Judging Freedom - Tony Shaffer: Putin vs Biden on Leadership.

Episode Date: January 4, 2024

Tony Shaffer: Putin vs Biden on Leadership.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, January 4th, 2024. Lieutenant Colonel Tony Schaefer joins us now. Tony, good morning. Good morning. A belated Merry Christmas, a belated Happy New Year, an expression of deep gratitude from my staff and me and from all of your fans among my viewers for all the time you gave us in 2023 and all of your astute analysis and a hope that we can continue to work together here and at the other place where we work called Newsmax during this coming year. Yes, sir. Well, I look forward to working with you and I appreciate your ever direct approach to the world from a fact-based, not an emotional-based

perspective. And I've always appreciated this since I've met you. And I appreciate that as a friend and as a colleague. Well, we have educated each other. You've educated me in military and intelligence. And I've talked to you a lot about the Constitution. And our viewers should know that you are a candidate for, is it county commissioner? I am. I'm running for county commissioner in District 2 of Chowan County here in North Carolina. So I am the Republican candidate. There was no other Republicans that showed up,, I realize he's still in his prime, and the war is still going on, although it's virtually over, and he has survived the coup by Prokofiev. He has survived beautifully, I think, the sanctions imposed by Biden. How do you think history views him? Well, it depends on which history you're referring to,

because at this point, I think the history of the Russian Republic is distinct and different from the Western perspective on history. You and I were mentioning Jack Devine as we were getting ready to come on. Certain folks in the West will still not acknowledge specific and indisputable facts relating to the return of prominence of the Russian Republic. It's, it's, it's,

it is what it is. And the fact that we have experts such as Jack and others in the mainstream media who simply cannot acknowledge that Putin has done going back to the early 2000s that he chose not to act on until you know about six seven years ago and that when they started pushing back the the west simply ignored Putin and said he was a madman he was a an aggressor and all these other things it's like so the western perspective on Putin is not actually what the Russian people or those following Russia, where I don't even say they're loyal to Russia. I think that those who are objective regarding Russia and its direction will write about history.

Putin is a strong man. I've said this. I am no fan of Putin. Putin started off as a KGB guy in service to the Soviet Union. We fought a war, a Cold War as it was, to defeat the Soviets. We did. We won. We beat them. And now, all these years later, without regard to agreements made in the 90s, nor the fact that the Russians have said over and over again that there's a need to maintain some level of security because there is a history of Russia being invaded. I don't have the list in front of me,

but I often have it and I go through and talk about those events which inculcated in the Russian soul, in the collective soul, a belief that they are vulnerable. It is what it is. You can't just simply declare the Russian culture to be insane. You cannot just say, oh, we don't agree with you, therefore we're going to trouble you. But that's what the West has done. So this is that's a, that's a, I'm, I'm, this is a difficult question to ask because, answer, because the Western perspective and, and, and Soviet and Russian perspective are completely different regarding Putin. Why do you think that the neocons, the Biden administration, the Lindsey Graham's, even John, the late John McCain, why do you think they hated him And despise him And hate all things

Russian So This is not the Soviet Union Of the Nixon era This is not Joe Stalin Yeah This is where I don't get it because Even if you don't like Putin it doesn't mean you shouldn't deal with him

I believe we should have a good relationship with Putin I know this sounds contradictory, but it's not. Simply because someone is a thug who runs a country a certain way. By the way, accepted by their culture. They culturally accept him. It's not my job to judge them on what they, the Russians, believe is in their best interest. It's not my job. Amen.

If they think that they love Putin, God bless is in their best interest. It's not my job. If they think that they love Putin, God bless them. Go love Putin. I don't. I don't care. Not my deal. But the issue becomes, why does the neocons wish to actually, in my judgment, interfere within the inner workings of the Russian Republic? Why are they interested in the front? What's your best take on that question? The neocons have always had this odd combination of totalitarianism and a thirst for conquest. It's almost like they've read the book 1984 and recognized that a permanent state of war would benefit their political aspirations. And it seems to me that poking the Russian bear, literally and figuratively in this case, has given them what they want, some level of authority and power that allows them to use essentially military conflict and international friction as a tool

to maintain their political influence, because that's what it does for them. If you just sit back and look at what it does for them, for the neocons, this gives them relevance and purpose in life to basically be a bully. They are the political bullies of today's political landscape. They are. I mean, if you analyze, if you look at a high school bully judge and you look at what they do, it's like, I think it's almost the same thing. And so I think that's why they do it because there are a bunch of bullies who have no other purpose in life except to trouble those people around them and

those institutions that will give them power. So the other day we interviewed Scott Ritter from Moscow and he had a colleague with him, a fellow who's a financial guy, investor, builder, developer, but also an official in a regional government, part-time official. And we had a translator and this fellow, Alexander, answered pretty directly the questions that I put to him. And there were two takeaways. One is Putin is immensely popular. You're talking about 82 to 86% approval rating.

Right. And the other is I said to him, what do the Russian people think of Joe Biden? And as soon as the translator translated that question, I saw a big smile on his face. And he said to me, Judge, you're not going to believe it. We have a phrase here in Moscow that is very common, and we all say it to each other every day. Thank you, Joe Biden. And I said, what do you mean? He said, thank you for the sanctions. Big deal. We don't have McDonald's anymore. We're now financially independent and our economy is better today than it was two years ago. And Putin gets the credit

for that. And so that's the point is that he's, he, Putin has overcome every challenge brought to him by the feckless and destructive foreign policy of the Biden administration. The other thing that's happened here, you know, some of the folks I listened to call it the project Ukraine. That is to say the Western neocon effort to do this. The neocon effort was founded in the concept of two outcomes they were seeking. First off is the removal of Putin, because I think they wanted to carve up the Russian Republic. I really do believe that. I think they thought, oh, much like someone, a short corporal in the 1930s, I will not mention his name, believed that, oh, Russia's frail and you just knock the door and it's going to collapse. Well, that wasn't true. And secondly, they wanted to actually sell out Ukraine. They believed, the neocons believed, and this is what I think was one of the underlying functions.

It's not about democracy, not remotely about democracy. And by the way, Putin's motivations aren't exactly all just about securing the Russians in the four provinces within Ukraine. There's more to it than that. But the economics of this was what I think drove a lot of folks to support it. BlackRock and others really thought they were going to come in after the destruction of Ukraine, which is pretty much done, and then rebuild it. Huge investment opportunities. So much of what the neocon mantra is all about is what can we destroy to rebuild? Again, I'm not a neocon. I'm not remotely a neocon. I don't think we'd be

friends if I was a neocon. I'm just speaking truthful here. But I just see what they do is a very destructive use of money and resources for purposes of trying to upend political regimes they don't like. And they don't like Putin. I think Putin symbolizes a failure on their part. And Ukraine was going to be their big Christmas turkey to carve up. Has Putin humiliated Joe Biden in Ukraine? Yes. He humiliates, he humiliates, he he Putin humiliates Joe Biden every time Joe Biden

opens his mouth. I mean, look, look at what happened. There was a competing on Christmas. There were competing videos of, of Joe Biden and Jill Biden. We all saw Jill Biden was sitting there as, and I think an ABC interview, Jill Biden sitting there with, uh, with, I think, every dollar store Christmas decoration for under a dollar on her shirt. It looked great, by the way. I'm a big believer in using low-cost ornaments, and she did a great job. So great job, Joe. But you had Joe Biden almost basically visibly

distressed and trying to basically put words together to speak his Christmas message from, I guess, the Virgin Islands too. Not that there's any virgins there based on what I've heard about the Weinstein flight lodge, but that's a different story. So anyway, back to Putin.

Now, Putin, in competition with this, was very clear. He did a policy-rich speech and commentary where he looked like a world leader. Right? I mean, again, this is not Tony Schaefer speaking. This is something that anybody who has two eyes and half a brain can observe. Correct. brain can observe. So I'm just saying that Joe Biden has self-inflicted the damage to his image, and Putin simply just stands there and speaks, and he looks good because Biden looks so bad. Okay. Do you think that, it's the last question about Ukraine. Do you think the neocons have recognized their failure in Ukraine

and now want to divert our attention to Gaza and other events, China, whatever other international flashpoints there may be, because they don't want us dwelling on the $100 billion we wasted and the 500,000 young men now gone and the 10 million Ukrainian refugees looking for a place to sleep in Europe? I don't think so. No, I think there's other things they're dabbling in, but at this point there's nothing like Ben Hodges, General Ben Hodges recently did an interview. I can't remember which one it was, but I watched it within the last few days.

And Ben basically, Ben Hodges says basically, oh, it's our fault. It's our fault that the Ukrainians have failed because we just didn't give them everything they needed. And I'm sitting there, it's like, 113? Judge, if you gave me $113 billion and told me to go invade a country, it would be invaded and secured in six months. Just saying. And you would have returned some of the cash.

I would have. It's like, are you kidding me? So no, I don't think for a minute they're now under this self-flagellation, oh, we didn't do a good enough of selling the concepts to the West. So I think you're going to continue to see that. Plus, Zelensky, as you know, was announced publicly. They're looking to bring up, call up another 500,000 troops, ostensibly for the defense of Ukraine, which is what they're going to have to go into. Aren't they finished, Tony?

Isn't Ukraine finished? Oh, I think it is, yeah. Look, I said at the beginning of the conflict, even with the initial Russian failures, there was no way Russia was going to be defeated. There was no way that Ukraine would prevail. It's not in the numbers. And at this point, it's the same thing. It's a numbers thing. There's absolutely no way.

Russia is using between 10% and 25% of its military forces. Most people think it's lower. It's like 10%, not to 25%. And it's not even like they're breathing hard to do this. And at the same time, they, the Russians, have moved their entire economy onto a wartime footing. As you point out, the Russian economy is way higher than it was before without Western interests or interoperability. And Putin's popular. Putin is actually doing those things which the Russians want done. I want to play for

you a portion of the clip. So this is in a television studio in Moscow. Scott Ritter is there. This Russian gentleman, Alexander, is there, and the translator is there. But this is the question I put to him and the answer that he gave. Alexander, what do the Russian people think of the West, of Western society, of the U.S., of the U.K. and of Western Europe? Что думают россияне о Западе, о западном обществе, о США, о Великобритании, о Западной Европе? Мы четко отделяем народы этих стран от руководства этих стран. Мы видим четкое отличие между народами этих стран и их политическим лидерством. И Скотт свидетель, очень хорошее отношение к американцам, у нас нет никакого негатива к американцам. Я понимаю, что это может быть с учетом той пропаганды, которая в США звучит удивительно, но я надеюсь, господин Напол. И, мистер Наполитано, я бы пригласил вас, чтобы вы пришли и почувствовали это сами. Ваша программа очень популярна в России. Я специально сегодня посмотрел. Все ваши ролики смотрят на ютубе 250-300 тысяч русских.

Your show is very popular in Russia. I checked today and on YouTube the episodes of your show have 250-300 thousand views. И я пользуюсь случаем, если можно, хотел бы поздравить американский народ, представляю русский народ, поздравить с Новым годом. And I would like to use this opportunity to congratulate the people of the United States from the people of Russia with the holiday season, with the new year. Isn't that an interesting observation?

The questions were spontaneous, the answers were spontaneous. And this is basically what you were saying before. We should be communicating with them. We should work with them irrespective of what our moral view is of their leadership. Right. premise here is that many of the Russian Federation's interests are very much aligned with U.S. Republic interests. Global stability, strong trade. I know that we have a Christian-based system, which I still, look, I still, I'm a Christian. I think it's a good idea. I think Christianity is not the evil that others portray it to be. Putin, as I think, really bolstered the church in Russia.

These are all common threads, which I think, if woven together, would actually give a basis for both nations to work together. I've believed from the days that I was a whistleblower on Able Danger, Kurt Weldon, Congressman Weldon, we recognized, he more than me, but he educated me. It's like, look, the Russians have a lot of the same enemies we do as a Republic. So why on earth are we not actually having discussions, fruitful discussions, now that the Cold War is over, to try to figure out how to work together? And so this is what I find distasteful and completely unacceptable from the neocons, that they don't want to talk.

They will actually go out of their way to spit on the idea of having a dialogue simply because it does not give them the power that they apparently thirst for. And it's a shame because I think the neocons have pushed us in a position to miss opportunities to work with the Russians on areas of common interest. Switching gears to the other hotspot, Gaza and Israel. Yeah. Does assassinating leadership truly stifle an organization or does it just make room for others to move up, often others just as tenacious and sometimes more so than the person who was assassinated? I don't know if there's a strong case of evidence one way or another. I

think I'm an information operations guy. Basically, I was taught as a very young case officer that to do effective information operations, information warfare, everything from hacking a computer to an assassin's bullet is an information operation because the effect that you're trying to achieve will have an effect in the information space, the perception space. Everything is based on perception, not reality. And so often when you examine the desired effect and outcome of a specific situation, a change of leadership, be it through peaceful means or unpeaceful, you know, through aggressive means of assassination, otherwise, it will have an effect. The question becomes, does the replacement of a leader, uh, or tend to have an effect you're trying to achieve? And I think that's the way I've, I've looked at events like that. Uh, in the, in the current circumstance, I think if you take someone out and they're going to be replaced with someone who is equal, if not a bit more aggressive with that said. With that said, if they don't have the resources or followers to actually take up arms and do the

work that they seek or direct to have done, then it doesn't matter. I think if you isolate a leader effectively, that leader can become essentially a moot point and a period in history that we move on from. So I'm not sure if that's the answer you're looking for. No, no, no, Tony. It's a very, very astute answer. I mean, Max Blumenthal told us that the fellow that was assassinated in Beirut was one of the negotiators and played an integral part in the release of the Israeli hostages. Why kill that guy? I mean, at least get your hostages back first. He's working. I don't dispute what he's saying, but I do understand that he's also the linchpin. He was the linchpin between the Iranian leadership and the Hezbollah leadership. So yeah, I mean, it's, I mean, Hamas leadership,

and he was there in hezbollah controlled territory so it's a point of diminishing returns i i wasn't i have no direct knowledge of what the decision-making tree was used for the the israelis i have no idea but i'm saying there may have been a point of okay we're done with this guy it's just time to knock them off. All right, now I want to just raise your blood pressure just a touch to put America's Baghdad Bob on. This is Admiral Kirby talking about first the so-called meritless, counterproductive South African lawsuit against the Israeli government at the International Criminal Court, and then more specifically about whether the U.S. thinks that Israel can eliminate Hamas. It's a little bit of a long answer, but it's fodder for your canon. Yeah. South Africa's filed this 84-page lawsuit against Israel, accusing them of genocide. Israel says

that this is blood libel. Does Washington agree? And where does this put Washington and Pretoria? We find this submission meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever. What's the U.S. assessment of the larger goal that Israel has set to eradicate Hamas? Is that still considered to be a realistic and wise military objective? I think I just answered that with Peter. We don't believe that military attacks alone are going to eradicate an ideology. And it's not likely that you're going to get rid of every single Hamas fighter. So in that sense, I mean, you still have to reconcile yourself with the fact that there may still be some Hamas around, even when your military operation is over.

That said, what they absolutely can do is eradicate the threat that Hamas poses to the Israeli people. And you can do that by going after leadership. You can do that by going after their infrastructure. You can do that by going after their resource. And we showed that with respect to ISIS and al-Qaeda. It can be done. ISIS and al-Qaeda still exist, but they are nowhere near the kind of threats that they once posed. So it can be done militarily. Sony. So look, he he fundamentally has some correct information. I mean, the last five sentences he stated were accurate.

I was part of the effort, as you know. I was an advisor to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Joe Dunford, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs under both Barack Obama and Donald Trump for the first part of his term. And when given the guidance from Trump, not Obama, Joe Biden was able to put together an effective strategy called by, with, and through to work with our allies as the primary...

You said Joe Biden. You meant Joe Dunford. Joe Dunford. Joe Dunford. I can't picture Biden in a military uniform, but go ahead. I can, but he'd have the Fidel Castro look, but that's another story. So for Joe Dunford, he was given guidance. I actually delivered him the guidance to figure out what he needed to do to defeat ISIS. And then

he put, and by the way, this is in chain of command. We actually documented this in a National Geographic series that talks about how this was done. And so, yeah, with sufficient political top cover, with good leadership, and a clearly defined and well-articulated set of guidelines and orders, you can do it. And Kirby's correct. ISIS was removed for, I'd say, 85 to 90 percent of the terrain it had. And for better or for worse they're not back they're still there i mean some people believe that the attack in teheran yesterday may have been an isis attack could be i don't know i'm not i'm not there yet but he's fundamentally correct in his assessment with that said what he and the the biden white house has done regarding

the israelis does not match up. He's basically, it's a non sequitur. He's saying, oh, this is the way we did ISIS. This is the way we're doing it now. It's not. It's not. They right now are trying to play it down the middle. They're not giving the Israelis what they need.

I mean, even though there's these things, oh, they're signing this up. It's like, yeah, it's not really what they want, but they're giving them stuff. So the Israelis are kind of on their own. And I don't think that this White House, Biden and Kirby will be part of anything. As a matter of fact, I think the Israelis basically just tell them enough to make them feel that they're part of the conversation. But what do you mean when you say the Israelis are on their own? Every time we turn around, it's another $100 million, and there's still $15 billion on the table for Congress to vote on. There is. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, no, I think the Israelis could manage without that $15 billion. I think that's why they're not yelling for it.

I think, yes. Have we given them money? No doubt. There's been money in the pipeline long before the conflict started. As a matter of fact, I would argue most of that money has come because of things which were already in standing agreements that were going to be activated should this event happen. I fundamentally don't believe the Biden administration wants to supply the Israelis with anything more than they have to because of domestic politics. The more publicly that's acknowledged about Biden's support to the Israelis, the more that harms the progressive movement, the Hamas caucus is what they call them. I call them within the Democrat party. There's going to be key and critical to Joe Biden's reelection. Joe Biden is caught between the donor class in the Democratic Party and the young progressives in the Democratic Party. He can't win without both of them in his camp. That's correct. That's correct. So yeah,

you're going to see support by the Biden White House, but I think much of that is going to be either quietly pushed or otherwise not acknowledged. And then he's going to say all the right things about trying to push for a ceasefire and everything else. Joe Biden, come on, judge, you know, Joe, Joe Biden is the ultimate empty man. I mean, he, he is a vessel that is open to being essentially content poured into him for purposes of political expression based on whatever he thinks will benefit him as an individual and his party as a group. And so I don't see it any different here. Tony, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for joining us. We look forward to your

regular weekly appearances in the year to come. Thank you, my friend. Thanks, Judge. All the best. Coming up later today, Kyle Anzalone, an anti-war and libertarian warrior who works with our good friend, Scott Horton, will be here at two o'clock. And at four o'clock,

you and me ask the judge. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.