The Chaser Report - Meowtually Assured Destruction

Episode Date: June 18, 2025

In the wake of war between Israel and Iran, Dom and Charles tackle the nuclear question: how should the world determine who has control of atomic bombs? Also, please keep your voices down when listening to this episode, thank you!---VOTE OPTICS FOR A LOGIE: https://vote.tvweeklogies.com.au/Follow us on Instagram: @chaserwarSpam Dom's socials: @dom_knightSend Charles voicemails: @charlesfirthEmail us: [e-mail] our caviar addiction: https://chaser.com.au/support/ Send complaints to: [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gadigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report with Dom and Charles and Dom, wonderful news out of the Middle East. Look, things are going very well. That said, I don't know if you can hear it in the background, but my daughter is currently watching a show called Gabby's Doll House. I don't know if any of the audio will spill into the microphones. But let's just say at this point, major international conflict. missiles would be a welcome change of pace

At this point So, I mean, I'd say with all due respect to Gabby In the team who do a fantastic job Of squeezing shithouse cat-based puns Into every possible scenario It's been on quite a lot here Your review of Gabby's dollhouse is that it's cat's piece Yes, yes

But their version of it would be something like Meow Amazing Or not Meow Amazing Oh, yeah, so maybe a nuclear one Sorry, meowmazing is a pun Most of the puns are not puns. No, right. Okay, they just... Like, have a meowstilant day.

Or I've got a whisker of a... No, no, that's a pun that makes sense. Oh, okay. God, it's hard. Yeah. So, for instance, if I were to say the meow del east, that would be a better pun than any of the puns on the street. Why am I talking about...

Because I'm traumatized by... No, you don't want to talk about the Middle East. That's right. I'm avoiding the subject, but we have to... We're going to talk about it. But, no, it's good news. It is good news. I'm not being sarcastic.

Okay, good news. Well, I know that I've seen today that Donald Trump wants a full solution. He doesn't know of his ceasefire business. Yes. He wants a ceasefire for good. He wants to fix them at least. A final solution. Maybe rethink that phrase during the ads.

Or I don't know what's been happening. Maybe not. No, look, the good news is that, and I didn't realize this. I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. Good. Which is I just didn't realize what peace nicks were in charge, both in Israel and the... the US because, you know, for like, I think it's all right for me to be mistaken in thinking that,

you know, for the last 18 months or so, I have assumed that Benjamin Netanyahu is a bit of a warmongerite, but he is hugely against nuclear arms. Right. Oh, that's good. Yeah. And he's come out and said, oh, nuclear is terrible. I hate it. I don't want to run to have any of it. I mean, a couple of just minutes ago, Charles, actually, they've just, um, claimed attacks on centrifusion weapons production sites. And this is great news because, as you know, Israel has nuclear weapons. Yes. And I'm assuming that, you know, not wanting to be a hypocrite,

he will now dismantle Israel's nuclear weapons and take us far further away from nuclear war than we otherwise would be. But Charles, Charles, you're misunderstanding the way that the calculation works because nuclear weapons in the hands of some people are a guarantee of peace. Take, for instance, the current situation whereby, Right. Iran will strike back. We've been saying before, they have to have a sort of proportionate response and a reasonable response.

Yes. And they have to do that because Israel has nuclear weapons. So Israel can bomb whatever the hell like. And essentially has air superiority over Tehran at the moment. It's been pretty clear. It's pretty one-sided war. But even if Iran had the ability to take out huge numbers of people, they wouldn't do it because Israel has the bomb. So it's a guarantee of, I suppose you could say, one-side being not not.

not getting too badly impacted. Right. But the other side, no, they're in big trouble. So, but wait a minute, if Iran gets nuclear weapons, wouldn't that just mean that by that logic, peace would also have to break out in Iran as well? Like, Israel couldn't bomb Iran into oblivion, and then it would actually be more peaceful. Well, look at what happened with... Like, isn't that under that logic?

Look at what happened with India and Pakistan recently, where there were all these skirmishes and everyone went, whoa, whoa, guys, because they both had nukes. So are you saying Iran should have nukes? Well, I suppose what I'm saying, no, I just assumed, having listened to Benjamin Netanyahu, that what he's actually saying is that he's about to dismantle Israel's... You're saying that he wants to keep the nuke. This is very confusing. And what's more, my daughter is shouting at us because we're interrupting Debbie's dollhouse.

She's shouting, I can't hear it. I must say, I'm kind of wanting to go back in there. I mean, it's probably... Sorry, honey, we'll keep it down, okay? We'll keep it down. We're just talking about World War III. We'll be more quiet. Are you worried about war?

Oh dear. So let's just take a moment and rebalance our audio levels for our inside voices. Okay, so this is just lean in, dear listener, and keep it quiet. We've been put in our place by Gabby and her agent in the other room. Charles, I worry that you had kind of gotten to a point. Yes. That, I mean, mutually assured destruction is actually the best guarantee. guarantee of peace.

But I don't understand, I don't understand. Yeah, I don't understand any, no, no, I'm saying that that's your logic about why Israel thinks that they should have nukes, right? But it surely, if Israel thinks that, then they would want Iran to have nuclear weapons because by that notion, then Iran would be safe. Well, John Stewart had an amazing, John Stewart had an amazing montage on the daily show today of all the time, well, earlier in the week, of all the times that Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Iran was weeks away from

getting nukes. Oh, it's been going on for 40 years. Many, many years. Yeah, 40 years of being weeks away from, and the whole point is what they actually want is a civilian, like their whole operation is to create, I mean, it's sort of ironic in a way. They've allowed international inspection

that keeps them on track to just doing a civilian-based nuclear program, which has meant that they're now weaker at this current moment because they don't have anything to use against Israel. Like, it's sort of, it's the most ironic. It is all very strange.

But it also makes me, it makes me just wonder it. Maybe Orcas has been the wrong idea. Maybe what Australian needs is nukes. And not just nukes like in missile silos. There may be everyone in Australia needs nukes. I mean, if there's a bullying problem at your school, if you come in the following day with a small kind of nuclear missile. Suitcase. Just a little, I'm not saying something major.

Lunchbox weapon. Just a really small one. Yeah, lunchbox. No one's bullying you in the playground. I mean, my childhood would have been a lot more fun. Particularly when I lived in the UK, because they really know about the nuclear umbrella over there. I was over there during Chernobyl and all the, you know,

we were worried about that. What I didn't realize is that I would have been beaten up a lot less in the playground if I had a small tactical nuclear weapon. Yes, you would. And I'm not saying like I would have used it. That's the whole point. You don't have to use it. It's just the threat of it being there.

So maybe Albao, with this orcus idea, Maybe we just need a lot of nicks, rather than nickly submarines, we need just full-ball. We just do one for every council area. Yeah, one per LGA. I like that, particularly because the areas where I live, the LJAs are quite small, so they'd be quite dense together. Imagine if every mayor.

Every mayor had the code. Had the code. Oh, that's interesting. That would be good. I mean, imagine how supercharged and fast-tracked, you know, development would be. Yes, and also those sort of... If the nimbies complain and it's like, Well, the boundary disputes between councils and science happen, that would be really tense.

Yeah. And I reckon, you know, how the Garbo has gone strike all the time? Well, I don't think they'd do that. I don't think they'd do that. But then, they wouldn't do that, but then the Garboes would develop nuclear weapons. And, I mean, this ends only in one direction. What, everyone has a nuclear weapon. Every single person has a nuclear weapon at all times.

We sort of need the right, we need to amend our constitution. And we'd all be safe. The right to bear nuclear weapons. Yeah, yeah, to have them everywhere. And I think... I mean, Bob Hawke dreamed of, you know, a house for every man, woman and child. Yeah, and no child will live in poverty. Well, if the child walks into a convenience store with a nuclear weapon,

that child's going to get wherever they want. Give me a Mars bar. Yeah. Yes, sir. Yeah, that's right. The Chaser Report, now with extra whispers. What we're really portraying is a vision of, would you say, paradox? Peace, peace.

Well, just peace in our time. Yeah. Peace and also a massive funding boost to the nuclear industrial complex. Yes. What would, I mean, no... But surely by that logic, then, all garsons should also get a nuclear weapon. Like, by that logic... If everyone in the whole world.

If everyone in the whole world gets a bomb. Well, I mean... Towards the justification... I mean, the problem... I suppose the idea is, Charles, that we do try to keep weapons out of the people who would actually use... them. Well, okay, so I've got to... I'm not saying Garzans would use them, I'm just saying,

there's going to be some people who don't get them, surely. You have a test. You have a test for whether you... Are too crazy. Can I have a nuclear weapon or not? And can I suggest what the test should be? What's a test? Which is, have you ever been

credibly accused of genocide? Well, no, we can't do that. What I'm thinking... That's sort of too high bar, isn't it? Well, it's hard to test. What you need, I think, is a trigger on the nuclear weapon.

Such that if you press it That means you probably shouldn't have a nuclear weapon So the thing to do And don't tell anyone else this It can just be for podcast listeners None of them would work Right So everyone would think that they had the nuclear weapons

And they go about adjusting their behaviour based on And the button, what the button would actually do Is call like a squad of people to lock you up And throw away the key kind of thing You know rubber room type of stuff Yes I just don't know how you kept the secret I've just ruined it

haven't I. Well, I think our podcast listeners can be trusted. I mean, they're the first ones getting you. They're the people who, yeah. I trust them. We run a pilot program just with our podcast listeners. Yeah, I must say, I think Hamish and Andy would find themselves number two for once. It would actually solve a lot of problems, wouldn't it?

Because, you know, I'm just thinking going across the border, like going into America. You know how lots of tourists are sort of being seized at the border and being turned back and anything like that? in the week. Yeah. If you have a nuclear bomb on you and you, you know how to ask you, do you have a nuclear bomb? Does that take, yes. Yeah.

Yeah. And then the guard would just go, okay, we'll come through then, I suppose. But also, what would it mean? I mean, it would mean no one would have a fight. Wouldn't it? It would mean that, like, if you had a, you wouldn't have a fight, an argument with your boss. No.

Because either of you could obliterate at the other at any point. I mean, marriage would be very different. The arguments in, you know, in a romantic relationship would. be much more high stakes. It would be very high stakes. Yeah. But that's sort of sexy. You know, that's, you know, if you've got the...

Well, everyone who's always just to say in the 80s, you know, under the shadow at the bomb, you know, it's kind of like, when they all die tomorrow, shut up and kiss me kind of stuff. How romantic. This is the most romantic this podcast ever been while contemplating the obliteration of everything. Let's just take a moment and then just say, I just want to just, we'll leave this conceit to one side. I don't really know how it's gone. It's gone very dark. Even by us, I think it's the future that our leaders are envisaging. What's going to happen?

I think all we've done, frankly, Dom, is follow the logic that is currently being played out in public. I mean, I want to explain why I don't think it's going to happen. I think the idea of having a nuclear weapon is just ridiculous, actually. That will be a positive note, and perhaps which to leave. Charles, it should be pretty obvious that a world with everyone having a nuclear weapon is not going to happen. They're expensive to produce the material. The fissile material is very hard to get. There's limited supplies.

Yes. And also all the centrifuges to make them to be blown up, yeah. Also, Charles, long before we get to a point where everyone in the world, have a nuke, everyone in the world has drone, has killer drones. We don't need. Well, robots. It's much simpler, cheaper technology. Yes.

We could kill everybody. Because I was thinking during the break, the nuclear bombs should be Bluetooth operator, shouldn't they? Yeah. Most of the drones definitely will be. Welcome to the future. Totally. Totally. I'm assuming the Orcus nuclear submarines will be remote pilotable

via Bluetooth. No, so I mean, we're going to be here long before everyone having the ability to obliterate anybody else is, you know, a couple of years away the way a drone technology. We've got a drone. Yeah. Just conventional explosives. You don't need any of this... Or lasers. Lazers. We could do lais.

Frickin' laisers. Frickin' space lasers. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Or I don't know. Or just even a camera. Like you can ruin someone's interpretation with a camera. What about? And hear me out. here, Dom. What if you didn't have any actual, like, physical weapons? Right. But people were required to talk things through in order to resolve disputes. So, like, instead of injuring or killing the people that you hate, you sort of sit down and you broker out a way to both

exist. You negotiate and you figure out how to kind of work together. Yeah. And you acknowledge your differences. Yeah, acknowledge you, even not work together. You know, agree to disagree. agree and live separate lives in separate communities and maybe an acknowledgement of shared flaws and common humanity and the only slight problem and it's a beautiful vision on which to leave this fairly dark episode Charles is everyone just sitting down and talking about things sounds distressingly like a podcast and I just worry that the model you're outlining is a model for podcast proliferation and I think that's the one thing we don't want In fact, nuk me now.

We're part of the Iconicless network. Catch you tomorrow. My name is Ryan. This is my best friend, Tony, and we host the Tony and Ryan podcast. And despite being from Australia, people ride across Canada, listen every single day. Jared's in Alberta. How did you discover the podcast? Someone was just like, oh my God, you need to check out.

These two from Australia. And I was hooked right away. I was like, oh, my God. I was pissing myself lost into my truck and, like, it just got worse from there. Oh, well, but it's good. In a good way. It gets worse with how good it is, and that's just the beauty of friendship. Tony and Ryan, every day.