Judging Freedom - Prof. Glenn Diesen : Are NATO and Russia Near War?

Episode Date: August 26, 2026

Prof. Glenn Diesen : Are NATO and Russia Near War?See 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. Fragically, 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? 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 Wednesday, August 26, 2006, Professor Glenn Deeson will be with us in just a moment. Is war between Russia and NATO coming? But first this. Today's headlines aren't just bleak. They're an indictment of a government that has abandoned the Constitution. You are witnessing the direct result of the Federal Reserve's relentless war on the value of your dollar. For centuries, gold and silver have been the ultimate shield against the state's favorite tools. Monetary expansion and runaway inflation. To protect your wealth is to protect your liberty. And you can do that with gold and silver. I own both

and continue to buy because J.P. Morgan is now lying gold at over $6,300 an ounce. And Bank of America is suggesting silver could reach $300. That's great news for precious metal investors. don't wait for Washington to fix a mess they created. Secure your freedom today. Take possession of your precious metals or diversify your IRA by adding gold and silver. Call 800, 5114620 to see if you qualify for up to $20,000 in bonus medals. That's 800,5114620 or go to Learjudgeonap.com. Professor Dees and welcome here, my dear friend, a few weeks ago,

it seemed as though the Kremlin was determined to cut off supply lines going into Ukraine from Slovakia, Poland, and Romania. At the same time, it had damage, then even destroyed Ukraine's ports on the Black Sea. I guess this was in an effort to strangle Ukraine, so to speak. What happened? The Ukrainian economy has been well doing fairly poorly because of this. Now, I think part of the reason why you saw the CIA director Radcliffe visited Moscow on a very brief trip was to try to find a way of negotiating a way out of this that is allowing Ukraine's ports to open.

The Russians, of course, they put their own conditions on this, which the U.S. and well NATO and Ukraine probably won't meet well I think definitely won't meet no but overall it's it does risk spreading the war further into into well with NATO and Russia we've seen the Russians attack the borders between Ukraine and Moldova but again some of these rivers especially near Romania between Romania and Ukraine are also targeted. So there is a risk of a direct war, but I think this many people in Moscow is calculating that,

you know, getting a bit closer to war is required in order to get NATO to take a step back because the escalation now is, well, they see it requiring a response. Is there, I'm interested in what you said about, this is a little off the beaten path of it, I'm interested in what you said, Professor, about CIA Director Ratcliffe has unannounced day in, day out, one day, four-hour meeting in the Kremlin, which is almost unprecedented, but not totally unprecedented. Is there some evidence to which you can point that that was the purpose? I'm not questioning what you're saying.

It's just that everybody I've been asking about it says, we don't know, we don't know, we don't know. Is there some report that that's what they discussed? No. There's been a lot of secrets around this, indeed. Before it was coming, Moscow did not announce that there would be any talks. And apparently the objective was to meet with the Russian intelligence chief. And from what we know, that's all that happened. But of course, there's been some more reports around it,

which makes it even more, well, makes us ask more questions. That is before Ratcliffe arrived in Moscow. There's reports of a U.S. military transport plane, this Boeing C-17 that arrived as well. Again, it's not for me to speculate what this is, but it begs a lot of questions of what exactly is happening. But, again, the intelligence chiefs wouldn't be the one negotiating an end to the war. but again, this is not a war between Ukraine and Russia primarily.

We know that this war is a proxy war between NATO and Russia. And since the first day after Rianukovych was toppled back in 2014, we know that the CIA and MI6 began already to move into Ukraine and set it up as a proxy. So the CIA is heavily involved in Ukraine. And it could be that this is a way of that they discussed possible de-escalation because, as we know, this 40-plus day campaign of the deep strikes in Russia, the Russians are now responding. And maybe they just need some rules of the game, what is required, or they might be looking for the escalation. Again, it is speculation at this point, but one really has to appreciate what an immense escalation there has recently been with this deep strikes into Russia.

I know your field, you have many fields, but one of them is not American politics, but here we have the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who's also in the National Security Advisor, who has nothing to do with the war in Iran, nothing to do with the war in Ukraine, nothing to do with negotiating on either of them, and now this further insult of sending the intelligence chief to talk in the Kremlin. I mean, it's just an insult to the Secretary of State who seems to be more concerned with being the viceroy, his word of Venezuela, and maybe the soon-to-be named vice-roy of Cuba, than to run American diplomacy. Does American diplomacy exist anymore, Professor Deason? Well, at least this administration is. has an interesting way of governing. And Marco Rubio, you know, holding these two roles at the same times is, let's say, unusual. But also the obsession with Venezuela, with Cuba. Again, but I wouldn't say that this is merely personal issue for Marco Rubio.

I think this is part of a wider strategy now for the United States, that is recognizing that the hegemonic era is over. And it does have to make priorities now. And I think a key concern is that China, Russia, Iran, other countries, adversaries primarily would get too much influence in the Western Hemisphere, which is seen as America's backyard. So I guess cracking down on some of these adversarial countries is seen as a requirement. You know, none of this is without any irony because this is essentially what the Russians

been saying for the past 30 years. that is, you know, do not begin to have any NATO incursion into Ukraine because this is an existential threat. And there's no acceptance of this in the West. The idea is, you know, apparently we're 100% for sovereignty of Ukraine to choose itself as long as it chooses NATO, otherwise will topple their government. But I think this is the obsession with, yeah, Mexico and, and Cuba. Right. The Black Sea is huge, but a small portion of it borders Ukraine and there are ports there, not the least of which is Odessa. What is the status of those ports? Are they usable for naval or commercial purposes?

No. I think, well, the Russians have been putting a blockade on them, hitting ships going in and out, but also focusing on destroying the port infrastructure. at some point if, well, there would be some Black Sea agreement in place, then, you know, let's say an agreement can happen two, three months into the future. I think during this time, the Russians will want to make sure that the capabilities of these ports are severely diminished. And again, I think this is, I'm a surprised I haven't done this before, to be honest, because we know from 2019, at least NATO and the US as well announced a lot of modernization of these Ukrainian ports so they would be able to host American British warships.

Again, the whole part of this wider project of making Ukraine into a frontline state against Russia. All of these are also reasons why the Russians ended up invading in 2022. So, no, I think the Russians will continue to destroy these ports. They will destroy some of the bridges nearby and other logistic systems, which the Ukrainians need to keep the economy going. A lot of the Ukrainian economy depends on agriculture. They do have land routes, but for a variety of reasons, you know, it's much easier to export by sea.

That being said, the Russians are also going after railroads as well. So they are, yeah, they're trying to shut down Ukraine. In the past, the Russians felt they had to justify all attacks in terms of having dual purpose. That is also military purpose. But now the NATO countries are very open about their purpose of striking deep into Russia, as the Finnish president said. The goal is to hit civilian infrastructure, he said. It's important that the Russian civilians feel.

the war because then once there's economic problem they would put pressure on the Kremlin. So the Russians are now using that same tactic against Ukraine. I mean, a group of EU foreign ministers recently visited President Zelensky. And then British Prime Minister, the new British Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, made his first foreign trip as Prime Minister. to visit President Zelensky. Are they sort of waving at and taunting the Kremlin? Well, you could say that. I mean, it's, again, the border, I guess,

or crossing the border between helping Ukraine in the proxy war and fighting Russia directly. I think this has already been crossed and it's been crossed quite openly, which makes it now near impossible for Russia not to respond in some way. Usually countries would seek some plausible deniability. But as you saw from, and this is essentially how, well, you could interpret what Bernham said in Kiev as well in this regard. He was pointing out that we'll hand over the blueprints of our shadow, our storm shadows to Ukraine so they can begin to produce them themselves.

Of course, I think this is nonsense. infrastructure you need to set something like this up. You need specialized workers. You can't just transfer that know-how by handing over some blueprints. Also, yeah, furthermore, if the factories you need for this, you can't really do this in hidden. So the Russians would very quickly see where these factories might come popping up and they would destroy them before they could produce a single missile. So a lot of this seems like nonsense. But I suspect what the British are planning is to do some attacking Russia with their missiles, but then, you know, being able to claim that these are Ukrainian missiles. They produce them, not the UK. And so again, some of

this is plausible deniability. But again, on the other hand, you see other voices. And again, this is president of Finland who is so blatant in what the strategy is, because he says out loud, you know, this is the strategy moving forward. One needs deep strikes. to Russia, civilian targets, and this will put pressure on the Kremlin. They're saying this at the same time as it's NATO weapons entering Ukraine. You have NATO intelligence to avoid the Russian air defenses. You have NATO target selection, NATO war planning, and NATO contractors assisting in firing these weapons. So this is, in every regard now, NATO war on Russia.

So I think the war has already begun and the Russians are now calculating what kind of response this requires. Yes. I mean, will Putin strike NATO munitions facilities? Will he strike manufacturing plants in France, in Poland, in Germany, in Great Britain? Well, he could or he might already have done so to some extent. there's been a lot of suspicious, you know, explosions at weapons factories across Europe. We saw in Bulgaria.

We saw it in Italy. And also in the Baltic states. So I think that, again, I have no evidence that these are sabotage missions. It could just be accidents. That is, if you do want to ramp up a weapons production a big way, then accidents like this could happen.

But I'm guessing that the Russians will most likely go up the escalation ladder incrementally the way NATO does. And if I find a way of, well, essentially speaking, the only language they think NATO understands, which is through force. But this is why it's become so dangerous. And, you know, you know, I spoke about this before. That is, for four and a half years, the Russians focused on just finishing off the proxy war with Ukraine without spreading it to its handlers in the West.

But this kind of calculation allowed the West to kind of reach the conclusion that, okay, they're deterred by NATO, they're not going to do anything. And the flow in this calculation is that the war isn't stable. That is, NATO continues to go up the escalation ladder, do more and more. So there was this obsession. Well, first they wanted to keep the war within Ukraine, then they argued, no, we need to bring the war to Russia, then they provide the weapons they were open about their intentions their participation and yeah it's

you can imagine if the situation was reversed imagine russia and china toppling the government in mexico building up a powerful proxy army and then you have a chinese and russian officials talking about how there's need to strike deep into america hitting civilian targets so they will put pressure on washington i mean what would the u.s do in such a situation and now yeah they think about pressure under what Russia has to do. What restraints it is, as soon as the direct tax becomes very overt, then we risk nuclear war. And Russia is the largest nuclear power in the world.

So this kind of caution is the main source of restraint. The problem in the West is we see Russia's restraint as being a sign of weakness that allows us to escalate further. Is NATO toothless without the U.S.? Yeah, well, I think there's a very wide consensus that is the case. It's the United States that has the military power. It's the Europeans who essentially outsource their security to the United States for decades. So, no, the European militaries aren't, well, there's nothing impressive there.

That being said, they do have a great. ambition to militarize to to make their armies more formidable and they essentially communicated this clearly also to the russians that is they want to build large militaries and they foresee a future war with russia as well so yet again the russians are faced with a dilemma do you take that fight today while the european militaries are still paper tigers or do you wait until the future when they arm themselves and uh It's a difficult dilemma because it has many layers to it. That is, in Germany, for example,

they're the most militant country now in, well, one of the most militant countries in Europe. They want to rebuild the most powerful military in Europe, and they see themselves as having a leading role in confronting Russia. Now, you know, you would assume that the logical thing for Russia would be then to strike the German weapons manufacturers. But that being said, not everyone in Germany is very happy about their government being so militaristic and sacrificing their economy. So you see the government being immensely unpopular and you see the largest, well, most support now is for the main opposition, which is IFDE, who wants to put an immediate end to this.

Again, the head of the IFDS says they want to, you know, if they win, take power, the first thing she would do is go to Moscow and find a way of resetting relations. no more participation in this war and ask Ukraine to get Germany's money back. So this pendulum swing can be quite powerful towards a peace movement. So the Russians kind of calculating this. How far can they let the Germans go to see if they can correct themselves or if Russia will have to correct them? So NATO is toothless without the U.S. After Iran, is NATO toothless with the U.S.?

Well, that's a great question. Well, I think, this is interesting, because for the European leaders, they seem to think that the United States has unlimited capabilities, that it's all powerful. This is the image since the 90s and onward, and they still kind of hold on to this. If we can just get the Americans to shift their intentions, if they will commit to the war against Russia,

then it's essentially one. This is the assumption they're often going with. But as we saw now in over the past years, they sent so many of their weapons to Ukraine. They ran down their stockpiles. And then, of course, going to war with Iran. Now, yeah, the weapons have been depleted to such an extent that, yeah, the U.S. might be more and more toothless as well. And we see with these air defenses, this is a huge problem. I know Trump is saying they have more than ever, but, yeah, no one's really listening to.

this and the fact that the US can't even escalate now against Iran, that there's no way of defending its allies, the fact that they have to direct air defenses out of East Asia and Europe essentially weakening their ability to defend key allies. It's quite dramatic. So yeah, the United States might be getting demilitarized as well. And you hear some rhetoric coming out of China as well because a lot of the weapons the US are building, the artillery shells, they need antimony. And a lot of this rare earth metals, the Chinese are wondering, why should we sell this to the Americans?

They are clearly stating that they foresee a future war against China. So they might see it as a necessity to make sure that the US can't arm itself to the teeth either. Wow, fascinating stuff, Professor Deason. Thank you very much, my dear friend. I'll be traveling in the next week or two, but we'll find a way, I've gaps in my schedule, I'll find a way to get you on as close to your convenience as we can. And I look forward to chatting with you from not very far, not very far from where you are now. All the best, my dear friend. Thank you, and coming up later today at 11 this morning, Jim Webb, at 2,000. this afternoon, Joe Kent. Yes, that Joe Kent. What did he warn the president about? And at three o'clock, the great Phil Giraudi. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom.