Judging Freedom - Prof. Gilbert Doctorow : Is Europe Collapsing?

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

Prof. Gilbert Doctorow : Is Europe Collapsing?See 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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That's an equivalent to $15 a month. Limited time new customer offer for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited. plan. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Hi, everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for judging freedom. Today is Wednesday, September 17th, 2025. Professor Gilbert Doctoro will be with us in just a moment on. Is Europe collapsing?

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Knapp.com. No one is going to protect your wealth for you. You need to do it yourself. And now is the time. Professor Dr. Rowe, welcome here, my dear friend. Thank you for accommodating my schedule, as you always do. Before we get into the current state of geopolitics in Europe, what has been the reaction in Europe and maybe in the Kremlin, if you're able to gauge it, to the United States approved and facilitated and Israeli perpetrated attack on a residential neighborhood in Doha, Qatar last week? The reaction also, I'll concentrate on the Russian reaction. What I detect in the last few days watching Russian state television is a significant

hardening of Moscow's position with respect to Israel. They were sitting on the fence. They didn't want to create difficulties in their relationship with Israel. That's all over. What I see now is very frank statements condemning Israeli genocide in Gaza. And, of course, what happened in Doha is part of the overall picture. So in that regard, there is a change in Moscow's position vis-à-vis Israel. and the ongoing land offensive in Gaza City is part of that picture as well.

In Europe, of course, what we see is a greater willingness to talk about sanctions against Israel, though, of course, nothing has happened as yet. So far, it's just jawboning. Is the Kremlin going to do anything about it? I mean, how should we read this public change in the Kremlin's attitude? I'm afraid to say that it doesn't indicate any particular actions to protect Palestinians or to intervene in the conflict. That is not the present state of affairs. I think that the Kremlin takes its cue from what the Gulf states are doing, and as you know, the Gulf states are doing nothing.

Therefore, it is useful, interesting to see the Kremlin has finally broken. with this mystique around Israel and is taking a moralistic stand and not afraid to condemn the Israeli government. Has there been any reaction that you're able to detect to Prime Minister Netanyahu going on international television, and before Charlie Kirk's shooter was even caught or named, denying that the Israelis murdered him. Who denies that they committed a murder before they were accused of it? Well, in the case of the Kremlin, there has been almost no commentary on that issue. I understand that it is highly visible in American media.

Even in Europe, I don't see much commentary on that. particular question but for russia it doesn't exist uh president putin's uh recent trip to um bell the belarus russian war games wearing a military uniform do you read anything to into that well it's the first time to my knowledge it's the first time that he has donned a military uniform it was a quite impressive when mr belusov his very civilian um Minister of Defense first shifted from a formal suit to military uniform. And now Putin has done that. I don't think it's necessarily a message to the West, but it would be appropriate to say

it's a hardening of his position and his position of the war, of course. And I think the occasion was to be one of the of the boys when he was meeting with the 20 or so foreign delegations who were present as witnesses and some as participants in the military exercises war this 2025 that's taking place as you say in central russia not far from the from the vulgar river in the territory of nizhny novgorod That is a remarkable event. It is understandable that attracted so many foreign visitors from the global south in particular, because there are 100,000 Russian soldiers in these exercises, an extraordinarily large number.

Were NATO officials invited to observe this? I believe they were. But of course, when Mr. Putin had his address to the foreign contingents, NATO people were not in it. Why would NATO be invited to observe 100,000 Russian troops and gleaming new military equipment? I don't think there's any particular meaning to that, because by convention, all military exercises. but both Russian and Western usually invite everyone. So it would be exceptional if they were excluded, not that they were included. What is the Kremlin's public position on the drones over Poland?

I think the public position was stated clearly by their ambassador to the United Nations last week, Mr. Medea. And he spoke of this as absolutely not Russian drones, that they had no participation in this. He made mention of the Belarusian reporting in real time on the incoming flight headed towards Poland. And as a demonstration that Russia was in a way involved, the Belarusian authorities hardly would be alerting the Poles if their fraternal Russian military were sending drones at Poland. So the flat denial. I don't see, though, any particular

accusations as to what the intention of this Ukrainian action was. From the very beginning, we assumed it was to spark some kind of a conflict between Poland and Russian, which would immediately broaden into a NATO-Russian conflict. But I don't see this as being reasserted or any other particular interpretation being presented by the Kremlin. Is this, in your view, the dirty work of MI6 and CIA again? I'd be skeptical of the CIA of this state. would be involved given Mr. Trump's position on Ukraine and Russia that the MI6 is involved is on the 100 percent so that that is a fair game I pick up there have been so many statements by various observers who are with considerable technical

expertise explaining why this was a fake attack why this was an attempt by Ukraine to settle off the parties against one another. But this has not been, as I said, hasn't been in Russian news. And I don't think it's a current issue for Russia. What is interesting is that, for example, the Financial Times today is speaking about these drone incursions as if they were Russian without any question. that this is not a contentious issue. That's a statement of fact.

The Russians sent these drones in and we in Western Europe have to react by strengthening, by investing more in our defenses. And of course, by increasing our cooperation with Ukrainians who have far more experience in liquidating, destroying Russian drones than we in Western Europe had. is the official word coming out of the Financial Times,

and I take it to be prompted by MI6. I thought of you this morning when I saw these absurdities in the Financial Times. Has the Kremlin indicated at all how much longer it will take for the Russian military to achieve its objectives in Ukraine? No, no. They don't put down out any timelines or any indications of what we're going to do next. The daily news on the hasn't changed in the last

several weeks. They speak about capturing or this or that village in Zapparoja, in Donets, Koblis, and elsewhere. But they don't give you a strategic vision of where they're heading or whether they're going to take

how soon they're going to take a desert. There's nothing of a show in Russian New. Let me back up to Poland for a minute I neglected to ask you this. Did the Polish government send troops to the Polish border in significant numbers? Yes, they did. There was a lot of theater involved for their own domestic reasons. Within Poland, of course, you have the government, you have the opposition,

the former government led by Kachinsky's. Mr. Kachinsky, who is the shadow head of this. opposition party was stating flatly that this was a Russian drone attack was a direct challenge to Poland and has to be answered in the most vigorous way. So the the government in power is far more cautious, but they are using this event for the purpose of bringing along the other allies to the notion of perhaps we put in place a no-fly zone over Ukraine. That is being aired. Poland is putting it forward, but tentatively, not assertively. I couldn't imagine who or what could enforce such a no-fly

zone in the face of the Russian military. Let's jump to Europe over the weekend. There was an enormous march in London. The British police said it was 110,000 people. The media says it was north of a million. It's a huge, huge number of people fiercely opposed to the government doing something that I honestly didn't know was unlawful in Britain, which is waiving the union jack. You know, you see these American demonstrations. People wave American flags all the time, but this was apparently unprecedented in Britain, or at least rarely done. Is Prime Minister Starrmer on thin ice?

Is the Labor Party going to go through this musical chairs as Prime Minister as the Tories did a few years ago? Starmer has serious political problems at home. I wish I could say that they were, that they were caused by his various positions in geopolitics, but they're not. The difficulties of Stimer has are very traditional in British political history, which was laden with sex scandals. Well, in this case, the domestic issues were the forced resignation of his deputy prime minister

over scandalous, really scandalous, tax. manipulation. And there are other members of this cabinet who are teetering. There is severe criticism within the party of Starrmer, who is now being called by leading figures in his own party as being incompetent and not up to the job. On the outside, the conservative party, the normal conservative party, is also in tatters. The only rising force in the people who could succeed Starmu, in case he loses his grip, is ousted, then has to uphold an election and loses the election, which would be quite likely, is Nigel Farage, who is doing very well. He has been consistent from going back a dozen years. He has a very statesman-like image.

let's remember that Mr. Farage had difficult. He was known to tipple too much, to drink too much. All that is gone. He's quite serious. And his policies on immigration and on Brexit and otherwise have been useful to him because of his very consistency over a decade, whereas others have waffled gone this way and that in both parties. You know, I know him well. He worked with me at Fox News.

He was there for about two years. In those days, it was almost inconceivable that he would become the prime minister, but you're telling me there's a spanking new, Nigel Farage, who's perceived as a statesman by the British people and could very well be living at No.10 Downing Street in the future? It is possible. I agree that he had difficult times, and for the reason I just mentioned, he wasn't taken so seriously, but that's all gone. He has sobered up in every way, and his positions are of a great popularity, particularly on immigration.

It's very hard for other parties to get their arms around them. Let's look at France, which is in its fifth government in two years. how stable is the government there? Well, it's a question of how many weeks or months this new government would last. The peculiar thing is that Beiru was replaced now by the defense minister who was close to Macron, but it's the heart of what is wrong with Macron government.

After all, Beiru was fired, was lost the vote of confidence. over his budget, which, what was wrong with the budget, that everything was being cut, that the number of public holidays were being cut, that health welfare benefits were being cut, and only one budgetary item was going up, and that is defense. It is inconceivable that this fact, this basis for the new prime minister, an increased military spend when everything else is being cut, it's inconceivable that that will go on for long.

In the meantime, French government has a different problem. That is a loss of confidence of investors and of the business world in its ability to keep the national debt within sustainable, financeable terms. At the day's Financial Times is reporting that exceptionally, the French private company bonds are giving a lower interest to their purchasers than government bonds. It should normally be the other way around. It means that the markets have lost confidence in Macron.

And I don't see how he can stay on for long when the markets, where he came from, disowned him. Fascinating observation. In Germany, the AFD gained recently, but at the price of the socialists, as I understand, not at the price of Chancellor Merz's party. I don't know if that makes Merz stronger or makes the AFD stronger. It makes the government weaker. He has a coalition government. Right.

And his coalition partners are precisely the people who took a battering in the West German elections. Now, this Ellis Vidal and her alternative for Germany, they didn't rise, I think it's not about 15%, which doesn't give you a ruling position in the government. But considering the law that other things she gained was at the expense of Meretz's coalition partner, it puts in jeopardy his coalition government. And if he should, if that government should fall, he'll be obliged most likely to call elections. In which case, all possibilities are open. And his continued service as Chancellor has a question mark over. Last subject matter, von der Leyen, is she confronting some sort of a vote of no confidence? and if the vote of no confidence prevails, is she out of a job?

Well, when we last spoke a week ago, I mentioned what I'd heard from a well-informed, independent, a member of parliament from Germany, who said his prediction was that she won't last six months, and he reminded me that on the last voter confidence, she has held in power by one vote. Now, what has just happened, and why is it possible that she will lose this vote of no confidence that there are two of them, apparently, scheduled in a week's time from now?

The one that's most important, I think, politically, is the one that is being sponsored by Victor Orban's block. They're deputies from various countries, but he is, it's just the block that he forms, and it's called Patriots for Europe. And that is interesting because Victor Orban is now in really a fighting mood. He just won a very important decision by the European Court of Justice in which the core issue was whether Orban's very restrictive policies on immigration, which are in contradiction with the much more lax immigration regulations of the European Union. whether he would continue to face blackmail and suspension of monies that are owed to Hungary in the EU budget for violation of EU immigration rules. He won the case. This just happened. And that put him in a brilliant, a fighting mood, as came out in a message to his parliament yesterday. He initiated a vote of malconfidence against von der Leyen. And who knows, they may unseat her.

Wow. Professor Dr. Oth, thank you very much. I know you're traveling, and I deeply appreciate the time you've given us. Enjoy your travels. Safe travels. We'll look forward to seeing you next week. Well, thank you so much. Thank you.

Coming up today, a busy and full day for you at 11 o'clock this morning, Pepe Escobar from Sond. somewhere in China, at two this afternoon, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, at three this afternoon, Phil Giraldi, at four this afternoon, Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.