Judging Freedom - Prof. John Mearsheimer: BRICS vs G-7: Economic or Military?

Episode Date: October 24, 2024

Prof. John Mearsheimer: BRICS vs G-7: Economic or Military?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. With courses available online 24-7 and monthly start dates, WGU offers maximum flexibility so you can focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, October 24th, 2024. Professor John Mearsheimer joins us now. Professor Mearsheimer, of course, and as always, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much for your time. I have a lot to discuss with you involving Ukraine, involving BRICS meeting as we speak, although maybe they're having dinner as we speak. But I alsoas, is this a substantial victory for Israel? Is it merely a PR victory for Israel, or is it the elevation of Mr. Senwar to iconic and heroic status, which is a help to Hamas?

Well, I think it clearly is a help to Hamas. I think he has been elevated and will continue to be elevated to iconic status in the sense that he went down fighting. The Israelis like to portray him as something of a moral coward who was hiding in tunnels and willing to send other Hamas fighters out to engage the IDF while he stayed safely behind in a hiding place. But that's obviously not true. And the fact that he went down fighting, I think, will do great things for his status. I'm not sure any of this makes much difference on the overall course of events involving Hamas and the IDF. I mean, the IDF has a rich history or the Israelis have a rich history of assassinating leaders, not just Hezbollah leaders, but Hamas leaders as well.

And it's never had much effect one way or the other. Decapitation is just not a strategy that produces significant political outcomes. So I think in the overall scheme of things, this does not matter much. Has the IDF defeated Hamas? No, there's no question that they have not. And they're continuing to battle them, not only in northern Gaza, but in other places in Gaza as well. And the fact is that Hamas has avoided large-scale engagements with the IDF, where the IDF would have an opportunity to kill large numbers of Hamas fighters all at once. And instead, you've had a lot of small engagements. The Hamas engages in hit and run attacks on the Israelis, and they have not lost that many men. But

furthermore, there's a huge population of young males, young Palestinian males in Gaza that Hamas can draw on to sort of replenish the ranks. So the idea that you're going to finish this group off once and for all is delusional. I'm going to play two clips for you from the American Secretary of State of dubious credibility. Nevertheless, he has a different view on this. I'd love your comments. So, Chris, let's do cut number 16 first. This is from yesterday and then cut number five, which is from earlier today. Israel has achieved most of its strategic objectives when it comes to Gaza, all with the idea of making sure that October 7th could never happen again.

In the space of a year, it's managed to dismantle Hamas's military capacity. It's destroyed a bunch of its arsenal. It's eliminated its senior leadership, including most recently Yahya Sinwar. This has come at a great cost to Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Now is the time to turn those successes into an enduring strategic success. And there are really two things left to do. Get the hostages home and bring the war to an end with an understanding of what will follow. This is a moment for every country to decide

what role it's prepared to play and what contributions it could make in moving Gaza from war to peace. And as I said the other day, I think this is a pivotal moment for that question because Israel has accomplished the strategic goals that it set out for itself – making sure that October 7th and the horrors can never happen again by effectively dismantling the organization of Hamas. It succeeded in doing that and bringing to justice its leaders, those who notably Sinwar. Does he sound more like an international diplomat or more like a lawyer for Benjamin Netanyahu? Well, he's two things. One, he's Israel's lawyer. And number two, he's delusional. I mean, it's just hard to understand what he's talking about. Israel has two stated goals in Gaza, and then the third goal, which they rarely state, which is the most

important law. The first goal was to defeat Hamas decisively, finish them off. The second goal was to get the hostages back. And the third goal, which is rarely stated, but is the key goal, is to ethnically cleanse Gaza, drive all the Palestinians out. Number one, they have not decisively defeated Hamas. I don't know what he's talking about. The fighting goes on. Second, they have not gotten the hostages back. And third, they have not ethnically cleansed Gaza. And in the process, they are committing genocide. And he is complicit in a genocide. Now, he talks about the time being ripe for creating a ceasefire, getting some sort of meaningful peace agreement and putting this war behind us. He has done nothing. His boss, President Biden, has done nothing to make that happen. In fact, what we do is support Israel at every turn.

Again, he is Israel's lawyer, pure and simple. What is your view of the significance or the impact of the release last Friday of two top-secret documents which have every indication of being realistic, which are an American intelligence assessment of the Israeli government's plans to attack Iran, which reveal that the U.S. does not share all of its secrets with the other four eyes of the Five Eyes, and which casually referred to, as if everyone knows it exists, the Israeli nuclear weapons. Yeah, it was very interesting that the document acknowledged, one of the documents acknowledged

that Israel has nuclear weapons. We go to great lengths not to acknowledge that because it would have all sorts of consequences in terms of American law and what we could give Israel in terms of aid. Also, I listened to Larry Johnson on the show tell fascinating stories about, you know, who can see the various paragraphs in one of the two key

documents. It was quite interesting, to put it mildly. My take on the document is that it just doesn't tell you very much. I'm not sure I'm right, but I want to know what the document has to say about what the ultimate target set looks like. In other words, what are the Israelis planning to hit? Are they planning to hit the nuclear sites? Are they planning to hit the oil refineries and the oil fields? Are they planning to hit missile factories, population centers? This is the key question. All the document seems to say is that they're going to attack Iranian radars and intelligence installations. And I find this hardly surprising because the Israelis have to cut a corridor into Iran. They have to take out air defense sites.

They have to take out radars, no matter what the ultimate target set is. And all the documents tell us is that they're going to go after those sorts of targets, but they don't tell us whether the Israelis are going to ultimately go after the nuclear sites or the oil refineries or what have you. So I don't think you can tell altogether that much from the documents. I don't think they are that revealing. And I don't think they help Iran in any meaningful way to defend itself. I may be missing something here, but I just don't think the documents are that big a deal. I think... Go ahead. Well, here's Sir John Sowers, who's the former head of MI6, with his opinion on what the Israelis

are about to do and can do. And this statement that he made, which we'll play for you in a moment, Professor, came out after the documents were released. Chris, number 13. The defense minister perhaps got ahead of himself when he implied there would be some form of intelligence operation, some form of cyber operation against Iran. The Americans have clearly been trying to restrain Israel. The Israelis might see an opportunity to strike Iran's nuclear facilities. Obviously, one of our biggest concerns has been Iran's slow but gradual process towards acquiring nuclear weapons. But in order to strike these nuclear facilities,

which are deep underground under meters of concrete, they need the weaponry that only the United States can supply. So I think what we will see is some form of cyber attack against the nuclear facilities, possibly coupled with missile strikes against military facilities, but leaving a major strike, a major kinetic strike against either nuclear or oil facilities on one side, not pursuing that route. That makes sense to you. Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. WGU is an online accredited university that specializes in personalized learning with courses available 24 seven and monthly start dates. you can earn your degree on your schedule. You may even be able to graduate sooner than you think by demonstrating mastery of the material you know. Make 2025 the

year you focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Yes, that makes sense to me. But I would just say he, in fact, is saying what I just said, that he doesn't know what the ultimate target set looks like. And he was speculating that they would not go after the nuclear sites, for example. I think that's correct, because as he pointed out, the Israelis by themselves cannot take out Iran's nuclear capabilities. They need the United States. So I think it doesn't make sense at this point for them to go after the nuclear sites. And I would imagine on the oil fields and the oil refineries, the United States has gone to great lengths to tell them not to do that because it might have huge negative economic consequences, huge negative consequences for the international economy.

And that's the last thing we need, especially before the election, if you're Joe Biden. I don't think those two target sets are likely to be the ones that the Israelis go after, which is what that gentleman from Britain said. Do you think these documents that were released on the Telegram site were a stunt to give the Iranians the false impression that they knew what the Israelis were up to? Or do you think it was a real genuine American document of American intel spying on the Israelis, released by someone who's either a whistleblower or wants to prevent World War III or wants to delay the attack until after Election Day? Yeah, I don't think it was a stunt. It seems to me that this was someone trying to spook the Israelis and get them to delay the attack.

And that is what has happened. The Israelis have made it quite clear that they're thinking long and hard about what to do in the wake of these documents being put out in public. So I think that was the basic goal of someone. The interesting question is whether or not it was sort of a rogue person inside the American national security community, or it was somebody at the highest level who wanted to leak these documents to slow the Israelis down. I mean, you can tell a plausible story about how someone at the highest levels would want to slow the Israelis down, given that we have a presidential election next week. And it may be the case, actually in two weeks, it may be the case that the Israelis could do something that would damage Kamala Harris's chances of winning.

I think we'll know if it was a rogue or if it was official, which is what Larry Johnson has suggested, but whether or not anybody's prosecuted. If it's somebody high up, they'll just make all kinds of excuses. Like when Justice Alito's draft opinion in validating Roe versus Wade was leaked, there were only 30 human beings, three zero, that had access to it. The court's investigators couldn't find who it was. So it'd be the same type of thing here. 300 people had access to this document. The feds will say we couldn't figure out who it is, unless it's a rogue like that young man, Jack Teixeira, the Air Force reservist on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, who revealed top secret documents about a year ago. You remember that case? He's serving 20 years. But if his bosses

had done it, nobody would have been prosecuted. Yeah. You and I talked about this in the context of the Julian Assange case. Yes. Yes. People at the highest levels leak all the time, and they leak highly classified documents. And somebody down below leaks, you know, even a confidential document or not a top secret, but just a secret document. He or she could end up in the who's gal. Switching gears. Do you have an opinion on the presence or significance, if they're there, of North Korean troops in Russia? Yeah, it's hard to tell what's going on here. I mean, the propaganda machine in Ukraine and in the West is portraying this as a major development. As best I can tell, there are a couple thousand

Korean troops in the eastern part of Russia. They're not in Ukraine. They're not, you know, getting ready to enter. They're on the other side of Siberia. Yeah, yeah. And furthermore, even if they come into the fight, I don't think it's going to matter very much. You're talking basically about a brigade's worth of men. And I mean, it certainly would help the Russians a bit, but not very much. And given where the balance of power is and where the war is headed, I don't think the Russians really need the Koreans. How impactful is the BRICS meeting going on in Russia as we speak. And before you answer that, here's a rather happy

President Putin at the outset of the meeting earlier this week. Number 14, Chris. We never refused the dollar as a universal currency. We were blocked from using it. Now, 95% of all external trade of Russia, it is carried out with our partners in national currencies. They did all this with their own hands. They thought everything would collapse, but no, nothing collapsed. It's developing on a new basis. Stated differently, not only did the sanctions not work, we're in better shape economically, old Uncle Joe, than before you imposed them. That's the opening of BRICS. Now Iran is joining.

What did the GDP of BRICS is 60 trillion. What's your handle on all this, Professor Mearsheimer? Well, not only did the sanctions not work against Putin, our attempt to isolate him internationally and turn him into a pariah has categorically failed. Is there a better example of this failure than the BRICS conference? I mean, there are just all sorts of countries there, including India, which is a democracy that the United States cares greatly about, that is breaking bread with the Russians. So I think what's going on is more evidence that Putin is in the driver's seat. He beats sanctions. He's winning on the battlefield. He's not a pariah.

And BRICS is an impressive institution that shows lots of evidence that it's going to grow more impressive with the passage of time. This is bad news for the United States and good news for Putin. Is this a route toward, even though President Putin said it's not in that clip that we just showed, is this a route towards the removal of the dollar as the world's reserve currency? I suppose if they're going to do that, they're going to have to create a currency, whatever they call it. Yeah, I'm not an economist. And so you want to take everything I say with a grain of salt. But I do read about this. And most people who are in the know argue that the dollar is not going away anytime soon. able or they may be able to create some sort of new system to replace the SWIFT system and to replace the dollar, but that's not going to happen anytime soon. Is BRICS, as you understand it, a way around NATO's politicized

sanctions and efforts to isolate President Putin? Well, what's going on here is during the unipolar moment, the United States took that Western order that it had created during the Cold War to wage the Cold War against the Soviet-led order. We took it and we spread it all around the globe. So during the unipolar moment, we had this international order. And there was no BRICS, right? It was the Western order. But with the passage of time and the coming of China and Russia to great power status and the growing dissatisfaction outside the West with the West's policies, not just the United States' policies, but European policies as well, that growing dissatisfaction with the Western order is leading to the creation of a new order. And that new order includes institutions like BRICS. You

want to remember that an order is a bundle of institutions. The Western order that you and I knew in the Cold War included institutions like the IMF, the World Bank, GATT, NATO, the European Union. Those institutions were part of that Western order. And again, that Western order became the international order during the unipolar moment. But that world has gone away. And now you see new institutions, GATT, not GATT, BRICS is just one of them. There are others out there as well. Think Belden Road, think the AIIB. So there are lots of other institutions that are popping up. And what you see is that the Western order is under threat. Tell me what you think of President Xi's opinion of the genocide inrip continues to deteriorate, the war in Lebanon

has started again, and the conflicts between relevant parties are further escalating. We need to promote a ceasefire as soon as possible, stop the killing, and make unremitting efforts for a comprehensive, just, and lasting solution to the Palestinian issue. Prize that he chose to make comments like that in his opening remarks at BRICS? Not at all. I mean, I agree with him 100%. Well, I know you agree with him, but BRICS is theoretically about economics, not about politics. But tell me why you think he said that. Will China get involved in a full-fledged battle between Iran and Israel,

with the United States backing Israel and Russia backing Iran? I want to be very clear here. Bricks is not just an economic institution. It's also a political institution. Is it military? No, it's not military, but it is political. It's just very important to understand that. Politics, in my humble opinion, always trumps economics. Right. But in this case- I'm sure Jeff Sachs disagrees with that, but occasionally great minds can disagree.

I'm sure Jeff disagrees with that, but occasionally great minds can disagree. I'm sure Jeff disagrees with that. But the point I would make to you is not to privilege politics over economics, but to say that BRICS is both a political and economic institution. Look, if you go outside the West, virtually everyone is appalled at what the Israelis are doing in Gaza and the fact that the West, and this includes countries like the United States and Germany, are backing Israel, that they are complicit in this genocide. People are horrified for all the obvious reasons. And I believe that people like Xi are making these statements because they believe from a moral point of view that what's going on in Gaza is wrong. But also it's in their political interest to make these arguments because they end up looking like they're reasonable. They end up looking like the good guys and we end up looking like the bad guys. Now, is this going to lead to China actually getting involved in a meaningful way

in the Middle East or Russia getting involved in a meaningful way in the Middle East because of the genocide? I think the answer is no. Is BRICS anti-Western or just non-Western? Well, I think it in a very sort of subtle way is anti-Western. I think it was created in large part to deal with the fact that the West had become in important ways a threat to those countries. I think, you know, it's certainly the case with Russia, certainly the case with China, but even India. The Indians are very suspicious of the Americans, as they should be. Well, let's say the war in Ukraine is over. Russia retains the real estate that it acquires. President Zelensky retires to his villa in Tuscany. A new government comes in and they sign an amicable peace treaty with Russia.

Whoever the new president of the United States is, President Harris or President Trump, removes the sanctions on Russia. Can Russia sell vodka to the United States or only to the other BRICS nations? Well, if what you described actually happens, then I think Russia's relations with the West, and this of course would include the United States, would improve markedly. It would be a new world in terms of relations between Russia and the West. But the problem is that what you describe is not going to happen. At some point in the future, hopefully the not too distant future,

the war in Ukraine is going to come to an end, or at least the shooting is going to stop, and you're going to get a frozen conflict. But you're going to have poisonous relations between Russia on one side, Ukraine on the other, and the United States and the Europeans on the other as well. And these poisonous relations are going to extend for as far as the eye can see. And this is- Well, if BRICS is not a club of exclusivity, what is it? BRICS is an institution that includes a good number of countries that have deeply hostile relations with the United States. This is Russia and China. And it includes countries that have

mixed relations with the United States. This includes India and South Africa. And you want to note that Turkey has applied to become a member of BRICS. Turkey is a member of NATO. Iran is now a member of BRICS. Iran, of course. And Iran would be right up there with China and Russia as countries. But what does Iran gain? If it's not a defensive pact, if it's not an economic pact of exclusivity, like there'll be no tariffs, you know, whatever these exclusive agreements are, what do they gain?

Well, what they gain is they gain access to an institution that is basically a set of rules that facilitates their economic and political intercourse with other countries that are in that institution. And when that institution acts collectively, that will sometimes work to Iran's benefit. It's not like joining BRICS is, you know, a way of solving all your main security problems. It doesn't do that much for you, but it helps here and there. And Iran has a deep-seated interest in moving as closely as possible to countries like Russia and China and even countries like India. And BRICS provides a vehicle for that purpose. Here's President Xi again, this time talking about Ukraine in his opening comments. Chris, cut number four. The Ukraine crisis is still dragging on. China and Brazil, together with relevant countries

in the global south, have launched the Friends for Peace group on the Ukraine crisis, aiming to gather more voices committed to peace. We must adhere to the three principles of not spilling over the battlefield, not escalating the war, and not provoking fires from all sides, and help ease the tension as soon as possible. The Friends for Peace group. How meaningful is that? Or is it just a PR stunt by the president of China sounding very Western? I don't think it's a PR stunt, but I don't think it's going to lead to very much. I think that, you know, Xi and Modi both understand full well that Putin has a deep-seated interest in making sure that he prevails in Ukraine and that

he prevents Ukraine from becoming part of NATO. And they're not going to stand in his way, because they need Putin as much as Putin needs them. These countries are all coming together in bricks because they have a vested interest in working together against the West, against the United States. So Xi and Modi don't want to do anything to undermine Putin. But at the same time, they want to make it clear that they are in favor of peace and that they'll do whatever they can to make peace happen and to prevent the war from escalating in different ways. So you can understand their position pretty easily. Before we meet again, probably next Thursday, do you expect that Israel will have attacked Iran or do you think they'll wait until after November 5th?

It's a really very interesting question. My guess is, I don't know, my guess is that maybe they'll wait. You know, maybe the Biden administration will convince them to wait. They've been talking about delaying the attack because of these two documents that were leaked. And as I said to you before, I don't understand why those two documents mean anything of any consequence for purposes of delaying the attack. I have the sense that they're delaying the attack because the Biden administration has asked them to delay the attack. But it is very hard to say when they will attack. Professor Mearsheimer, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for your time. We look forward to seeing you next week. You're welcome, Judge.

Such a pleasure. Thank you. Coming up tomorrow, Friday, at 4 in the afternoon, everybody's favorite time of the week, the boys, Larry Johnson, Ray McGovern, and the Intelligence Community Roundtable, and at 4.30, right after the boys, Professor Jeffrey Sachs. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. I'm out.