Judging Freedom - Larry Johnson: Israel Shoots Itself in the Foot!

Episode Date: December 21, 2023

GET READY - "Israel Shoots Itself in the Foot" with Larry Johnson, a distinguished former operative of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). This conversation takes a microscope into the complex dynamics surrounding Israel's actions and their potential repercussions, as seen through the experienced lens of Larry Johnson.The dialogue explores the multifaceted aspects of Israel's decision-making, analyzing the possible consequences and unintended fallout from various perspectives. Larry Johnson's background in intelligence lends a unique and informed perspective, allowing for a nuanced examination of the strategic, geopolitical, and diplomatic implications of Israel's actions.#russia #ukraine #USMilitaryHistory #Israel #Gaza #ceasefire #hostages #Ukraine #zelenskyy #Biden #china #IsraelPalestine #MiddleEastConflict #PeaceInTheMiddleEast #GazaUnderAttack #Ceasefire #Jerusalem #prayforpeace #hostages #Israel #Gaza #ceasefire #hostages #Ukraine #zelenskyy #Biden #china #IsraelPalestine #MiddleEastConflict #PeaceInTheMiddleEast #GazaUnderAttack #Ceasefire #Jerusalem #prayforpeace #hostagesSee 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 Monday, December 18th, 2023. Larry Johnson joins us now. Larry, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Welcome back to the show. You have written, I commend it to everybody that's interested in all of this, at your website, sonar21.com, a great piece called The End of Ukraine, in which you have outlined the seven or eight steps that have produced Ukraine to its perilous condition today. Let's start at the end, and then we'll go back and let you analyze these phases. Is the war in Ukraine effectively over, Larry? Based on articles from the New York Times, Washington Post over the last week, yes.

You know, when the mainstream media starts reporting things that we've known about for 10, 15 months. An example is that the New York Times has a piece about how Ukraine is snatching men off the streets. Well, they've been doing that since a year ago, July. And the New York Times is just now discovering this. So, and the reason they're reporting it is they are preparing the American public,

particularly those that read the New York Times and the Washington Post, to the fact that the war in Ukraine is lost and that Ukraine can no longer maintain its manpower. And this is not just one story. It's a cascade of stories that's coming out. And I think we're going to be seeing that with more and more over the next two or three weeks. Are these stories provoked by intelligence leaks intended to embarrass or ca or cajole uh joe biden no actually i i think that it's not so

much a leak as you've got administration officials calling up these reporters saying okay here's the story you can start tell you can start telling the story now and uh because the policy is shifting. Zelensky, he's in real trouble. We know I based that in part on the story out today where General Zelensky is saying, oh my God, my office was bugged. Now, whether Zelensky bugged his own office in order to be able to tell that story or whether Zelensky actuallyged his own office in order to be able to tell that story or whether Zelensky actually bugged the office.

The ultimate target of this is Zelensky, that he's acting out of control. That's the story. That's how the meme is going to be presented. So once Zelensky is gone as the sacrificial lamb, the Ukrainians are then going to try to negotiate with the Russians. But the problem they've got, the Russians are no longer open to negotiations based upon making concessions. It's going to be, they're like Ulysses S. Grant, unconditional surrender. So the Ukrainians could have had a far better deal with Russia and China a, diplomacy might, you know, have prevented this war. A year ago in March, March of 2022, Ukraine and Russia had reached agreements in principle on disengaging. And Ukraine would agree not to become a member of NATO,

that they would recognize the Donbass, Donetsk and Luhansk Republics as having affiliation with Russia. You know, there are still details to be hammered out, but it would have brought the war to a halt. And consistently over this nine-year period now, the United States has been constantly intervening to exacerbate the war, to egg it on, to encourage it. Now, this debacle becoming apparent,

recognizing that Ukraine has no viable means forward, no path to victory. There's only a road to defeat. And so now the United States is trying to figure out how to extricate itself by blaming the Ukrainians. You know, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago on your show, about some of the articles that were out where they're blaming the Ukrainians for basically a policy and a military strategy that is entirely from the United States. They're going to blame the Ukrainians because Boris Johnson came as Joe Biden's emissary and big for the agreement that the Russians and Ukrainians negotiated in Turkey in March of 22, which would have said no NATO and no war.

Right. Zelensky made him do it. You know, these guys are just incredible in terms of their audacity, where the Ukrainians actually were willing to entertain the Russian deal. And it was under pressure, not just from Boris Johnson, but Biden, Lloyd Austin intervened directly, and other diplomats, including Anthony Blinken. So there's a full-court press brought on Zelensky. And notice at the time, we're with you as long as it takes, as long as it takes. Now, last week, Joe Biden, well, we're with him as long as we can. You go, whoa, wait a second. As long as it takes, that implies an open-ended commitment. As long as we can means we've already purchased our exit ticket.

We're leaving you. Good luck. Guess what? Zelensky's going to learn the same lesson that the Vietnamese learned, that every other country that we vowed to back, and Afghanistan and Iraq, hey, we got your back. That's usually bad news coming from the United States. We have run all right we we have run this clip a lot but we'll run it one more time this this is a montage of uh of joe biden first he says uh putin has lost the war putin is losing then he says we're with you

for as long as it takes then he says we're with you for as long as we can. Then he says, well, if Putin takes Ukraine, then he's going to go into NATO. Now, the last part of that is absurd. Putin has no interest in it, doesn't want to govern Ukraine. The last thing in the world he wants to do is pick a fight with NATO. But this is either Joe Biden's dementia or the craziness coming from Blinken and Austin and Sullivan and Victoria Nuland. Chris, play the Biden montage. Putin's war of conquest is failing. Russia's military has lost half its territory it once occupied. It's worth fighting for, for as long as it takes. And that's how long we're going to be with you, Mr. President, for as long as it takes. We'll do it.

Thank you, ma'am. We're advancing this goal by providing them the support Ukraine needs now on the battlefield and helping them strengthen their military over the long term. The fact of the matter is that I believe we'll have the funding necessary to support Ukraine as long as it takes. The American people can be and should be incredibly proud of the part they played in supporting Ukraine's success. We'll continue to supply Ukraine with critical weapons and equipment as long as we can. If Putin takes Ukraine, he won't stop there.

It's important to see the long run here. He's going to keep going. He's made that pretty clear. If Putin attacks a NATO ally, then we'll have something that we don't seek and that we don't have today. American troops fighting Russian troops. American troops fighting Russian troops if he moves into other parts of NATO. You see how cavalier he is, all presidents are, with the truth. Just twist and mold the language and the facts to suit your political needs at the moment. Is any of this based on the sort of faulty intel that senior management and the CIA is giving him

because they're telling him what they think he wants to hear as opposed to what's really going on on the ground? In other words, does Joe Biden know, to the extent that his brain is capable of processing raw data and forming conclusions, does he know Ukraine is lost, or is he still being fed what the intelligence people think he wants to hear? Yeah, no, it shows that the intelligence is finally getting through, because he went from open-ended to, well, as long as we can, to now raising the specter of the domino theory that, you know, if we don't stop those commies in Vietnam, boy, they're going to take over all of Southeast Asia. And if we don't stop Putin now, he's going to take over all of Europe.

He doesn't want all of Europe. I mean, that place is a mess. So the fact that even Biden, in his advanced stages of mental incapacity, is able to acknowledge and recognize that, you know, the United States now has limits on what it can do for Ukraine. We don't have unlimited resources. We don't have open-ended you know a checkbook that you can write endless checks on and the fact that they couldn't even get agreement to continue funding and likely would not be able to get one until uh february at the earliest and by then frankly it's going to be too late uh the. I think the military situation on the ground is deteriorating so rapidly with respect to Ukrainian fortunes that by the end of January, it'll become apparent that

they have no way to win. So the Financial Times, a well-respected international daily newspaper, which you and I and probably a lot of the folks that are watching us now, read and consult from time to time, reported over the weekend about talks between Great Britain and the United States of stealing, stealing the frozen Russian assets. I mean, it's one thing to freeze money in a bank account because you control the bank. It's not your money. So the U.S. government frees Russian money in an American bank. It's another thing to empty that bank account. The conversations are to do that and get that money to Ukraine, because Joe Biden apparently has been told by his political advisors, the House of Representatives just is not going to give you the kind of money you want because what they want in return, you won't give them.

So either Ukraine goes and your presidency goes or you find some other source for the money. So what does government do? Something it's very good at. It steals. Yeah, well, it's a petulant move. It's a vindictive move, and it's a counterproductive move. You know, Russia doesn't need that money. Russia is not going to collapse without $300 billion in its account. But what it does do, the reason it's counterproductive, it sends a message to everybody else who holds dollar accounts that even though the United States gave their cross my heart and hope to die promise that your money's safe with us, it's a lie.

And now that they've recognized the United States cannot be trusted to protect the property in the place which is represented by the money, you're going to see a capital outflow. People are no longer going to trust the U.S. dollar. They're no longer going to trust any account that the United States can get its claws on. So again, this childish juvenile desire to punish Russia. And we're even more frustrated now because Russia has not done what we wanted to do. We wanted them to lose, and they're winning. And so, therefore, we've got to figure out some other way to try to hurt them.

And in this desire to hurt them, we're hurting ourselves. It's incredibly stupid and short-sighted so the Victorian Newland I don't know if she ever said this or we attributed to her but her behavior certainly manifests it attitude the Lindsey Graham attitude uh that we can use Ukraine as a battering ram with which to drive Vladimir Putin from office, A, has failed miserably. Well, you and the others all predicted it would fail. And B, I guess they've recognized that it failed if they're going to this length of stealing property. And some of this property is not Russian property. It's private property owned by Russian nationals who have

assets in the United States. I mean, I know of a case involving a very expensive apartment in an apartment building in New York City that has the former president's name on it, seized by the federal government because it is owned by a Russian national, a person who legally lives in the United States, but was born in Russia and earned his wealth in Russia. Now, seizing that, converting it, taking the cash value of it and giving it to Zelensky, that does not directly hurt the Russian government. That hurts a human being who has no more to do with the war than you or I do. Right. Which Joe Biden and Rishi Sunak, they're going to

do the same thing in London, or at least that's what the financial test reported they're thinking about. That's the length to which they're willing to go. But, Larry, even if they do that, what is going to be accomplished? That money will run out, and Putin's victory, what, will be delayed by two months? That doesn't mean anything to him. Right. Now, you know, this is a case of the, exposes the hypocrisy of the so-called international rules-based order. So it's the rules for me, but not for thee. So consider this.

Right now you've got U.S. corporations buying up property, getting commitments from the Ukrainian government, financial groups like BlackRock that are buying up large swaths of Ukraine. And from American government policy, we're going, yay, boy, that's great stuff. Okay. Let's just change. Let's change two words. Instead of black rock, let's say China. And instead of Ukraine, let's say the United States. China's buying up all of this real estate and property in the United States. U.S. reaction, oh my God, we've got to stop that. So like I said,

the hypocrisy of it stinks to high heaven. If it's bad for the Chinese to come in and buy up property in the United States and buildings and invest money in the United States, then it's got to be bad for us to do it in other countries. So either it's good for all countries or it's bad for all countries, or this is why the United States is becoming isolated. We're insisting we're the only ones that get to do it. You other guys, no. We get to do it. We can take what we want. We can rob who we please. We're an outlaw out of control. In the fall of 2022, there were some small Ukrainian gains in terms of recapturing, reacquiring, or pushing the Russians off some land that the Russian military had taken. And General Milley said, this is the best you're going to get,

negotiate now. And boy, did they want to silence him because he said that. Turned out he was right, because that line between Russia and Ukraine, between the two militaries, is a lot farther west than it was at the time General Milley said, negotiate now, you're not going to get any better. Yeah. Milley just proved the broken clock rule. It's right twice a day. So he got something right. Let's give him credit for that. You know, back then in late September, Russia had not mobilized a big force when it went into Ukraine. They had about 80,000 soldiers.

The Ukrainians had about 400,000. So the Russians were outnumbered roughly five to one. And so when the Ukrainians finally managed to cobble together, you know, their, quote, offensive up around Khirkuk in the Kharkiv in the north, the Russians recognized all they had up there were some military police battalions. So they extracted them. They withdrew. They weren't going to stand there and fight for that territory because it was meaningless. At that point, then the Ukrainians said, oh, boy, we're on a roll. But Russia came back. They mobilized forces and have been retaking territory ever since.

And that's where, you know, Milley was correct. That was sort of the high watermark for Ukraine in this war. And now they have guaranteed over the last two weeks, word is coming out of not only the Duma, but out of official Russian channels, the Russian deputy ambassador to the United Nations. He was very strong about basically the time has come and gone for Ukraine to negotiate where Russia will make any kind of compromise. Russia is in an uncompromising mood now. Last week, President Viktor Orban of Hungary voted against, which is an effective veto, Ukraine joining the EU.

Does Putin care if Ukraine joins the EU I mean that's not a military alliance it's an economic Alliance I I think Putin's attitude would be boy if if if you if Europe wants Ukraine let them have it uh because what Europe's going to get is going to be uh the the equivalent of a disabled country a country that has lost its economic foundations, a country that has been stripped of its manpower. The very youth, that cohort between 18 and 40 that you need in order to build, have a future in a country that's gone that's been stripped out it's it's down to one of the lowest levels when you do a population graph of ukraine it looks like an hourglass you know right right figure eight that's what happened to uh the southern states in america after the war between the There was a whole generation of young men who would be everything from lawyers and doctors

to factory workers was gone. Here's Viktor Orban explaining himself. He's so articulate, Larry Bellis. I don't want to jump the gun. You tell me what you think. But here he is last week. Why we are here is not to make business. It's not about bargain.

It's not about deal. We represent approaches and principles. So to give money to Ukraine is easy to do because in short term the money for Ukraine is already in the budget. So there is no any extra decision to give it in short term. In long term and the bigger sum of money, my position is that we should give it outside. But we are not under the pressure of the time because the bridging solution is already in the budget. Enlargement is not a theoretical issue. Enlargement is a merit-based, legally detailed process which has preconditions.

We have set up seven preconditions. And even by the evaluation of the commission, three out of the seven is not fulfilled. So there is no reason to negotiate membership of Ukraine now. By their own standards, Ukraine doesn't even meet their economic standards. Of course, Ukraine doesn't even meet, or economic standards, of course, Ukraine doesn't even meet it. There's some new breaking news from the New York Times. I'm just going to read the headline because it's consistent with what you've been telling me. Now, I don't know if this is leaked by the CIA or if the Times hung onto it. Ukrainian soldiers frustrated by positive reports from Ukrainian officials break their silence,

describing the military effort as brutalizing and ultimately futile. This is exactly what you and McGovern and McGregor and Ritter have been saying for the past six months. Yeah, yeah. No, it's this phenomenon of modern government where so much effort is devoted to spin and lying. I mean, we see this lying go on continually here in the United States. Right. You're told it's like with Hunter Biden corruption. We're told, no, no, normal business deals. It wasn't influence peddling. Come on.

So when you can't even tell the basic truth about certain things, you can't admit to the fact that the United States cannot supply enough artillery shells that will permit the Ukrainians to match what the Russians are firing at them on a daily basis. So right now, for every one shell the Ukrainians are firing, Russia's firing seven or eight back. And guess what? Each shell represents a potential for casualties, which explains in part the great discrepancy between casualties, the low casualties on the Russian side, the enormous casualties on the Ukrainian side, if for no other reason, simply that the Russians are firing more bullets and artillery shells at them. But do you have a theory as to why Putin has been so careful, meticulous,

and surgical? He's the opposite of Netanyahu. Yeah. And not harmed or done his best not to harm Ukrainian civilians. Yeah, he's an adult. He understands what the consequences would be of just randomly killing civilians. That would enrage a future generation. That would sow seeds for future insurgencies in the country. So he's deliberately limiting, making sure that,

that's why it's called a special military operation. It's not all-out war. In all-out war, you do what we did in World War II, where we routinely bombed German cities and killed, you know, over 900,000 German civilians. We didn killed, you know, over 900,000 German civilians, right? And we didn't, you know, lose any sleep over it. That's total war. This is not. He recognizes and has repeated the fact that Ukrainians, they're brothers. Ukrainians and Russians are the same people, ethnically the same people. And so you don't want to go, you know,

the times when you may be, you know, really angry at a family member And so you don't want to go, you know, the times when you may be really angry at a family member, but you don't want to go so far as to actually have to destroy them. Switching gears, you and I were talking before we came on air about the United States Navy and Yemen. Are you of the belief that before Christmas, which is a week from today, the United States Navy is likely to attack Yemen? Yeah, I think it won't just be the United States Navy. I think it's, you're talking about trying to create a flotilla of different countries with

Great Britain. I've heard Great Britain and Saudi Arabia mentioned as two others. You've got a legitimate law of the sea effort on the table here. The Houthis, they are a Shia group that had been at war with the established group, the established government that was aligned with Saudi Arabia for six, seven years. They've now, they've been the only one to come out and declare war against Israel. And instead of talking, they've been acting. And they've both hijacked, captured ships that were en route to Israel, as well as have hit some with anti-ship missiles, as well as fired at some U.S. military vessels.

So the United States and Great Britain are going to try to attack those Houthi positions to try to destroy their ability to attack shipping. I think while it can be justified on the legal side and represents the right military strategy perhaps to pursue, I think it's going to be another public relations disaster because it's going to reinforce the image of the United States beating up on these third world countries. It's like the bully beating up on the kid in the wheelchair. Is there a government in Yemen or is it run by whatever groups of militias? No, there's a government in Yemen and Aden, but they've been involved with the civil war with the

Shia ethnic group, the Houthis. And it's been long running. So again, I think you've highlighted really what should be the first strategy of Western diplomats meeting in the capital with the government of Yemen and getting a commitment on how to go about reining in the Houthis. Oh, Larry, that's not the American style. The American style is to shoot first and talk later. You shouldn't laugh at it because innocent people will die. Can the Houthis use a drone that they bought at Staples? I'm exaggerating a little bit.

I don't know if Staples sells drones. Creative license. You're allowed. To take down an American ship. An American naval ship. No, it's going to take something bigger than that, and they do actually have some missiles bigger than that. They do have some anti-ship missiles that they've used.

So let's say the worst-case scenario here is that the Houthis are going to succeed in sinking one or two military vessels, armed military vessels. American vessels. Yeah, American or British. And that will then necessitate a ramped-up response. You know, it's just at that point everyone gets into face-saving. Larry, put on your political hat for a minute.

Does Joe Biden want a wider war leading up to the presidential campaign in 2024? Well, I think that's what his aides are afraid of. You know, remember the reports from last week were the aides around Biden were not telling them about the attacks on these ships in the Red Sea because they were afraid he would then launch an immediate retaliation because he's thinking about, hey, a president at war is going to get the, we're going to rally the American people. And that's a Biden calculus. And so maybe credit to some of, I'm not sure if it was Jake Sullivan or Blinken or who, but they kept him in the dark, which is outrageous.

I mean, that just shows you the disarray of this American government. But yeah, he would, I think in Biden's mind, a wartime president is a winning president. And all of this is because the neocons hate, and their Israeli allies hate, Iran and want to destroy the theocracy in Iran. Yeah, getting rid of Iran would be, you know, the cherry on top of the sundae. That's what they're hoping for. But Iran hasn't really taken the bait. You know, Iran has been very cautious israel has ramped up its war against the palestinians uh hezbollah i think many people mistakenly assume that hezbollah is under the direct command and control of iran it is not there was a time about 30 35 years ago when that was the case, but that's changed. And so Hezbollah is very much its own creature.

It certainly has friendly relations with Iran, but Hezbollah is pursuing its own path. And Iran is, I think, trying to figure out how it can avoid getting more deeply embroiled in this conflict. But the way things are trending, you could see some attacks even on Iran as a retaliation for what the Houthis have done. That's another possibility. Got it. Larry, my man, thank you for your insight, even when it's terrifying. We need to know what's going on, and we're not getting it from the mainstream press unless the CIA wants us to hear it. I hope we'll see you

Friday with the great McGovern. We'll probably have a lot more events that have transpired in the next four days for your and his analysis. Thank you, Larry. Thank you, Judge. I'll be there. Of course. Coming up, two o'clock this afternoon, Professor Jeffrey Sachs right here, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.