Judging Freedom - Prof. Glenn Diesen : Transatlantic Unity Is Cracking

Episode Date: January 21, 2026

Prof. Glenn Diesen : Transatlantic Unity Is CrackingSee 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? 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, January 21st, 2006. Professor Glenn Dyson joins us now. Professor Dyson, always a pleasure, my dear friend, that was telling you in the break before we started taping that I was thinking of you earlier this week when the President of the United States,

Chris, if you could post it, sent this to the Prime Minister of Norway. Dear Joan, I won't read the whole thing, just the relevant part. Dear Joan, as considering your country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped eight wars plus. I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States going to the bottom. The world is not secure unless we have

complete and total control of Greenland. Thank you, President D.J.T. What was the reaction in Norway to such an absurd, almost comedic email? Well, it was strange, I guess, on many levels. That is, well, the first problem was that he sent this to the Prime Minister, but the Nobel Peace Prize is decided, the recipient that is, by a committee. So it's not actually the government which hands it out. One can make the argument that the government will always be capable of influencing at some point. But still, this, I think,

this was misplaced. But also linking Greenland directly to the Nobel Peace Prize is also, well, I guess, concerning because it reads more or less as, you know, either give me the Peace Prize or I'll wreck havoc, which is, you know, it's very strange. Yeah, strange. So it's, again, I've heard people comment perhaps it was meant as a joke because it became almost too absurd. I know I suspected many times that perhaps Trump sometimes plays Nixon's madman that is pretend to be unstable and erratic simply so others will other leaders will be careful not to confront, assume that the US will have some escalation control given that nobody wants to go up the escalation ladder with him and also be willing to make massive compromises and concessions given no one knows what he will do tomorrow.

or he maybe just really, really likes the Nobel Peace Prize. It's very hard for me to say. Did the Prime Minister of Norway himself respond directly to Trump or comment publicly about this? Well, I think there was a comment that it wasn't up to him who gets the Nobel Peace Prize. But overall, the Europeans, they're quite cautious to step on Trump's toes.

So as you probably saw with Trump releasing those messages from Macron and the route, it's, you know, they're still willing to, you know, crawl and kiss up as much as possible, even as is threatening to our next part of Europe. But yeah, so, no, I think they're very careful to speak back. Just explain that it's not up to them. Here's the position of the leadership of the British Labor Party on the floor of the House of Commons calling, we'll play the clip in a minute, calling Trump a bully when I played this for your colleague, Professor Sacks, he basically said that's, you know, the pot calling the kettle black. The Brits are the biggest bullies in history. However, they are right this time. Chris? Madam Deputy Speaker, President Trump is acting like an international gangster. Threatened to trample over the sovereignty of an ally, threatening the end of NATO altogether,

and now threatening to hit our country and seven European allies with outrageous damaging tariffs unless he gets his hands on Greenland. The present of the United States is attacking our economy, our livelihoods, and our national security. The only people cheering him on are Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping. We have to finally be clear-eyed about the sort of man Trump is and treat him accordingly. He is a bully. He thinks he can grab whatever he wants using force if necessary. And he is corrupt.

The most corrupt president the United States has ever seen. So there are only two ways of getting him to back down, bribing him with a new debt, jet perhaps, or a few billionaires crypto account, or standing up to him like we would with any other bully. Now, in a little bit more humorous and whimsical way, here is Italian Prime Minister Maloney saying, what he want us to do? attack McDonald's? Watch this. Is this strategy wrong? But if so, then you need to formalize the alternative. You need to tell me exactly what you intend to do. That is, should we distance ourselves in what sense?

Should we leave Nato? Should we close the American bases? Should we break off commercial relations? Should we attack McDonald's? I don't know. What should we do? What else should we do? Wow, if she closed the American basis, that would be extraordinary. There were five, as you know, enormous bases

starting up north and going down, towards Sicily. I don't know. What can the Europeans do about Greenland? I mean, he said today in Davos he won't use military force, but who would believe him? No, it's a great point. But if I can first just comment on

this comments being made from different European leaders, that they're all now speaking about values and international law. and as if something fundamentally different has happened. But it's worth noting that they kind of egged on this position by the United States for years. That is, the Europeans were fine with what was done to Yugoslavia, the forced secession of Kosovo. Many were joined in on attacking Iraq, Libya, Syria, Gaza, the attack on Iran.

No one seemed to have a problem with bombing Nigeria a few weeks ago or kidnapping the president of Venezuela. So time and time again, it's seen as acceptable. What's different this time is we're at the Europeans are at the receiving end. So I think this is the main problem. And even now you see Macron sent this message to Trump saying, listen, we're all with you on Syria. We can do things against Iran.

Let's do it together. But don't touch Greenland. This is us. We have to stand together. So it's not as if international law or anything else is the guiding principle. It's simply that the Europeans want to be on the inside. But as Trump has some retweeting a comment that the real enemies are not China or Russia, it's the enemies are within and then referencing NATO.

So I think this is where the anger is. Will Russia sit back and, watch Trump destabilize NATO and secretly be happy about it? Or does it not want the United States military that close to the Arctic Circle? Well, it doesn't want, no, because if the U.S. can seize control over Greenland, this could put, yeah, the Russian Arctic put it in a vulnerable position. The U.S. could do anything from placing missile defense on Greenland. They could use it to interfere or sabotage Russia's Arctic route.

So there are many things that could be done. I don't think they want the United States to have Greenland. On the other hand, they definitely do not mind to see the Americans and Europeans go at each other because the main security threat for Russia has been NATO due to its expansion. Indeed, it's NATO expansion that represents the, well, the collapse of the pan-Europeans. European security architecture. So given that this is seen as the main threat for the past 30 years, it doesn't, of course, there's joy as to see the possibility now of NATO collapsing.

It could even open up the possibility for a new security architecture in Europe, where the stability and peace in Europe doesn't depend on, or the recipe for it isn't to continuously expand NATO military infrastructure closer and closer to Russian borders. So I think they're quite happy about this. But if a Greenland actually ends up under U.S. control, I don't think they would care for that at all. You know, it's hard for me to imagine it ending under U.S. landing under U.S. control without force because it would require the Congress. Trump wants to buy it for a trillion dollars. I don't know what it's worth.

He threw out a number of $750 billion. A, the government doesn't have that money. B, they'd have to borrow it. C, that would require an act of Congress. And D, he'd never get 60 votes in the Senate. And after November, probably can't get a majority. I don't even know if you can get a majority in the House now. The Republicans have a two-vote majority.

And there's a few Republicans who don't go along with leadership. Again, your colleague, Professor Sachs predicts this is just not going to happen. and the votes are not there. There's no burning desire amongst the American people to do this. If you ask the average middle American, you want the country to own Greenland? Will you feel safer if the U.S. owns Greenland? I don't think they care. No, I think it's going to be, it's very unlikely that he's going to be able to cease Greenland using the U.S. military.

Again, the Europeans are heavily dependent on the US for security. It's heavily dependent economically. So if the US would decide to take Greenland, it's not much the Europeans can do. They can threaten to kick out the US bases, but the Europeans want Americans to stay there. So that the US probably wouldn't mind that much. They can say NATO's dead. Well, I don't think the US would mind that much either. Also, they're going to shut down some commercial interests of the United States.

sure, they can bring some pain to the US, but the Europeans are much dependent on the US than the other way around. So if the US wants it, it can take it. The main weakness is, though, in the United States, is that it's deeply divided. So it would be very unpopular, I think, to use military force to take it.

Now, I think I agree with our common friend, Jeffrey Sachs, that is unlikely that Trump would use the military. For many reasons, one of them is, if it wouldn't be accepted then by the European, It would be highly controversial within the US and even next administration might hand it back to patch things up with Europeans. So what I think is the main approach is just threaten military force, which would then be humiliating the feed for the Europeans and also it would mean the end of NATO and hope that under this pressure the Danes will simply sell Greenland to the US. Once there's a signature on paper, then it's a done deal and it will be bipartisan consensus. that this will be okay.

If this doesn't work, you can always try to regime change. Like in Ukraine, have a little Maidan that Greenland secedes from Denmark, gets its independence, and then it would be easier to absorb. Keep in mind, there's only about 55,000 citizens. You can offer one million dollars to each,

and if, well, if math is correct, that would be about $55 billion. So it's, you know, it would be easy. Once you can decouple it from Denmark. So there's different pathways that the US could take. But use just military force and just put it under US occupation, I think this would be it would be too many uncertain variables. And I think Trump doesn't like it.

He likes something quick, go in heavy, and then get a quick settlement and then get it over with. We saw this with Panama. We saw it with Yemen, Iran, Venezuela. He doesn't want to hang around for too long because he has drawn into something longer than it's going to absorb focus and attention. He can't do his next projects. Well, here he is earlier today. He starts to call Greenland, Iceland,

and then he catches himself. Cut number five. So we want a piece of ice for world protection, and they won't give it. We've never asked for anything else, and we could have kept that piece of land, and we didn't. And so they have a choice.

You can say yes, and we will be very appreciative. Or you can say no, and we will remember. China, not crazy about Trump's threats, talking about the law of the jungle, Chris, cut number six. Everyone should be equal before the rules. A handful of countries should not enjoy privileges based on their strength. The world cannot return to the law of the jungle, where the weak are prey to the strong. Every country has the right to safeguard its legitimate interests. China has always attached great importance to promoting its own development

and driving the common prosperity of its trading partners. We are committed to making the global economic pie bigger for everyone. We have never deliberately pursued a trade surplus. We are not only willing to be the world's factory. We are even more willing to be the world's. market. In a phrase, given the size of their population, the world's market. Obviously, there were hints in there about Trump's statement to the New York Times now

about a week and a half ago that he doesn't feel constrained by international law, just his own mind, and his own sense of morality. Surely the Chinese, just like the Russians, did not let that slip by. No, well, this is the main concern that the United States helped to build, well, not just help. It was the main actor in building this order based on international law where we try to civilize the competition and cooperation between states. So the fact that Trump now treats international law like a woke conspiracy is, of course, deeply concerning.

And for China, of course, they see that they're being able to grow and prosper and thrive within a system based on international law and agreements. So the concern now is that as this unipolar world order has come to an end, the hegemonic position of the US is over. We'll see that this puts a lot of pressure on the United States, because under the hegemonic order and even the Cold War, the US could rule through alliance systems, but now this appears to be coming to an end.

For example, with Europe, the US needs to prioritize other regions, and the Europeans at some point will have to diversify their own ties, be less reliant on the US if they want to be prosper and be relevant in the world and have some sovereignty. So at some point things will start to drift apart. So I think what they see with the United States is it's essentially looking to reshuffle the deck that is to seek new strategic advantages, that is seized the assets which can't rely on allies anymore under US control, just try to sabotage the,

the technological development of other countries. And overall, just throw the entire rule book out because it can't compete to the same extent it did before. And of course, the Chinese feel a bit exposed because this is the main problem. The US can't really compete directly with China anymore. Its economies become over-financialized. And overall, the Chinese abilities to scale gives it so much more competitive. advantage and also the huge industrial might of the Chinese gives it also competitive advantage and even

developing AI in terms of implementing it and finding place to make money of it. So overall, this is a concern for the whole world that if the US feels it can't prosper or thrive under the old set of rules, that it will simply throw away the rulebook. So this is a huge, huge concern, especially for the Chinese. But of course, also the Russians are, yeah, something that. bothers them. I want to talk about Iran for a few minutes, but we'll start with a clip from Secretary Bessent yesterday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, boasting about how he was responsible for devaluating the Iranian currency and attempting to foment the revolution in the streets, which, of course, failed. Trump has failed to bring about two resources.

changes and boasted he would bring about both Venezuela and Iran. But I know you're also an economist, listen to what Secretary Besson, rather smugly but proudly, had to say. What do you want to say about sanctions, something else you've been working on, of course? What are you planning there in terms of Iran and the impact there? Do sanctions actually work? And the same question with regard to 500 percent secondary sanctions are, tariffs on countries who purchase energy products from Russia. Okay, so two things there. There are Treasury sanctions.

And if you look at a speech that I gave at the Economic Club of New York last March, I said that I believe the Iranian currency was on the verge of collapse, that if I were an Iranian citizen, I would take my money out. President Trump ordered Treasury and our OFAC division, Office of Foreign Asset Control, to put maximum pressure on Iranians. Iran and it's worked because in December their economy collapsed. We saw a major bank go under. The central bank has started to print money.

There is a dollar shortage. They are not able to get imports and this is why the people took to the street. So this is economic statecraft. No shots fired and things are moving in a very positive way here. Economic statecraft, people died because of his manipulation, which was followed up by the CIA, MI6 and Mossad, bringing rifles to thugs to shoot and kill innocence. Your thoughts, and it failed. No, it did fail, which is why it's a bit strange to take such pride in it.

But again, there's a common formula. We've seen this been used more than once over the past. 30 years. That is, first, try to impose crippling sanctions to instigate an economic crisis. This results in a bit of a social and political instability. And as you have this political instability, fuel the riots through, well, NGOs or whatever you want. I mean, Pompeo, Mike Pompeo said that Mossad was marching among the protesters on Israel TV, I think was Channel 14. They confirmed that a lot of weapons were being shipped in to the protesters to, well, to use against law enforcement people in Iran.

And at this point, this is when you move towards regime change. And much like the playbook in Syria, the golden is if they run in government uses extreme force to shut down these riots, then the US and Israelis could assist with. airstrikes against the government to bring the coup along. I mean, we all seen this movie many times before. And I was even on a debate program explaining that this is obvious, has a heavy U.S. and Israeli footprint on it. It was said that, well, this is defense of the Iranian regime.

But here we have a Bessent essentially confirming this. But it could also add the economic statecraft, when you use this kind of sanction or disruption, It's within economic statecraft, it's very well known that these are tools you can only use so many times before countries develop immunity. That is, they seek to defend themselves from it. So what the Iranians will do now is make sure that they never exposed to this again. They will try to reduce any reliance on the U.S. economy. It's a bit like the sanctions against Russia.

You could play this weapon once, but the Russians will never again be dependent on the Western technical. technologies, industries, banks, payment systems like swift currencies or any of the sorts, insurance systems. So this is the problem with this very aggressive economic statecraft, as it calls it. Well, before we go, just because this is such a European issue, I should have addressed this earlier, about two or three days ago, right before. before he released his emails to and from President Macron, President Trump predicted that President Macron

would be out of office in a couple of months. Do you have any idea what the basis for such a prediction would be, number one and number two, how can diplomacy be effective if one side is afraid that the other side is gonna reveal their texts and emails? No, this is very, very dangerous to do, to release what is supposed to be private communication. Of course, Macron has done this himself in the past.

He has, well, released to the press videos of him talking on the phone. He's done it with Putin. He's done it with Zelensky. He's done it with Trump. So he does it himself. But of course, this is very problematic because, you know, diplomacy shouldn't be all transparent. It's important that the leaders, I think they can speak in not secret, but in confidentiality among each other without it being leaked to the press.

But the message, well, the comments about Trump, I think that came in the context of Macron saying that he wouldn't be on this new peace board, which seems to be some efforts, colonial approach almost to privatizing what the UN is supposed to do, in which Trump would essentially lead this thing. And in response, he did say, well, nobody cares what he wants. Nobody wants him there. And also he'll be gone in a few months. Again, it could just be Trump, you know, just spouting words, denigrating those who oppose him. On the other hand, Macron is deeply unpopular, much like Starmer, much like Mertz.

So Europe has a crisis, I've often argued, not just, economic and military, but they also have a crisis in political legitimacy at the moment. So you and I've spoken about in the past as well. The political opposition now is increasingly criminalized to the point they're afraid that someone who will pursue very different policies will come in their place. So I'm not sure if Trump would actively seek this. I know that the new US national security strategy suggests that the U.S. should help to encourage or cultivate the opposition in Europe to get rid of this globalist crew. But again, if I would bet, I think it was just Trump having an aggressive response, impulsive, if you will.

Just to end on a light note, our friend George Galloway, as only he can say it, Chris. It is unable to join the more gung-ho members of NATO. That's relative, of course. The French sent 15 soldiers. The Germans sent 15 soldiers and then quickly withdrew them. The British have sent one soldier. That's right, one soldier. They can't join the more gung-ho Europeans

because Britain is an American-occupied country. and we are occupied by American military bases. They're called Royal Air Force bases, but you won't find the king saluted in them. All of my lifetime, we've been told the Russians were coming. The Russians were about to invade Europe, and we had to spend, like Billio, on military hardware. We had to possess nuclear weapons

because the Russians were coming. And as it turns out, it's the Americans that are coming. And the Russians have no interest in the matter whatsoever. It's enough to make a horse laugh. It certainly got me laughing. Enough to make a horse laugh. As usual, George, in his own unique way, makes a very profound point.

Professor Radizan, thank you very much for your time. And we'll look forward to seeing you again, my dear friend. Thanks, Judge. It's a great pleasure as always. Of course, all the best to you. Thank you. Coming up tomorrow, I don't know if Phil Giraldi's going to be with us at three. There is some internet problem where he is in Virginia. But if you watch our homepage and he's going to be on, we'll announce it. But we do know that tomorrow at 1 in the afternoon, Max Blumenthal, at 2 in the afternoon, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, at 3 in the afternoon. afternoon, Professor John Meersheimer. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom.