Judging Freedom - Prof. Glenn Diesen: US Attacks Yemen, For What?

Episode Date: March 26, 2025

Prof. Glenn Diesen: US Attacks Yemen, For What?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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Meowgreens.. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Wednesday, March 26th, 2025. Professor Glenn Deason joins us now. Professor Deason, always a pleasure. Professor, you are an internationally recognized scholar of geopolitics. Is the United States any safer today because it bombed Yemen the other day?

Well, I wouldn't say there's a lot of evidence supporting that. Indeed, I think it was quite clear from some of these text messages, which came out in a very embarrassing way that people like JD Vance was critical of it. I think he called it a mistake. And indeed, it really makes a question of the purpose was, and also to what extent it's actually successful. Now, I think that, well, the purpose was obvious in terms of attempting to open the sea lanes, but the extent to which that is actually possible

is a different question. And it also puts the United States right back into one of Israel's wars. And given that this is a conflict which is not in America's interest, and also knowing that Israel would like to pull America into one of its wars, I would say no, it's not in America's interest at all, and it would make the world any safer. Wait, the president is supposedly a man of peace. He has stated many times before and after his inauguration, he hopes to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

He is continuing to fund the war in Ukraine, which Ukraine has bound to lose almost literally any day. He's continuing to fund even accelerate the slaughter in Gaza. Now he's bombing Yemen. Can anybody take him seriously when he says he's a man of peace? Or alternatively, does it appear from your vantage point that the Trump administration even knows what it's doing?

Well, in any case, it's a point to put the military intelligence right away because they are in the middle of negotiations. So they don't want to give up an important hand because there's not much leverage anymore. That is that the Russians have won this war. So it's not much if they give up supplying the weapons, then not only do they lose an important bargaining card with the Russians, but also a key point of pressure for the Ukrainians. Keep in mind that Zelensky is quite reluctant to make any real compromises. So I think it's quite important that he continues to have this card. But I agree, he was voted in for being a peace president. He was going to end the forever war. So to call for

ethnic cleansing of every man, woman and child in Gaza, or even now actually bombing Yemen, I think this is something that will disappoint many of his voters. And it's even worth noticing that from these leaked calls, it was quite evident that there were some of them which belonged to the America First Club, such as Vance, who saw this as a European problem. But there's still neo-cons there, so they're driving not all in the same lane it seems. It is fair to conclude that notwithstanding the so-called America first aspirations of President Trump, I've got to rephrase this, is it fair to conclude, I want your opinion, is it fair to conclude that not withstanding the America first aspirations of President Trump, not withstanding his talk about the grand reset, a big reset involving the United States, Russia, China, Brazil and India. The president has surrounded himself with old-fashioned neocons who think that freedom comes from the barrel of a missile and who regard, Tulsi Gabbard said this under oath just two hours

ago, Russia as an enemy, not as a likely trading partner to enrich both of us. Take it from there. to enrich both of us. Take it from there. Well, unfortunately it does appear that a lot of evidence coming in to suggest that one should be skeptical about the ability to have Trump to actually follow through on what he said. Again, this is, I think it's distinctively different though from the different presidents, but that being said,

this is a common trend. That is Clinton, he was gonna be the president after the Cold War to bring about some peace, but he ended up starting this nation building. Then the American people voted for Bush, which was gonna, he was criticizing the nation building of Clinton. And then he took it on a much greater level

in Afghanistan, in Iraq. You had people voting for Obama because he was gonna offer change. Then they voted for Biden because he was gonna bring the Doles back. And instead he almost took America to war with Russia. So I think time and time again, people tend to vote in America for reducing or ending the wars,

but they rarely get what they want. So I think this is a good indication that there's a very strong neocon element within the US and I think this is very problematic because the main issue for the United States, if it does recognize that the unipolar order is over, that is it should then stop unipolar order is over. That is, it should then stop wasting too many resources as it might run into some real economic problems. And it should take a more modest position in the international system because if it attempts to be all-powerful, that is, re-establish a unipolar order, then all the other major powers in the international system will try to balance the United States. So a lot of what Trump said seemed to make a lot of sense, but we have to question why the policies aren't actually reflecting what he said.

Your recitation of the foreign policy foibles of modern American presidents reminded me of what George Galloway, who was just on this program an hour and a half ago, said, if voting changed anything, they'd abolish it. I mean, it almost sounds literally true when you can promise to be the man of peace and you're funding funding all of these wars do you see a connection between Donald Trump's impatience with Vladimir Putin and his patience with BB Netanyahu? Well, it is always a bit of a difference when you look at the American leaders and their relationship with Israel. But it also goes back to what you said about the banning democracy, or as Galloway said,

because I think a lot of the democratic institutions have been hollowed out. That is, we still have the rituals, everyone can go and vote, but while one can change the people in power, there's often less and less ability to actually change the policies. So I don't doubt that a lot of the people who genuinely believe in the platform they're running on, but once they come into power, I think there's a recognition that they have to adjust to the actual power structures. Now, Netanyahu, I think obviously, he gets much more loyalty from the United States. So whenever you see Netanyahu around Trump, you do question what happened to America first. Now, I'm not sure if Trump would like to also reconsider America's close relationship with

Israel to the extent it doesn't serve American interest. Maybe it's something he wants to do, but it would be too bold to take on the entire Israeli lobby at the same time as he's trying to do a huge drift with Russia. Again, it's a possibility, or he might just be very much beholden to Netanyahu like others. And Netanyahu himself, in my view, and please push back or reinforce or modify as you see fit, Professor, from your vantage point in Norway. Netanyahu isn't even making Israel safer. Is Israel safer

because the IDF slaughtered a thousand civilians in Gaza in the past week? No, and I think this is why often we get into this difficult dichotomy of either support Israel or before Israel or against it, but really this is not good for Israel either. You see domestically it's becoming very divided. Society itself can fragment. We see the army being very much exhausted. Indeed, one of the reasons why they accept the disease far is because the army has been overstretched. That is, they bogged down in Gaza, they have exhausted themselves against Hezbollah, now they have the additional occupation of Syria. And if you see this issue

with Yemen, this is not a recipe for success either. That is, they can't really hit the weapons which are underground. Indeed, the missiles and drones which they use tend to be a lot cheaper, which means that they can exhaust the American ones. And I'm not sure exactly what can be achieved. And all of this appears to only be building up to the big war, which they're working themselves up to and trying to bring the Americans in, which is against Iran, which would just be a complete disaster. So I think which would just be a complete disaster. So I think, yeah, Israel is on a very dangerous path, very suicidal path.

And again, I would caution the Americans not to go down with the Israelis. Indeed, as a good friend, one should try to steer them away from this dangerous path. It's almost as if Netanyahu controls Trump rather than Trump controlling Netanyahu controls Trump rather than Trump controlling Netanyahu. Last week the Hamas or Gaza, I'm not sure what they call themselves, health ministry, announced the burial of the 50,000th civilian in Gaza. Does the world even take note of the enormity of that slaughter? How

does that number, 50,000 dead, these are people that can't shoot back, how does that number resonate in Europe where you are? Well I think the oldest killing has sadly become normalized. This news comes out every day, but within the European Union, it appears that all of the world's values, which all about the women, it's Israel. Indeed, the EU leadership as well as the German leadership tends to be very supportive of Israel. And again, I don't see how this impacts any of that solidarity. So it is, yeah, no, it's a truly horrific, horrific numbers. So I don't-

That's the Israeli donor class, as we call them here in America, the very, very wealthy Jewish and pro-Jewish, they're not all Jews, pro-Jewish people who donate to American politicians with the quid pro quo that they will support whatever the government of Israel wants. Does that exist in Europe? Does Frederick Mertz own his chancellorship to the Zionist lobby in Germany?

Well, it is an interesting group because, well, not all Zionists are Jews. Indeed, there's a lot of Zionists among the Christians as well. And again, you also see that a lot of the people who oppose and criticize Israel are Jewish as well. So I think they fall most in the Zionist camp. But if you wanna look at the donor class, it's quite huge in Brussels. It's become a very concerning trend but over many, many years now,

which is that you have the lobbyists more or less penetrating the EU structures. The Germans are a bit interesting though, because they have their history and because of this it appears that the way of making amends for the Holocaust is by allowing Israel to do whatever it wants and support it, which is a very strange thing because it's effectively the Palestinians now have to pay for the crimes of the Germans in World War II. So it's quite remarkable. Also, the events have been of genesis, which is out in. You mentioned that the outset of the conversation, Professor D's and the signal scandal in which President Trump's senior most national security President Trump's senior most national security officials were engaged in a group texting. People say it was a chat, it was texting. And somebody either intentionally or inadvertently

included a journalist, a person well known. Some people like him. A lot of people don't. He's a former IDF member himself. He's a former prison guard at Israeli prisons for Palestinian prisoners, but he's an American and he works in Washington, DC. And now because the leading intelligence officials, the director of national intelligence and the director of the CIA testified under oath that they saw no military plans, now he has posted the transcript of this conversation up to the point where he stopped copying it.

And it shows that military plans were in fact posted. This is a very serious potentially criminal issue. And I'm not gonna ask you about the federal criminal law, it's not your field. How does this resonate in Europe? All the Americans are cowboys, they can't keep their phone calls straight or is it serious?

Is it perceived as serious in Europe? I mean think about it, the plans to attack another country were revealed to a journalist an hour before the attack took place. Yeah no it is, well it did take take the media a little bit by storm, but the angling is, of course, usually aimed at presenting the Trump administration as incompetent because, as you know, the European political class is very much, well, almost a copy paste of the Democrats. So they don't care much for Trump. Indeed, they don't care much for the Republicans. And so they tend to be a little bit gleeful

as this happened. But of course, it's not a good look at all the way. Not only how they actually had the war plans when they said they didn't. Again, the legal issues as a judge would be much better at addressing this than me. But I think it is maybe a little bit of this cowboy feeling to it that is not done quite professionally. And again, I think some of the criticism is fair, because I think Trump put together a team such as Hegseth, which doesn't necessarily have the right background or the sufficient experience. Yeah, so here is a senator from Georgia, a young man that I really didn't know, but I was quite impressed with his questioning. John Ossoff is the senator's name, questioning John Ratcliffe. Now, Mr.

Ratcliffe is the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and of course, he is under oath. Take a listen to this, Chris, cut number two. And they were discussing the timing of sending US air crews into enemy airspace where they faced an air defense threat, correct? I'm gonna, Senator, defer to the other principles that you're referring to about what the meaning and the context of what they were on. They're talking about the timing of US airstrikes, correct? Yes.

Yes, and therefore the timing of sending US air crews into hostile airspace, correct? Yes. And therefore the time period during which enemy air defenses could target US air crews flying in enemy airspace, correct? I don't know that. You do know that. Let me ask this question, General Hawk.

You lead America's signals intelligence collection. Would the private deliberation of foreign senior officials about the wisdom and timing of potential military action be a collection priority for you and the U.S. intelligence community? Senator, it's our job to do indications and warning for both the plans and intentions of adversary leaders and for military commanders.

And would not information about the timing of airstrikes Is that not information about the timing of air strikes, allow a military to pre-position or queue air defense systems to shoot down enemy aircraft? I think Senator, from our perspective, any advance warning is something that we certainly are trying to protect. This of course was all before the actual transcript was. That was from yesterday. This morning, and I don't blame him, people calling this reporter a liar, he released the transcripts

and it showed that he was not lying, that he was telling the truth and that if anything, the person we just saw, Director Ratcliffe, his colleague Director Gabbard, a friend of mine, their colleague, Pete Hegseth, with whom I worked for 10 years at another network, were not being truthful. Oh, this is a huge embarrassment. And it's also coming from the US leadership. This is the largest army in the world. You would have thought there would be some more professionalism here. So I'm not sure how this is going to play out. But again, this is not just a massive embarrassment, but I guess Trump has a knack for getting out of scandals. But overall, given how this was done and all of the political capital which Trump has put

into this, given that he was supposed to be the peace president and now he's using this very aggressive language to destroy Yemen or the Houthis and obviously it's not going to be able to deliver on the massive threats he made because yeah it's a it simply won't work on them. They have been bombed since 2015. I think this idea that they can just use brutal language and then somehow the Houthis will be fearful and bend to his will, I think this is a huge mistake. And it can also get not just dragged into Yemen,

but dragged in closer to war with Iran. And on top of it, what we're seeing now with this, I guess, poor execution with them essentially texting each other and adding one of the journalists, which don't even like them, who leaks these things. It's, yeah, now they have also been caught of lying to the public. So it's, you know, it's an unmitigated disaster. So again, one has to see if Trump is able to get out of this one as well. What will be the international economic consequences if the United States and

Israel wage war on Iran? That would be hard to predict. Iran can shut down important waterways, can shut down important waterways. It can make energy prices go through the roof. Indeed, if the US and Israel would attack Iran, they would probably use the airspace of different Arab states like Saudi Arabia, which would then get retaliatory strikes as well. So there would be massive, massive disruptions. And that's just if they're able to contain it to Iran. And also, there's no clear

exit strategy how they're not going to be able to defeat Iran. So how are they just going to bomb Iran and tell Iran when they're done? No, I think Iran would hit back in a massive way. So they wouldn't set a dangerous precedent. And also, keep in mind that Iran's becoming very deeply integrated into more Eurasian, also BRICS economic system. So the Chinese and Russians, I don't think would want to sit around and do nothing. So I know, I think it would be a absolute disaster for Trump to go down this path now, especially at this point in time when he's trying to bring peace to Europe. And on this, I commend him. And if he's pulling it bring peace to Europe and on this I commend him and if he's pulling it off I hope he gets the Nobel Peace Prize but what he's doing now in the Middle

East is beyond reckless and as we saw from these videos it's also appears to be done by amateurs. This is no way to run an operation. You were talking earlier about how not all Zionists are Jewish, true, and how not all Jews are Zionists. Here is some back and forth between Senator Tom Cotton, who's a strong supporter of the administration and is the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, which means he has the highest intelligence level of clearance, and his good friend, Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense. Chris?

During the Biden administration, I want to give you a chance to respond to what they said about you. I think the first one accused you of being a Christian Zionist. I'm not really sure why that is a bad thing. I'm a Christian, I'm a Zionist. Zionism is that the Jewish people deserve a homeland in the ancient holy land where they've lived since the dawn of history.

Do you consider yourself a Christian Zionist? Senator, I support, I'm a Christian and I robustly support the state of Israel and its existential defense and the way America comes alongside them is there a great you? Only thing worse is Mike Huckabee who's the another former colleague of mine from Fox Who is the nominee to be the US ambassador to? Israel Who is the nominee to be the US ambassador to Israel?

Referring to people that are opposed to Zionism In Zionism of course is not democracy. It's apartheid as Satan But I guess you're I guess you're right the influence of the Zionists is all over the place now you tell tell me it's even in Brussels. I'll give you the last word. Yeah, well, Zionism could be fine if it's a Jewish nation state, but if that Jewish nation state would be full of Jews, it would be one thing. But the problem is when this Zionist state denies a separate Palestinian state, because if Israel will now be a Jewish nation state in which it then encompasses greater Israel, that means half the population will be non-Jews. So how are we going to have a Jewish nation state

if half the population is not Jewish? Well then you either have to have them live under apartheid rules such as they do in the West Bank or you're gonna have to ethnically cleanse or genocide a large part of it which is what you're seeing in Gaza. So I think this is the danger of Zionism. It's again when they say Israel has a right to exist but yes but if they don't accept that same right for Palestine then there's not many more options. No one really explained to me what the alternative is. If you're gonna have only half the population being Jews because you deny a Palestinian state,

what is the alternative to either apartheid or ethnic cleansing? I don't really see what the option, what the alternative would be. And that's a disaster. Nicely put, it is a disaster. Professor Deason, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank that's a disaster. Nicely put. It is a disaster. Professor Deason, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you for joining us. We'll look

forward to seeing you again back here soon. Thank you, Judge. Of course. And coming up later today at two o'clock Eastern, Aaron Maté on all of these things at three o'clock Eastern on all of this. Phil Giraldi. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. You