Judging Freedom - Scott Ritter: Will Russia Attack NATO?

Episode Date: August 22, 2024

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Thank you. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here on Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, August 22nd, 2024. Our dear friend Scott Ritter is here with us today. What exactly happened in the incursion into Russia, and when and how will Russia respond? But first this. A divisive presidential election is upon us, and the winner is gold. Let me tell you what I mean. Since 2016, our national debt has grown a staggering 70% and gold has increased by 60%. Do you own gold? I do. I bought my gold in February 2023 and it has risen 33%.

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Protect your savings and retirement before it's too late. 800-511-4620, learjudgenap.com. Remember, hope is not a strategy, but gold is. Scott Ritter, welcome here, my friend. I want to spend a fair amount of time exploring with you your understanding of what happened in and around Kersk, what is happening now, who is behind it, and what you think will be the response to it by President Putin. But before we get there, I need to ask you about the latest out of Israel and Gaza, where Prime Minister Netanyahu emerged from a 12-day period, apparently underground,

but at least out of sight, and put an offer on the table that he knows Hamas cannot accept. Whenever Hamas puts something on the table that the Israelis have already agreed to, Netanyahu adds to it. Whenever Netanyahu puts something on the table, he knows Hamas won't accept it. And besides, he murdered the chief Hamas negotiator. Is it fair to conclude he is absolutely not interested in the hostages or a ceasefire? I think we know this. The only thing that Benjamin Netanyahu is interested in is Benjamin Netanyahu. Tragically, he has sacrificed the security of Israel and the safety of the Israeli people for his own political ambition. This is a man who does not want his legacy to be political embarrassment. And right now,

if he were to step aside, he would be politically embarrassed. He is the leader who, you know, built his career on the notion that he is the security man, the guy that guarantees the security of Israel. And yet it was under his watch that October 7th took place. And it's under his watch that the Israeli Defense Force has been unable to bring to closure, you know, the military campaign against Hamas. It's gone so poorly that the Israeli military itself has acknowledged that Hamas cannot be defeated. And so, you know, how does he get out of this? An honorable man would resign, but he can't because he's not an honorable man. And he's also

a man with looming, you know, allegations of corruption over his head that would cause him to go to trial and most likely lose as soon as he stepped down as prime minister, which means he'd spend the rest of his life in jail. This is not the outcome he wants. So what he's doing is playing a very dangerous game of escalation management. He went to the United States in July, spoke to United States Congress, got 54 standing ovations, all the while breathing fire and brimstone about the need to go to war with Iran, the need to go to war with Hezbollah, the need to finish the job in Hamas, war, war, war. Everybody saw that. What most people didn't see was the subsequent meetings at the Pentagon and the White House where Netanyahu was told the truth that the United States will not support any continued Israeli, major Israeli offensive

actions against Hezbollah or against Iran, and that we were pushing for a ceasefire. Now, what does Netanyahu do? He goes back home and he orders the assassination of a senior Hezbollah official in Beirut and the chief Hamas negotiator in Tehran. Now, normally, these two actions would result in a massive retaliation, But Netanyahu was gambling on the fact that neither Hezbollah nor Iran want or are looking for a big fight at this point in time, and that the goal and objective of everybody is a peaceful outcome. So he gambled and he guessed right. There hasn't been a major Hezbollah retaliation, and Iran so far is likewise held in check. Why? Because they are hopeful that there will be a ceasefire, that there will be an end to this conflict, which is after all their strategic

objective. And so now that Netanyahu has certified himself as the man who can assassinate people in Beirut and Tehran without consequence, the real leader of Israel. He's now seeking to see how far he can push this. Eventually, I believe he's going to have to accept a ceasefire. What he's trying to do is get a ceasefire that is less damaging to him politically so that he can offset that damage with what he's done with Hezbollah and Iran. If this sounds crazy, it's because it is. This is all about the personal political ambition of Benjamin Netanyahu. Is he in danger of an IDF coup against him? That would be unprecedented. I think he's already seen the IDF express its concerns over an extension of the war. You know, I don't think it's so much an IDF coup as it would be a rebellion within the political establishment.

You know, when the IDF will tell the war cabinet and tell, you know, the other leaders of Israel that, you know, it can't win a war, that this would actually put Israel in grave harm. It would be hard to see how Netanyahu could pull that off. And so, as opposed to a straight out coup where generals take over, I think the IDF would work within the political establishment to, you know, put Benjamin Netanyahu on notice that his political future would be over if he pushes this too hard. One of the things that upset you a lot, upset me a lot, upset a lot of people, was the IDF slaughter of a young girl. Her death has taken a life, an afterlife of its own. And the clip we're now about to run, which will aggravate you, shows the depth of American complicity in all of this.

Cut number two. It's been over two weeks since Israeli forces attacked Hindra Rab's family, killing her aunt, uncle, and cousins, leaving her trapped alone in her vehicle. We heard her pleas to the Red Crescent Society. Two medics were sent, all to be blown up, allegedly, by Israeli forces. I wanted to ask about the status of the inquiry into this. So I think that question is appropriately directed to the government of Israel. I will say, on behalf of the United States,

we have made clear to them that we want that incident to be investigated. Any updates on Hindra Job's investigation in the killing of Hindra Job's family and the paramedics sent to save her? I don't have an update. My understanding is that the investigation is ongoing. So I'm wondering if you have updates on not just the investigations, but actual accountability measures in response to these. And if not, how can this administration's approach of relegating things to months-long investigations while not changing policy, all as thousands more are killed, be a justified approach? Investigations in some cases take time. Secondly, it's been 101 days now since Hindler Job, her family members, the medics, and a saver

were killed. So first question related to that that is is there an update on the investigation into that attack I don't have anyone I happy to go back and get you the latest okay okay is there an update into this investigation let me get you an answer that on that and come back to you is it really an independent investigation if the alleged culprits are the ones conducting so what I said it's it's we thought it's appropriate for the governor of Israel to investigate. They had last month when myself and other colleagues asked about the investigation into

this, the department said, Israel, Israel said that they're still investigating and that Israel also said that the UN and red Crescent did not respond to outreach from the Israeli government. I reached out to the red Crescent and they said that no, the Israeli government did not reach out. So has the Biden-Harris administration followed up on this alleged lie by the Israeli government or sought to confirm any of Israel's claims on the half-year-old killing now of this girl and her family? So we are in touch with our partners in Israel around the clock on a variety of issues. I don't have any specifics to read out as it relates to

this conversation. I'm happy. It's now 197 days since him, the job was killed, her family members were killed, the medics that they were killed. What's the update on that? I don't have any updates for you. This is one of the reasons why Ambassador Freeman calls this the least reputable Department of State in the post-World War II era. What are your thoughts? I mean, I'm furious. This is outrageous behavior on the part of the United States government, on the part of the State Department. You know, these are trained liars. I always worked with press representatives, press spokespersons, and they said, you know, we may not be able to tell you the truth because, you know, classification or sensitivity, et cetera, but we won't lie. Here we have a case where they're just lying,

straight out lying. This administration will not hold Israel to account, cannot hold, is incapable of holding Israel to account, especially in the public information space. And, you know, after a while, you know, we, Hen just becomes a name. We forget who she was. We forget how she died. And that's the goal here. The goal is to stretch this out so that our memories get dull, that the pain goes away. And there's no greater insult to her death, to the murder, to the families of not just her, but the tens of thousands of children who have lost their lives in Gaza at the hands of practitioners of genocide, murderers, armed and abetted and facilitated by the United States. And that's half the problem.

Because if there was a genuine investigation into Hind Rajab's death, the United States would come out as, you know, a co-defendant. We have allowed this to happen. We have facilitated this happening. We have done nothing to stop it. And, you know, I wish there was justice in the world because there would be no greater justice than to see these two quote-unquote spokespersons be hauled before a court, an international tribunal, and held accountable for their lives. Switching gears to Russia, who or what invaded Russia with the military incursion into the Kursk area? Well, it's the government of Ukraine using a military force comprised of up to,

if this would have been a week ago, 18 separate units, whether they be brigades, regiments, independent battalions, et cetera. Now, participating in this attack are Ukrainian units, including several who are notoriously affiliated with neo-Nazi political sentiments, like Azov and others. Also included are international legion units, Georgians, a large number of Polish mercenaries, French mercenaries, Americans, Australians, British. And there's been a lot of speculation in the press that this was primarily a mercenary driven unit. I've spoken to a number of Russian war correspondents and military officers. And yes, while there are mercenaries there, they all, and the radio nets are filled with Polish,

French, and English language. The majority of the people that are being killed and captured in the Kursk area by the Russian army are Ukrainians. The vast majority of the forces that went in are Ukrainian forces that have been organized, trained, equipped by NATO advisors and are fighting a NATO-style war. But there is a definite foreign element, but it's not the majority of these forces. Is it fair to say, as our friend Larry Johnson does, that because this was authorized and no doubt planned by CIA with the help of MI6, using American equipment, using American technicians to operate the equipment, using American ammunition to kill Russian soldiers, and more likely than not with American persons, whether they're CIA, outside contractors, soldiers of fortune, or full-time military in Ukrainian uniforms, another legal issue,

that America, this is Larry's conclusion, the United States of America invaded Russia. NATO invaded Russia, and that includes the United States. One of the things that have come out of this is that the Russians have killed and captured a large number of Ukrainians, and they've captured a large amount of equipment, and they've captured the plans. And so through interrogation, evaluation of captured material, the Russian military has concluded that the force that came in was organized unlike any Ukrainian force Russia has ever encountered in the past. This force was organized as it to be the equivalent of the most advanced NATO fighting force with total informational awareness, the full integration

of artificial intelligence, satellite connectivity, real-time interactions so that as the troops advance, they're getting real-time updates on where the russians are and where the russians aren't artificial intelligence helped predict outcomes design the best way forward this allowed the ukrainians to advance rapidly because normally you're probing the way this way with this new connectivity they're able to find the gap shoot the gap exploit the gap communications are outstanding which also leads to more effective fire support. So these Ukrainians were more lethal, more capable. This was a very, very good Ukrainian force that went into the Kursk area. And why are the invaders still there, Scott? I mean, this is really a question only the russian defense ministry can answer i you know

opti al-adhanov who is a um chechen russian chechen general in the russian armed forces has basically said that the the ministry of defense russian ministry of defense lied so much about what was going on in Kursk that eventually they began to believe their lies and they deceived themselves um you know the the the irony is just by monitoring Ukrainian telegram channels um in the lead up to uh the the invasion the the the Kursk incursion it was clear that this was going to happen. I mean, civilians like myself were looking at it and just seeing that, you know, the Ukrainians were predicting this, projecting this. Russian telegram channels were warning about this, and then it happened, and it seemed as if

the Russian Ministry of Defense was taken by surprise. And again, according to Optyal Adanov, they were. His forces were some of the initial ones that came in to respond and he has said that the first uh the first day was just confusing chaotic uh very difficult with these ukrainian forces just move maneuvering all over the place to try and bring some sort of uh cohesion to the battlefield by the second day they were able to you know get things to calm down and be better defined uh but then the days that followed, he said, were very, very difficult days, very difficult fighting. You know, now Russia has contained the advance and is in the process of eliminating the Ukrainians. Optia said they've

inflicted horrific casualties on the Ukrainians, both in terms of personnel and material. But, you know, the Russians have only responded, the Ukrainians went in with about two divisions worth of troops, anywhere between 12 to, by some estimates, 30,000. I think that's a very high number, but maybe 12 to 20,000. The Russians have responded with two brigades, an airborne brigade, the 11th, and the 810th Marine Brigade, plus the Chechen Ahmad Special Forces, which is about a regiment in size. So roughly half, the Russians have

responded with half the manpower that Ukraine has, but now Russia has terminated communications. The Russians have responded with half the manpower that Ukraine has, but now Russia has terminated communications. The Ukrainians can't communicate. They don't have the situational awareness. They've isolated them, and now they're in the business of hunting them down and killing them. But in order to push them back, you'd need to bring in significant forces, which was one of the Ukrainian objectives to begin with, to get the Russians to divert troops from the Donbass front and bring them to respond to Kursk. Because at the Donbass front, the Russians are killing it. They're advancing rapidly. The Ukrainians are in absolute collapse as we speak. One Russian war correspondent who was on the front lines said it's very likely that the

Ukrainian forces in the Donbas will totally collapse and the Ukrainians will have no choice but to pull back behind the Dnieper River sometime in the near future. That's basically the complete defeat of the Ukrainian forces. So this was a gambit designed to get the Russians to slow down their advance by diverting significant forces up to Kursk. Russia didn't take the bait. They did send some troops, but just enough to contain this. Russia is not going to allow Ukraine to achieve some sort of strategic advantage by this. This is a political embarrassment for Russia. Let there be no doubt about that. This is a devastatingly political embarrassment. But in terms of military, I'll let Atiyah Ladonov speak.

He said, you know, he was always confident that Russians are going to win and then they'll must. He believes that, you know, the fighting will reach its terminal phase sometime soon. Russia will prevail. But he said, I was always worried about the reserves. Where are the reserves? How are we going to get the reserves? And he said, thank God the Ukrainians gave them to us. And so Ukraine has taken its strategic reserves, put them into Kursk, and now Russia knows where they are and Russia's killing them. And once they kill them,

there's nothing left. Let's go back to Kursk. Have the Russians cut off supply lines from Ukraine to Kursk, or can these invaders still get fuel, ammunition, food, medical supplies, whatever they need? My understanding is that the Russians have put considerable amount of effort into seeking to denigrate and eliminate and suppress and cut Ukraine's logistical bases and lines of communication connecting them to the four deployed units. According to the Russian officers who are doing the fighting, the Ukrainians are lacking their mobility because they've run out of gas in many cases they're compelled to abandon their equipment and um and move into tree lines and uh and into housing areas and dig in uh awaiting some sort of reinforcement but as the ukrainians bring troops divert them from the front because it's now the ukrainians that are diverting troops from a front line that can't afford to have troops diverted um they're assembling and they're

getting bombed the russians have you know put in there what they call intelligence surveillance reconnaissance assets that are surveilling the sumi area and anytime new forces come in they're being hit immediately by these glide bombs as they seek to move into the kursk area they're being interdicted by artillery by multiple rocket launchers a lot of esconder missilesander missiles, ballistic missiles, aircraft, helicopters. And so, you know, on occasion, a pickup truck may get through with some food and ammunition and maybe a couple of five-gallon jerry cans of fuel, but not the significant, sustainable logistic supply that needs to occur. Russia has effectively cut that off. Or is Zelensky crazy enough to have this invasion force attack Russian nuclear facilities? That appears to be one of the principal goals and objectives of this is to have these Ukrainians

seize the Kursk nuclear power plant, and then Zelensky would seek a trade, returning Kursk to the Russians in exchange for the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant that is currently occupied by the Russians and is part of the new territory of Zaporizhia, which Russia has annexed following referendum in September 2022. So that was the goal. That was the objective. But from everything the Russians have told me, the Ukrainians didn't even get close. The nuclear power plant is very well defended. And even its outer rings of defense weren't even approached. The Ukrainians didn't even get that close. But that appears to be, according to the interrogation of Ukrainian prisoners of war and the documents seized by the Russians, that appears to be one

of the main goals and objectives of this Kursk operation was the capture of the Kursk nuclear power plant. Is there pressure from the right inside the Kremlin and outside the Kremlin on President Putin to come down with an iron fist to decapitate the Ukrainian leadership and command? I don't want to be disrespectful to people who might believe that, but to say that means you don't understand who Vladimir Putin is. Putin doesn't work with pressure. It's not how it operates. He's the president of Russia. You can have a conversation with Putin, but you can't pressure him. Ask Prokofiev how that worked out when he tried to pressure Putin. It never works out. So the idea that the Russian right is somehow going to pressure

Putin to do something is ludicrous. Of course, they're out there speaking. There is somewhat of a press-related safety valve that allows people to speak out on talk shows and on social media to be critical. But the way Putin works isn't to have people come in and pressure him or threaten him. The way he works is to sit down in conference and talk to people, listen to them. Now, if there's members of the right there who are capable of having informed discussion, responsible discussion, these ideas might get bounced off of Putin, and he will consider them, and he'll discuss with others. But he's not a leader that is prone to panic, and he's not a leader that's prone to pressure. He's a leader that governs the way he governs in everything, where he sits down and he consults with the

experts. He receives their reports. He asks questions, he gets answers, and then he comes up with solutions. That's how he works. So the idea that people are putting pressure on him to come down hard is wrong. I'm sure Putin recognizes that this situation has changed and that he's already said that the negotiations are off the table, that isn't going to happen. And he's also implied that the final end game solution for Ukraine will be to correct the mistake of Lenin, which was, you know, something he mentioned in one of his earlier speeches, that Ukraine only exists because Lenin created it during Bolshevik times, and that was a mistake. And so he's basically implying that there will be no Ukraine when this is finished. And now Ukraine continues to escalate. They just blew up a oil storage facility in the Krasnodar region in Russia. I think you're going to see Russia begin escalation, not because Putin's been pressured into doing this by the right, but because Putin, after consultations, agrees that what needs to happen now is that Russia needs to escalate the level of violence on Ukraine

to punish Ukraine for attacking Kursk and attacking other parts of Russia proper. Before we go, I want to play for you a series of clips. This is a time period with which you are very familiar, May of 2013. These clips involve a decent, peace-loving man whom you knew, and a colossal blowhard whom I don't think you ever met. But you'll know who these two are, and I think you'll appreciate this. This is back around the time when general petraeus was arguing in favor of a surge cut number 10 we say that her positions are radical and they are let

me tell you what's radical what's radical is to send more americans to die in this war which is a monumental blunder by a president who swaggered us into it with by the way the at least tacit approval of the democratic party there's a lot of sin to go around here do you want to send more people to this war is that your position if we cut and run out of there like you want to do we would be putting every american in a thousand times more jeopardy than they're in we're going to cut and run anyway well that's your opinion well that's my opinion

american military leaders have said we're going to draw down beginning next year the difference is we've drawn down and cut in now listen now listen you wouldn't send your children to this war bill my nephew just enlisted in the army you don't know what the hell you're talking about very good congratulations yeah you ought to just walk away how many more young men and women are you going to send to have their arms and legs blown off this is so that you can be tough and pointed people in a kind of cowardly way and they knew that first of all only congress can declare war why is that unimportant to you billy this

is why he's not on not become a patriot that your loud voice proclaims that the ways and stand behind the constitution and insist that we never go or again without the approval uh... and that's what i have a poorly planned or poorly executed but bill o'reilly wants to send more kids to fight and die. We've already had almost 2,000.

Just let me have the last word. In the last year, two things have doubled. The number of dead American troops in Iraq have doubled from over 1,000 to almost 2,000. You know what else doubled, Billy? The price of Halliburton stock. Wow. Well, I actually know both of them. I was on the Bill O'Reilly show numerous times. And I have to tell you, if he had ever tried pointing his finger at me like that, he would have lost his hand live on set. What ridiculous posturing. I will say, first of all, you know, Phil Donahue is just a phenomenal journalist. And I wrote an

article about him, about my relationship with him and, you know, how he suffered because he was unique in mainstream media to bring me on his, at the top rated show at the time and allow me to, you know, present what I considered to be the, the reality, a fact-based truth about the inadequacies of the case for war against Iraq. He was, he was fired because of this. And so he's, he's a brave man, but I will say this about Bill O'Reilly. He played the, he did that with me once right before the war. And he was on with, you know, I think General McInerney. And they were

just coming at me about Iraqi chemical weapons. And I said, there are no chemical weapons in Iraq. I know it because I was there. None of you were there. You simply don't know what you're talking about. And O'Reilly said, okay, Scott, we're getting ready to go to war. Now, when American troops cross into Iraq and Iraq responds with chemical weapons, will you come on this show and apologize to the American people? I said, yes, absolutely. But Bill, when American troops cross into Iraq and find out that there are no weapons of mass destruction, will you invite me back on your show and you apologize to the American people? He said, yes, he would. What was interesting is the summer went along

and it became clear there were no weapons of mass destruction. I kept getting calls from O'Reilly's producer. He said, Scott, Bill wants to bring you on, but the management won't let him. Won't let him. He hasn't forgotten what he said. Bill O'Reilly went on ABC's Good Morning America. And he said straight up, I told Scott R on ABC's Good Morning America, and he said straight up, I told Scott Ritter that I'd bring him on and apologize to him, and they won't let me.

So I'm here right now to say Scott Ritter was right, I was wrong, and I'm sorry. So as much as I don't like Bill O'Reilly sometimes, he was a man of honor in that case. So I was in the green room when this happened because I was also on that show. And when Donahue came out, we hugged each other. And then I went on the set and I said, Bill, Phil just ate your lunch. And he was furious. He wanted to cancel my segment and throw me out of the studio. He's a workaholic.

But like you, I had a great relationship with him. At one point, I was his most frequent guest for a couple of years. I was on three times a week. But I thought you would appreciate that. God rest your soul, Phil Donahue, a great human being, a great journalist, and a very big heart. Boy, I loved what he said at the end. You know what else went up? Halliburton stock doubled in value.

Dick Cheney. Wow. Scott, thank you very much. Thanks for your time. Thanks for everything you do for us. We'll look forward to seeing you again next week, my friend. Thanks for having me. Of course.

All the best. coming up later today at three o'clock Eastern, Professor John Mearsheimer and at four o'clock Eastern, Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. This podcast is sponsored by Talkspace. You know when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself? Talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person? How do you find them?

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