Judging Freedom - INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern + Scott Ritter : Weekly Wrap 29-May

Episode Date: May 29, 2026

INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern + Scott Ritter : Weekly Wrap 29-MaySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Tragically, 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? 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 a judge. Judging Freedom. Today is Friday, May 29th, 20206. It's the end of the day, the end of the week. It's our favorite time. It's the Intelligence Community Roundtable with Larry Johnson, Ray McGovern, and Scott Ritter. Gentlemen, always a pleasure. Thank you very much for joining us.

I want to start with Cuba, because I know you guys have been doing some research on it and are animated by it. Ray, to you first. what are Trump and Rubio up to? Well, they need to know that Cuba is not Venezuela. In other words, they're out to do some regime change or worse in Cuba, and they ought to realize that Cuba's going to fight back. They probably don't have the kind of agents of influence that they did have in Caracas. And a complicating factor is there's an outside chance that Russia

and China might make good on their rhetoric against these big bullies who do unlawful things. So there's a history to Cuba. Last thing I'll say on that is that the Russians made a deal with the U.S. on Cuba under John Kennedy. No invasion, no regime change in Cuba in return for Khushchev taking those medium-range ballistic missiles out of Cuba. There was a side deal. We took some missiles out of Turkey, but that was the main deal. That's probably way heavily on Russia's mind with respect to how they react to this. Larry, are Russia or Chinese intel in Cuba?

Oh, I'm sure they are. The U.S. has had a tough time staying there. And let's just give a plug that VIPS. under raise leadership, posted a memo last night. It was drafted, principal drafter on it, Fulton Armstrong, was at one point the national intelligence officer

for Latin America, but he also served in Cuba as a undercover CIA officer. So very, you know, very knowledgeable about the place. But the views that he expressed encompass that of all of us. So this is,

the fundamental thing for the Cubans is a strong sense of, national identity and one in which they've, you know, they've spent the lives of everybody who's alive today, you know, for 66 years, fighting against, you know, U.S. imperialism. And, you know, United States, we never, we never forgave those damn Cubans for getting rid of organized crime and both the Jewish and Italian mafia. Right. And anybody that's watched Godfather 2, where, you know, the Hyman Roth character was, you know, is portraying Meyer Lansky, a known Jewish mobster who was in bed with the Italian mob.

And then that can take us off into the whole realm of their role in the killing of John F. Kennedy. But so this obsession of the United States with Cuba is really one about revenge over the fact. that they had the audacity to overthrow a U.S. criminally backed organization. Volgenzica Batista, Scotty, what are the likely consequences of an American installed, Rubio-crafted government in Cuba? Consequences? I don't think you could install one. I mean, the consequences would be their imminent death at the hands of a population that just won't tolerate this. You know, Marco Rubio lives in a fantasy world of his own creation.

It's a fantasy world that, you know, was developed at the echo chamber that is Florida. You know, there's a large, you know, Cuban population in Florida, Cuban American population, many of whom, you know, have date their time in America back to fleeing Fidel Castro. These were people who were supporters of Batista, people who were involved in the casinos and the organized crime. you know, the empowered economic and political elites, you know, they have no knowledge whatsoever about what's going on inside Cuba. They have no connectivity to Cuba. They live in their own little little Havanaas throughout Florida, and they just sit there and reminisce about times that never existed because as years go by, memories fade and they just create more, more fantasy-driven notions of what Cuba should look like as opposed to what Cuba does look like. The Cuban people,

of course, have suffered under sanctions who would like a better life. Who wouldn't? And maybe many Canadians would actually see their government change, how it operates and its makeup, et cetera. But that change comes from within. I don't think this island of revolutionaries is going to tolerate regime change foisted on them by little Marco. I mean, the Cubans know who he is. They know who he is. They know where he came from. They know everything about him. They don't respect this guy. They don't fear this guy. They're not intimidated by this guy. And they certainly aren't afraid of the CIA. They're not afraid of the U.S. military. You know, so let's say what, we appoint a government somehow. How do we get them installed? Do we come in in the middle of the

night and arrest Rao Castro and then put these guys in? They won't last a week. The bottom line is the United States will not be able to install a Marco Rubio clone. government. You know, they may succeed in this government as in killing the leadership, but it'll be the Cuban people that determine what the future of Cuba will be. And it's not going to be a future dictated to them at the point of a gun by the United States. We know that the indictment of Rao Castro is just pretextual. Larry, you were familiar with the planes that actually flew over Cuban airspray. who were ordered to leave, who refused to leave, who were piloted by CIA-backed terrorists,

what government wouldn't be immune in shooting down planes like that? Yeah, no, and it violated Cuban airspace. So, you know, this, you know, Royal Castro's, if he does come to trial, I mean, it'd be a travesty, number one. But, yeah, he's firmly, and he's got international law to stand on, in contrast to the United States who's blowing up ships in the Caribbean in international waters without any legal justification. I mean, this is worse than a case of pot calling kettle black. This is the case where back then it was clear provocation by the United States, by the CIA, trying to provoke a reaction from Cuba that would give a predicate for the United States to take military action

against Cuba. Ray, is the CIA physically present in Cuba? Well, they've they would have agents there, but only the agents that the Cuban intelligence service hasn't already wrapped up. One of the major scandals that CIA suffered a couple of years ago was that by virtue of some glitch in their communications or some other kind of glitch, the Cuban government was able to round up pretty much all the assets that the U.S. had on the ground. So, yeah. When you say assets, you mean...

Cuban people working in conjunction with American agents. Spies. People who are recruited and paid for spying. Now, one thing that we don't have is any evidence that the Russians or the Chinese have spy installation spying on the United States from Cuba. That's Passa. There's no recent intelligence information suggesting that. As a matter of fact, they don't need that anymore with all these other sophisticated devices.

that exists today to collect information. Let's go over to Iran. Scotty, will Trump's Zionist controllers allow him to enter into an agreement that restrains Israel from slaughter in Lebanon and Gaza? And the flip side of that is, will the Iranians enter into any agreement with Trump that fails to restrain?

Israel. According to our friend and brother, Professor Muhammad Miranda, the answer to the second question is no. Well, I mean, I agree with him 100%. Let's just, again, let's just set the record straight. Winners dictate outcomes. Losers are the ones who have to adhere to the dictation. Iran did not lose this war. The United States lost this war. We don't get to dictate. any outcomes because we have no leverage at all, economic or military or political, that can compel Iran to do our bidding. What we're seeing right here is political theater by literally an insane man, Donald Trump, suffers from malignant narcissistic personality disorder. It operates as a cult of personality, not as a president. He believes in erecting golden idols

to himself and having religious figures, you know, vector their prayers through. him to God. In the Old Testament, he'd have been smitten, smoke. Today, he should just be ignored, but he can't because of the President of the United States. Iran will not allow anything to happen that they don't want to happen. And Iran has made its position very clear. There's some negotiating room on nuclear, for instance. Iran has shown great flexibility to agree to practical terms, but they're not going to allow Donald Trump to get, you know, a face-saving mechanism of the United States, the idea of the United States troops landing on Iranian soil to take custody of the Iranian 60% in Richmond is, I mean, you'd literally have to eat high-arm cocaine or

insane. I don't think the president's snorting cocaine, so I'll go with insane. It just isn't going to happen. There's no, there's literally no scenario in the world where that will happen. Likewise, the idea that Iran isn't going to retain control over the Strait of Hormuz. That's their, that's their nuclear weapon and Trump wants them to give it up. They're not going to. They've already worked out an agreement with Oman and the world has pretty much agreed to do it. Everybody in the world except the United States and Israel. Now, your question about what Israel, we know that the phone's ringing off the hook. We know that Donald Trump's getting a lot of pressure. But let me just boil it down as simplistic as possible. In 1992, you know, Bill Clinton was campaigning

against George Herbert Walker Bush, the man who just won Desert Storm, one of the greatest foreign policy presidents of our time. And he was trying to say that he has a better foreign policy than Bush. And he's out there talking about it. And James Carbill came up and put a sticky note on the door of the war room and said, it's the economy, stupid, meaning stop talking about this stuff. The only thing the American people care about come election time is how much money's in their wallet. And if the average American is like me right now, they open up their wallet, and they get one little dollar, and that's it. And you don't get to buy much gas with one little dollar

when the price of gas is going through the roof. It's the economy, stupid, and that's what's driving President Trump's decision, and no amount of phone calls from Israel is going to change that. Wow. I just looking at this piece that Phil Giraldi sent to all of us about the NDAA, the National Defense Authorization Act for 2027, with two sections in there calling for the interim.

integration of the IDF with the United States military at a level that the U.S. military has never integrated with a foreign country before. Does that surprise you, Larry Johnson? Oh, no. They're going to try to hide it, you know, launder the money. You know, right now, do you have to go through an open process of State Department selling weapons to Israel? This way, you get to bury it in the Department of War. But, you know, I think this comes too little too late because several of the weapons that Israel would like to get, we no longer can make because we don't have the supplies. So, you know, the United States is making promises to deliver things

that it can't right now produce, simply because of the lack of resources. So, you know, this Israel remains sort of the central player in this drama. Now, we saw earlier today Trump announcing that he was lifting the blockade, but then he proceeded to basically take the 180-degree opposite position on every one of Iran's demands, such as release of frozen assets, sanction, relief, the end of the war in Lebanon and Gaza and the West Bank. And so as long as Israel continues to carry out those attacks, Iran's not going to agree to any kind of permanent agreement. agreement. You know, the ceasefire is tentative. It remains barely in place. But I think that as these

attacks on Lebanon, as they intensify, Iran's going to finally pull back and start striking Israel, because Israel is violating the ceasefire. Ray, Trump told CNN he's spending all afternoon in the, I forget the name of the room that they use in the way. Situation room. In the situation room. Thank you, Larry. with his closest advisors. I can't imagine he has the patience to do anything all afternoon with the possible exception to play golf. Well, actually, maybe that's where Zelensky went.

Zolensky got out of Dodge, didn't he? He left Kiev. People say maybe in Sweden, but maybe he's in the situation room, dictating what we should do. I make a joke. But, yeah, Trump is really so understanding, unpredictable. It's really hard to understand what he'll do. And in these parlous situations,

Putin and Xi have to be really careful not to provoke him into doing something like invoking Article 5 of the NATO treaty to rise up and even contemplate doing nuclear weapons. I don't think that's going to happen. But these people, that is, Putin and she, are being really careful not to provoke them in that direction. Scotty, I guess President Zelensky is wise to be out of Kiev in light

of what is probably coming. What do you think is coming in response to enough is enough when they bombed, when the Ukrainians bombed a girls' dormitory and killed 25 school girls? Well, first of all, I think that

Zelensky is not on the target list. It would be the dumbest thing in the world for Russia to put them on the target list. Zelensky is one of the best assets they have. Zolensky is corrupt as a day is long, and right now inside Ukraine is a huge corruption scandal centered on Zolensky in his inner circle that further undermines his authority and his legitimacy. Russia has made the decision, and this is a finalized decision after the murder of these 21 teenagers who were attending a teacher's college, the future of Russia, the people are going to teach the next generation, the hope of Russia. There's a reason why Russia, this is the straw that broke the camel's back. It's unforgivable and the symbolism and the reality and the practicality of what Ukraine did here has turned the

entire Russian nation into singularly focused on ending this conflict on terms solely acceptable to Russia. There will be no negotiations. They're dead. There will be no compromise. The war ends, when Ukraine accepts the unconditional surrender. That means they accept unconditionally the terms dictated by Russia. Europe is no longer a factor. Russia is not listened to Europe. And the United States has opted out. We'll never be asked to come back in.

And so Russia, this means that Russia is going to replace Zelensky. And I can tell you, and Larry knows this as well. Larry, you hang around with the very people that talk about this, the same people that I hang around with. We know who they are. We know what they're talking about. We know what's in store, at least what they plan to be in store. It'd be very difficult for them to install what they hope to be the future government of Ukraine in a compromise situation and negotiated settlement becomes difficult because there's post-settlement things that have to happen that it's unpredictable.

But in an unconditional surrender, you now get to slide in your government. But here's where it gets difficult. If you kill Zelensky, the most hated man in Ukraine today, they despise this guy. They really do. He's not loved at all, not respected. He's widely reviled. You kill him, you instantly turn him into a martyr. And people will rally around him. And then the replacements will have legitimacy because they'll be seen stepping in to replace a martyr to stand up to Russia. And now you've created a more legitimate government. It's going to be harder to replace. You need Zelensky to stay in power. So the first thing is, Zolenski can stand right in the middle of Kiev,

and the Russians won't target him. They just aren't going to. to target him. What they are going to target is everybody else but him. And this is what's going to happen. But it's not going to happen. I mean, I'm sure, I think tonight's going to be a big strike. I think they're going to come in with a heavy punch tonight. But then the other thing, that's just shaking the tree. I mean, it's an old intelligence term where you go in and you do something and then you stand back and watch. Because the Russians have a good idea what certain things are, but they have no idea or other things are. So you want to bang things up and make things move, make things activate, make communications, come on, come off, etc. Russians will be

collecting that. And then you're going to see they have assets standing by. And as a rabbit runs and goes into a different hole, boom, that hole is going to be hit. As somebody runs up and goes up a tree, bam, that tree is going to be hit. And the Russians are going to spend a whole bunch of time hunting down the things that fall from the tree that's about to get shaken tonight. This is a sustained campaign of eliminating Ukraine's decision-making centers, eliminating their leadership, their command and control, their defense industry, their military leadership, their intelligence leadership, and Russia's just going to eviscerate them, slaughter, and then murder them. It's going to be as ugly as it can possibly get. And Russia's put the

Ukrainian people on notice, because here's one of the secrets of nobody in the West wants to talk about. Ukraine has, for the entirety of this conflict, hidden capabilities behind a human shield. They do this. We see that in every town, village the Russians go into. They have aliens in the basement to keep the Russians from putting a bomb on the house. They force the Russians to come in to evacuate the basement under fire, taking casualties before they can come in and move out. They build drones in apartment buildings. Housewives of Ukraine post on their social media, hi, I'm at home. I work for home mom. And behind me is my 3D printer and I produce drone parts. And then they assemble those parts in the basements of these apartment facilities that turns these

apartment facilities where hundreds of civilians live into a defense industrial facility that could be struck, but Russia can't strike it because you kill civilians. This game is about to change. I'm not saying that Russia is going to be taking out apartment blocks, but I am saying that the notion that Ukraine can hide behind civilian walls is over. This is why Russia gave advance notice of their intent to strike and said civilians get away from these defense industry and military targets. So if you're a civilian living in an apartment and you know that the next door neighbors producing drone parts, you're going to either move or you're going to kick her out. And if they're doing something in the basement, either move or remove them because Russia is now not going to let this go on anymore.

This war is going to end. It's going to end with a Russian victory and that victory will dictate in unconditional terms to a defeated Ukraine. Ray, when Scott just alluded to this, when Foreign Minister Lavrov called Secretary of State Rubio and insisted he take the call, even though Rubio was in India at the time, and told him, get your people the hell out of Kiev. Did Rubio tell the same to Ratcliffe stated differently? Is the CIA still on the ground, or are they gone? Because they know what Scotty just said is coming, is coming. Well, my guess is that CIA people or the agents that case officers run in Kiev, no places to hide, no rabbit holes that even the Russians don't know about.

I think that the CIA presence there is not the important thing. The important thing is how Trump reacted to the Russian retaliation for the attacks there in Lugansk at the teachers' college. It was sort of a yawn. Trump didn't even do anything on his social account there. He left it to Karen Leavitt to say, well, you know, this is a tip-for-tat sort of thing, and you can expect this kind of thing. Now, that's not the kind of reaction that Kiev will find any encouragement from. And the fact is that the Russians and we, that is the United States, according to Vladimir Putin himself on the 9th of May, together on Ukraine. In other words, we're approaching this in the same way, and the Europeans are

going on a half-cocked. They're going to take it on the chin, but I don't think that there'd be a lot of civilian casualties. Now, that big attack, 19 people killed, well, that's a lot for a Russian attack because usually they spare civilians. I think they'll still be sensitive to that, and I don't think they'll go anywhere near the United States Embassy. Larry, assuming what Scott says happens, does happen. Do the Russians have any concern about France, Germany, Great Britain, or Washington? No, no longer. Look, some have asked, why did Russia wait till now to make this threat to do this warning?

Well, I think one logical explanation, is Russia always calculated that if they did this, they would run the risk of an escalated war with the Europeans, with NATO, with the United States. So they wanted to make sure that when that possibility came, that they would have enough mobilized troops, they would have enough inventory of a variety of missiles and weapons systems that they could fight NATO if necessary. And I think that they have finally reached that point where they're ready to take on NATO if necessary. Now we just saw today there was a lot of hype you know about six hours ago

about oh my god Russia has attacked Romania and Konstanta with a drone and the Europeans were getting all spun up just as we started this program the president of Romania came out and goes oh well this this was a Russian drone that was hit with air defense fire in Ukraine and it got offline it hit us. So this was not an intentional. So he's downplaying it because they don't want to get into a fight with Russia. They recognize that doesn't work out well. Scottie, how long will it take the Kremlin to achieve its military goals in light of its new attitude and what you say is coming? A day, a week, a month? Who knows? I don't know. They don't know. Nobody knows. One doesn't care. They're not operating off of a calendar. They are a, you know, this isn't a timeline-driven event.

This is a results-driven event. The war ends when Ukraine surrenders unconditionally, and Russia is going to continue to put pressure. The difference is right now that Russia is no longer constrained by concerns about NATO intervention. They don't care. In fact, there are many right now who are now increasingly influential in the inner circle of Putin that welcome NATO intervention because it gives Russia a chance to

excuse my language bitch slap them down russia's ready i mean political decisions have been made red lines have been crossed um the straw broke the camels back and there ain't going back on this if germany wants to provide the tourist missile as some idiots uh suggest and dussledorf disappears um and you know they have to be careful here because the carragano doctrine is in full effect i continue to advocate and i'm going to russia next week and i will advocate it openly that russia cannot cross the nuclear boundary. But unfortunately, there are people who are saying this to say, it's time if they want to play this game to hit them with a nuclear weapon under the belief the United States will not sacrifice Boston for Poseman. And they're probably right. But then the

question is, what does France and England do? Do they sit back and do nothing or do they move it? These are questions we really don't want answered. But the people in Russia right now, you know, Sergei Karaganov and others, are of the belief that nobody will do anything that if Russia uses a nuclear weapon preemptively, that it will intimidate Europe to stand down and the United States won't respond. And so they're tired of Germany threatening. You know, Germany just published a new defense thing that says, we're ready for war with Russia in 2029. Mark Ruthie says we have to prepare to fight the war that our grandparents fought. The British are talking about fighting a war in 2030. General Donnie was talking about launching against Kaliningrad, the foreign minister of

Lithuania second at Lafayette's putting drone bases in place to strike the St. Petersburg International not conform. How long does Russia have to put up with this? And the answer is no longer. No longer. And so the Russians aren't sitting there going, well, this has to be done by a certain time. They're saying it's going to be done. That's the only thing that matters. Decisions have been made and Russians don't go back on decisions. You know, there's an old Russian saying, you know, slow to harness, fast to ride. Well, guess what, NATO? You just allowed the Russians to get harnessed. Now get ready for the ride. Ray, you understand the Russian mentality and language and culture as well as anybody in the West. Agreed with what Scotty just said? You know, I look at

Putin mostly. He's unique in Russian history. He's so cautious and perspicacious. We're lucky he is. Will he take that a very mercurial President Trump will invoke Article 5 for the NATO Treaty? What would be the cost-benefit analysis for that? My position is that Putin has built up a country for the last 25 years. He'll take every measure to prevent it from being subjected to an attack by NATO. Now, Latvia was mentioned here. The Foreign Intelligence Service, the CIA from Russia, made a statement 10 days ago saying, look, Latvia, you've been deceived in thinking you can take Ukrainian drones.

They can be fired from Latvia and missiles fired from Latvia and we won't know where they're fired from. Give me a break. You've been subjected to wishful thinking here. We know exactly where they come from. And remember Latvia that there's no way that membership in NATO will protect you from retaliation. That is a strict, very, very specific warning. What will happen if Latvia does this stupid thing, which I think they won't? But let's say they do.

I think there's an equal chance that Russia would knock out a base in Latvia and risk the invocation of Article 5. But anything short of that, they're winning in Ukraine. They can bide their time. I think Putin is still able to resist those questions from the likes of Karagano. Larry, last word. Let me just say that I was being interviewed earlier by some folks in Czechoslovakia, the Czech Republic. Scott has interviewed with him before Miroslav, and they just wanted to say, hello to you.

They're faithful watchers. So you have a big audience in the Czech Republic and in the Slovak Republic. So you're a global influencer. Thanks to you guys. Thank you, Larry. Thank you, Ray. Thank you, Scotty. Truly one of the best

intelligence community roundtables we've had. I don't know what the weather's like where you guys are, but in northwest New Jersey, it's perfect. That's 75 degrees. There's not a cloud in the sky,

and that's what's coming for the next two days. You deserve it after that crummy Memorial Day weekend of raining cold. Four days. Guys, all the best. Thank you. Scott.

I hope we can spend a little bit of time together before you leave, but if we don't save travels to you. Thank you. All the best, my friends. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Coming up Monday, it's a regular Monday. We're not cramming Monday and Tuesday together this week. So Alistair Crook, Ray McGovern, Larry Johnson, and hopefully Scott Ritter and Jeff Sacks in the afternoon.

Judge Lepaulte for Judging Freedom.