Judging Freedom - Russia Ukraine China & U.S. - a NEW puzzle - Col Doug Macgregor

Episode Date: March 29, 2023

Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Wednesday, March 29, 2023. It's about three o'clock in the afternoon here on the east coast of the United States. Colonel McGregor returns to the show. Colonel, you and I have talked off air about why there is no negotiation or communication going on between the Russians and the United States. We know that there was communication going on even at the height of the Vietnam War and throughout the Cold War, but there's no communication going on now. Secretary Blinken seems to feel that a ceasefire would be a cynical trap. What's your take on this, Colonel? Well, I'm not sure he could give you a different answer. Remember that the people we're talking about in Washington are universally ideologues.

And given their ideological mindset, a discussion with anyone who disagrees with them is impossible. Anyone who opposes American policies in any form, particularly military policy, strategic policy, is by definition an enemy i mean this is the sort of remember this was the the george bush message you're with us or you're against us this is ridiculous nonsense but we're not interested in winning anything we keep talking about helping ukraine win but what does a win look like? Has anybody ever described victory? I don't think that they can define a win. It can't be the removal of Russian forces from Crimea. That's not even militarily conceivable. It can't be the removal of President Putin from office. These are probably on the wish list of Victoria Nuland and maybe Tony Blinken, but these things are not realistic.

Well, from the neocon or globalist standpoint, if anything they do harms Russia and its leadership, it is by definition strategically positive for the United States and its allies. I don't subscribe to that view. But then again, people don't think carefully when they start wars about how to end them. And if you take the position that the only way the war can end is with the complete destruction or near complete destruction of your opponent, the war is not likely to end anytime soon, and sometimes never. Unfortunately, that's what we're dealing with. Colonel, President Zelensky gave an interview in English to an American reporter. I don't recognize her and I don't know the name of the network for which she

works. They were on a train. We're going to run this in just a minute. There's a little bit of background noise from the train, but you can hear what they're saying. The essence of what he's saying is he needs, I don't know if he understands this properly, he needs to win Bakhmut, and President Putin needs to win Bakhmut for PR reasons. So take a listen, and then maybe we can dissect what he says. Is this part of why you are fighting so hard in Bakhmut? Because a lot of military analysts will

say that strategically it's not that because that will be with her for him he was any victory yes he will sell this week three he will sell this week three to West to his society to China to Iran to all the countries, to Brazil, to Latin America countries, not to Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia. Of course, they really understand, you know, from details. And they feel this dangerous because they're neighbors. So, but he will sell it to his society. That was the first step.

Now, wait, wait a minute, wait a minute, I will have a decision with Ukraine. Then another step, another step, another step. Is Bakhmut militarily significant, strategically significant, or just emotionally, PR-wise significant? I think most analysts that have looked at Bakhmut recognize that that town is the keystone and the edifice of the defense of Donbass. That once that falls, because of its unique position,

the road networks that run in and out of it, rail lines, the various factory installations, mines, presumably supply depots and other things, it is very important. And that once it is taken, it's questionable how you build another effective defense line on the scale of the one that you had in Donbass. So I think it is very important. And I'm sure he knows that as far as PR is concerned, he may not realize what a PR disaster he now has on his hands, because he's effectively saying that he's sacrificing tens of thousands of Ukrainian lives in order to convey the impression that, first of all, Ukraine can still win, but he argues to deprive Putin of some sort of PR success story.

The Russians have a lot of capability right now, a lot of forces. They're not moving because they're not going to slug their way through the sea of mud that has famously stopped armies for centuries. They're waiting for that to dry out. They are going to attack when it dries out. He knows that. He keeps trying to build this argument for an offensive that he's going to launch that will preempt the Russians. No one has figured out how he does that through the mud. Maybe he has a super answer that no one else has gotten. Secondly, we're not really

sure what kinds of forces he has at his disposal. What I sent you in terms of the map gives you a rough estimate, but those numbers for the Ukrainians are rather soft. The numbers for the Russians on the map are quite hard. It doesn't make any sense to figure out where the Russians stand on this, and they can slug it out very quickly when they decide to do so. So I don't think Putin's in any hurry, and I don't think he needs a PR victory. Gary, let's put the map up. There you go.

So, Colonel, how accurate are these numbers? I see 130,000 Russian troops. I see 60,000 Wagner forces. I see 50,000 Russian troops from Donetsk. I see another 50,000 Russian troops on the bottom. I can't tell what country that is. I don't know if that's Crimea or where they're coming from. The Ukrainian forces appear to be less than half of the Russians. Yeah, well, understand the 130,000 at the top are forces in reserve, uncommitted. That's very important. But are they there? Are they there where they're shown on the map

so that they can move east if needed? Yes, they are. And they're spread out, though. They're not concentrated into a tight little ball for obvious reasons. So they're spread out from perhaps the top of the map down to the dark part in the center, but they can rapidly move north and south, east or west, because the road networks that the Russians control give them excellent lateral routes to reposition forces quickly. Now the 60,000

Wagner troops, the 50,000 Donetsk- luhansk militias and regular russian forces fighting with them where you see the the bent the curving red arrows around adivika and bakhmut they're fighting right now in other words those are forces that are committed to the front they're not all committed but most of them are. And those that aren't are certainly in positions to defend. Then at the bottom, where you have the 50,000, these are the ones that are not far from Kherson, which is off the map to the left. Those forces are not necessarily in contact, but they are in defensive posture. In other words, they're ready for an attack if the Ukrainians launch it.

Now, the point of this map is to look at the Ukrainian side. These numbers, 80,000 at the top and 40,000 to the left as you view it, those numbers were good a few weeks ago. We don't know precisely what they are because you'll see the dashed blue lines. What does that mean? That means that the forces that were formerly concentrated, as shown on the map, have been reduced in size and capability because they've had to move them to reinforce Bakhmut and Adivika.

In other words, we may be looking at now 20,000 down to the left and maybe 30,000 or 40,000 up to the right because the rest of the forces have been drawn off to fight. Now, Bakhmut has reportedly fallen, which means they no longer have those defensive positions that are going to have to fall back further to the west if they're going to maintain any kind of coherent defense. Colonel, let me interrupt you. Is this breaking news that Bakhmut has reportedly fallen, or is this a repetition of what we expected in the past week or so? I have only received a direct statement that came to me from my sources, that what you see, the distance between the two red arrows around Bakhmut is closed. Do those arrows mean that Bakhmut is surrounded?

Yes. In other words, it's completely surrounded by Russian troops. Yes. And the Ukrainian forces, we're unsure how many are left. Maybe there are 3,000, 2,000, 4,000. But effectively, Bakhmut has fallen because those troops cannot be reached, they can't be reinforced, and they're on their own. So we'll see what that means over the next 24 or 48 hours. Do those forces surrender? Supposedly, a lot of Ukrainian troops have surrendered, talked about being isolated, having no support, having nothing to eat, having no more ammunition, and so forth. So at any rate, the point is that the totals that

we thought were available just two or three weeks ago for counterattacks really don't exist anymore. It's something less than what's shown on the map. Secondly, they have to move across relatively open ground in order to reach the Russian lines. Now, this is a wonderful opportunity for the Russians because, as we've pointed out in the past, you have intelligence reconnaissance surveillance platforms, manned and unmanned from the ground all the way up to 30,000, 40,000 feet, low-Earth orbiting satellites at 80,000, 40,000 feet, low-Earth orbiting satellites at 80,000,

90,000 feet. All of these can track with absolute perfect detail where the Ukrainians go. The result is that as soon as they are within, say, 10 or 15 kilometers of the Russian lines, they're going to be annihilated by artillery, rocket artillery, missiles, and conventional artillery. This is not a question of, well, the Russians have covered the road or the Russians have covered this. They've got the whole place covered. They're never going to get to the Russians. They're going to die in great numbers. So what are the circumstances when the Russians move?

You might as well sit and wait for what remains of the Ukrainian army to attack. Wow. I want you to watch and listen to Senator Roger Wicker, Senate Armed Services Committee, interrogating the former four-star general who is now the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. And tell me if you think the secretary is credible. With regard to your optimism about Ukraine having the upper hand, that is what you told me yesterday. It is. Now, what I was about to say, Senator, is that Ukrainians have inflicted significant casualties on the Russians, and they have depleted their inventory of armored vehicles in a way that no one would have ever imagined.

And so now we see Russia reaching for T-54s and T-55 tanks because of the level of damage that the Ukrainians have inflicted on them. Reaching for those tanks demonstrates what to you, sir? It demonstrates that their capability is waning. We've continued to witness them be challenged with artillery munitions and other things, and they're reaching out to Iran, to North Korea. Do you believe there's a real chance for significant Ukrainian advancements between now and the beginning of winter?

I believe there's a chance, and we're doing everything that we can do to ensure that they have their best opportunity to be successful. All right, Colonel. Well, in October, November of 1967, General Westmoreland indicated in a public speaking tour across the United States that he was more optimistic than he'd ever been. He was immensely proud of the way Vietnamese forces were fighting and was confident that we were nearing the end of the beginning of victory in Vietnam. Now, I've also listened to Dave Petraeus as a general tell us that the Iraqi army was in first-class condition and quite able to take over the mission of defending the new

Republic of Iraq, that elections there were successful, that democracy was reaching Iraq once and for all, and that we were winning. I listened to, you know, General Dempsey. I mean, just go down the list of all the generals, including Austin when he was in active duty, tell us how successful everything was and how good everything was, only to discover that none of it was true. Now, I guess what I'm trying to say is that we have killed integrity in the military. It just doesn't exist. Remember that a fish rots from the head, not from the bottom. If you want the truth, get a soldier, sergeant, lieutenant, or junior captain and ask him what do you think you're going to get the truth he'll tell you the truth or she will tell you the truth but once you move above that the higher you go the more unrewarding telling the truth becomes so everyone above you

wants good news if you bring from my from my end of the world, I look at it this way. The Secretary of Defense was under oath. This is not a game. It's a felony to lie under oath. It's also a felony to mislead Congress if you're not actually lying, if the impression you're creating is erroneous. Does he believe what he's saying? Well, first of all, Judge, how frequently have we brought anyone in and held them accountable for having lied to Congress? The last person prosecuted for lying to Congress was the New

York Yankee pitcher Roger Clemens, who supposedly lied about the content of his urine. The first trial was a mistrial. The second trial was an acquittal. Well, I think the government doesn't prosecute its own. We know that. Yeah, well, if you're not going to prosecute, there's no accountability. Where there's no accountability, there's no performance. I don't think any of these general officers are worried in the least about being brought back and asked hard questions in the future when everything falls apart. So that's the first thing. Secondly, many of these people convince themselves over time that they have a duty to lie. It's my duty to go in there and support the president and his policies.

No, it's not. That's wrong. But that's what they have convinced themselves. But they, in this case, he is betraying the soldier, the lieutenant, the junior captain, the people who have a real feel for what's going on, whether they're Americans or not. Well, this is absolutely true. This was true in Vietnam. It was true during World War II,

particularly for the German generals who, after the war, were asked how they could possibly have continued to do what they did and lie the way they did. They were ultimately held accountable, not all of them, but large numbers of them, fortunately. But there's no sense right now in the officer corps that if you're a three or a four star, that you have an obligation to tell the truth that might be embarrassing to your superiors, whether they're four star superiors or political appointees or the president of the United States himself. Here's an interrogation before the same committee, just a few minutes after the one we showed you.

I don't align, I don't think you do, with the ideology of the interrogator one bit. It's Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, who's a Lindsey Graham accolade and loves war. However, he does accuse Secretary Austin of lying. It's not about Ukraine. It's about the notification of the military action in Syria. But watch the back and forth between them and tell me if a rational person could conclude that Secretary Austin is being truthful. We turned to the issue of the strikes in Syria last week and Senator Wicker's line of questioning about the timing of notification to Congress. You said that you, quote, should have notified Congress earlier. These attacks happened against our troops killing one contractor early in the morning Eastern time. Do you believe that you should

have notified us that morning while we were voting on amendments directly related to this kind of attack? There is no connection between when we notified you, Senator, and your vote. The chairman and I were testifying that morning as well. So as soon as we came out of testimony, we began work on crafting response options. Secretary Austin, I don't believe you. I believe that your office specifically withheld notification of this deadly strike against Americans because the Rubio amendment on which we voted midday directly touched on exactly this scenario, not repealing these use of force resolutions if the president couldn't certify that Iran was no longer attacking us in Iran and Syria. That's what I believe. Nothing you can say

is going to change my belief about that. I've got to say, I think I speak for a lot of my colleagues. I just want to say, Senator, that that is absolutely not true. Maybe you didn't personally do it. Maybe you didn't personally do it. But I believe entirely that people in your office did that. You have a vast legislative operation, as Senator Wicker pointed out. Do you really expect us to believe that they didn't know that we were voting on a Rubio Amendment that directly covered exactly this kind of attack? I don't believe that. I believe there's a conscious decision made not to inform Congress because you fear that it might lead to the passage of the Rubio Amendment, which would kill the entire bill.

Does Secretary Austin have a reputation in the military community for being truthful? You know, I would like to say that in most cases, general officers are not thought of as people who are going to tell the truth about things that might embarrass them or their administration. I mean, you'll recall that when Lieutenant General, then three-star Dave Petraeus came back from Iraq in 2005 to testify on the subject of how things were going in the fall, that Senator Kerry said on one of the few occasions, something that I could agree with that came out of his mouth. He said, we're going to discover that General Petraeus is going to tell us how successful General Petraeus is. And Kerry was absolutely right.

So I think everybody in the military at lower levels knows exactly what goes on. Now, as far as the actual subject is concerned, you know, frankly speaking, every presidential administration knows that there are lots of people like Senator Cotton or they or on other occasions, it may be Rubio or it might be Schumer or someone else is anxious to take advantage of an event to either embarrass or harm the administration or to force through legislation that might otherwise not pass. So I'm sure he's accusing Austin of something that probably happened, but doesn't mean I have much use for Senator Cotton. I don't have much use for most of the people on the Hill who have failed to tell the American people the truth about almost anything. So you're dealing with institutions that have essentially codified lying as an acceptable behavior. So it's very difficult for me to get excited over it. I wish that we could change what goes on in uniform, but that would take wholesale change in the institution, widespread removal of people to get someone who tells you the truth. Here's an interview that CBS had, now I'm taking it to the other side

of the world, with Admiral Sam Paparo, a four-star, who's the commander of all the naval personnel and equipment in the Pacific. And he's talking about

we're ready to defend Taiwan. And by the way, we're not talking to the Chinese. If the U.S. and Chinese militaries can't communicate over a Chinese spy balloon, then what's going to happen when there's a real crisis in the South China Sea or with Taiwan? We'll hope that they'll answer the phone. Else, we'll do our very best assessment based on the things that they say in open source and based on their behavior to divine their intentions and we'll act accordingly. Doesn't that make the situation even more dangerous if U.S. and Chinese militaries are not talking? Yes.

I guess the last answer is a truthful one, but the one before that, he almost has to say that, whether he believes it or not. What is he going to say? The Chinese have a better navy than we do. We might as well give up on Taiwan. He better put his retirement papers in. It's troubling to me that an active duty four-star is essentially behaving as a policymaker. Right.

And announcing policy. He has no business speaking publicly on any matter pertaining to policy other than to restate, if compelled to do so, what the current policy is of the President of the United States and his administration. That's not what he did. We have a huge problem with too many four stars. We have about 44 in active duty, and all of them view themselves as Caesarian figures, especially the reaching unified commanders who think that they are. Caesarian as in Julius Caesar, not in as the surgery that sometimes produces babies. No.

They end up thinking that they're Caesar. And that's what you heard from him. What will you do when X happens? And the answer should have been, I will do as I am instructed to do by the President of the United States, the Commander-in-Chief. That is where my orders come from. All right, this next clip will aggravate you even more. This is Admiral Paparo talking about the capability of the U.S. Navy to neutralize the Chinese Navy. Gary? Is it your hope that the power of the U.S. Navy to neutralize the Chinese Navy, Gary. Is it your hope that the power of the U.S. Navy, the forced posture of the U.S. Navy will deter a Chinese invasion of Taiwan? It's not my

hope, it's my duty in conjunction with allies and partners to deliver intolerable costs to anybody that would upend the order in violation of the nation's security or in violation of the nation's interests. The saying, which is, si pacem para bellum, which is, if you want peace, prepare for war. Well, that's George Washington, although Washington said it in English, not Latin, if you want peace, prepare for war. But I get your point that an active duty military, four-star or not, shouldn't be having an interview like this. We have many more of these clips. I don't know how much of this you can tolerate. It sounds like it was produced by the CIA. Sounds like it's propaganda. Well, keep in mind that any admiral, if you ask him, are you ready and are you capable of defeating your enemy? He's going to tell you that he is.

I would expect that. I would expect a general officer in the field to say the same thing. The only way to find out if that hypothesis is accurate is to test it on the battlefield or in a war at sea. That's not something he should talk about, but he said the right thing. And we are ready and we will fight if we have to. However, this business about deterrence is nonsense. His job personally is not to deter a damn thing. He's supposed to be ready to fight. It's not his job to provoke the Chinese, to intimidate the Chinese under any circumstances. His job is to be ready to fight. If he's called upon to do so, he's directed to do so. If he's fired upon,

and that's it, and he should not be speaking extemporaneously on a whole range of topics, but this is more evidence that there is no one in charge in Washington. I'll give you a little bit more evidence. After that interview, which took place in Guam, which by the way, CBS describes as the size of Chicago. I didn't know that. I thought Guam was about the size of New Jersey, but it's the size of Chicago, according to CBS. So back in Washington, D.C., in the Pentagon now, this different, I forget if it's a different reporter or the same reporter, but it's CBS, it's part of the same package, interviews the CNO, the chief of naval operations,

and he makes a rather damning admission. Take a listen. Okay. Well, his admission is that the shipyards that build big ships during his tenure as the chief of naval operations has gone from the 30s down to the single digits, and the Chinese are building two ships for every one we build. He concedes that they have the larger Navy. But how insane is it for Joe Biden to provoke the Chinese into attacking Taiwan because of this fanciful belief that we can somehow defend it? well first of all the royal navy submarine captain who was crossing the north atlantic was in the vicinity of a u.s navy submarine captain who was headed in the other direction and they hailed each other and the american captain said how does it feel to be part of the second largest Navy in the world?

And the Royal Navy captain answered, I don't know. How does it feel to be part of the second best? You know, this sort of thing is, this goes on. There's nothing wrong with that. And he's telling the truth in terms of sheer numbers of hulls. Certainly the Chinese have lots more of them, but about a third of all the ships, and if you're talking about 300, that means that 100 are effectively Coast Guard vessels. They exist purely for coastal defense. This is in our Navy or in the Chinese Navy? The Chinese Navy, and that needs to be understood. But, you know, when you get into these discussions about being ready to defend Taiwan or something else, it's very dangerous.

At the outbreak of World War II in 1941, we had 11 oil tankers in the Pacific for the United States Navy, which was larger then than the Navy we had today. 11 oil tankers. Well, the bottom line was that the Navy, as soon as we were attacked, was supposed to sortie the entire fleet, fight its way all the way to Corregidor, Manila, and relieve the beleaguered American garrison and tow behind it two divisions of Army troops. Well, the two divisions of Army infantry showed up on the docks at San Francisco, but the Navy didn't take them anywhere because they only had 11 tankers full of oil. That meant that if they had used those tankers, they might have gotten halfway across the Pacific. And they're running out of fuel?

Yes. In other words, we didn't have enough. Now, when you look at the Pacific today, we have three major hubs for logistics purposes. They're well known to the Chinese, as they are to us. I'm not going to enumerate them here today. But if those three hubs are destroyed, which is very easily done with precision guided missiles, then you're out of luck with the Navy and the Pacific. In other words, I'm trying to say we're not prepared to fight the Chinese any more than we're prepared to fight the Russians. So instead of talking about fighting them, let's talk about what we need to do to be ready. Let's understand what the president is instructing us to do and to get ready to fight. We don't need to provide

lots of details on how ready or unready we are to the public. And again, that's why these four stars should not talk this way. There's wonderful correspondence that went on between the various four stars in the Navy and ultimately Marshall and MacArthur in 1940-41 talking about these issues but publicly publicly MacArthur said we are ready we can hold these islands and we'll defeat whatever is thrown at us bluff bluff bluff he said we're lucky to hold out for six weeks we don't have enough of anything we need to spend billions of dollars we don't have enough of this, enough of that. And Marshall knew it, which is why they all told Roosevelt, don't embargo Japan. If there's a war, we're not ready. And what did we get? Well, they fought very, very valiantly. In fact, we fought extremely well in the Philippines up to

the last bullet practically, but it didn't do us any good, did it? 12,000 men were captured and marched off to the Bataan. And what happened to our Navy? We took a lot of hits, a lot of casualties, lost a lot of ships at the beginning. My point is that you've got to be very careful about what you say publicly. It's best to let the suits in the Pentagon talk. Don't send your four stars out to beat their chests.

They make fools out of themselves. It's not their job. And I think we have that clip I wanted you to look at. Take a look, Colonel. Admiral Mike Gilday at the Pentagon. He is the chief of naval operations and is responsible for building, maintaining, and equipping the entire U.S. Navy. Is the Navy in crisis? No, the Navy's not in crisis. The Navy is out on point every single day. Is it being outpaced by China? No. Toshi Yoshihara of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments

may know more than any scholar in the West about China's Navy. Why is China able to build more warships more quickly than the U.S.? China has clearly invested in this defense industrial infrastructure to produce these ships, which allows them to produce multiple ships simultaneously, essentially outbuilding many of the Western navies combined. After the Cold War ended, the shipbuilding industry consolidated, and many of the yards where ships were both built and maintained closed down. What do you see when you see China's shipbuilding program? It's very robust. Do we have enough shipyards? No. I wish

that we had more commercial shipyards. Over my career, we've gone from more than 30 shipyards down to about seven that we rely upon on a day-to-day basis to build ships. Why is to be discussing this or generally known to us and to them? Well, that's a known fact. We've allowed that whole industry to atrophy. Basically, the seven shipyards are on federal welfare. They only build warships. They do a good job on those warships. Everything that Gilday said up front is exactly what he should have said as CNO. He did the right thing. That's what you say. What's true is different behind the scenes, but that's not a care for the American people right now. That's a matter for discussion with

the president and key members of the Senate and the House who need to know the bottom line. I mean, they all need to keep their mouths shut. Now, here's some good news. First of all, we don't need all the surface ships and neither do the Chinese. Warfare has changed. If you're putzing along as a surface ship within striking range of China, you stand an excellent chance of being disabled by any number of missiles. Because of what? Because the same ISR platforms I talked about before, from seabed to space, are going to find you. The waves are ruled by submarines. Our submarine fleet is the best in the world. It's excellent. I don't think we have enough submarines. That's my own personal view. As a former army officer, that would be my first choice for strategic priority. Double the size of the submarine fleet. That's what gives us real power over the oceans. That's what can bottle

up our enemy if we don't like him and prevent him from conducting commerce. That's number one. Surface ships, that's a distant fifth or sixth. So that's the first thing. Second thing is good news. Chinese Navy is miserable. They have a huge morale problem. The Chinese don't want to go to sea. I don't blame them. I never wanted to go either. But the point is the Chinese are really not interested in going to sea very much. Secondly, their submarine fleet is very new. They're very reluctant to send it great distances from China for fear they'll sink themselves. They might not get back. So the point is that quality makes a difference. We have the edge, certainly in the

submarine fleet. We need to keep it and make it greater and stronger. As far as the rest of the Navy is concerned, all you have to do is pick up the newspapers and read about the Navy the same kinds of things you're reading about the Army. We have huge morale problems, problems with discipline, problems with recruiting, problems with retention, problems with finding quality manpower. But that's not something that the Chief of Naval Operations should talk about. He made the right decision, absolutely the right thing. But that's what he has to talk about to the president. And unlike Franklin Roosevelt, the president today or in the future needs to listen to what these men say behind closed doors. Never knew a tank commander knew so much about the Navy, Colonel. So helpful and illuminating. And I very much appreciate the good news with the band.

Thank you very much for joining us today, Colonel McGregor. Always a pleasure. Thank you, Judge. My dear friends watching, if you like all of this, more to come. Like and subscribe. More as we get it. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom.