Judging Freedom - [ DON'T MISS ] - COL. Douglas Macgregor: Why Is Trump Arming Ukraine?

Episode Date: February 26, 2025

[ DON'T MISS ] - COL. Douglas Macgregor: Why Is Trump Arming Ukraine?See 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 Wednesday, February 26, 2025. Colonel Douglas McGregor joins us now. Colonel, always a pleasure, sir. Thank you very much for your time, allowing me to pick your brain. Although I'm going to start by amusing you and probably irritating you at the same time, if you'll forgive me. This has got to be buffoon of the year, and you'll know exactly who it is. Chris, cut number 13. Everybody knows there's a minerals deal on the table today, right? And I think it has every prospect of being signed. And frankly, I think it should be signed because it

commits the United States in black and white to a free, sovereign and secure Ukraine. So what we need now is everybody to be serious and to get real and to listen to what Trump is actually saying and doing and proposing. He said he doesn't mind UK troops on the ground in Ukraine. That's great. Well, then we need to make that real. The US is committed, black and white, to a free, secure, sovereign Ukraine. You can't have a sovereign country without the ability to decide which clubs you're going to belong to. Sovereign country can remain committed to joining NATO. That's sovereignty.

Sovereign country can remain free to allow whatever troops it wants to come on its soil to support it. That's sovereignty. Now, Putin could never accept that. The US has already committed to that. I think Putin is ultimately going to fail and Ukraine is going to succeed only the fool who talked President Zelensky out of signing an agreement that his people had negotiated with the Russians in the spring of 22 could have made statements like that but I'll let you respond to it please colonel well bojo the clown is back in action and as you point out

every time he's involved himself in any way shape or form with ukraine we've ended up with thousands and hundreds of thousands of more dead ukrainians i know that president trump recently said some things. I think he was in error, and we are all going to discover that Moscow is not interested in any agreement that allows NATO troops, specifically French or British, to take up residence under any circumstances, whether they're peacekeepers or anything else in Ukraine. So I think that's unfortunate. And if President Trump really wants this agreement to work, he needs to go back and carefully examine Putin's words. But of course, Bojo the Clown is interested in creating the illusion that somehow or another, we're going to end up with a Ukraine inside NATO at some future date. And that, of course,

is a non-starter. We may not see NATO around very much longer as it is. Colonel, here is what the president said just a few minutes ago, Chris, and it's even worse than Bojo, because President Trump is talking about U.S. personnel. He doesn't say military. U.S. personnel on the ground, and nobody will mess with us. I'll let you respond after we listen to it. Cut number 12. They spent $350 billion, and Europe spent $100 billion.

Now, does anybody really think that's fair? But then we find out a little while ago, not so long ago, a few months ago, I found out that the money they spent, they get back. But the money we spent, we don't get back. I said, well, we're going to get it back. And we'll be able to make a deal. And again, President Zelensky is coming to sign the deal. And it's a great thing. It's a great deal for Ukraine, too, because they get us over there and we're going to be working over there. We'll be on the land. And, you know, in that way, it's this sort of automatic security because nobody's going to be messing around with our people when we're there.

And so we'll be there in that way. But Europe will be watching it very closely. I know that UK has said and France has said that they want to put, they volunteered to put so-called peacekeepers on the site. And I think that's a good thing. Mr. President, you know, we both respect him and we both applaud his willingness to communicate with the Russians meaningfully. But statements like that betray either gross ignorance or very, very bad intel. Your thoughts, Colonel? No, I think that's a polite way to put it.

You know, to be frank, President Trump needs to get out of this notion of putting anybody in Ukraine who's not Ukrainian and stay away from it. I heard this and I was genuinely disappointed because I think there's been a gross misinterpretation, but we've had somewhere between 1.2 and 1.5 million Ukrainian dead in this war, along with 100,000 dead Russian troops. Now, what number of those troops are actually Chechen or Muslim versus Christian is irrelevant. They all fought for Russia, and at least 10,000 of the Chechens and other Muslim soldiers have died. This is a catastrophe, and President Trump should recognize that talking about deals regarding rare earth minerals to somehow or another pay us back for a war that we did everything in our

power to cultivate and launch, for a war that we subsidized, for a war that persisted far longer than it ever should have because of our influence is a disaster. I think he should be much more mindful of the human losses, recognize this country is now wrecked, recognize that Russia has also paid a price for its victory, and back away from this. Stop talking about deals that are going to compensate us for something good. We didn't do any good. We did the opposite. And then finally, I'm not sure about this rare earth business and how much is actually

present. I've seen several reports that suggest there's very little over there. Now, there may be other kinds of minerals, maybe lithium and some other things. I don't know but at this stage I think it's both in bad taste as well as ill-advised to talk about that sort of thing in public uh I know that President Trump takes great pride in being very transactional but this is transactional in the extreme why is he much more concerned about the people that live in that country. Why is he still arming Ukraine? Well, the man next to him, Secretary of State Rubio,

who must have been wincing, the camera wasn't on his face, is supposed to be negotiating with his opposite number, Foreign Minister Lavrov. Why are we still arming the Ukrainians? Well, ostensibly because we're going to receive some sort of payment. I mean, my impression is that he would provide more aid if they provided mineral wealth to the United States in some substantial form. Again, it makes no sense. All of the aid should stop immediately. Not humanitarian aid, but certainly any form of military aid should stop immediately. Not humanitarian aid, but certainly any form of military aid should stop immediately. Why would the Russians take us seriously for a second if we sustained it? So the only answer I could give you is that I don't know, but this is another

example of something that happened to him during his first term. He would issue an order, he would give direction, but then there was no follow-up to ensure that his orders and directives were obeyed. That may well be the case now. And of course, Secretary Hegseth is new to the Defense Department. He may be in a somewhat similar situation. I don't know. Here's Foreign Minister Lavrov. Yesterday, excuse me, earlier today, before President Trump made the statement that we just ran and you just analyzed. Chris, cut number 11. We cannot consider any options of deploying peacekeepers to Ukraine. I don't know what Macron said there. He did not play his role very convincingly in Washington. But when this topic was raised at a press conference, as I read, President Trump said a decision to deploy peacekeeping forces is possible only with the consent of both parties,

apparently meaning us and Ukraine. No one asks us about this. Well, he didn't say that when he made his statement from the cabinet meeting that you just analyzed. But this betrays, in my view, gross ignorance, unless this is some sort of negotiating ploy. Who knows? That's the way he operates. But if he honestly believes what he's saying, to me, this betrays a gross, gross, gross ignorance. 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. Of the Kremlin's mentality and the Kremlin's capabilities on this? The Russians are deadly serious people.

They don't bluff. Neither do the Germans. I think the Russians in particular, at this point in time, are not interested in nonsense. They're not going to take any sort of strategic hedge that President Trump or anyone else thinks they're creating seriously. They want an end to this. They're willing to sign an agreement with us. They're interested in a security architecture for Europe, Russia, and the United States.

We need to take that very seriously. This should be seen as a strategic inflection point in the history of Europe and, frankly, the world. And we should treat it appropriately, very seriously, sit down and work it out, however many months it takes, because this could set the stage for decades of prosperity and peace and stability. That is what everyone should now be interested in. Russia is interested in it. I think we are as well. All this sort of tactical nonsense or mispronouncements all needs to go away.

In fact, frankly, Judge, there are too many people in this administration talking too much about everything. We need less of this marketing ploy, less nonsense, and more facts. And those facts should come from the president and not from anybody else. And they should come, I would say, only when absolutely necessary and carefully constructed after much research and understanding. That obviously is not the case. Tomorrow, Prime Minister Starmer will be visiting the White House. We all know that President Macron was there yesterday.

Do they have any leverage with President Trump at all? I don't know why they would. And this would be a wonderful opportunity for President Trump at the end of the visit to make it abundantly clear that there is no agreement and there will be no agreement about peacekeepers of any kind unless Washington, Moscow and Kiev agree to it. And let it go at that and clear up this confusion. Unfortunately, I think Prime Minister Starmer is going to come flying in with inflated expectations thanks to Bojo. Instead of having an advisor like you, he has people who will tell him what they think he wants to hear. The same thing from which Joe Biden suffered in my view and I think in yours. Is the war in Ukraine effectively over or can the Ukrainian military, as weak as it is, continue it by the use of drones? Clearly, this regime in Kiev is going to use whatever it has as its disposal to

attack or harm Russia. I mean, that's what all these long-range strike weapons are about, whether they're drones or missiles or whatever. So I'm sure that if they still have something left, they will use it, which I think is a mistake. And we should order a halt to it. We have the authority. President Trump can intervene and say, I want it all to stop now. That's what he should be interested in. That should be his top priority.

And make it clear to Zelensky that if he doesn't stop, Zelensky is going to be removed from power, and they'll get no further assistance of any kind, even humanitarian, from the United States. That's what President Trump should do, and otherwise he should be focused here at home where we have 100 million people on food stamps, which is outrageous, but that's where we are thanks to this economy. You are 100% correct. You're also correct under the law, because the hundreds of billions that Congress authorized is all, quote, subject to the discretion of the president. Unlike other expenditures that Congress orders, he is not required to spend at all. He can exercise, I realize that these laws were enacted when Joe Biden was president, but Donald Trump can exercise his discretion as he sees fit. He could turn that spigot off in a heartbeat right now if he wanted to. I wonder if his advisors, Secretary of State Hegseth and Secretary of, excuse me, Defense Hegseth and Secretary of State Rubio and Mike Waltz. Mike Waltz does these things. He was in Congress when this stuff was negotiated.

He voted for it, foolishly, but he did. I wonder if they've told this to the president. I have no idea. I don't know what sort of discussions were actually held. Right, right, right. Of course, none of us knows. Switching gears, Colonel, do you believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu is determined to wreck the ceasefire with Gaza and reintroduce genocide in the Gaza Strip? I think President Netanyahu intends to resume the attacks in Gaza. He plans to continue activities in the West Bank that will ultimately result in something similar to what's happened in Gaza. And I still think that he's carefully organizing for an attack against Iran. And I think Egypt is very close to delivering an ultimatum.

They've announced that they're going to provide an ultimatum to the Israelis. I don't know what the content is. I've been trying to get a copy of it or at least a translation of it. Haven't been able to do that. But I think that ultimatum is coming from President Sisi to Mr. Netanyahu, and I think that will trigger a war, because I don't think Mr. Netanyahu is going to stop doing anything. He is going to absolutely continue to do what he began. You have often expressed a very considered and learned fear of a regional war that might drag the United States, and I'm going to guess that you don't have that fear with respect to Ukraine. If I'm wrong,

correct me. I'm guessing on your thinking. On the other hand, do you still have that fear with respect to the Middle East? Yes, yes. I think all of the Arab states, they're meeting, as you know, on the 4th of March. This is to consider the plan for Gaza that's been outlined by the Egyptians, which is obviously radically different from what the Israelis and President Trump have been talking about. For instance, the Egyptians plan to build temporary facilities for the population to remain in Gaza while repairs are affected. And this is something that the Israelis are obviously completely disinterested in. Most of this has been done with the goal in mind of driving the population out or killing it.

So why would they accept a plan from the Egyptians that involved reconstruction that allows the population to live nearby on the land that is theirs, where their ancestors have been for at least a thousand or more years? It's not going to happen. So I think the Arab states have come to one mind. I think that this particular plan the Egyptians have outlined was really discussed with Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince, and Saudi Arabia and others. It's now going to be presented to all the Arab states. They will all back it.

And then Israel is going to be stuck with the ultimatum. Either you accept this or we go to war. Now, will President or Prime Minister Netanyahu wait for this to happen, or will he preempt it with action? The Israelis are very good at preemption, and they may decide to preempt action by attacking the Egyptian forces that are currently arrayed along the border with Israel. I don't know.

But I don't think this is going to come to fruition. I think ultimately it will break down and the war will resume. If Israel attacks Iran, what do you expect the United States to do? What do you expect Russia to do? Second part of this question, do we understand the nature of the relationship between Russia and Iran? Well, the answer to the first question is that we will automatically respond in support of Israel. Go back and listen to Secretary of Defense Hegsess' promises made in public in the conference room

across from the Office of the Secretary of Defense in the Pentagon, in which he told a broadly smiling Netanyahu and Mr. Netanyahu's supporting cast that they stood ready to provide whatever support Mr. Netanyahu needs, that everyone at the table with Secretary Hegseth was on side with them, and that we were ready to go. So I think it's quite obvious. We will immediately join whatever happens. Now, when I say immediately, will we fly the initial assaults against the Iranians? Perhaps not, but we'll be not far away. We will provide the refueling assets and we will reinforce the attacks once it becomes clear that the Israelis have attacked and the Iranians respond.

So that's the answer to the first question. Yes, we will be deeply involved. Secondly, do we understand the relationship between Iran and Russia and what Russia is likely to do the answer is no I think that we tend to compartmentalize we view what happens in Ukraine as separate and distinct from what happens in the Middle East don't think the Russians see it that way for them an attack on Iran is going to be treated as an attack on their strategic interests, their national security concerns, just as our intervention in Ukraine to push the war against Russia was viewed as an attack on Russian national security interests.

So I think, initially, the Russians will assist in any way they can to support and defend Iran. Then, as it becomes clear that we are involved with the assaults on the country, I think we will see their intervention to help protect Iran, and that would include potentially attacks on us in the region. And by the way, we haven't mentioned it, but once this war breaks out and all of the Arab states are unambiguously allied against Israel and are part of this fight that Egypt will initially lead, I would expect the Turks to also eventually intervene.

I don't know when, but they won't wait long because Mr. Erdogan, who still views himself as the unofficial leader of Islam in the region, particularly the Sunni Islamists, is not going to miss the opportunity. He's the one that wants to march into Jerusalem and liberate it more than anybody else. Wow. Colonel, before we go, do we know why the president fired the Joint Chiefs of Staff? Oh, I

think so. I think there's a recognition of three things. First of all, all of these senior officers have come up through the ranks certainly from the mid-90s until now. That was a very different atmosphere in professional terms from what existed before 1991. Now, I'm not saying that all the senior officers today are much worse or less capable or less competent than the officers that existed before

1991. But I don't think there was any highly politicized faction of any kind inside the senior ranks of the armed forces before Desert Storm. That changes in the 1990s because the Clinton administration and subsequently the George W. Bush administration, which was really in most cases an extension of what happened under Clinton, and then Obama, who was really an extension of what was going on under Bush, positioned officers who were user-friendly to the political regimes. And that meant that they were going to support and implement policies, which frankly, most of the officers that were there before 1991 would have viewed as

antithetical to the interests of good discipline, cohesion, and effectiveness. So there's good reason to send them away. We need new fresh eyes to look at a new world, new situations, new technologies, and frankly, to build new armed forces, not rebuild the old ones. I mean, the biggest mistake we can make at this point is rebuild the old force. The old force is the wrong force. We need to build a new one. So putting new officers in there is important for that reason, as well as the political reason, that why would you want someone serving under you who's supposed to obey your orders, who is ostensibly opposed to you fundamentally, viscerally, in their thinking?

It's catastrophic. Do you want a chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who is user-friendly or who will cause you to rethink what you've asked him about? Remember, the mission statement that describes the chairman of the Joint Chiefs' true role in all of these matters is as the senior military advisor to the president. The chairman has no real command authority of any kind. The command authority reaches from the president and the secretary of defense down to the regional unified commanders or the functional and unified commanders. It does not go through

the service chiefs. The service chiefs are literally a committee of men and women who are part of the advisory staff for the chairman. They have very limited authority when it comes to operations. So none of these people are in the operational chain of command, but they control most of the money. And when you control most of the money, you control most of the decisions. So changing them for that reason also makes sense. But in the case of the chairman, he's someone who has to be able to speak truth to power. He has to have backbone. He can't just be a yes-man. Unfortunately, most of the chairmen through most of our history have been very unimpressive men, people that were likely to be user-friendly in the wrong way. We haven't had

very many who stood up and said, don't do X, it's a bad idea. Very few have done that. I wonder if General, I think his name is Kane, the one who's coming out of retirement to replace General Brown is a yes man. I mean, he met the president of the MAGA rally. I don't know. I mean, I know General Kane, in his retired capacity, also has a board on an organization chaired and run by Jared Kushner's brother. I don't know if that makes any difference, but that would look like a potential conflict of interest. Then, of course, you're right. If he went to a MAGA rally,

I guess that suggests that there's some commonality of interest and values. You know, bringing people back from retirement, you know, in most cases has not been a successful action. Schumacher came out of retirement, became Chief of Staff of the Army, and I would argue made matters much worse in the Army and in Iraq than they were to begin with. The last time that we had someone who came out of retirement, well, there are two examples, good ones that I can think of. One is Admiral Leahy, who had been chief of naval operations, and he was de facto the senior military advisor to FDR. I think he did a splendid job, and he was effectively the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who gave directions to Marshall and King, the two four-stars, one Navy, one Army, and then, of course, Arnold. The only other one who was a success story is MacArthur.

MacArthur was retired. He was in retirement. He was a major general because once you retired as a four-star before World War II, you reverted to two-star rank. He was then restored to his four stars and put in command of the Philippines. And at the time, you know, FDR wasn't very comfortable with him because he was a known Republican and right winger. But MacArthur seems to have gotten along with FDR

and done effectively whatever FDR wanted operationally. So there are some success stories, but in recent times, I don't think so. So, you know, it would have made more sense if you really want fresh eyes, a new way to look at things to reach much lower. That's what FDR did with Marshall. Marshall was a one-star general, and he reached down and elevated this man. It had a huge impact. It helped to retire lots of people. It was a complete turnover in the army in terms of its mentality, thinking, and outlook, even though Marshall and FDR were frequently of a different opinion. And Marshall was also a Republican. It worked out very well because Marshall,

like MacArthur, was ultimately loyal to the President of the United States, who was the Commander-in-Chief. Nobody knows the history the way you do, Colonel, and your ability to apply historical lessons to present-day crises is so admirable. Thank you very much for your time. I know it's late in the day for us to be doing this, but I appreciate your accommodating my schedule. I'm always happy to accommodate yours. It's a joy to be able to chat with you, Colonel. Thank you very much. Hey, listen, Judge, it's never too late down here in beautiful Orlando, Florida. All right. A little bit of spring here in New York City today. I came in with a coat, but I don't need to wear it on the way home. Thank you. Well, that's good news. I'm glad to hear it. It's in the 80s here and very sunny,

just thought you should know that. Making making me jealous thank you you're the guy at lake como you know so i i hate you forever because you know i've never been to lake como i'll probably never get there so i'm deeply depressed so i wish you all the worst whenever you go to lake como love you colonel all the best all right right. Bye-bye. Bye. Coming up tomorrow at 11 in the morning, more or less because of who it is, Max Blumenthal at 1 in the afternoon. Former British diplomat Ian Proud at 2 in the afternoon. Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson at 3 in the afternoon. Professor John Mearsheimer at four in the afternoon, former command

sergeant chief Dennis Fritz, Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. With courses available online 24-7 and monthly start dates, WGU offers maximum flexibility so you can focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu.