Judging Freedom - Pepe Escobar : Trump’s Blind Spot: Misreading Asia’s Power Dynamics

Episode Date: November 13, 2025

Pepe Escobar : Trump’s Blind Spot: Misreading Asia’s Power DynamicsSee 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 Thursday, November 13th, 2025, joining us from Thailand, my dear friend, our regular correspondent, our world traveler, Pepe Escobar. Pepe, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you. No, this pleasure, Judge. I know it's not your usual day, your usual time. I guess you don't even have a usual day and a usual time with your schedule.

Thank you for accommodating us. Before we get to President Trump's blind spots about Asia, I must ask you about the international reaction to this latest monstrosity in Israel. How does the international community, as you see it, officials, elites, ordinary people, react to the defense by the Netanyahu regime of videos of prison rape, defending behavior, which is otherwise universally condemned and utterly reprehensible? Well, it's no news in Europe, in Latin America,

because there's a lot of focus on possibility of an American adventure in South America in the near future. The attention in Brazil is focused on the COP 30, which for the moment is a bunch of speeches. And here in Asia, wow, Gaza and Palestine all across Asia is very, very distant. Young, public opinion among young people, like in South Korea, in Japan, in China, is very much mobilized pro-Gaza everywhere. everywhere but obviously in mainstream media you don't you don't read about it anywhere in the major papers all across Asia for instance you don't you don't read

about it so obviously the Zionist access they can count on no getting this kind of horrors getting lost in the new cycle well which usually happens unfortunately how can a country One last question on this. How can a country like Israel expect to be a respected member of the international community when its government perpetrates a policy like this? As far as I know, no government on the planet perpetrates or tolerates? Well, we cannot call this a nation state, a serious nation state. It's basically a death cult, that's how I call them, with no borders, by the way, and no limits, and self-entitled enough, assuming that they can get away with virtually anything, because, of course, they have a very, very powerful international Zionist access, protecting this setup in Tel Aviv.

That's why they can literally get away with anything. Can you imagine if any other nation state on Earth was perpetrating rolling genocide like they have been doing for the past over two years? You know the reaction, how it would do. Right, right. But they're the only one on the planet that can actually get away with it. That's why it's so horrifying and out of proportion. Were the so-called Abraham Accords a scam? Well, basically, this is Jared Kushner.

Can you imagine that you have a lowly real-state scammer dictating official U.S. foreign policy? That's the case. The Abraham Accords basically is something that he discussed, obviously. blah, blah, blah on Trump's ears, discussions with his friends, MBS and MBZ on WhatsApp. That's it. It's essentially his idea. This will never happen. Of course, you can drive certain, I wouldn't even call regimes, certain literal scams in West Asia to be part of the Abraham Accords.

But Arab public opinion, if this would ever implemented, this would be a, we could talk about a popular revolution all across West Asia if this was ever implemented. What is the core, we'll get to the Trump's blind spot on Asia in a minute, but what is the core part of the Abraham Accords, which, if implemented, would cause resistance to rise up? The recognition of a criminal apartheid gag, gangle, excuse me, as a legitimate state? Absolutely, Judge. And normalizing Israel post-genocide, normalizing basically the extermination of Palestine, preventing forever sovereign Palestinian state and of course extending the tentacles of Israel all across West Asia.

Well, Syria, the visit of the former head shopper to Trump. By the way, did Trump get the $10 million reward for capturing Germany? Nobody's about to apply for it at the Justice Department. So the visit of the head shopper was to receive the marching orders about Israel. He has to, whatever he does in Syria, first order of business is to normalize and accept what Israel is doing, whatever Israel is doing or we will do. And the United States is going to build a military base right outside of Damascus. Damascus.

They owned by the Syrians, operated by the Americans and used by the Israelis. Well, we can say for sure that the majority of public opinion in Syria, even the ones who are giving the benefit of the doubt to this fake government at the moment with a former ISIS al-Qaeda guy, they will never accept that. Of course, they will have to accept that because this will be imposed by the US-Israel and the former headchopper has no cards in his hand on the country. The only card in his hand now is to tell people in Syria, look, I have been normalized at the UN and I have been normalized at the White House.

So I'm really your president now. Trust me. That's it. Wow. Wow. Even though MI6 CIA and Mossad will be telling me what to do. Of course. But there's no question about that. And the balkanization of Syria is beyond tragic. There's no Syria anymore. The north is Turkish.

The northeast is basically American Kurds. The south, Israel. Wow. Well, very, very important. The west, a little bit of the west, is Russia. Wow. So that's the interesting part. Does Russia still have a naval base there?

Of course. And don't forget that the former head shopper, he's not as dumb as we think. He first met in person with Putin. Then he met in person with Trump. So Putin obviously told him, look, we keep Tartus and Ramin. We may even have another base if we decide to, and that's it. And then we can more or less support you if you don't do anything stupid. This is what was discussed in Moscow.

Wow. I got to ask you one other question about MI6. To my surprise, MI6 announced that it would not provide intel to the Americans to help them blow up boats and murder people on the high seas in the Caribbean. Because the Crown Prosecution Service, their Department of Justice, has come up with a league. opinion saying that these are extrajudicial murders and they're a war crime, even though the American Department of Justice has come up with a legal opinion saying, don't worry about it, it's not a war crime and you're not going to be prosecuted. Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, both legal opinions are classified.

How can a legal opinion, an argument based on public law, be classified, but they are. But nevertheless, for the first time since 1947, when the U.S. entered into this crazy agreement with the British and the others, the British are saying, we're not helping you with anything in the Caribbean. Are you surprised? Well, they are, in fact, extrajudicial murders. There's no question about that. And of course, from the point of view of MI6, the Caribbean is too far away.

They are concentrated on Eurasia. concentrated on Russia and parts of Central Asia. For instance, what kind of destabilization efforts they can conduct in Tajikistan, in Kyrgyzstan, even in parts of Xinjiang still. That's why Chinese intel is so focused on Xinjiang. And of course, their own extrajudicial murders in Russia. Right. Which they facilitate directly with the SVU. Well, President Trump has been boasting that poor countries like Kazakhstan are going to invest... The Kazakhstan is not poor. Well, do they have the billions to invest in the United States that Trump has boasted about?

It was not Kazakhstan, Judge. It was Uzbekistan. No. And the answer to your question is, Uzbekistan doesn't have that kind of money, period. absolutely impossible. Kazakhstan would, because Kazakhstan is oil-rich. And, of course, everybody is investing in the Kazakh energy industry, Americans, Europeans, Russians, Chinese, et cetera. But Kazakhstan is the most interesting factor, judge, after that famous dinner at the White House, Trump and the five leaders of the five Central Asian stunts. Do you know what happened two days later. Tokayo, what happened? The President of Kazakhstan, he established a strategic partnership with Russia. So wait, let me get this straight. The President of Kazakhstan

has dinner with the President of the United States in the White House and two days later establishes a strategic partnership with the Russian Federation. You can't make this up. No, you cannot make this up, but it's totally predictable. Why? First of all, Kazakhstan is a member, is a partner of BRICS. Very important. Kazakhstan is a full member of the Shanghai Corporation Organization, Russian, China, the most important members. Kazakhstan is a member of the Eurasia Economic Union. They're the second most power of the Eurasia Economic Union after Russia. And Kazakhstan is a member of the new Silk Rose of the Belder Road Initiative with China.

So if Trump has any inkling about the geopolitical standing of Kazakhstan and the fact that they, since the previous administration, which we can say the Nazarbayev clan, to put it mildly, diplomatically, and now it's the Tokayev people, they continue to apply what they call multi-vector policy. They look everywhere and they want good relations with everybody. So they will never submit to dictates from the White House. And their most important geopolitical relationship is with Russia. And don't forget, Judge and our audience,

who saved Tokayev from a color revolution? Was three years ago, four years ago, which started in Kyrgyzstan, crossed the border to Kazakhstan, and almost toppled his government. Vladimir Putin and the Russian military. Wow. What is Trump trying to accomplish by cozying up to the presidents of the Stans, as you call them? And which Stans were there?

Pakistan wasn't there, was it? No. We usually use the term stands for the five Central Asians. So Pakistan is South Asia. And Afghanistan is Afghanistan. Afghanistan is the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. But when all of us, mostly independent analysts, when you talk about the Central Asian stands,

we mean the five ones. Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan. These were old former Soviet republics. Some of them have tremendous trouble to start, life anew as new republics after fall of the Soviet Union, but they are still in the sphere of influence of Russia and of course, geo-economically, in the sphere of influence of China. So the most important geoeconomic partners of Central Asia, Russia, and China. For instance, before this trip that I made to Xinjiang in September, before COVID, I went to, I did a loop of Central Asia, and I went to the three borders of three of the Central Asian stunts with Xinjiang.

Because I wanted to see how trade was flowing between Central Asian stands and Xinjiang. And it's booming, absolutely. Because everything that comes from China has. has to cross Central Asia to go further on down the road to Iran, to Turkey, or even to Europe. You name it. Trains, people, lorries, you name it. Aren't these central South Asian countries, the stuns, more likely to be affiliated with Bricks and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization than they are to anything the White House can give them?

Absolutely, Judge. And that's already a fact. The two top economic stance, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, they are BRICS partners, official BRICS partners. Sooner or later, they will become full members as well. They are all members of the Shanghai Corporation Organization, except Turkmenistan. Turkmenistan is a fascinating place. It's totally surrealist. But it's very interesting because they're completely independent. They don't align with anybody, even in Eurasian. And they are a gas republic.

So this means, for instance, the Chinese years ago, when Dick Cheney, by the way, war criminal Dick Cheney, was sending American missions to the stands virtually every month to seduce them to, okay, all your energy, we want it. We want it. And they say, okay, we can discuss and all that. What the Chinese did? The Chinese went to Turkmenistan and said, look, we are interested in your gas. We build the pipeline from here, Turkmenistan to Xinjiang.

We pay everything, and you give us guys for a good price. Guess what happened? They did it. Wow. Well, how do the Chinese and the Russians feel about the Americans cozy up to the five stanz? Oh, but the response, the only response that we, we had so far, Judge, official, was from PESCO, a Kremlin's spokesman. He said, look, the Americas try to talk to this time is natural, like saying, look, they can't talk anything

they want. But these guys are our neighbors. They are in our area, a sphere of influence, and we do business with them all the time. And very important, Judge, the language of business among all them, guess what? It's Russian. It's not English. Yeah. Let me, switch gears as our last topic because you have a piece out this morning talking about the dominance of Chinese tech. Is there any question but that the Chinese tech sector is superior to Silicon Valley? They are proving themselves to be superior in terms of their model is sustainable and it's not based on speculation. There's no question about that.

And even under sanctions, Judge, which is the case of Huawei, Huawei has been under sanctions since Trump 1.0. Terrible sanctions. In fact, these sanctions forced Huawei to abdicate from the Western smartphone market. At the time, Huawei had the best smartphone on the planet. Well, I still have my old Huawei from pre-sanctions, which still works perfectly.

And what did they do? They invested a lot on research and developed. They are, if I'm not mistaken, they are the sixth largest company on the planet in terms of investing in research and development. They have that absolutely outstanding research center in Dongguana, southern China, Guangdong province, It's not very far from Hong Kong. And, of course, they have one breakthrough after another. For instance, only in terms of smartphones. When I was in China this year, I tested their latest top-of-the-line smartphone.

The West people don't even know that this thing exists. It's that trifold that turns into an iPad. You know, it's amazing. It's like a mini Star Wars in your hand. But most important, semiconductors. and fabrication of latest generation semiconductors. So in the start of this column, I go for something that was announced only a few days ago.

Huawei is already testing their own lithography machines capable of printing three nanometer semiconductors. The so-called experts in the West, they had been saying for years, is going to take 10 years, 15 years to catch up, and if they catch up it's going to be too late. They caught up in a matter of two

to three years. They are already testing it, and they're planning to start mass production of these machines next year. So if you compare the physics that they use, I talk about that

with professional physics experts. They say, the physics is completely different from what NVIDIA does, sorry, ASML, the Dutch, but it's Chinese style. It's simpler, cheaper, and faster. Wow. So imagine next year they inundate the Chinese market with this new machines producing three nanometer semiconductors. This will turn the semiconductor market internationally, totally upside down. And this means total Chinese. these self-sufficiency.

Wow. I know I said that would be the last topic, but I have to ask you one more. It appears now that an American attack totally unprovoked, utterly immoral, profoundly illegal and even unconstitutional, nevertheless will take place on Venezuela. What do you think the response, the reaction, the outcome will be? Judge, are you having, I would say, a last-minute echo about that? Is that some new information? The amount of hardware that's on the seas there is now extraordinary. The Gerald R. Ford, which is the largest aircraft carrier in the world, is there.

And, of course, it travels with a fleet of battleships that protect it. I mean, the government has spent probably hundreds of business. millions just concentrating equipment and manpower there, it seems likely they're going to use it. I don't know why they would spend that money if they're not going to use it. Obviously, I condemn it, but I'm just wondering from your contacts in Latin America, what the response is going to do? What will Colombia do? What will Venezuela do?

What will the outcome be? Well, this is what all of us have been following, this military buildup. There is a feeling, and even I talked to one of my best friends in Caracas, from a collective called Mission Verdad, you know, through ambition. And he said that people, the average Venezuelan, they say, maybe this is too blah, blah, blah. I see Americans, usually they're both. And everybody's concentrating on their.

everyday living. It's fascinating. He was talking about the Venezuelan Street reaction to all that. The government is different. The government, they are completely mobilized, if I'm not mistaken, what, 15 million people. Let me just stop you for a second because we have a clip from President Maduro on the immobilization. And this is from just two days ago, November 12th. Chris, cut number 15. By signing this law, all integral defense commands that bring together all public institutions of the Venezuelan state, the military and all popular power must be activated at dawn. So by signing this, the order must be activated for integral defense commands to be established, structured, and put to work in order to be prepared.

We love peace. We deeply love peace. We don't want war here nor in any other place around the world. world. But if they dare to touch Venezuela, they're going to find us in every street. Sounds like they're expecting a land invasion, not just a bombardment from naval forces. No, they are preparing for all scenarios, Judge. We should remember that all these scenarios are on Trump's desk. invasion, shock and all, transferring the Baghdad experience in 2003 to Caracas,

Navy SEAL's assent to try to kidnap or assassinate Maduro. All these scenarios are on the table. What we heard from some of our Washington friends is that there is a split inside the Beltway about it. because there's absolutely no evidence. Of course, there's no evidence because Venezuela is not a narco state. First of all, the drugs, they don't come from Venezuela. They come from Colombia and from Mexico. This has nothing to do with Venezuela. So not only would be a completely unprovoked attack,

but based on less than zero evidence. Well, okay, we had less than zero evidence in, Iraq in 2003 as well. Right, right. That is not a concern to the Americans. If the president wants to make this statement, he doesn't care who he kills. It's reprehensible. Well, we'll see what happens.

So Pepe, thank you very much. What a wonderful conversation. Now, next week, I'm going to announce this now. You're going to be in Moscow with our dear friends, Alistair, Crook, and Larry Johnson. and the three of you will be together on judging freedom. We don't know exactly when, but we'll make it happen. Are we back? Yes.

Yes. Okay. Just to finish. And there's popular mobilization as well. Because the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela is a popular movement. So not only the army is mobilized, but the people everywhere is mobilized. And the Bolivarian Revolution is still is immobilized. immensely popular in all across Venezuela, apart, of course, the Comptor Elites in Caracas.

That's a completely different story. So they are ready for any scenario. Of course, it's not as sophisticated as Iran. We should not remember that we run now. It's also mobilized and ready for any scenario. Wow. So the United States is going to invade Venezuela and at the same time help the Israelis invade Iran. this from the President of Peace.

Wow. I think the Internet froze for a moment, but what I was saying to thank you is that you're on your way to Mexico. Excuse me, to Moscow, to Moscow. And next week, you and Larry Johnson and Alastair Crook will be on together on judging freedom. We don't know the day or the time,

but we'll give everybody plenty of notice. Pepe, thank you, my dear friend. A great conversation. Thank you. All the best, Judge. Thank you. All the best. Safe travels, Mike.

my friend. Coming up at 11 this morning on Charlie Kirk, Jeffrey Epstein, Benjamin Netanyahu, dividing Trump's MAGA base, who else, Max Blumenthal, and at 1 o'clock this afternoon on similar topics, Matt Ho. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.