Judging Freedom - Connor Freeman : Ukraine Collapsing

Episode Date: April 17, 2024

Connor Freeman : Ukraine CollapsingSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. WGU is an online accredited university that specializes in personalized learning. With courses available 24-7 and monthly start dates, you can earn your degree on your schedule. You may even be able to graduate sooner than you think by demonstrating mastery of the material you know. Make 2025 the year you focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Wednesday, April 17th, 2024. Connor Freeman joins us now. Connor, thank you very much for your time. Much appreciated. of what went on last weekend when the Iranian government retaliated against Israel for the Israeli destruction of its embassy, its consulate adjacent to the embassy in Damascus, its murder of two generals and seven civilians. You probably heard some of these arguments about morality,

that somehow it was moral for the Israelis to attack the Iranians, but not moral for the Iranians to fight back. David Cameron, the former prime minister and now foreign minister of Great Britain, made those comments. We'll play them for you again. Can you unpack that argument for us, please? Well, under the rules-based international order, as Antony Blinken calls it, certain countries and certain people do not have rights. And they're not considered actual humans. If you look at Syria, for instance, the sanctions regime has put 90% of the population below the poverty line. Israel bombs the country roughly every week. I mean, they blow up

repeatedly. The Damascus International Airport, the Aleppo International Airport, the Israelis have carried out assassinations of Iranian officials and scientists and aerospace engineers in Iran, which could, of course, have all kinds of devastating consequences. And this is something that even the IAEA chief, Rafael Grassi, is warning about right now. He was too worried to send even his inspectors to nuclear facilities on Monday this week for fear. He said, we're always worried that Israel is going to attack Iran's nuclear facilities. And he repeated that Iran, we have not seen any evidence that Iran has a nuclear weapons program. So Israel essentially acts as a rogue state and really so does the US. But I guess in the case of even the genocide in Gaza, there's really no moral, certain people are subjected to certain, if you want to call them this, laws of morality that other countries

are not. So when we say, send in Nazis over the border into Russia to kill civilians and attack civilians, or we complicit in it, that's really not a crime. But of course, Russia and their war against Ukraine is viewed as the ultimate evil, even though we are using Ukraine as a human battering ram. It's all very- The US pretty much makes up its own rules as it goes along and makes up rules for others. Any other country doing in Gaza what the Israelis are doing, even the U.S. would acknowledge that it's genocide. But because the U.S. pays for it and pays for it under pressure from the donor class that really has a vice grip on the U.S. government, it's not considered

genocide. It's not even considered a war crime, and the president can condemn it all he wants, but he keeps paying for it. Precisely. And the Israeli, the IDF, can occupy the West Bank and can occupy Gaza all at once. But Joe Biden will attack Vladimir Putin for occupying the eastern part of Ukraine, but will pay for Benjamin Netanyahu occupying Palestine. Absolutely. $3.8 billion a year, at least. How much of this free speech for me, but not for thee, is going to go on? I really don't see any end in sight, Judge. I mean, for instance, again, to your point, the American government makes much more of a stink about how women are treated in Iran than they do about Israel attacking or bombing 400 different health facilities in Gaza and killing 700, or hundreds anyway, of... They've

killed 700 people in those attacks in the first five months of the war, according to the World Health Organization, but they've killed hundreds and hundreds of medical workers and doctors and nurses and hundreds of aid workers, mostly working for the UN. They've tortured UN workers. They've raped UN workers. They are currently, as you say, as you're alluding to, demolishing thousands and thousands of buildings on the border with Israel in Gaza to create a so-called buffer zone. And they're currently stealing at least 16% of the land in Gaza. And we have, you know, members of the Knesset in the Jewish Power Party, Yitmar Ben-Gavir's party, the, you know, some of the worst hardliners

talking about how we have secret plans. We're going to be resettling Gaza. We're going to be taking it back. It may happen in phases, unfortunately, but we're going to take Gaza. And Benny Gantz, of course, is saying that this war is going to go on for years and years and years, and the plan is for an indefinite occupation, and that's been repeated. So, of course, the American position is, well, we don't want to see Israel taking any land from Gaza. But then, of course, when they announced that that's exactly what they're doing, the Biden administration does nothing, sends thousands more 2,000-pound bombs, and salutes everything that Netanyahu is doing despite the claims of frustration. It's hard to swallow, but our government is just as criminal and genocidal and venal as the Israelis.

Nicely put. Criminal, genocidal, and venal. I mean, the Israeli government is a criminal gang, and you're correct to quote Benny Gantz. I mean, Benny Gantz is tall, slim, nice looking and likable as opposed to Netanyahu, who was none of those. But in terms of the ferocity, the way God made him, but in terms of the ferocity of their policy, Gantz might actually be worse. I mean, when Gantz was the head of the IDF, the stuff that he did in Gaza, which was not covered even by us at the time, was as horrific as what Netanyahu and his crew are doing now. I think Netanyahu's days are numbered, but I don't think anything's going to change with respect to Gaza unless a state actor enters, which brings us back to Ukraine. My understanding of what the Israelis did was to kill civilians and attack an embassy,

a consulate adjacent to an embassy. Consulates and embassies are immune from attack even in wartime under the Geneva Conventions to which the Israelis are signatories. They don't care. Of course. Iran don't care. Of course. Iran attacked military sites. They did send hundreds and hundreds of drones.

They were all aimed at military sites. The purpose of the drones was to force the Israelis to waste their defensive mechanisms by shooting down the drones and by doing them, revealing where the shooting down was coming from. They succeeded in doing that. That is, the Ukrainians now know where the Israeli defenses are, and the Israelis wasted $1.3 billion worth of ammunition in one night. Five missiles got through. They destroyed an intelligence headquarters, the headquarters that planned and plotted the attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus.

And they rendered useless to airfields. There is no moral equivalency. One was a targeted, let's not hurt civilian military attack. The other was, who cares about international law? Let's destroy the embassy. Let's kill the generals. And if anybody else gets killed too bad. That's absolutely right. And also the Israelis gave the Iranians gave at least a 72 hour notice and had been telegraphing this attack for two weeks. At least they had let definitely let the Turks and the Jordanians and the Iraqis. Uh, and I believe the Turks and the Jordanians and the Iraqis,

and I believe the Saudis as well, know about the attack, who they no doubt passed that information along to the United States. And so, of course, Israel knew about it probably for the same duration. And as you say, they only targeted military sites, and they didn't kill anybody. The one injury of the seven-year-old Bedouin girl in the Negev was a result of a shrapnel that came down from a missile that was intercepted. And in the case of the bombing of the Iranian consulate, civilians were killed in that. And it was seven IRGC officials, including General Mohammed Reza Zahedi, the top Quds Force commander for operations in Lebanon and Syria, and his deputy. And so this was a absolute declaration of war against Iran. And the

Iranians actually, there's been reports that they actually said to the Americans in these back channel communications, if you push for a ceasefire, then we will not respond here to the Israelis. And they also said that if the UN Security Council would condemn the attack on the Iranian consulate, which is a flagrant violation of international law, virtually unprecedented, they'd still, the Americans, the British and the French did not, and they're shameless, and they continue to lie in support of this genocide. And of course, we're seeing what it's reaping, which is a larger regional war with the axis of resistance, which is led by the Quds Force, led by Iran. And this is Benny Gantz's plan. Actually, Benny Gantz announced earlier, I believe during when Naftali Bennett was still

prime minister, that the goal of the Abraham Accords project was to build a NATO-style coalition encircling Iran for a future war. And of course, that's not going to happen now, especially because Israel has isolated itself so much in the region. The only Arab state that helped them intercept any of these projectiles coming through were the Jordanians. Otherwise, they had to rely on the Americans, the British, and the French. It's not much of a regional coalition. And so what we're seeing now is, of course, this is resulting from Biden's just unconditional support for Netanyahu. And I fear that at this point,

politically, Biden cannot use his leverage. I mean, it's encouraging slightly that he's saying we will not support offensive operations against Iran, but at the same time, they're pledging ironclad support and actually promoting, Judge, the bombing of the consulate. We've seen a senior Biden administration official tell reporters that the way they're framing it to the Israelis and to the public is you really got off a win here. You wiped out the Quds Force leadership in the Levant and and then you defended against these strikes and you've shown how superior you are militarily. And so you got a win. so don't escalate further. Just take this one and basically give yourself a pat on the back and continue with your genocide. But they're applauding Israel now for this bombing of the Iranian consulate.

It's just disgraceful. And again, it just shows that the U.S. completely acts outside international law. This has been the case my whole lifetime. We've killed millions of people in this region. And it looks like at this rate, there'll be millions more killed if the US goes to war with Iran, which is clearly Netanyahu's goal. It is Netanyahu's goal. I don't know if Joe Biden is foolish enough to fall into that. Here's Foreign Minister Cameron. So this is cut number nine, Sonia, not 10 yet, just nine. What about Iran's frustration at part of its sovereign territory being flattened?

Well, I would argue there is a massive degree of difference between what Israel did in Damascus. And as I said, 301 weapons being launched by the state of Iran at the state of Israel for the first time, a state-on-state attack. 101 ballistic missiles, 36 cruise missiles, 185 drones. That is a degree of difference and I think a reckless and dangerous thing for Iran to have done. And I think the whole world can see all these countries that have somehow wondered, well, you know, what is the true nature of Iran? It's there in black and white. Now she follows up with what would the British do if one of their embassies was demolished? What would Britain do if a hostile nation flattened one of our consulates?

Well, we would take, you know, we would take the very strong action. And Iran would say that that's what they did? Well, what they did, as I said, was a massive attack. So they were right to respond, but they overreacted, is that what you're saying? What I'm saying is that the attack they carried out was on a very large scale, much bigger than people accepted. Do they have a right to respond? Well, countries have a right to respond. He was a mediocre prime minister and he's a terrible foreign minister who obviously has a political motive here. I'll let you comment on it before we move over to Ukraine.

I don't hear... He's just an absolute... I was on mute by accident. He is just an absolute liar. The Israelis have attacked the Natanz nuclear facility in Isfahan repeatedly, the main center for building centrifuges. They have carried out assassinations, as I said, repeatedly using the MEK terrorist cult in the Mujahideen cult in Iran to kill Colonel Hassan Syed Kodeh in Tehran in his driveway. They just machine gunned him to death. And then they carried out drone strikes on various military sites inside Iran. This is just a, I mean, and also Israel, I mean, excuse me, also Syria.

We have seen Israel bomb civilian infrastructure, civilian areas, bomb Damascus, bomb Iran. It's what they call Iranian targets, but it's very often the Syrian Arab army that they're bombing. And these are very, these, the wall street journal reported in June of 2022, that these mo many of these strikes, if not a majority are cleared with and coordinated with the Pentagon and central command before they take place. So the U S is absolutely complicit in this. And of course, you know, I course, this is the first state on state. It's incredible. They basically just, I don't know, they're, they're, they're, they're allowed to, you're allowed to bomb Iran. You're allowed to bomb Syria, Lebanon. You're allowed to kill all these aid workers and civilians and women and children.

And it's just, you know, as long as Israel's doing it, it's just self-defense and it's just absolutely atrocious, but he's just outright lying there. There have been transitioning to, um, to Ukraine is Ukraine on its deathbed. Well, I mean, we've seen half a million people killed if not, uh, or injured so severely, they can't return to the battlefield. The average age of a Ukrainian soldier now is at least 43. Um, the They've lost 20% of their territory. There's all kinds of reports coming out now suggesting that the military is on the brink of collapse. I mean, that some of the top officers in the Ukrainian military told Politico about two weeks ago that the frontline at virtually every point is at risk of collapsing anytime Russia pushes forward with an offensive

on any part of the front line. And they're expecting a major Russian offensive here in, uh, later in the spring or in early summer. And we hear, you know, quotes from officials saying, we don't have the technology to repel the large numbers of troops that the Russians are going to throw at us. And the Americans and the rest of the NATO Alliance don't have the weapons in sufficient quantities to defend us either. The Ukrainians have depleted their air defenses. The Russians are increasingly attaining better intelligence and are really hitting the energy infrastructure in Ukraine much more strongly. They just took out the largest power plant. I believe it's the Triplitsky, uh, thermal plant in the Kiev region. And so, uh, and in the meantime, all the Ukrainians seem to be able to do is send over these drone attacks and these artillery attacks and these,

uh, militias to go into civilian areas over the border. Uh, and they don't really make a big impact on the, the actual, uh, war itself, but it does escalate the conflict because every time they attack inside Russia or they attack the Kerch Bridge, for instance, there is always a massive response from the Russians against the House called you up and said, Connor, give me the argument against the $61 billion. I mean, these people think that $61 billion is somehow going to change the war. We know the $40 billion of it is going to stay here, but I'll let you take that argument. Put aside the Republicans stand for nothing. Put aside that this Speaker is about to lose his job, that Thomas Massey is a hero and the Speaker is just doing Joe Biden's bidding. This is absurd that we should waste another $61 billion, is it not? Absolutely. And I would just tell him to call the head of Eurocommand. He's the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, for crying out loud. He just told Congress last week that Russia's military is 15%

larger than it was before the invasion, that they're on track to having the largest military on the entire continent of Europe, that they're more lethal and stronger than they've ever been. And that the, they, you know, even Kurt Campbell, the number two at the State Department has said that Russia has virtually completely reconstituted its military, meaning that all of this nonsense we've heard from these hawks like Mitt Romney and Richard Blumenthal about how, oh, we've destroyed Russia's military capacity by a half. It's just a complete lie. They have any kind of damage that was sustained according to the top officials in the military and the State Department, they're saying that is not the case, that the damage at this point is almost negligible.

And in the meantime, they've completely outstripped the entire NATO alliance in terms of producing artillery by at least three times. And so there's just no way that they can, I mean, the only thing they can do, I mean, this is why we're hearing more talk from these European, these hawkish European states, like, well, from Macron, most importantly, saying that he's going to, he's thinking about sending troops to Ukraine. Well, you only would do that if you believe that the war is completely lost and that the Ukrainian regime is on the brink of a collapse. And in the meantime, we're still on the brink of nuclear war. And apparently, you know, according to the Office of Management of the Budget, the spending on the war is $14 billion greater than was originally admitted. We've spent over $120 billion. Now, if you spend60 billion, it gets up to about $185 billion.

They're only doing it for politics. And we're talking about hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who have died. It's just- Do you think the neocons who pushed for this and who have surrounded Joe Biden know that this has been a dismal failure and now we're concentrating on Israel, or do they not have a reverse? Do they not have remorse? Do they never acknowledge when they're wrong? They want blood and they got it. I think it's unfortunately likely to be the latter. They have the sunk cost fallacy. They really do believe that if they just bleed Russia anyway, it's worth it. In fact, you know, when they sent the Ukrainians in for that counteroffensive last summer, we knew from the Discord leaks, from Jack Teixeira's leaks, and we knew from actually subsequent reporting after the counteroffensive had begun in the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal and the other major papers that they absolutely knew the Ukrainians did not have the equipment that they needed from artillery to planes to air defenses. And they sent them in there anyway. And they said, we expect high numbers of casualties, but we expect Ukrainians to accept that as the price of pushing through Russia's defenses. And then when they couldn't do that, they and tens of thousands of Ukrainians were getting killed or gravely wounded. The response from American officials in the press was the Ukrainians are just too casualty averse.

And of course, we've heard record rhetoric from Lindsey Graham, who is essentially a spokesman for the neoconservatives. He's, he's just furious that the, that some of the Ukrainians are trying to avoid fighting in this war, this unwinnable war, which the majority of the public empathizes with people who are dodging the draft or trying to anyway. Uh, he says, and he said that he wants them to fight to the last Ukrainian. I really like how this works. We provide the money, we provide the weapons and you fight to the last Ukrainian, even if it means you're fighting hand to hand. And this is, you know, the policy is to weaken Russia as much as possible, as I mentioned before on the show, in anticipation of this future war with China. But I don't see them really ending this or negotiating, at least not until, you know,

we could see a different calculus after the election. But in the meantime, we're talking about at least through November or even early next year, where there's not going to be any thought of diplomacy with Russia. And in the meantime, we're only going up the escalation ladder and closer and closer to nuclear war. And we're already closer than we've ever been. Conor Freeman, thank you, my dear man. Your knowledge of all this is encyclopedic, and you're very generous to share it with us. We'll see you again soon. Thank you very much, Judge. Take care. Of course. Coming up at three o'clock Eastern, the great Phil Giraldi, and at four o'clock Eastern,

the intrepid Aaron Mate, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.