Judging Freedom - Larry Johnson : The Metrics Behind Russia’s Coming Victory

Episode Date: January 26, 2026

Larry Johnson : The Metrics Behind Russia’s Coming VictorySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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

What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong? What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom than to live as a slave? What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now? Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Monday, January 26th, 2026. Larry Johnson will be here in a minute on how do we know Russia is winning the war against Ukraine? What are the metrics and what conceivable defense is there for shooting an unarmed man

restrained on his belly on the frozen ground in the back? But first this. History tells us every market eventually falls. Currencies collapse. And look at where we are now. 38 trillion in national debt. Stocks at record highs defying gravity. So what happens next?

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to Learjudgenap.com today. Larry Johnson, welcome here, my dear friend. I can see you're nice and warm in your Florida shirt. There's a foot of snow in New York City, and many of the roads are impassable. Before we get to Russia's coming victory, and you've done some terrific research on the metrics behind this argument,

what is your take on the ice killing of this? nurse Alex Petrie over the weekend. Yeah, it should be, the officers should be charged with manslaughter at a minimum. Look, I'm a firearms instructor and one of the classes, I teach a couple of classes about, you know, how to defend yourself in the home, how to defend yourself outside the home. I teach concealed carry. and taking a human life is the very last thing you should do. If you can disengage, if you can find some way to de-escalate, do that.

But in this case, they put out, oh, this guy had a handgun. Yeah, he had a handgun. It was in a holster that was behind him in his backside. It's called it inside the waist holster. So the gun, he had a gun, a Sig Sauer, I believe it was the 320. He didn't draw it. If he had drawn the gun, then yeah, it would have been a justifiable shooting. But he didn't.

What happened was, and you can see this now clearly on the video, when you slow it way down, one of the officers, these Homeland Security Border Patrol, officers took the gun, they grabbed it. And I think what happened is as soon as they saw the gun and they grabbed it, that officer shouted, gun, gun, gun. And one of the other clowns then said, oh my God, he's got a gun out and drew his gun and began firing.

And not only him, you know, two or three of them were firing shots. I mean, this is the level of incompetence that was on display there by these, these Homeland security personnel is just shocking. So, you know, at a minimum, that officer needs to be charged with manslaughter, his supervisor on scene, needs to be fired. This was poor training, a combination of poor training and lack of proper management control. Now look, Alex Pretty, he shouldn't have brought the gun. Do not bring a gun to a protest.

I'm not blaming him for provoking it, but he helped create that situation. Poor judgment on his part bringing that. That said, the initial confrontation with him, you know, he was standing in the middle of the street. He moved to the side. A Homeland Security officer came over and violently shoved a woman who wasn't doing anything to that officer. So that, you know, that was an assault by police, number one. Preddy got in the middle, he got in between them trying to stop it, and then they immediately began pepper spraying him and then beating him. And he had at least five Homeland Security officers

on him. And again, if, you know, five guys are unable to restrain one individual, please. On his belly, on the frozen earth, and temporarily, on this case, because he dies a few minutes later permanently blinded, how could Christy Noem claim that this is self-defense? That's the problem with the problem here also, was the government lying. They called them, Stephen Miller called them an assassin. Trump called him a terrorist. She said, Nome said he was prepared for mass murder. I mean, this is just crazy. The thing they did with Renee Good. They demonize the dead person. Well, it's like, you know, again, I have a slightly different take on the Renee Good. I'm not just to find that shooting. And again, the officer, I think it's borderline

because you can say, oh, she's driving at me. I've got to shoot. He had some options. He didn't have to shoot. What I'm seeing with these guys is they're very quick on the trigger. But for Nome to call this guy and Stephen Miller to call this guy a terrorist and prepared for mass murder, no, when you watch the video, it's not like it would have been one thing if as soon as the Homeland Security officers approached, if he started throwing punches at him, he didn't do that. So he was not attacking them. He was trying to prevent them hurting this woman more. Right. Right. You know, this gets down to training. You train police officers normally are trained to try to de-escalate. Now, and I can, but I can show you lots of,

videos online where police just, you know, they forget that and they act with their full authority and abused the rights of people. But in this case, if the woman's not directly attacking you, there's no need to lay hands on her. And that's what this guy, that's what this cop did. He went up and immediately shoved her. She goes to the ground. Preti steps in trying to get between him, the attacking officer and that woman. And then they began, pepper spraying him, beating him, they force him to the ground. He wasn't flat out on the ground. He was still up on his knees.

You can see in the picture in the video I posted at sonar21.com, where you can see a hand come down and pull the firearm from his holster. So he's still sort of up on his knees. This is, you know, this is a horror show. And Trump is exacerbating it by making these outlandish, outrageous claims about what this individual was doing. Was he protesting? Yes. And he had every right to protest. He has every right to protest carrying a sidearm. The Supreme Court has said the Second Amendment occupies the same space in our hierarchy as the first.

Unless the police are arresting him, and there was no basis to arrest him. him when they threw him to the ground, they cannot take his gun from him any more than they could silence him from saying what he thinks about them. Here's, go ahead, go ahead. Well, I just say, when they arrested, if they were arresting him, hands behind his back, yeah, they can take the gun out. But again, this gets back to the, you know,

the judgment of all the individuals involved. If you're going to that kind of protest, don't bring a gun. Don't give them an excuse. It's just, you know, I think it's more on the common sense side. But here's a montage Chris put together. Who goes to a protest and brings a gun? I mean, was he not asking for some kind of trouble in that situation? But as Secretary Nome said, no one who wants to be peaceful shows up at a protest with a firearm that is loaded with two full magazines.

That is not a peaceful protest. And I don't know of any peaceful protester that shows up with a gun and ammunition rather than a sign. I'm sorry that this gentleman is dead, but he did bring a nine millimeter semi-automatic weapon with two cartridges to what was supposed to be a peaceful protest. Peaceful protesters don't have nine millimeter weapons. He wasn't there to peacefully protest. He was there to perpetuate violence. I mean, as you know, he was an ICU nurse, worked for the veterans. and there's no evidence that he brandished the gun whatsoever.

The fact that it appears that he was disarmed before he brought a gun. I've been to a protest. Guess what? I didn't bring a gun. I brought a billboard. You cannot bring a firearm loaded with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It's that simple. You don't have that right.

Yeah, that's just crap. They don't understand the Second Amendment. Yeah. In the United States, in here in Florida, we have what's, we have open carry. not concealed carry, open carry. He could have gone to that protest carrying open if that was happening in Florida. And the police do not have the right

to take your gun just because they want to take it. You can carry. It's the right of self-defense. I am sickened, outrage, shocked, disgusted by Trump and his clowns. Because they, you know, a lot of people who voted for Donald Trump

are voting for a guy they thought would protect Second Amendment rights. And here they're making the case. You don't have any Second Amendment right. I mean, it is, again, I would, you know, if I was, had a chance to, you know, Alex is younger than my son. I would have advised him to say, hey, kid,

don't take a gun to the protest. These guys, they're out of control. Can you connect the dots between murdering people on speedboats and fishing boats on the high seas in the Caribbean and murdering people in the streets of Minneapolis? Let's give Trump credit for something. He's consistent by ignoring international law. Ignoring lawless behavior. You know, killing people in boats out in the Caribbean who are not firing on U.S. ships or U.S. personnel.

is murder. That's pure and simple. And here in this case, even though this Alex Preti was carrying a firearm, it was concealed until he was forced to the ground. The police saw the gun. And it would be one thing if they had asked him, you know,

put your hands up, et cetera, and he refused. He tried to grab the gun and shoot him. That didn't happen. That's the thing. He did not at any point brandish the gun.

And that is, and Godbesant is disgusting, despicable. I brought a placard. Hey, you can go to a protest carrying a gun. But just do not produce that gun unless your life is an imminent threat. That's the standard. You know, when I teach my students,

the only time you get that gun out is if you're threatened with loss of loss, severe bodily harm or someone else has faced with loss of life, severe bodily harm. You see this kid? You see this kid, Kyle Rittenhouse, bringing a weapon to a protest in Wisconsin? And the Trump people praised him to the skies for it. Yeah. Hey, if you're looking for consistency, you're going to find it. Don't look at Donald Trump and that group.

I mean. You have done some terrific. research on the metrics behind how we know Ukraine is losing badly and Russia is winning. Can you share that with us? Well, it's down, it's very simple. The loss of personnel in combat is the numbers are off the charts. We've now got a year, a full year, in which the Russians and the Ukrainians, are exchanging bodies. As the lines change or as positions change, each side recovers the bodies of the other soldiers.

Since January of last year, so for 12 months, for every minimum, for every 35 dead Ukrainians, there's one dead Russian. Now, you can't keep up that kind of loss of life and continue to fight. and the other dimension that Ukraine's facing, and I hear these people talk, oh, it's a stalemate, they can hang in there.

They don't have a secure place to train new recruits. Yeah, they get some recruits every month. Many of them are compelled. I mean, they literally grabbed off the streets and shoved into a van, but they don't have a place where they can go and train for, you know, 12 weeks, 15 weeks. without being hit with a missile. And so, you know, they're in a situation where, you know, if you're going to put soldiers in the field,

you don't know just someone sitting in a hole with a gun. I mean, you've got mortars to fire, you've got artillery pieces to fire, you've got drones to operate, you've got some tanks. People need to learn how to use those things. They don't, you know, if I, you know, came up to New York and grabbed you and shoved you in a tank and said,

okay, Judge, drive away, you'd be going, where's the starter button for start? You know, so I mean, it's, so on all across the board, on every category you're looking at, Ukraine is losing. They're losing men.

They don't have enough trained troops. They don't have the money to sustain this, but they're also losing territory. So, you know, the lies that have been perpetuated that, you know, Russia's losing Russia's on the verge of collapse. Again, it's just, it's more dishonesty from the Trump

administration. Oh, but Larry, here's someone who you'll recognize immediately who claims that Ukraine is winning. Watch this. Number three, Chris. Essentially, the Ukrainians without a Navy have sunk over 35 percent of the Russian Black Sea fleet and force the entire fleet to tie itself up inside a port as far from Ukraine as it can get in southeastern part of the Black Sea. Ukraine has also carried out some incredible operations on Russian soil through the air, including the one in which maybe a million or so dollars worth of small Ukrainian drones secreted in the roofs of large transport vehicles, were able to position themselves near strategic airfields of Russia's

thousands of kilometers apart and destroy or damage some five to seven billion dollars worth of strategic aircraft. To be sure, again, on the front lines, they've largely hardened, and the gains such as they are have generally been on the side of the Russians, but these have been glacial. They've been quite incremental, and they have been incredibly costly for the Russians. What is General Petraeus trying to say? Well, look, I'd like to start with him by saying, Hey, hey, David, how'd that Afghanistan thing go that you were in charge of? Tell me about how you overwhelmed the Taliban, a bunch of goat herders

wearing sandals and sidearms. Oh, that's right. You failed. Who are you to sit there and have any kind of assessment about what's actually going on on the ground. I mean, his ability to tell lies is remarkable.

He's not an unintelligent person. You know, he is not mentally handicapped. But by God, I have never, you know, watching guys like him and Jack Keene, you know, it should, it's really, it reflects on what a, what a travesty, our own military,

has become, at least at the leadership level. You know, if you've had a son or daughter thinking about having them join the U.S. military, don't. They're being led by morons. And here is a classic example with Petraeus. Do you put any stock into the Whitkoff-Kusner negotiations in Abu Dhabi this weekend? I mean, Larry, isn't it inconceivable? that this thing can be resolved on the conference table without Ukraine's total neutrality and Russia's total dominance of the eastern Russian-speaking areas?

Yeah, I don't say, you know, Ray and I have a fundamental disagreement on this. This is show there's nothing if substance is going to come out of this. Russia's not going to make concessions with respect to territory. They're not going to say, oh, okay, well, we'll keep Densk and Lohans, but we'll hold up in Zaporasia and Kyrgyz. That's okay. We'll stop in place. They're not going to do that.

They've already made it clear. Kerasan, Zaporizia are now permanently forever part of the Russian Federal Republic. They are part of Russia, not going back. Same with Crimea. So there is no foundation. for negotiation here. And look, Zelensky over the weekend reiterated, we're not going to surrender any territory to those Russians. If you're going to have a negotiation, you have to have at least one party willing to make some concessions. Russia's not willing to make any concessions.

They've got their demands. They've been very clear about them. They're not going to back off of those. And apparently Zelensky is equally intractable. So, yeah, this is a diversion, its show, but nothing of substance is going to come from it. Why is it taking so long for the war to end for Russia to achieve its goals militarily? Because Russia didn't, it's a special military operation. What that means is you've not fully mobilized society. That means you haven't required all the reserves to become active and to have leveled that everybody who's of, you know, between the ages of 18 and 30, must now sign up and come in.

You haven't directed all the resources of society to go to the war effort. And they're taking steps to not kill Ukrainian civilians. That has been a priority for Russia from the outset. Because you look, just compare the numbers. Look at how many women, children, elderly have been killed by the Israelis in Gaza, in a much smaller area with what has transpired in Russia and in Ukraine. It's not even comparable. Now, what has taken place in the last two months,

Russia has now, they're turning off the electricity across the board. But again, in doing that, they are forcing the civilians out. of the cities because they're going to attack those cities. They're going to attack Kiev. They're going to attack Kharkiv. They're going to attack Zaporizia, the big city. Nipro-Petrovs. But the civilians are leaving their fleeing because it's becoming uninhabitable.

But this notion that, you know, again, Petraeus, oh, they're moving very, very slow. Well, bottom line, they're moving. And this year, they're moving at a far greater pace than in the past, one, in part because the Ukrainian military itself is far weaker. But the Russians, if they wanted to just destroy the city, break the back of Ukraine, they could have done that, but they haven't because they're trying to limit civilian casualties. Listen to the nonsense from President Zelensky yesterday, claiming the U.S. has agreed to security guarantees and all they need are signatures on the document. Chris cut number one. When today we had

conversation with American team and when American team, me and when American president and his team and we all said that security guarantees is done. So the document is done. We need to sign, to understand, but it will come only after the war will stop. So we need to have all this document. So that's why I think that if something is done and if we have, we have, some first steps for three-literal on the same level but in any way if we have such meetings we have to wish that it will a little bit push us closer to this you got the deal of the security guarantees you got this that's the third question we we finished with the document the document has to be cited by by the

sites by the presidents and then will will go to national parliaments in the United States. In Congress, in Ukraine is parliament. Thank you. What is he talking about? You know, it's time to cue up the Grateful Dead song, driving that train high on cocaine. You know, he's delusional.

Russia, you know, Russia is not going to allow U.S. or European troops to come into Ukraine to, quote, provide security guarantees. Not going to happen. That is the ultimate cause of this war. Correct. The fact that NATO was moving to the east. Russia doesn't want more Europeans, Germans, French, Brits,

Poles, or American soldiers, quote, patrolling areas of Ukraine because they're there just to provide a trip war an excuse to bring the West into the war. The West is already, look, they're already engaged in war with Russia. That's the thing that the Russians have avoided escalating this because the last thing they want to do is get into a nuclear exchange with the West.

Up until recently, though, particularly the Europeans, are insistent on trying to confront Russia and escalate this militarily. But the reality of what's happening on the ground right now, Russia is in the process of breaking, destroying Ukraine's ability to fight. Larry Johnson, a pleasure, my dear man, no matter what we talk about. Thank you very much. Look forward to seeing you Friday with that youngster McGovern. Hey, stay warm.

Get one of those Russian Ushanka hats, you know, the ones with the... I can use one today. All right. Thank you, Larry. All the best. Thank you. And coming up later today at one of close. this afternoon sheriff David Hathaway on all of this especially Minnesota and at two o'clock

Scott Ritter, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom.