using them as bait for the parents, and killing innocent American civilians. I think you could lay that at the feet of Donald Trump and his cabinet and people at the Heritage Foundation, and in particular Stephen Miller and others like him in the administration, not necessarily necessarily at George Bush's feet. The main objectives to creating the department were quite bureaucratic but powerful bureaucratic arguments. How can a secretary looking at all the disparate cultures that were assembled into homeland security, and they are disparate cultures, believe me,

and think that she can or he can manage them, an impossible task. And I think Noam is an and not only facing that impossible task as anyone would, she has picked the things she wants to concentrate on and the rest of the department be damned. And what she wants to concentrate on is things that Trump points to her to concentrate on, primarily ICE. But what regime can last long by killing and lying about it? I mean, the government's lies have been shamed.

shameless and never repudiated and never corrected. Trump said that Rachel Good was a vicious terrorist who ran over an agent. Stephen Miller called Alex Preti an assassin. Christine Nome said he came out ready to slaughter people. I mean, this stuff is repellent, reprehensible, profoundly untrue, but not untypical of authoritarian regimes when they'd want to justify murder. Not at all. And there are other than authoritarian regimes in consequence, in way, or in description,

that do the same thing. I'm thinking of Israel immediately. Get away with murder day in and day out and don't get held accountable for it. And it's not just because they have the superpower, the empire behind them. It's because it's in their nature, in my view. When I was dealing with the death of Rachel Corey, it was so clear to me that the IDF was lying to me, that the adjutant general was lying to me, that the ambassador in Washington was lying to me, and to Powell, and that the head of Israel was lying to the president of the United States and to all of us below him about Rachel Corey's death. She was murdered by an IDF bulldozer. There is no doubt in my mind, not a skin till of it. And yet today, if you ask, you'd still get the same response from Israel. And this has been multiplied across a plethora of murders in the West Bank, in Jerusalem,

in Gaza now, to the tune of hundreds of thousands, I think. And yet nothing is done. There is no accountability. So it's not a new phenomenon. What do you think will be the consequences of these killings aside from? This is not necessarily going to make things better. The Democrats taking the Congress this fall. That's an interesting question. It's one some of the people I deal with every day in a professional relationship have been trying to calculate.

And those that know the Congress and politicians in general in the Congress better, than I are just as puzzled as I am as to how to figure this out. Yesterday, we talked about the shutdown if it were to come again, the pain that that would bring to Americans in every walk of life virtually. And they do that in order to achieve some purpose that was in itself not very consequential, because it wouldn't be, really. The only thing that would be consequential in our view is that if they moved with, valid, authentic, and solid Republican support, and it doesn't mean too many in order to commence

it, to very effective impeachment proceedings, which I think there's enough evidence now, God, there should be, that they could do. But there's no, there's no courage in the Congress, and I don't just single out the Republicans for that. There's no courage amongst the Democrats, and there is absolutely pitiful leadership, Chuck Schumer, being, the scintillating example of that. Yeah. All right. President Trump says that he has amassed an armada somewhere in order to attack Iran.

Do you know of what this would consist and where it would be? Well, it's all around them right now or steaming toward them, as it were. It reminds me, Judge, in some respects of. what we did to Sodom Hussein when I was working for Colin Powell when he was chairman and did that press conference and said to the American people, our strategy is simple. First, we're going to cut it off and then we're going to kill it. And he was referring to the Republican Guard and the rest of the Iraq army that went into Kuwait. Now, at the same time, we were looking at building a coalition of 625,000 soldiers, which included the French, the Syrians, the Egyptians, the Turks. I mean,

all manner of people were in this coalition, but we didn't do anything for almost six months, except build up logistics and frighten the bejesus out of Sodomers saying the inquiries were coming in from everyone across the world. Gorbachev was working his rear end off, trying to get Baghdad to realize that we were serious and so forth. And a lot of that was done not only for logistics required and running the National Guard units through the National Training Center to see if they were all right. We actually didn't take some of them because they failed. It was also to put Saddam Hussein in a psychological trick bag. All to say, I don't know if that's what the Pentagon is doing, what Pete Hankseth is doing, what Donald Trump is doing, but it certainly is working in terms of

everyone concerned, including some of the American people, what the hell are we doing? Well, what the hell happens if we begin to attack, not invade, Colonel McGregor says we don't have the troops to invade. You agree with them on that. But what will happen if we and the Israelis begin attacking Iran? Would Tel Aviv survive? I think one of the hold-up factors right now, Judge, you just put your finger on. I'm not sure Beebe wants to start this, because increasingly he is becoming aware of just how vulnerable Israel is,

particularly if Iran is quick off the mark, if you will, after the first bomb drops on them, and all that off the mark is aimed at Israel. Israel may cease to exist materially. and physically cease to exist. So that's got to be in his mind right now, and also in his mind, you may have noted that the bulletin of atomic scientists, just as security board met and just move.

I know this is just a symbol, but they just move the atomic clock to 85 seconds for midnight. Now, this clock was put together after the Manhattan Project was shut down, and scientists decided they wanted to keep a track on what the potential for nuclear war was. That's the closest we've ever been to midnight, the nuclear holocaust. I think they're looking prominently right now, not at Ukraine or any of the other nine weapons that own nuclear weapons other than us.

They're looking at Israel and they're looking at Gaza and they're looking at Iran. They're thinking what Israel might be put into existential state and what they might do just prior to that or during that. And I'm sure that's a threat BB is using to keep Trump tight on his side. This is a very dangerous thing that's that's percolating right now, regards to what real purpose is. Does Iran have any Russian or Russianics? I can't answer that question.

I can't answer the question, generally speaking, from a source that I have that I trust, that they do have missiles of a similar nature, but not quite as competent or as fast or as, maneuverable in that fastness as the irasional. Would the Iranians seek to obliterate using Trump's word, Israel? If it comes down to it, I think yes. I think yes. They are up against the wall in a way that they haven't been, and they're up against the wall internally. They've seen what everyone has tried to do to them. If you've been reading the reports that have come out that are fairly

balanced now. They know that Massad was there. They know that the CIA was there. They know that the only thing missing was Kermit Roosevelt and Muhammad Mossadegh and 1953. They know we tried to overthrow them in a most vicious but covert way. And they know that it's coming again and again and again. So why suffer it further? Their patience has been inexhaustible to this point. What is going on at Abu Dhabi? Are these serious negotiations? Are there two lines, one to bring about an end of the special military operation, the other to bring about the end of American sanctions on Russia? Why is Zelensky saying nonsense like we're not going to see it any territory? Obviously, the Russians must take that with a grand assault or they wouldn't be wasting their time there? No, I read Anatol Levin's article this morning from Quincy Institute, and if there's even some accuracy to it, and I trust Anatol to not write things that aren't at least credible, if not actually perfect, there are some changes being made on the Russian side that I didn't think

would ever be made, and I think Doug McGregor would agree with me, if they are in fact being made. as the size of the Ukrainian military post any agreement, such as working on the Donbass together rather than Russia getting the whole thing, and other things like that, that if they're true, they are making more progress than I thought, and there might actually be some sort of cessation to hostilities, if you will, not for a minute, I think that the piece is going to to break out. But there might actually be less killing, less repine, and a reasonable situation to continue to work on. I don't know. Well, about an hour ago, Trump said at his cabinet meeting, because of extreme cold, I personally asked President Putin not to fire on Kiev and cities

in towns for a week. He agreed to do that, and it was very nice. Now, who knows if this conversation actually took place because the president has such little credibility, but wouldn't it be nice if he gave the same advice to Chris, or direction to Christy Gnome and told her to quit shooting people on the back and quite cold there too? Why isn't he give the same advice to Netanyahu, stop slaughtering Palestinians and stealing land in the West Bank and in Syria? Bingo. Yes, and Syria really troubles me right now. We'll get to Syria in a minute.

Is it reasonable to believe? This is not a ceasefire. Who knows if this is true? Cities, towns, and Keeve. What else is there for them to attack besides cities, towns, and Keeve? Exactly. Exactly. And they have been restrained on a few things.

They are not, and God bless them for it, either side, going after nuclear means anymore, whether it's reactors that are operational or whether it's on the case of Moscow, their strategic ability to deliver those weapons should they be necessary. Yeah. I think we have the clip on this statement Trump made maybe 45 minutes ago, Chris. And because of the cold, extreme cold, they have the same that we do. I personally asked President Putin not to fire on Kiev and the cities and towns for a week during this. It's extraordinary cold. It's not just like cold. It's extraordinary cold. Record setting cold. Over there, too. You're having the same place. It's a big, it's a big pile of bad weather, the worst.

But it was really, they said they've never experienced cold like that. And I personally asked President Putin not to fire into Kiev and the various towns for a week. And he agreed to do that. And I have to tell you, it was very nice. A lot of people said, don't. I would only remark that you didn't have that kind of thing in Leningrad or Stalingrad or during the German counteroffensive in the Ardennes in the coldest winter in Europe in 35 years in 1944-45. they kept right on fighting and killing. So great if you want to do that,

but you better not cause any problem for Putin in doing that. That is to say, doing something like shipping more weapons in the interim, I wouldn't put it past us at all. Wow. I mean, is Donald Trump a worthy and, well, let me restate it, a trustworthy negotiator, whether it's an informal negotiation like a phone call or something more serious like Abu Dhabi?

Ask the Persians. I'm sure they can give you a very emphatic answer to that question. Right, right. He invited them to a negotiation at the very moment that he and B, beware, beginning their attacks. This is the 12-day war back in June. Right, exactly. Right.

Back to the armada. Why an armada? Why the Navy? It's the only way really that you can bring multidirectional ordinance, if you will, on to the landmass that is Iran. It's a huge place. And when you're talking about really doing serious damage, you're talking about bringing in fighter bombers and cruise missiles and other things from what I call omnidirectional apertures. You want them coming from everywhere you can get the expansion. to shoot them and the wherewithal to shoot them.

So you bring a carrier into the eastern mid, you bring a carrier into the North Arabian Sea, maybe even the Sea of Oman, be careful there. You might lose a carrier. And you bring planes from that filthy, coward state known as Jordan, and also from Al UD and other places that you have fighters. And you bring other assets from around the area, such as the tankers and such,

to keep the strikes going and going and going. You could even in the case of two carriers, which usually couldn't generate strikes for more than 72 hours, takes three to go all the time, you could even tank with Air Force assets that they have plenty of in the area, and you could keep the carrier fighters going indefinitely. How many carriers do we have to send there, Lincoln and Ford?

I think the only two that are going, at least right now, because we're very limited to judge. The one coming up through the North Arabian Sea is Lincoln, I think, and then the other one's Bush or Ford that's coming into the eastern end of the Mediterranean. At least I assume that's where it's going. Wow. How do you feel or what is your understanding of the likelihood of an attack on Iran? And is Trump going to change his mind?

Is this another negotiating deal? You talked about scaring the daylights out of Saddam Hussein. Does he think he can scare the daylights out of the Ayatollah and his people? Or are they determined to attack? I think what scares the daylights out of me, Judge, is the fact that he made his decision on Bibi Netanyahu. And Bibi Netanyahu is growing increasingly desperate, politically and personally. and he's growing desperate in a sense that he knows the window is closing and closing rapidly

on his final and most demanding promise to his people and to himself and to the Israeli defense forces. And that is to affect a regime change in Iran, even if it takes almost total destruction of Iran before they are amenable to it. And that's what scares me about the potential use of an nuclear revolution. I would not put it past BB one meter that he would use a nuclear weapon on Iran. That's why I've said multiple times Iran made a huge mistake in not going ahead with a nuclear weapon. Would China allow the Israelis and the Americans to destroy Iran? Well, I don't think anybody's going to destroy Iran, Judge.

I really don't. Bring the regime down is another matter altogether. Right. So changed my sentence to bring the regime down. China or the Kremlin? I think both would have major objections. I think Putin's hands are tied, which let me go back to Anatol's piece. One of the reasons I read it two or three times to get all the things that I could out of it

was that I think what that's reflecting in terms of Putin doing things that I had no idea or conception that he would ever come to do if it's true. is because he's so hard pressed. And he wants to get unhard pressed, at least with the major parts of his military, because he's got other threats. And one of those is in Iran and environs thereof. And he wants to have more military power at his pecking call

in case he has to act there significantly. And I'd say Xi Jinping, and he have probably had some very meaningful discussions on this very issue. So you're right, they are as concerned as anyone in the world about what's going on there for all kinds of different reasons. But Putin probably most of all, remember he has a signed defense pact with Iran. Wow. Colonel McGregor just told us that of his view that Putin is under, quote, tremendous pressure from his inner circle to end the war militarily and quickly. which I guess means a rest next all over the place. Do you agree?

I have a hard time seeing Putin being ultimately that way. I think he would even risk his own standing in Moscow not to be that way. That's the kind of person he is. He's got a bad rep in the West because we manufactured it for him. So in that specific case, I don't agree. I do think he's harassed mightily, and he is. He's got a very powerful military now, in all respects, a very powerful base underneath it in all respects.

And he's being threatened elsewhere. And arguably these elsewhere's are as serious as Ukraine. Wow. And we've done this. We have done this. What happens if the Iranians close the Strait of Hormuz? How much will gas cost in Manhattan or war? Washington or Dallas.

Well, I can only base it on the last time it became a real problem, and it went to about $185 a barrel for West Texas intermediate and roughly the same for Brent Crude and disturb the oil markets to the point where things calmed down relatively fast. I'm not so sure they would this time, because once you do it this time, and if you're doing what we just talked about with regard to Iran, full bore attack without a ground invasion, then the situation becomes very much different, I think. And so you might have a long closure. That would be absolutely destructive of global oil prices.

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, thank you, my dear man. A pleasure. Thank you for sending me Anatole's article. I will read it. I just got it, but I'll read it as soon as we're off there. Thank you so much. You still coming to New York soon? I'm coming by Zoom.

Oh, okay. were physically going to be here so I can kiss you on the top of your head and buy you a nice dinner. I owe you more than one. Well, Temple Emmanuel decided to have me do it by Zoom. But I'm going to get up there in the next three weeks or so, I think. Okay. We'll look forward to seeing you. Thank you, Colonel. All the best. Early. Take care. Sure. Yeah, stay warm. Coming up at 3 o'clock, Professor John Mearsheimer. And at 4 o'clock, Pepe Escobar. Josh Napolitano for judging freedom.