Judging Freedom - Ukraine, CIA and Russia - Tony Shaffer fmr CIA

Episode Date: May 17, 2023

See omny.fm/listener for privacy information.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 Wednesday, May 17th, 2023. It's about 10 minutes after 11 in the morning here on the East Coast of the United States. Tony Schaefer joins us now uh tony i have a lot to talk to you about but i want to start with a

uh report in the wall street journal this morning that the cia is openly advertising on certain apps that it knows uh russians use yeah soliciting russians to spy on the russian government and provide information to the CIA. A, do you believe this? And B, isn't it fantastic? When do spies advertise for spies to join them? This is not new. It's just the CIA has updated their technology to the 21st century. And let me give you how this ends up front. It doesn't end well. They've tried this sort of thing before with a number of countries to include Cuba, to include certain Eastern European nations. And what they do, judges, is essentially they put an ad in the paper. This is what this is. This is a 21st

century version of an ad in the paper. And then they have people who they want to come in. It's never worked out by the fact that when the Russians see this, you know what the Russians, do you want to guess what the Russians do when they see this, Judge? What? They put people imposing to be agents into the system. They basically say, oh yeah, go sign up and we'll control you. Basically, they roll the op up against CIA. So what does the CIA think they're accomplishing by this? So the CIA has a number of problems we could get into. One of them is a numbers game. I'm trained by CIA. We go through the same training. As a matter of fact, it's all consolidated now it's field ftc field tradecraft training and um once you if you go to the field and cia so many people actually have assigned to you uh essentially uh certain numbers you must

accomplish dod we've never we've never had that system requiring that you have a certain number of recruitments. That's, to me, insane. And the moment you do that- So at the end of the month, cops give out more traffic tickets because they haven't met their quota. At some time on the calendar, CIA agents are lowering the bar to bring in recruits because they haven't brought in enough. Is that a fair analogy? That's absolutely 110% correct. Absolutely. And we DOD have never signed up to that system.

It's like, really? This is not cops writing tickets. This is trying to get clandestine intelligence from people in places you can't get it. And so the moment the Russians see this, they put together a counterintelligence program where they will create legends for individuals to go sign up. And so some of these folks get signed up. They sign up and become CIA assets. They're basically double agents. They're feeding information.

I've worked these operations against the other side and I'm just telling you judge that's where this is all going. It will not end well. Alright, let's take let's take a look at the CIA promo. Now, it's in Russian obviously. Yeah. The the colors are black and white. It's dark and gloomy. I mean, it it looks like a Hollywood production, probably is. Obviously, there are actors. They're not real CIA agents.

They're not real Russians. There are subtitles. I am going to, because a lot of folks listen to us on audio as opposed to watching us, I'm going to read both the subtitles and the description of what's going on. This will take about a minute and 10 seconds. Here we go. And who decides that? Central Intelligence Agency released a video on the social media platform Telegram aimed directly at Russian government officials. Почему жизни одних людей ценятся больше, чем жизни других? И кто это решает?

Сбыть героем – это значит терпеть напрасно. to convince Russians disaffected by the Ukraine war to spy for Washington. It portrays fictional Russian officials struggling with the decision to reach out to the American spy service. An official said the CIA hopes Russians will share information about the country's economy, foreign policy, cyber activities, and culture. The people around you may not want to hear the truth. We do. You aren't powerless. Connect with us securely. It's almost silly, Tony. It's almost childish. It's sophomoric. I mean, I don't know how many adjectives I can throw at it. There's going to be people at the CIA dome out in front of the CIA main building getting huge rewards for this complete monstrosity. Some contractor at CIA

has probably made, and I'm going to be conservative, about $50 million off of this nonsense. Some person with a psychologist sat down and said oh people in russia are feeling bad they're not feeling bad and and and the audience this is targeted to is cia nobody in russia is going to buy this you're there you i've recruited russians this is the wrong approach just there must be more sophisticated way to recruit Russians who are more reliably into the recruitment and who are not double agents. I have a few notches in my belt from regarding Russia. I can't say much more than that. Anybody who looks back at my operational history would probably figure out where those contacts happened. I've been put on airplanes in the middle of the night to go places and do things regarding this

issue. So I'm just telling you, there's ways to do it. This is not one of those ways, Judge. And the motivations, you've got to figure out the motivation of both the audience and the individuals that you're going to bring in. Nothing in that video hits any issue that any Russian leader is going to be feeling bad about at this point in time. They're winning. And the other thing is, even if they don't like the carnage, they have a different mindset regarding the carnage than we do. They aren't. I'm going to play this for Jack Devine this afternoon. He's on and ask him about it.

Of course, you know him. He'll play. Good luck with that. I want to watch that. I'll watch that show, Judge. I'm just telling you, I'm going to watch that show. Okay. Well, not only will you watch it, we'll let you comment on it.

I want you to comment on it the next time you're on. But to be serious for a moment, before we get to the latest in the war in Ukraine, doesn't the CIA know that this is a potentially dangerous and fruitless way to recruit people? So a lot of, I came out of counterintelligence. So my first assignments in the army was the army special agent doing both counterterrorism and counterintelligence work. And Judge, one of the things you do gain from experience is understanding how to go about detecting and countering spies. Most CIA officers do not get that training. They do not have that as a fundamental component of their field operations training. A lot of these folks come through Ivy League schools. I won't, you you know jack and those clown i mean people jack and those people over

at cia uh come from very uh high high level educated backgrounds i'm a muddy boots guy i just started out as enlisted and went through the system and i don't think they have a full appreciation of how badly they can be fooled because i think ci has a certain arrogance about them and i'm speaking from experience here and And they believe that they're smarter than the average bear. That's why people several times in CIA have had their lunch eaten badly to include in Afghanistan where they actually had at Camp Chapman, an Al Qaeda operative blow up the entire station in Afghanistan at one point. So they don't have proper training regarding counterintelligence or if they have it, they don't internalize it. Among Jack Devine's latest claims is that Ukraine leaders are patient and Russian leaders are full of bluster and impatience.

I don't know where he gets this from. I'll ask him about it. Seems to me it's the other way around. What do you think? So the latest interview I literally just saw a few minutes ago before doing prep for our discussion is Zelensky admitting that, well, I think he was blustering because he said that they had the correct number of troops, the correct motivation, the correct organizations. The only thing they're lacking, according to Zelensky, is certain technologies have not shown up on the battlefield. It sounds like you saw the same BBC interview that we saw. Probably. And so as I was prepping, it's like, okay, that sounds like bluster to me, especially regarding the fact that they don't have the numbers of troops available to do what they need to do. Again, at a minimum, Judge, at a minimum, and you know, Danny Davis,

I just, full disclosure, I texted Danny this morning too. Danny Davis, Colonel Davis, has said, tried to explain to you all, you and your audience, what's required. To go on the offensive and be successful, you need a minimum of three to one advantage over the adversary. And you're not, you don't have that. Well, that is that is numerically impossible unless the Polish and American and British troops show up. That's correct. All right. Is the West growing tired of the war? Not those who are committed to the destruction of Russia. No, I think Victoria

Nuland is more motivated than ever. I think there's a battle going on between State Department and Blinken and Sullivan at the White House. Sullivan will be all in this too. Jake Sullivan will be all in on this too, except that they know that an election year is coming up. And unless there's clear and compelling results showing that U.S. support to Ukraine is paying off, Sullivan's a politician first. He's going to try to start getting, trying to cut losses. All right. You're speaking of Jake Sullivan, who's the president's national security advisor. By the way, woke up at 3 o'clock in the morning with a stranger in his bedroom, even though the house is guarded by Secret Service, and escorted the guy out and then went back to sleep. Didn't even call the CIA.

The whole thing is bizarre. Was that John Brennan? Was it John Brennan that was in that? No, I'm just kidding. It's a joke. Sorry, John. I'm just joking. It is a joke. We do have humor on our side here. Just saying. Right, right. We do. But it could have been John Brennan. Can the Ukrainians realistically drive the Russians from eastern Ukraine, as President Zelensky has boasted in another interview? counteroffensive started. As far as I can tell, I've gone through and looked at folks and talked to folks. I've read some firsthand accounts of people on the ground there. It started, but it's kind of like, I don't know, it's like it's just kind of puttering along because to Zelensky's point, the technology and weapons systems that they were promised have not shown up and are still in the process of either being deployed or acquired by the Ukrainians. So even if he had the troop numbers, which he doesn't, I don't see how they have specific achievable military objectives assigned to the offensive. I just don't see it. And again,

I'm not on either side. I just don't see what they're trying to do here. What is your take on the latest either nonsense or real, to me it's nonsense, involving a pregosion? I mean, first we saw this horrific, angry outburst condemning by name the Russian defense minister and the chief of the Russian military staff for not giving him enough ammunition, purporting to show over his shoulder dead Wagner soldiers. Then we saw a milder, more sane version of that, but essentially one warning. We need more ammunition or this is not going to happen. Now the latest is the CIA, and I assume it's the CIA because it came from the Washington Post,

claiming that Prokosian offered what would be an act of treason that I think would result in his summary execution of revealing the location and movement and size of Russian troops in return for their evacuating Bakhmut. How do you read all of this Prokosian stuff, Tony? So the fact that they're allowing a PMC, a private military corporation, to do the lead in this war tells me how unserious the Russians are about being concerned about losing. I mean, if losing was a concern, you would not have a knucklehead like Prigozhin up front making all of these protestations. That does not help discipline, does not help military cohesion, it does not help be a force multiplier. So that tells me that

politically, Prigozhin thinks he can get away with a lot, and he is. But this tells me also that Putin is like, okay, you know, Putin was really concerned about the Ukrainians actually making, you know, doing something back, he'd fire the guy and put real military in there. Prokosin's not a real military leader. He has no military experience. Yeah, okay, I've heard it. Oh, he should be credited for being up front with his guys. You know, being crazy is not a notable feature of success on the battlefield.

Okay, he's crazy enough to be up front. I just don't think, Judge, that they're worried about losing, neither Russians, and they allow him to speak out like this. I'm sure, I'm speaking as an Army guy, if I saw Eric Prince and his guys doing that nonsense, I'd be less than cooperative as well. We're going to run the clip where he's angry. I'm thinking, funny you should say Eric Prince, head of Blackwater at the time.

I'm thinking of Eric Prince doing a selfie, which didn't exist at the time, in Afghanistan. Personally ripping apart Donald Rumsfeld and General Petraeus. Bingo. It's as outlandish as that. Here's Prokosian exploding. We have a 70% shortage of ammunition. Shai Gu, Gerosimo, where the blank is the ammunition? Look at them, blank.

If you give the normal amount of ammunition, there will be five times fewer of them. They came here as volunteers. They are dying so you can gamble in your redwood cabinets. Take note of that. All right, some of it is, you know, Russian terminology. I don't know what Redwood cabinets means. I mean, the DACA's on the Black Sea. Yeah. There's a great line from Shakespeare, Sir John Falstaff, fit for fodder. That's what this is. Look, again, I'm going to be very blunt about this. This is how little the Russians are concerned about what's going on. They're allowing volunteers who are essentially cannon fodder to go up front and die. Again, if they were worried about victory, they'd be sending in effective troops. And yeah, this is like Eric Prince. And Eric, don't be upset because I'd mentioned your name. Eric Prince going out front in front of the folks at Bagram in 2000 to 2003,

yelling about not getting support from Central Command and Don Rumsfeld. That's what this is like. But it's more acceptable, clearly, in their culture. But again, Judge, this just tells me that the Russians aren't worried about the Ukrainian offensive or else they put real troops in there to do something. What would the CIA have to gain? And I suppose you could answer that in almost any way possible after the silly movie we just saw. But what would the CIA have to gain by planting a story in the Washington Post

that Prokosian offered to commit an act of treason, which would have resulted in his summary execution? I think it's to continue the the dissent that's obviously existing within Russia. This is probably something they think they can enhance more by saying, oh, Prokofiev is so upset he's going to go to the other side. Believing it, but like, so I think what Prokofiev, I don't think helping their cause one little bit, I think it's hurting them. And I think that may be what CIA saw. It's like, oh, we have an opportunity here to kind of double down and enhance their internal dissent. I think that's what they did. Here's a milder but still cautious Yevgeny Prokhozhin.

There are about 20 houses left to take and Bakhmut would be taken completely. But the occupation of Bakhmut gives nothing to the Russian Federation. Because the flanks are crumbling, the front is collapsing. And attempts by the defense ministry to publish statements to make things look better are and will bring an overall tragedy for Russia.

They need to stop lying right now. If you have fled, build new defense lines. What is he talking about? So I think he's basically saying that he's not being properly supported as they move forward to establish what we used to call the FIBA and FLOT, the forward edge of the battle area. Basically, as conventional militaries move forward, Judge, you establish essentially lines of control, lines of departure. Basically, it's incremental. You set up zones of control. One of the things I've heard over and over is this road in and out of Bakhmut that they've not been able to fully secure.

So I think what he's saying, because I don't have the maps in front of me, I have no inside information directly on this. It sounds to me like the Russian military is not taking advantage of the gains that he's made. He feels that they should be doing things to more stabilize the battlefield around him as he moves forward to take the rest of the city. Now, when I play this same tape for Jack Devine later today, I know what he's going to say because he's written this, that the Russian military is disillusioned and Prokofiev is speaking the truth. Is the Russian military disillusioned? And if not, why do they even let Prokofiev say these things to the point where an international audience can see and hear him? Because I think he's a knucklehead. I think that Putin has given him far more authority. You know, look, come on, judge, we've known these people. We known these people.

We know these people. And they just say and do things and they get away with all sorts of nonsense until something bad really happens. I think Bogosian, look, Bogosian is useful to Putin doing what he's doing. He's doing the nasty stuff that the Russian military does not want to do. He's the guy who's the cleaner, if you will, trying to get this all done. And I think what he's saying is that the military is not being as enthusiastic about his victories and helping him as he should be. And that's just a statement of, of, of a fundamental friction that exists within mercenaries like Pergosian and his guys

and uniformed professional military soldiers. It's friction is what I see it. It's not anything to do about, oh, their morale is so bad they're about to quit. The two are not related. Where do you see the war going, Tony, in the next five, six, seven months? So I still think it's going to come. I just don't see it going much past summer. They can sustain this right now they're going through tons of patriot missiles i mean extraordinary numbers of of missiles are being fired on a daily basis i you know i don't see the ukrainians being able to sustain this much past the end of the month regarding defending themselves against russian missiles and just the the the toll on human life that is being experienced on both sides, I just don't see it as sustainable. I think

some adult in the room has got to get these folks to the negotiating table before July. That's, I think so. Gary, do we have the tape we ran yesterday that Larry Johnson sent us of the ammo depot being exploded? Take a look at this. Larry says, given the size of this, and there were secondary and tertiary explosions, of course, because this is an ammunition depot. Larry estimates 500 million, a half a billion dollars worth of ammo destroyed in 15 minutes. I have no reason to doubt that number. I have to go and understand

what exactly they were storing there to be able to kind of validate that. But I have no reason to doubt that. But if Larry's number is correct, they are really, Ukrainians are really, really hurting for ammunition. Well, they're hurting. And then apparently there's the Russians claim, and we don't know what exactly they hit. They said they took out one of the Patriot missile systems. That doesn't mean a launcher, doesn't mean the entire system.

We don't know. But let me put it this way. If the Ukrainians were doing well, they'd be crowing about it and bragging about it. And they're not. Tony Schaefer, always a pleasure. Thank you very much for your time. Always great to be here, Judge. Thank you.

Of course. If you watched us, and you did, and if you liked that, and I hope you did, like, subscribe, and tell a friend. More as we get it. Alistair Crook coming up at 11.45 this morning, and at 2.30, the man you all love to hate, Jack Devine. Judge the Politano for judging freedom. 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.