The Duran Podcast - Regime change industrial complex w/ Brian Berletic (Live)

Episode Date: September 9, 2025

Regime change industrial complex w/ Brian Berletic (Live)

All right. We are live with Alexander Mercuris in London. And once again, we have with us on the Duran, one of one of the fan favorites on Duran lives. It is a pleasure and an honor to have with us. Mr. Brian, Berletic. Brian, thank you once again for joining us. How are you doing? And where can people follow your work? Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me back. It's always an honor and a pleasure. If people want to find and follow my work, go to YouTube, type in the new Atlas. And in the video description of each video, you will find all the other places you can find and follow my work, Telegram, X, and Rumble. And I have those links in the description box down below. And I will also add them as a pinned comment when the live stream concludes. So let's say a quick hello to everyone that is watching us.

on Odyssey, on Rockfin, on Rumble, on YouTube, and a big shout out to our locals community, the durand.com. How is everyone doing in the locals chat? How are our moderators doing for today? Thank you to our moderators who are helping us out on the YouTube chat. And let's get started. Let's start talking about regime changes. regime change industrial complex. Alexander, Brian, man, there are a lot of regime changes going on in the world at this moment. So let's get into it. Indeed.

I mean, it's almost as if suddenly everything is going to absolute overdrive. So there is, and that a lot of the patterns that we have been seeing in previous regime change, color revolutions. Color revolution is one type of regime change. Decapitation strikes, military attacks, another type of regime change. Economic destabilization of a country. A third type of regime change. We see all of these playing out simultaneously at all sorts of places, all one at the same time. Now, the most dramatic one, affects the one that involves moving military assets,

actually threatening military action. At the moment is Venezuela. We've had the American War fleet operating on the coast of Venezuela. They're saying that this is an anti-drugs smuggling operation. If you believe that, then I have a bridge to sell you. That's the first thing I would say. But everybody, everybody, I think, can see. Certainly the government of Venezuela can see that this is clearly directed ultimately.

at removing them and they're trying to do what they can to defend against it you also by the way had have had a similar attempt to carry out a destabilization overthrow military attack on iran and we should not overlook that because it is my clear belief that before the end of the year that is going to resume again we're going to have more military attacks on iran fairly soon and steps are being taken in the UN, in the UN Security Council to prepare for that. Then we have the sort of classic colour revolution type operations and they've been happening now increasingly in Serbia. We see them happening in Thailand. They're happening also in Indonesia. In the case of Indonesia, they caused the president of Indonesia to,

pull out of the SCO summit meeting. He wasn't able to go to the SEO summit meeting in Tienzin. He actually apologized to the Chinese government because of all of that. He did manage to go to the celebrations of the World War II victory in China a few days later. But obviously he had to cut short his visit. And Indonesia is a key country because, of course, he's recently joined the bricks. And we also have protests in other places, smaller places. Nepal, for example, has now seen a sudden burst of protests.

Again, many people will say that this is unconnected. People will ask, what is the strategic significance of Nepal? Look at a map, and you will immediately see what the strategic significance of Nepal is. You have India and China moving towards daytime. If you want to cause trouble between China and India, you do it in the Himalayas and Nepal is a Himalian kingdom. So all of this is going on in all sorts of places all at the same time. And I think that I always say about colour revolutions, which is a thing that people do not always understand about them, is that colour revolutions always work on exploiting. genuine local grievances that people have.

So there are people in Serbia who, for very good reasons, for example, have very good reasons to be very angry with the government there. But it takes these grievances and that anger and tries to manipulate them to serve a geopolitical objective. And that's the other thing I wanted to say. So are these, all these attempts, are the actual colour revolutions? Is it just coincidence that all of these things are happening? What is the purpose of this?

Who better to discuss this all with than Brian Belletti, who obviously has been keeping an eye more than anyone I know on what the United States and its various think tanks and institutions have been thinking? So first of all, Brian, do you agree with me? are these indeed colour revolution attempts. You are in the eye of the storm in relation to one, which is one that's been playing out in Thailand. Thailand has been under a lot of pressure for a very, very long time.

It's overlooked by many people that ASEAN is now China's biggest trading partner ahead of the United States. Is there a colour revolution underway in Thailand, or at least an attempted one? First of all, there's a very good overview, Alexander. I do agree with you, and I want to impress upon people. And you made a very good point. A leader does not have to be a good leader for the United States to want to remove them.

They don't even have to be someone who refuses to work with the United States. They can even be a government, the U.S. itself, installed into power. The only thing a government needs to do to incite regime change from the United States, States is be disobedient about something important. The U.S. told them to do that they refuse to do either regarding their own country or the region of the world that they're in. We've seen the government in Serbia go along with certain aspects of the U.S. proxy war against Russia and Ukraine and then refuse. On the other hand, no matter how bad people think President Fuchich is, whoever the U.S. is going to replace him with will be as bad in all other regards, plus whatever the one thing is he's saying no to.

they're going to say, yes, it'll always get much, much worse. The other point, before I get into the different targeted countries, you have to figure out who is funding the protest, who is leading them, who is funding them, and the media organizations promoting them, getting the narrative across to the people, the public, getting them out into the streets, who is funding them? That's all you need to do to figure out who is behind these protests.

far too many people try to get into some sort of ideological analysis about what this group says it stands for. It's not beyond the United States to build up an opposition group that poses as wanting one thing while actually pursuing something entirely different. So all you have to do is look at the media groups. This is what I did with Serbia and Indonesia. And then right before the show started, people pointed out in the Pali started checking that out. And you will see the National Endowment for Democracy for an organization that was, defunded in this method, has been very busy recently. It is funding almost all of these media outlets

promoting these protests. If you look at the NED funding deeper, they fund these human rights organizations, human rights organizations, legal organizations, and what they do is take U.S. government money and spend it to give free legal assistance to the agitators, the leaders of the protests.

They are targeted by the government. They're involved in sedition, even treason to a certain extent, and they use this fund to give them unlimited legal assistance. They have the human rights organizations which will look at all of the activities of the police or military in a targeted country while deliberately ignoring all the violence from the protesters that are provoking whatever reaction the police and the military have. So it is a large coordinated efforts. there are many moving pieces, the U.S. government, together with European governments, and also Western corporate funded foundations.

They are involved in funding all of this. People have to remember that, yes, it was under President Trump where this, at least the attempt to sell to the public that USA and NED were all being dismantled. This was actually going on under Biden. Many people started waking up to what the NED does and how it does it and why it's doing it. And so what the U.S. started to do, even under Biden, was redirect money through European governments. You know, the U.S. doesn't want to be implicated. So they launder it through European governments or private foundations.

So that is why you have all of these different groups that the U.S. channels the money through. But if you follow it all the way back, sometimes you have to go to two or three different websites, it always ends up back at United States. and the corporations that are driving U.S. foreign and domestic policy. So Indonesia is very easy. You said it, Alexander. They joined bricks, and they refused to allow their country, which has a massive population and huge economic potential.

They refused to be turned into a battering ram and used against China. They joined bricks, and now they're cooperating side by side with China. So it's a no-brainer why they want that government out, no matter what else they're doing. That is the reason they're destabilizing the country. And short of regime change, they will settle for just destabilizing it, causing constant chaos that will set a country economically in terms of infrastructure projects, investments. If they can just set it back five to 10 years, they will settle for that also. In the same region, I'm here in Thailand.

I learned about all of this witnessing it firsthand being in the offices of any defunded organizations before I was public. I wrote under a pen name and I was actually in their office. quite often, actually. They have throughout the entire 21st century now, they have been trying to remove the Thai military as an independent institution. It is independent of the civilian government

and the constitutional monarchy. They want to remove both of these. These are institutions that unite the Thai people, regardless of there's different races and ethnic groups. They're all united. And so what they're trying to do is get rid of them, then divide the people, against one another and then capture the country politically. They have political parties that they

are backing led by two billionaires, tax in Chinawat and Tanatuan, Juan, Kitt. They have traveled to the United States. Tanaton, for example, in 2019, literally met with people in the State Department, USAID, and all of these. And he has openly since coming back said, Thailand is too close to China, we need to pivot back to the U.S., Europe, and Japan. He has said this in public. So it's very clear. That's why they're doing it. And these are the people they're using to try to do it.

Right now, there's a change in government. The party headed by tax in Chinawat has kind of been sidelined. But this is going to be a continuous issue. And this will be a continuous threat hanging over Thailand and the region. And Nepal, the last one, I didn't have enough. time to really research it deeply. But I was looking at CPJ, the committee for protection of journalists, which is, again, just another fake front. It protects U.S. funded propagandas. That's what it actually does. They were talking about a social media ban in Nepal. Nepal said, if you want to operate a

social media platform in Nepal, you have to register with the government and you have to follow our local laws or you cannot operate here. This is what China told Facebook and Google. And so then they said, all right, well, we're not doing that, and we're going to burn your country down. So that's what they ended up doing. So maybe I'll just leave it there, and then we can expand into the other areas as well. I just want to say a few things about Indonesia, which is a country which I've never actually visited, but I know it's history quite well, because Indonesia was a very, very big issue in the 60s and in the 70s.

And I remember, and I got to know very well then. And that is, of course, that after Indonesia became independent, it was previously a Dutch colony, the Dutch East Indies, its then-president, a man called Sukarno, tried to follow a policy of non-alignment. In fact, the non-aligned movement was set up in 1955 in Indonesia, in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta. And that was where the policy of non-alignment began. Anyway, this was obviously deeply unpopular with the United States and with the West. And the government, also Sukarno, also maintained quite good relations with the Soviet Union and China, especially, by the way, the Soviet Union. There was quite a lot of Soviet investment in Indonesia in the 50s and early 1960s. Now, Sukarno, Sukarno was overthrown in a coup, a very violent coup. In 1965, the new government that was established, which was a military dictatorship, was very, very pro-American.

Now, the interesting fact about the current president of Indonesia, who's only been a president of Indonesia for a relatively short time, is that he's. has visited Moscow several times. He has praised Sukarno and his policies. This is the leader who, as I said, pursued non-alignment in the 50s and 60s. And he spoke about how Indonesia really needs to reconnect with Russia and start to rebuild a lot of the links that had existed in the 1950s and early 1960s. And I thought this was really quite extraordinary language, especially coming from an Indonesian general, which is what he is. He was a military man before he became president. And I was sure that that would raise hackles with some people in the United States. Given what a big country Indonesia is, you only have to look at a map to see how big it is. And what enormous

role it plays in East Asia and it's absolutely enormous economic potential. So I was not at all surprised that all of this happened and you can absolutely see why Indonesia was targeted and why this president is being targeted in this particular way. He's only been in power for a short time. Now in all other respects, I agree completely with what Brian was saying. Follow the money and I would add something else, and this is my own view, that one of the great problems with money flows is that money that may be of the surface earmarked for one purpose can often find itself being used somewhere else. So if you wonder where the trillion dollars that was invested in Afghanistan went. Some of it, I am sure, went into all sorts of accounts and could very well

be the money that is ending up being used in Thailand or Indonesia today. So, you know, this is this is not just a machine. It's also a business as well. And people are making an awful lot, gaining an awful lot from it. Anyway, those are some of the things I wanted to say, bouncing off the things that Brian just said. Why is it? happening now? Why do we have the sudden burst of activity in all of these places, all at the same time? Any thoughts about this, Brian? Well, I think you, I'm not sure if you said it since we went live, but before we went, we went live, you were mentioning about how the United States has hit a brick wall with its proxy war against Russia in Ukraine. It's losing it. And Russia refuses to

fall for Minsk 3.0. And so what they're doing is hitting everywhere else. when your enemy is strongest in one location, you divert and you hit where it is weakest. So it's looking at Venezuela, it's looking at destabilizing all of these other countries along both Russia and China's periphery. Serbia, you could say, is along Russia's periphery. Indonesia, Nepal, obviously, along China's periphery. They are always working on this. These are not things that they just throw together overnight.

The U.S. has a massive global spanning network of fake NGOs. working their way into every targeted country and building what is essentially a parallel government or system. And when it reaches political mass, they will launch these color revolutions and try to stall it on top of the existing indigenous political system and institutions. And just sometimes they see that this is a good opportunity to do it, regardless of what's going on anywhere else in the world. but also just like you say, it's a great diversion. It's a good time to do this because they have Russia and China tied up elsewhere. So now they always intended to overthrow and politically capture these countries, but now is the best time to do it to serve a multitude of reasons.

And just to point out, they had the, we remember under the Obama administration, the pivot to Asia. And then during that, they were creating what essentially was an attempt, to repeat the Arab Spring, which was also U.S. engineered years in advance, they tried to recreate that across Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, China. And they called it the Milk Tea Alliance, and they were all using the same hand signals and colors and symbols. And what they tried to do is create synergies between them

and create a regional destabilization. Luckily, that has passed. But a lot of what they're doing right now is just a continuation of what they were doing than in Indonesia and Nepal, they're literally using the same cartoon flag. There's this Japanese anime series called One Piece, and they're using it. So it's like the CIA and any data is just too lazy to come up with two different gimmicks. So they just reuse it. And these protesters don't seem to notice.

Well, I think a lot of them are swept along by all of this. Again, I've come across people from Serbia and by the way from Russia who've been involved in this kind of activity and of course they don't have any idea or any understanding of the forces that are working behind the scenes and of course it's often done

in ways that are intended to be very attractive and to appeal especially to young people and always one of the major themes that is talked about is corruption and of course it's a very difficult point to rebut if you use it against a government because there's nearly always corruption somewhere in any government however clean it is and you can always make it seem worse than it is and sometimes it's pretty bad and secondly if it isn't happening at all if there if governments are not corrupt well how do you prove that it's trying to

prove a negative you know that we are not corrupt corrupt is often very difficult to do so it's something though that people get very worked up and very angry about and my own invariable experience just to say is when governments are overthrown by people who are campaigning against corruption that which follows always ends up being more corrupt the purpose existing before you saw that spectacularly in Ukraine you saw that by the in the Soviet Union as well, just to say. So anyway, let's focus on the specific countries now. Let's start with Venezuela, because I think in some ways, at this moment in time, I think it's the

big one, but they've already attempted colour revolutions in Venezuela. They've already attempted to use internal protests to overthrow the government in Venezuela. It's not worth. Now they're going a step further. Are we going to see an armed attack on Venezuela? It seems almost certain they have put all the pieces in place that are required to do this. Alexander, I heard you earlier this week talking about this specifically the way this operation might unfold. And for someone who always says you're not a military expert, it is pretty spot on. I mean, that's what they do.

People say there's no way they can invade. and occupy a country like Venezuela, they have no intention of doing that. They are going to use missile and airstrikes. They'll have special operations on the ground with Milton's opposition groups and mercenaries. And it'll be a similar replay of what President Trump attempted to do during his first administration, but on steroids with this U.S. military power behind it. They will attack infrastructure. They will just try to wipe out whatever is left of the Venezuelan government.

and then they will see C, see how bad the government is in Venezuela, how horrible their policies are. The U.S. did this to Venezuela. And it's not to pick on President Trump specifically because this goes all the way back to President George Bush Jr. He attempted. And for a very brief time overthrew the government of President Hugo Chavez, and then it was reversed. And they've been trying to do this ever since. And then during the four years, Biden was president. He continued absolutely all of the sanctions.

and ramped them up and engaged in election meddling in Venezuela as a continuation of what President Trump did during his first term. So we have to keep a very close eye on this. All of the pieces required for military action in this way, this air and missile strike campaign, and then the use of elements on the ground, kind of like what they did in Libya in 2011. Now what they have to do is build consensus.

They have to build consensus and they have to shape, the battlefield in Venezuela specifically and geopolitically across Latin America to actually execute this. And it's very alarming watching Americans cheer on, blowing up some speedboats that obviously wasn't going to make the trip from Venezuela to the U.S. over a thousand miles. And that's how speedboats work. And with no due process, not identifying who these people were, the U.S. government is accusing these gangs of trafficking drugs, yes, but also innocent, huge. human beings. So how do you know you blew up just a bunch of drug dealers and out a bunch of

human beings that needed rescuing from these drug gangs? How do you know there were drug gangs in the first place? And isn't this what we went through 20, 20, 25 years of the war on terror, the drone warfare all around the globe? The exact same thing. Killing suspected terrorists and then leaked documents reveal over certain periods of time, 90% of these people killed by U.S. drone strikes were completely innocent, had nothing to do with terrorism. So this is very alarming that Americans are still being pulled into this. I remember President Trump himself saying he has secured the border, he is rounding up all the foreign drug gang. So how are the drugs still getting in and how are they being sold to Americans if that's true?

One of these things isn't true and probably both of them are untrue. And we're watching another WMD style pretext in the making right before our eyes. Absolutely. And I think we, Alex and I were discussing this, and we will, I think our program about this is going to come out reasonably soon, but we discussed this. That in fact it also fits in very well with sort of American popular culture, attacking drug gangs, going after cartels, calling the Venezuelan government a drug cartel. It creates a very, very attractive narrative, which are an awful lot of Americans. are going to buy into. And I think, by the way, that here you can see something else,

the extraordinary contrast between the legal community's response to this attack, which is exactly what you said, Ryan. Lawyers, international lawyers, were horrified by this attack on the speedboat. And the absolute silence in Congress. Congress has gone missing in action. as somebody rather well put it. I mean, they're not asking any questions about this buildup, this event at all. They're sitting out and letting it happen.

Some of them, of course, wanted to happen because they're absolutely part of the system that wants these regime changes. Others are swept along by the narratives as well, but one way or the other. I'm afraid I think when this, when the attack on Venezuela comes, a lot of people in the United States are going to support it. There will be some opposition, but an awful lot of people are going to support it. Do you think that Venezuela has any chance? I mean, that he can repel this?

It's hard to say. You cannot overthrow a government with just missile and air strikes alone. The United States has tried this over and over again. It all depends on the elements on the ground. whether the Venezuelan government, the militias that has built up for self-defense and its own military, whether they are able to remain cohesive and united in the face of this, again, yet another war of aggression. To touch on the legal issue, I have spent the last two days explaining to adult Americans

that due process is not to protect terrorists or criminals. It is to protect innocent people from being mistaken as terrorists and criminals or being punished as a terrorist or a criminal. And the fact that there are so many Americans lining up in support of this policy, indifferent to due process, not even understanding what it even means. That is extremely alarming because America as a nation is based on innocent until proven guilty, people's rights, their individual rights, being opposed to tyranny, unchecked tyranny. That was the whole purpose of establishing the U.S. independent of the British Empire in the first place. So it's alarming. It's not surprising, and I agree with you, Alexander.

When it happened, if and when it happens, the Americans will probably support it. There will be very little opposition to it, just like with the war on Iran. And a lot of this is just being steamrolled forward, and people really really. don't even have time to even think about it. I just want to confirm what you've just said. Due process is what makes law law. If you take away due process, what you have left is not law any longer.

It's become completely arbitrary and entirely tyrannical because it is due, without due process, law simply cannot function. Whatever is left becomes a kind of, anti-law, if anything. Anyway, let's actually turn to another country, which is because we talked about Venezuela, because this looks like a military attack. What about Iran?

Because Iran appears to expect an attack. There are reports that they are now working on an air defense system with the Russians. First of all, do you agree with my view that an attack on Iran is likely to happen? There was an article in foreign policy that also said that the writer there thought that there would be an attack on Iran this year as well. You also think this. And is Iran in a better position to resist an attack than Venezuela is? And if so, why? I think it's inevitable.

I don't know when, but it is inevitable. This is what the U.S. has been determined to do all throughout the 21st century. The primary geopolitical objective of the United States is still establishing and maintaining primacy over the entire globe. So all of these things that it has been doing up until now continue, even if they try to convince people otherwise. Just one more thing about Venezuela. A lot of people are saying because there was that political article about how the U.S. is retreating back to the Western Hemisphere, and it's no longer going to worry about Russia and China. Do people remember under the Obama administration the pivot to Asia?

That did not mean that they weren't going to still continue burning all of these other places to the ground. It just meant they're going to spend more time focused on Asia than they had been previously. That is exactly what they're talking about. They are still determined to prevent peer and near peer competitors from reaching parity or surpassing them. That is their absolute utter obsession, destroying Iran. is part of this agenda. So yes, they are going to. I would say that Iran is in a better position as far as we can tell. We have watched Iran defend itself. It has a very large and capable missile force. The whole reason, you know, the conflict didn't actually end. It is on pause.

And that is because the United States and Israel ran out of air and missile defense munitions. They ran out. And so they paused it. And Iran has, suffered a serious damage during that exchange as well. Their air defense system looks like it took severe damage. That is not something that you just rebuild overnight. I don't know how long. I don't know what state it's in or what progress they've made in fixing that. But I would say they still stand a better chance.

Venezuela just always has seemed much more precarious. We don't know how their military is going to operate. during a conflict. Half of the military could turn on the other half. For all we know, we don't know. At least in the case of Iran, we saw the unity that Iranians demonstrated during that conflict.

And I think they will do that again. And so we'll just have to wait and see. Iran also has the advantage in that it's not just a member of the Bricks, but it is a Eurasian country. It has secure road and rail and air links to China. and Russia, whereas Venezuela is an entire, well, it's oceans away. And maybe this is a military thing that perhaps you can better discuss than others, which is that Russia and China are not in a position to exert military power in Venezuela

on its behalf. At this particular point, only the United States continues to have global reach, in that kind of way. But can you explain that because it's something that I personally run into all the time. People say, you know, Venezuela is going to be a doubt?

What are the Russians and the Chinese going to do? Can you respond to this? Well, you're absolutely right. Russia and China have very limited options what they can do for Venezuela. People have to understand the United States spent decades building up its global spanning military presence.

That includes bases. and all of the logistics that serve it. They have a massive sea lift and strategic airlift component to their military forces. And this is what allows them to move their army military forces around the globe whenever they feel like it. Russia and China simply do not have these capabilities. Their militaries are designed and being built up right now to defend their countries, not project military power across the planet. And so they don't physically have the ability to move their military.

from where they are now to Venezuela to do anything to stop the United States. I mean, there are probably things they could do to help Venezuela enhance their ability to defend themselves. They probably are in many ways, but whether that's sufficient or not, I don't know. And just think about it. The United States is right there. That is actually much closer to the United States than many of the wars of aggression it's normally pursuing.

So people have to remember that. And you're absolutely right about Iran, too. It's much closer to Russia and also China has these logistical links to them. And so they're able to benefit from that. I thought people should think about Syria. Just Syria is much, much closer to Russia than Venezuela. And Russia ultimately failed protecting the government there and supporting the military there. It's not as if they failed because they're incompetent.

It was the fact that they were overstretched. And this goes back to the Rand Corporation 2019 paper extending Russia. The whole purpose of a lot of what the U.S. is doing, including provoking and attacking Venezuela, is to overstretch Russia but also China and also Iran. They want to overstretch all of these countries, keep them tied out in one area, overstretched in another area, and they use their ability to move around the planet with ease, much easier than Russia or China, to gain the advantage. So that is what we're watching.

transpire right now. Yeah. By the way, just to quickly add, on Iran, you asked how long it would take the Iranians to build up an air defense system. Somebody who has some contact with Russian thinking has told me the Russians think it would take the Iranians two years, two years to get to the point where they have an air defense system, which would not be fully effective, by the way, but it would at least have an ability to make a successful, an effective counter, a reasonably effective counter to an attack. It would still not be anywhere close to being fully up to need. So this is how long these processes take.

Let's talk about the overall geopolitical thing, because you said something I think very important, that the United States doesn't want to see any peer competitors emerge. And everything that's been happening over, certainly the last 30 years, has revolved around this. There was even actually, there's a doctrine that the United States actually set out in 1992. It's never been fully published, the Wolf of its doctrine, which made it the actual official policy of the United States, never to allow a peer competitor to emerge. Now, what do you say to those who would argue that we are actually already there,

that the Americans have done everything they possibly can to prevent a peer competitor emerging? But the events in China last week showed that China at least has reached that point where it could be argued that it is. is if not a peer competitor, at least a peer state. It has the resources and the technology and the aggregate power to, at the very least, match the United States. And though Russia obviously is in a lesser category, because it's a most economically, much smaller population in terms, much smaller country. Nonetheless, it has also achieved an ability to match the United States in its immediate territory and the areas immediately adjoining to it. So what is your response

to this? Well, I think I would agree with that. The United States is attempting to prevent nations like Russia reemerging or China from rising, and they clearly have failed. These countries continue their upward trend. But that doesn't mean that they're going to give up on it. Now the priority shifts to we fail to prevent this, now we have to reverse this. And now they're going to do it in much more dangerous and desperate way. And I think we already see that manifesting itself. The way the United States launched a war against Iran, decapitated, Hezbollah's leadership, attempted to decapitate the Iranian leadership, are now setting the stage to do so with Venezuela. This is this is just, this is serial military aggression that I have not, I don't remember seeing. I mean, we, we,

watched the US invade Afghanistan and then Iraq, it was a very lengthy process to build consensus. This is just reckless. And again, it's just steamrolling forward. And they're not even taking time to build a case or convince anybody. They're just rushing right through it. So I think that's where they are right now. They're in a mode of desperation and they are trying to reassert themselves. Now, they have failed to prevent the rise of a peer.

or near peer competitor, now they are rushing to reverse it. And they're going to use everything at their disposal to do it. And they will do it at the expense of everyone else on the planets before they themselves end up paying any sort of cost, which is why they constantly talk about burden sharing, the vision of labor and strategic sequencing. They're going to use their allies to their fullest extent, even if it's completely at the expense of these countries

as functioning nation states. That is what they're going to do. They're already in the middle of doing it in Europe, vis-a-vis Russia, through Ukraine, and now they're preparing nations in Asia to do this vis-a-vis China. Actually, you make a very important point, which is about decapitation strikes and killing the leaders of countries. Because actually, not only is this illegal in itself, but the fact that this has been done has broken an important.

important taboo, even during the Second World War, even despite the nature of some of the regimes that were fighting in that war, the participants of the Second World War did not seek to kill the leaders on the other side. That is, gives you a sense of how strong the taboo against doing this used to be. And there are reasons for it. There are reasons why. that taboo is there now that is being thrown aside and we see decapitation strikes becoming increasingly an accepted part of western state state graft and people applauding them as well by the way so as i said i just wanted i did want to just make that point now um given the china especially is its aggregate power is now at least level in some ways,

at least economically, I'd say economically, it's ahead of the United States, at least in manufacturing and technology. Persisting with this, this policy of trying to reverse this process, it's not only reckless and increasingly dangerous, Isn't it also utopian as well? How do you force a country as big as China to go backwards? It's not going to happen.

Well, I was going to say that if you look at what they are actually trying to do there and they're putting the pieces of this together right now, and this, again, transcends presidential administrations. It's not a Trump. or Biden or Obama thing. They are rebuilding the U.S. military to strangle Chinese maritime shipping, not just in and around China, but far beyond China and the reach of its military. We were just talking about how they have a limited reach worldwide.

So the United States, and we can see them doing this. This is why they're involved in Indonesia, here in Thailand, neighbor in Cambodia. Myanmar is already for all intents and purposes dysfunctional, nearly a failed state, if not a failed state, they are just burning everything down around China. And then if they can find a pretext to justify clamping down on Chinese maritime shipping and trying to do to China, isolate China in the same way that it isolated Russia from 2022 onward or maybe 2014 onward, they think in their mind that there is a possibility of, and especially considering how large the Chinese population is,

They imagine there's some sort of socioeconomic fragility. They could exploit. And if they're able to shock China on a large enough scale, fast enough, strong enough, they can. They can have China, you know, reverse, basically its rise, or at least pause it or freeze it in place. This is what they are openly talking about in their policy papers, again, for years in years.

And these policies are manifesting themselves. as U.S. military doctrine, as U.S. military weapons programs. They are deploying these weapons right now as we speak in places like the Philippines, the Korean Peninsula, Japan. They're contracting with companies to build the next generation of weapons to work on all of this. People imagine that the United States is going to try to fight and then be defeated by China in some sort of head-on war. No, they're not going to do that.

they're going to take advantage of their ability to act globally with impunity and China's inability to stop them beyond their own shores. This is what they're going to attempt to do. And if they fail, think about this. If they fail, what really is the cost for the special interest in the United States? Will anyone hold them accountable from all of the death, destruction, and damage they do to the entire planet in this process? No. So they see, why not? Even if it's a small chance, it's worth taking it. do not accept China surpassing the United States and the collective West. That is unacceptable.

And we'll try anything and we will try this. Well, which now brings me to the next point, which is about Russia. Because I am about the only person I think, well, I'm not the only person. There was this article that appeared in August 2021, written by a man called Aaron West Mitchell, who it turns out is a very close friend of Elbrose. Colby, the man that we know is now the presiding genius, if you like, within the Pentagon. Anyway, Elbridge Colby, Erron, West Mitchell said that what we need to do is organize the defeat of Russia in Ukraine, so as basically to capture its government, and align Russia with us so as to isolate China.

This is written in August 2021. Now, what we're actually seeing is the reverse of this happen. Russia hasn't been defeated. It's now building gas pipelines, China. China is opening up its financial markets to Russian companies so that they can float bonds there, which I think is a big thing. a big thing. They are now once again resuming work on joint aerospace programs. And of course, Russia is also stepping up food exports to China. Is this China's response in a sense to what

you said, the attempt to suffocate China to take away its ability to develop its resources, resources that it needs to keep its economy, its people fed, its industries humming. The Chinese are now no longer focused exclusively on maritime trade, that they're instead starting to think about developing relations with Russia and with the Central Asian states to counterbalance this. Yes, absolutely. I think that is the entire concept behind the Belt and Road initiative. These are land routes that China is using to move goods and people between them and all of their partners. And they've made a lot of progress on this.

Unfortunately, the United States is well aware of this. And they have been attacking Belt and Road Initiative projects in a multitude of ways. One way is that billionaire was talking about here in Thailand who went to Washington and then came back talking about pivoting back to the U.S., Japan and Europe. He actually came back saying Thailand should cancel its high-speed rail project with China. So this is part of the Belt and Road initiative and instead opt for Hyperloop, which doesn't even exist. It's just a totally absurd. And that was his actual policy. That was what he was running on for becoming his party getting into power and him becoming prime minister.

That's what he wanted. And so that's one way. And then he and NGOs funded by the U.S. government are going up and down the route that it's being built and encouraging people to cause as much illegal trouble as possible to delay it as much as possible. In Pakistan, the U.S. has armed terrorists just attacking infrastructure projects, killing Chinese engineers and the Pakistani security trying to protect them. And in Myanmar, there are Belt and Road Initiative projects, a pipeline that brings hydrocarbons directly to China, circumventing the Malacostr. great, the U.S.-backed terrorists there are physically attacking these pipelines and also Chinese investments all over the country. So this, when you think about it, although it's by proxy, the U.S. is already waging a hot war against China in all of these places. They're just doing it

through proxies, just like they're in a hot war with Russia, but it's just kind of through Ukraine. And so that's where we already are. And the U.S. seeks to escalate even beyond this. This is what's so troubling. But as you pointed out, and I did hear you and Alex's conversation about the power of Siberia two pipeline, an excellent conversation. I think a lot of people in the West misunderstand that Russia and China are unnatural allies and they've been forced together. But the majority of their history over time, they have actually worked very well together.

And the Sino-Soviet split was actually a bit of a historical anomaly. And so if that's part of their calculation in developing a strategy, I think that probably explains why they're so off the mark. Absolutely. You're completely right about this. I've actually did essays about this whole topic of Russian-Chinese relations when I was at university, by the way. And I know this history very well. And Russian-Chinese relations go back to the 17th century.

Russia was the first European state to establish diplomatic relations with China. and had an embassy in China throughout the 18th century, which most people don't know about, by the way. But anyway, if we are looking at road and rail rings and resource links, and by the way, the Chinese are building an enormous railway through Tibet at the moment, which is an axi chin, by the way, just an area which India has claims, which also looks to be connected to developing the Chinese interior and establishing these links with these resource-rich nations, Russia,

and the Central Asian states. Does that mean that in the end it's the Central Asian states which where all this conflict is going to really play out? I know there's been a lot of interest in the Central Asian states and you get lots of things and think tanks about them. And is this also where perhaps Iran suddenly becomes important and interesting and Turkey as well? Because you can do things on China's periphery in Myanmar and even Thailand. And I don't want to discount what's happening there.

But if you really want to get at the heart of this, Central Asia, it seems to me, is the heartland. is the heart of the heartland, if you like. What do you think about this? Is this where the focus is going to be? I think it already... I think it already has been for many years. I think that is one of the contributing factors that actually compelled the United States to invade

and try to occupy Afghanistan for so long. I mean, look at where that's located on a map. And the Central Asian nations, the US has invested millions and millions, and millions and millions of dollars every single year, through the National Endowment for Democracy, USAID and whatever it's called now, and all of these other funding mechanisms

to do to these countries, what it has done everywhere else, try to politically capture them, transform them into battering rams against all of their neighbors, including both Russia and China, and essentially destroy the country itself, because if all you're doing is hosting U.S. troops or just denying Russia and China cooperation,

then what happens to your country? I mean, you end up looking like Ukraine. And so they have been trying this. I think a lot of people forget right before Russia launched its special military operation. They actually sent troops to, I think it was Kazakhstan, because the U.S. was trying to overthrow the government there. And they actually, it was so important to them that they sent U.S. troops, they sent Russian troops there to stabilize it.

And they did. They stopped it. And then after that, they launched the special troops. military operation into Ukraine. And so if Russia and China commit to these Central Asian states in that manner, they begin identifying the color revolution as America's actual and most dangerous super weapon, and they start arming their partners and potential partners to defend themselves against it, in the same way they help nations defend themselves against actual military power by selling them weapons, then I think they could turn this around significantly. This,

If the US, its ability to politically capture nations through the NED, open society, color revolutions, if that was taken away from them, they would be significantly weaker. I would say it would be impossible for them to continue pursuing primacy. Ron Beletic, I'm going to finish stop there because that's actually a very good place to stop, because I agree, by the way. I mean, this is their last big card in this game. I mean, military power. they can't really use because the other side is now too strong. I think Ukraine has demonstrated that conclusively. Economic power, that economic power is waning, but they still have this enormous ability to do the kind of infiltrations

and destabilizations and color revolutions that you're talking about. And as I said, this is the last card in their pack, really, that they have to play. I think it's a good point to stop. I'm going to ask you to stay. I'm sure Alex has lots of questions to put to you, and I'm going to go over to Alex. We've got a lot of questions,

but we also have some breaking news, which is from Nepal. It looks like the government has collapsed. That's how it looks. Well, there you go. Now, the parliament stormed by protesters, reports claim that the parliament was set on fire, Prime Minister, they claim, has resigned.

They're dragging some prime ministers and former, some former government officials and current government officials. They claim they are dragging them through the streets. Anyway, it looks like, looks pretty chaotic. Pretty violent, actually. So that's the news. It does appear as if Nepal has been a successful regime change. what do you guys think oh absolutely and again to say this about Nepal Nepal is a very interesting country because it is called between it is it is between China and India India has long considered

itself to be the paramount power in Nepal is very very sensitive about what goes on in Nepal and of course there's also there was there was used to be a communist insurgency in Nepal which had some connections with Mao's China. You wanted to create tension between China and India at the time where the two countries are moving together, trying to create chaos in Nepal. And this looks very ugly, by the way, is an obvious way to try to go about doing it.

Absolutely. And actually, Alexander, you said something, I think it was earlier this week about Peter Navarro, and you were asking, why is this man so upset that China and India are trying to make peace, which obviously would benefit everyone on planet Earth because it would mean more peace and stability worldwide. And you would only be upset about that if your plan was to maintain American primacy

and do it by dividing and conquering everyone else, which is exactly what he and the people around him are doing. Peter DeVarro wrote a chapter in Project 2025 about using tariffs to reindustrialize the U.S. But he had no intention of doing that. It was all about maintaining American primacy. And the opening to his chapter was, America is the top superpower in the world, and we need to maintain it that way.

And so that is everything that we see now is these ideas manifesting themselves as foreign policy and interference. Yeah, the images coming out of Nepal are really, really ugly. Yeah, it looks like the government officials are either trying to run away or have been captured. It looks like some of them

have even been captured by the military? Maybe the military has also turned down the government. That's the way it looks. But anyway. Quite pleasant. Yeah. Yeah. Britain, by the way, also has very, very strong connections with Nepal.

It's part of the British Empire. And the British army still recruits troops then, just a say. Yeah. So quite an interesting development in Nepal. As we do this live stream on regime change, we get a regime change. seems. So let's do some questions, Brian, Alexander. Let's start things off with Nikos, who says Brian and Duran, will Europe send troops to Ukraine anyway, using the North Korean troops

as an excuse? They will say they'll pay after the war ends. Well, I mean, they're going to send troops to Ukraine because Secretary of Defense Pete Higsev pulled them to back in February, told them get get ready you're going to send them in this is how we're going to freeze the conflict and if they honestly think they can even have a small percentage of a chance of freezing the conflict by doing this then then they are definitely going to do it from iranian kiddo uh brian in two In 202023 Lavrov supported a joint statement by Gulf cooperation in the UAE laying claims to Iranian islands, islands which were occupied by the British for some years before Iran regained control. The UAE was only founded in 1971.

Alexander or Brian? Well, I know I know nothing. I know nothing about this. At the moment, I mean, whatever happened in 2023. Yeah, go on. Here's a second part. Maybe this helps. By the way, Serge Lavrov was instrumental. instrumental in devising the snapback mechanism, which will be used next month to reimpose sanctions on Iran. So when Alexander says Iran must trust Russia, with all due respect, I beg to

differ. Is that Labroth created those snapback? He didn't create them, but he was part of the consensus that existed that brought them about. This is unequivocally so. But we're looking back now to the world of 2015. I've never said that Iran should trust Russia. I don't remember ever saying anything like that. If I have, well, you know, I said more than I intended. And I've always said that Iran has legitimate reasons to have historic mistrust of Russia. What I have always said is look at Iran's situation now. Where is the threat to Iran? coming from? Is it coming from Russia? The answer is no. The Russians are opposing the reintroduction of snapback sanctions against Iran. They're saying that it is illegal. The Russians are offering to

sell weapons to Iran. The Russians are offering to provide military intelligence and assistance to Iran. This is what Iran needs to understand. Taking on the United States and Israel by itself, I think is going to be, well, extremely dangerous. You need all the friends and allies that you can find if you are in that kind of confrontation. Russia is a very powerful country. China is still more so. You cannot turn away help like that.

I agree with that. And, you know, I, you know, people say Iran wants to be independent. You know, when, when you have, free and you're independent, yes, it's great. You don't answer to anybody else. But in order to achieve anything in life, you have to cooperate with others. Cooperation always means compromising and giving up a little bit of that freedom. And you can give up a little bit of that freedom, or you can try to fight the U.S. and Israel all by yourself and then you just lose your whole country. So it seems like an easy decision to make from my point of view. And another, one last

thing. People are always looking to blame Russia or China or even Iran, for that matter, for all of these developments geopolitically that are being driven by the U.S. and its client states. People have to be a little more realistic about how the world works. It is not a Hollywood movie where you just openly head-on, fight the bad guy and win. You have to think about this strategically. You have to think in the here and now, but also along the axis of time. Now, in the future, how are things going to shape up? It's like a very complex chess game. It's not always as direct as people imagine it.

Yeah. From Agu, if the U.S. administration believes a decapitation airstrike will give them control of the government, then they have reached a high level of self-delusion. Venezuela will be Trump's Bay of Pigs fiasco. Brian, your thoughts. And that could be true. You know, people have to remember, the United States isn't only seeking regime change and then putting a client regime in the place of the current government. They will settle for a dysfunctional failed state.

What they are trying to do is isolate Russia and China. They are trying to take away a Russian and Chinese ally that they are incapable of coming to the aid of. It's to make a point, but it's also, again, like just think about the planet as a big game. game board. They are taking a piece off the board that is working in favor of Russia and China at the moment. That's what they're doing. They don't care how that looks, whether it's a client regime installed into power or just a failed state with destroyed infrastructure and the economy. Rob Wan says, thank you, thank you, thank you for all your efforts, the resources, the insights, the hours, all three of you have put in. Very grateful for it all. Thank you, Rob one for

that and let's let's go back to Nikos for Brian and Alexander you have been ignoring Finland please check it out they are arming Finland to the teeth with 15 new bases for an invasion of Russia the Finns hate the Russians I know this firsthand is it a problem well I'll tell you so I can I start with this I mean I have had many many contacts with Finland to come with I used to visit, and this is what is so extraordinary about this, because the Finns did not used to hate Russia. I can remember on the contrary, when Finland and Russia got on really very well, and in the Soviet period, Finland and Russia were economically very close and

personally very close, and the leaders of these two countries went to Saunas together, I remember, and Russian banyas and all of that kind of thing. And at a personal level, between Finns and Russians. There was quite a lot of friendly interchange. The extraordinary speed of this reversal is remarkable, and you're absolutely right, there is a buildup, a military buildup in Finland. And can I just say it is going to be a disaster for Finland. Finland was used historically by other powers to attack Russia. And it was a disaster for them. They lost 10% of their territory. They were very, very lucky to escape as an independent country. It's incredible to me that the Finns are letting themselves be used in the same way all over again. And all I will say

is it was done by a political elite. They didn't put it to a referendum. They didn't put NATO membership to a referendum. There was never a proper election about it. It was all done in a very manipulative way, and I'm afraid Finland will one day pay the price for it. And I agree with all of that, and I just want to say that this is why being politically captured is so dangerous. Have a nation that has a friendly relationship with its neighbor

and doesn't gain anything at all by starting hostilities with that neighbor, but once you politically capture the government, and if you control their information space, you can convince the population of literally anything. And that is what they've done to Ukraine, and it is at the expense of Ukraine's existence. It is going to be a rump state at best. That's at best, and at worst, it will cease to exist. And that is, as Alexander said, that is the danger now Finland is presented.

And the U.S. doesn't care. That is the whole point of having proxies. You have them pay the full cost of your actions, and you gain all of the benefits. Kane Whitehead says, Brian, Whitehead says, Brian will. confrontation against China over Taiwan end up being a Suez Canal crisis for the U.S. and ruin its reputation as a global hegemon. I don't know about that. I would actually like to hear Alexander's take on this,

because I think he probably knows more about the Suez Canal incident. But what I will say is, first of all, Taiwan is part of China. The United States seeks to use Taiwan in a very similar manner. It's using Ukraine. It wants to use it to exact the highest cost possible. on China to reunify or to at least counter whatever the U.S. does to provoke China. And they do not care at the entire surface of the ion is scoured of all human life, infrastructure and industry. That's what their own policy papers say. So that's where they

stand on that. And that's what their objective is. I mean, there are some similarities between China and the United States and Britain and the United States and the 50s and Suez. But you have to understand that there are immense differences as well. The Suez crisis was the last flicker of the old British Empire to try to assert itself against the rising hegemon, which was the United States. Now, I don't want to make it sound as if the British were the good guys in Suez because emphatically they were not. In fact, the whole Suez affair was tawdry and ugly from every conceivable point of view.

And what the British were trying to do was dreadful. And if anything, it was the Americans who were in the right over that one. But the point was that the British tried to assert themselves. They tried to maintain control of the Suez Canal. They tried to engineer what was in effect a regime change in Egypt by arranging a conspiracy to invade Egypt, which is ultimately intended to overthrow Gamal Nassas government. The United States got wind of it.

They said no, and they stopped it, and they did it because they had enormous power over the British economy, which was heavily in debt to the United States. And at a time of fixed exchange rates, the Americans started to sell gold, pound sterling which was creating crisis and was draining Britain of gold and the British were basically brought to heal so the key thing is Britain and the United States at that time were

allies they were allies Britain was a subordinate ally of the United States and there was a tremendous imbalance of power between the United States, which is at that point at its 1950s, perhaps its peak as a global economic power, whereas Britain was already clearly in decline and was already only a fraction of the power of the United States. Now China and the United States are not allies. There are adversaries and the imbalance of power. If there is one, between the China, China, the United States is in no conceivable sense as great as the imbalance of power was between the United States and Britain in the mid-1950s. So I would say that Suis is a wrong analogy to follow. I don't myself think that the similarities are that strong when you unpack them in the end.

The Nexus says, I am in the H and teach my students media competency, often inspired by Brian. For that, the school board censored me. Brian, please come on the Nexus. Here's the message, Brian, to join the Nexus. I'm not sure what that is. Nor do I, but anyway. All right. Yeah.

There it is, Brian. Thank you for that super chat. And from, let's see here, from Utwada 1. Interesting question. Brian, Alexander, in two years, they took 1% of Ukraine. Atrition is not working fast enough. West is restarting production. Flipping regimes.

How many years do they have? I'm not sure where the 1% comes from, but I guess that's the movement. of the actual front line, I guess, since the opening year of the SMO. Anyway, attrition is not working fast enough, Brian. We really don't know. I mean, I would say that it is working. Measuring it by territory taken, I think that is the wrong approach.

This is what a lot of Western analysts have been doing, and they're wrong to do this, and that is why they've been wrong about everything all along for the last three, almost four years now. It is a war of attrition, and they are grinding down not just Ukraine's military power, especially its trained manpower. That is almost essentially gone. They're also demilitarizing the United States.

Yes, the U.S. and Europe are trying to ramp up arts production, but not anywhere near fast. I mean, we're watching this happen. Right now they're talking about, you know, people panic when they read these headlines. 3,000 ERAM missiles. They're talking about the first 1,000 getting to Ukraine. in like the first two or three years. And if you compare that to the number of actual cruise missiles, Russia has, which they don't need a version of the ERAM because they can just make cheap cruise missiles.

They have almost a thousand of each being made every single year. And so for the U.S. to catch up, they still have years to go. So Russia doesn't have forever to do this. But I think right now there's still where they need to be in order to finish this, see this through. I was listening to the Kiev independent, which is in Ukraine and is as pro-Ukraine as you can get. And they were talking about entire sections of defenses that are unmanned because Ukraine simply doesn't have enough people to fill it up with. And when we see these rapid breakthroughs, and as you, Alex and Alexander, you say in your broadcasts, Ukraine has to respond like a fire

brigade with their reserves to push the Russians back. And the Russians will go back because they're not trying to take territory. They're just trying to overstretch them. and grind them down. And it is working. And it's not linear. It is happening exponentially. And so there will be a point where it will noticeably collapse. And right now, we're watching Russia make more progress now in like a month than they, than they were in, say, a year, you know, one or two years ago. I mean, I have nothing to act with that. I think that's exactly right. I think that's a master's description of the situation. I mean, can I just say, Bryant has been the go two-person to have this explained pretty much the moment the SMO began.

Fuzzy Ball says Finland has five million people and most of them are liberal pacifists assembling a formidable army. It's nearly impossible. Well, you know, you say that, but of course in the British media we read a completely different story that the Finland has conscription and they're all enormously well trained. and ready to fight. And all that we have to do is to give them a few more weapons and installed a few more bases, and they will be in St. Petersburg tomorrow.

I am only very slightly overstating this. As a matter of fact, I know Finland, as I said reasonably well, and I know that what you say is much closer to the truth, but that's not the narrative that we're hearing in the West. Finland is already being set up as the country, the next country. I actually read an article. If Ukraine falls and the Russians attack the West,

it will be the Finns who will slow them down. All right. Mark Hewitt says, I assume that surrounding Venezuela is also about giving a message to Brazil. What do you guys think of that? I think that is absolutely true. I mean, Lula, of course, Brazil is a very big.

very divided society. And in some ways, it's, you know, it's brittle. But Lula has definitely been showing and doing and saying things which the Americans don't like. I mean, he's been the person who's been pushing most hard for a alternative reserve currency, for example. It's he who called an emergency meeting of the Bricks yesterday that discussed how to respond to sanctions. So, absolutely the United States is worried about Lula and of course it's worried about Brazil altogether Brazil is a big country it's potentially a rich country it could be the most powerful country in Latin America you don't want a strong country to rival you in your own region what you now are calling your own sphere of influence just say

Banos says brilliant analysis has always team Breaking news regarding Nepal is so prescient, especially after your spot-on comment about Central Asia as the next conflict theater. Thank you, Panos, for that. And Sue Whitaker says the Nepalese government banned social media, then reverse this. Why is this regime change? That's a good question. Why is this regime change?

In Nepal, why is it? Why are they regime changing Nepal? Why would this be defined, I guess. is a regime change? But if the U.S. is funding all of the opposition and leading them in the streets and having them burn things down, like I've watched them do here in Thailand,

2019, 2020, most recently, that it's essentially the U.S. is overthrowing a government using its own people as weapons against their own country. That is what they're doing. This is the danger of leaving your information space unguarded. In the 21st century, information space is a national. national security domain on par with your land borders, your shores, and your airspace. And if you're not protecting your information space now in the 21st century, it's like leaving

your land border open, allowing foreign planes to fly over at will, allowing ships to come and go on your shores as they please. That's what they're doing. And Nepal was trying to rein in these US-based foreign, these US-based social media platforms. And those platforms said no. and then we see the rest of the story. And other nations, people ask, why don't they throw out all these NGOs? Why don't they kick Google and YouTube and all of them out? This is why, because they will burn your country to the ground

if you're not prepared. Nico says, where did this Nepal news come up? Since when did Nepal been in a war of instability? Can you explain the history and who did this regime change? Nepal has a very long history. instability. I mean, I remember, I mean, within a relatively short time, it was an autocratic monarchy, just to say. And the monarchy was overthrown. There'd been tensions in Nepal. The British have always had greatly live influence in Nepal. India, as I said, considers itself the paramount power in

Nepal. It's always been an area of contention between India and China. It's also a very poor country. ways. They're a very rich country too in intellectual terms. Can I just say that? It's also, by the way, just for the record, probably the place, the territory of what is today Nepal, is probably the place where the man who we today call the Buddha was born. So, you know, it's a very, very historic, very, very historic region. But there's been a lot of instability in of Paul over the last few decades. The, as I said, the government, the, the monarchy sided with India against China. It had an autocratic approach that provoked a communist insurgency,

which established a significant reach in the countryside. There was a civil war that went on for a long, long time, and that has generated instability, which has never completely gone. Sparky says, Brian, why was the Venezuelan boat weighed down with 11 people instead of using its capacity for drug cargo when it only needs a couple of crew to operate? Was it a logistical crime against humanity? Oh, exactly. This is the whole point. Nothing about the story adds up at all.

President Trump says he's secured the border and people like, well, it's a boat. It's closed on your coast. That's part of your border. So if you secured your border, then that is also secured. And all the drug gangs have been rounded up. I was just reading it off the White House website itself. So if that has happened, how are the drugs still getting in? How is this still a danger?

So this is WMDs all over again. Instead of a little white vial in the UN with Colin Powell, it's a speed boat in the middle of the ocean with who knows what and who on board. We'll never know. You see, it's Hollywood again. People have seen in Hollywood and all the movies and, you know, on the speedboats with drugs, and they've heard all about narco submarines and all of that.

So you send in the Navy, you blow one up. And of course, it fits correctly. It fits exactly into that Hollywood narrative, if you like. Except, of course, what goes on in Hollywood doesn't actually correspond very closely with what really happens in actual life. I'm not saying that there are narco submarines. so that they don't use a speedboats from time to time. But you are making the mistake of actually factually sitting down

and unpacking this story. It's a mistake because the people who are peddling this story are not interested in the facts. It's the image. It's the movie that is being played. And of course, that movie is going to lead us on to the next part, the next part, the next part, which will be the missile strikes on the lair of the cartel king,

who is, of course, none other than President Maduro. Yeah, unfortunately. Yeah, exactly. Klaus Clemenson says, thank you for all you do. Do you think the war with Thailand and Cambodia is over? The thing is, it's not actually a real central issue. Most people, I mean, they're aware of it. Both sides are very patriotic.

And Thailand, by the way, was the only country in Southeast Asia that was never colonized by a Western power. Cambodia was colonized by the French. Thai people are very proud of that, that they did have to give up some of their territory to both the British and the French along their borders. And at one point, they had gotten that territory back. And so this does state back. There's a real border dispute, but it is not a reason to go to war.

And neither side actually believes that is a reason to go to war. And what happened was Hun Sen, and people make this mistake. He is the, well, he was the prime minister of Cambodia. Now he's president of the Senate. His son is now prime minister of Cambodia. They did a hard pivot. They were building relations with China, but I would say not very substantial when you really look at the numbers and the nature of it.

They did a hard pivot under the Biden administration, and now it continues under the Trump administration. They're making a hard pivot toward the United States. And it's very obvious they made some sort of deal with them. And Taxon and his daughter was prime minister here in Thailand at the time. And they were working together. Taxin and Hun Sen, these are close friends. And they have coordinated for many years together to destabilize each other's countries

in terms of eliminating opponents. And in Thailand, especially the U.S.-backed opposition, in 2010, they were like burning sections of the city. They had war weapons, and then a lot of them fled, and Cambodia gave them safe harbor. So they were working together to create this border incident, forcing the Thai military to take action. And then they used this as an opportunity for the U.S. to invite itself in and pose as mediator. And this is what they were doing in the South China Sea. This is how they're injecting themselves deeper and deeper into Asia by creating these false security threats,

and then posing as the solution to it. It's like someone breaking windows at night and fixing them at their car shop during the daytime. David, buterosa says, it seems that the authorities in Kosovo are increasing their hostilities against civilians in Kosovo. It seems that they would like to provoke Serbia. What's your thoughts on the situation, Brian?

Well, regarding Serbia specifically, this is what I've been researching. I'm looking at who is behind the protest. the media organizations promoting it, human rights groups providing free legal age to the protest leaders. So that's what I'm looking at. The whole Balkan region, I mean, it is a tangled mess of U.S. interference, NATO interference, and they are playing all of these different groups against one another, Muslims against Christians. They have all of these different separatist movements across the entire region. engine, the NED, which still has its website up and still has an entire document that you can

download where they're funding in Europe. They have three or four pages just for Serbia alone and all the different separatist movements that they're funding inside Serbia right now. So it doesn't surprise me that they're pushing on every single button to divide everybody as much as possible and cause as much chaos as possible. Sparky says, Brian, will the Seahel nations Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger come to aid, come to the aid of their beloved France and Macron in their time of need. French government has collapsed.

Yes, it has collapsed. Barkie, thank you for that. From Henrik, Brian, do you think the U.S. tariff move on Switzerland is to control institutions such as Risk V International, Risk 5 International, which is an open source CPU architecture. I mean, the whole point of tariffs, you know, the overview of what the U.S. is using tariffs for is not to reindustrialize the United States. It is to exert control over ally and adversary alike. That is what they're doing specifically about open source CPU architecture.

I mean, obviously they're against any sort of competition of any kind, geopolitically, in terms of technology. I would have to research that specifically to see if there is any concerted effort against that specifically. But overall, the tariffs are being used. Just as Peter Navarro said in his chapter about tariffs in the project 24-5, it's about reasserting American primacy. Vincent says, after the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, many soldiers returning here to the

USA suffered from PTSD, depression, and even suicide. what can Russia and Ukraine do to take care of the mental health of their veterans after the war? They have to actually give them care, not put them on a waiting line for three or four months. And then when they show up to the VA hospital, it's like a butcher shop in there and not get the care that they need. So this is what the U.S. government does. It is using these human beings. It dupes them into joining the military. It uses them to the fullest extent possible.

And they promise them all of these benefits, but just like a cheating insurance company, they try to get out of ever paying what they promised you. If Russia and Ukraine want to avoid this problem following this war, they need to actually care about their soldiers after the war is over. Zachary Jarvie says, our communities in America have been ravaged by drugs. The law and due process have done nothing for us. So no, we aren't concerned with this attack.

Normally a fan, but you're clutching pearls. Okay, again, due process is meant to protect innocent people from being mistaken as a drug cartel member and murdered at sea while being a completely innocent citizen. And one more thing, these people, Americans always finding someone else to blame for their own problems. Stopping a drug problem starts at your border and in your communities. and there are nations around the world that do not have drug problems right now because they have secured their border and they have fixed their communities and they've given their people something to do other than take drugs to escape the realities of their life that they don't like. And so maybe people instead of, you know,

hey, let's go fight a war with Venezuela over a thousand miles away. That'll stop the drugs, as if no other country is sending drugs into the United States. Get real. Again, these people, and these people are allowed to vote. And it's not to be disparaging to them. But this is reality. They are brainwashing people, indoctrinating them, telling them these far-fetched stories that are even close to grounded in reality, and they buy it up and they invest themselves wholeheartedly in it. And this is what in part allows the US to continue acting like this. I mean, just to quickly say, I mean, the important thing to understand is that this isn't about the drugs for anyway. There's nothing to do with it. I mean, it's about changing the government to Venice. And for the record, I mean, I wasn't aware of this, but I understand that, in fact, Venezuela is not an important source of drugs, of the drugs that go into the United States. I mean, other Latin American countries, you find that much more, much more there than as it is, than the case, then is the case with Venezuela.

Yeah, Sparky says, Brian, how will the government of France falling affect the CFA Frank, colonial Frank, in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso? It is a challenge opportunity or business as usual for them. Actually, I think this is a good question for Alexander. I know a little bit about this, but I think Alexander probably knows way more. I think the two things in themselves are unrelated. I mean, Macron's fall is not going to change. French policy, well, he hasn't fallen. I mean, the fall of the French government in Paris is not going to change policy by France in West Africa. And by the way, I don't really get any sense that any

new French government is thinking about changing the policy in West Africa either. So they will remain committed to this Frank. If there is going to be a challenge to the CFA Frank, it has to come from the African countries themselves. Don't look to Paris. Do it in your own territory, in your own region. And don't say to yourself, well, you know, Marine Le Pen becomes president or Madela becomes president or Jean-Luc Melanchon becomes president. We're going to be rid of this thing. It's not going to change it. I myself believe using a currency devised by devised for you by your former colonial master is to submit to neo-colonialism and it explains a lot of the problems in these countries and that is what I think people in these countries are increasingly coming to understand. Brian you have time for

for three more questions? Yes, sure. All right. David Falconier says, after, after Rodrigo DuTuerte sent to the ICC, do you think the ASEAN is becoming exacerbated with Manila in the Philippines? Well, the Philippines have been politically captured by the U.S.

And the U.S. has always held tremendous influence over the Philippines. It was literally a U.S. colony after the Spanish-American war. It took the Spanish colony, made it its own colony. It carried out mass murder against people resisting U.S. colonialism. And it only got its independence after World War II. I think it was 1945, 1946, something like that. But even after getting its so-called independence, U.S. has always maintained a military presence there

and has always interfered in the internal politics. And this explains why the Philippines has a much, much larger population than, say, Thailand, but a much smaller GDP, because it just has never been allowed to pursue its own interests and develop to serve those interests. And now with, hold on a second, let us want. I got to close something here. All right. Now with Duterte out, and now they sent him to the ICC, now it's, now it's completely, everything that was being done together with China to actually try to develop the country. These were infrastructure projects that were being built.

Marcos Jr. canceled them and had them torn down and has now redirected these funds to missile bases so that the Philippines can help the Americans point missiles at the Philippines's largest trading partner, which is China. And so again, it's another example like Ukraine, a nation that's been politically captured. It's government turned against its own best interest and now the information space trying to convince the population to turn against their own best interests. And of course, this complicates ASEAN as a regional organization because now you have part of it that is not operating as a nation state is captured and is working against the interests of the entire region, not just against the Philippines and China. Ruby Appel says, do you think the West understands the method of the Russian War of Attrition?

They don't really seem to have addressed it. I think some people do. I mean, most of my analysis when I talk and when I cite things are from the Western media. So buried in all of these articles pretending Ukraine was winning all of this time, were all of this evidence that they were losing. And it was because of a Russian war of attrition. So it's not that they don't understand it. They don't want to admit it.

Because if they admit it, everyone would realize how futile this was. And people in Ukraine would say, well, why are we doing this? And then the Americans would have to explain to the Ukrainians, well, we're fighting to the last Ukrainian. Some of them have actually literally said, we are fighting this to the last Ukrainian. We don't care about what happens to Ukraine. This is about exacting the highest price possible on Russia and keeping them tied up while we destroy all their friends and allies around the globe. That is why I think they don't really focus on attrition and the implications of it. Bad Wolf, TX says, are you seeing the news about the Israeli strike on Hamas and

Qatar? No. No, not not yet. I mean, I haven't seen it. I mean, I haven't seen. I haven't seen. I mean, I haven't seen it, but, you know, no doubt we'll be getting more in a while. A couple of more, Brian. It's on CNN. Okay. An attack on attack on Qatar. It's the Hamas leadership in Qatar.

Oh, wow. Okay. That's big news. Sparky says, Brian, I believe Ukraine changing back to its Zaris-era status is the best outcome. a Rump state would be a launching point for Western-sponsored operations. Ideally, Ukraine becoming like Belarus, that would be the ideal situation for both Russia and the people actually living in Ukraine. People don't understand this. There is no future for Ukraine in the European Union or as a NATO member.

There is no future for Ukraine in that direction. That is just a cliff that they will just fall down and disappear. So realistically, what is their other option? Their other option is to become like Belarus, where it is a close ally of Russia, it's not a threat to Russia. And if Europe and the Americans ever decide to work with the rest of the world rather than try to impose themselves on it, they could also work with Europe and the Americans. This was actually the arrangement before 2014. It was actually working very well, too well, and that's why the U.S. decided to upturn it. From Empire, we are.

We Americans must undo the National Security Act of 1947, the great bloodless coup d'etat. The more I look, the more I see this as the source of Brian's continuity of agenda. Well, I think that's a very good point, actually. I mean, it created a whole national security defense bureaucracy, which in turn built on the military industrial complex. It can not bind with the military. industrial complex and it created what if you like what if you wish is the permanent government of the united states that we've had ever since yeah sangeva says israeli war planes attacked the hamas negotiating team in katar with full approval of the u s a well as i said i do you remember

what we were discussing earlier in the program uh how um a boundary has it has been crossed you attack leaders attack negotiators. I mean, even in the ancient world, they didn't do that. I mean, attacking negotiators was considered the most extreme taboo. No, they do everything. They, there is, they show no restraints at all. We've been talking about this for a while, yeah. And of course, that line of decapitation strikes. Yeah. And of course, they've also humiliated the government of Qatar. Now, of course, what, how, how, how, It is going to react. I don't know. But let's assume, for example, that there were some people in Qatar who were involved in this, which is quite possible and colluded with it. The fact is that it has demonstrated to the world that Qatar is not safe. It cannot protect people who are there to conduct diplomatic missions. And this is exactly what the US uses Israel to do, things that it doesn't want to do, that it wants to create distance between itself and others. why they used Israel to attack Iran and that's why they use it to do this.

Nick says just got here, but didn't Nepal ban social media which would provide an expected response? It goes back to what you said, Brian, why white countries don't ban social media, don't remove NGOs is because of the fear of what could happen. Yes, they try to. And here in Thailand, the previous government, the one that the U.S. wanted to remove close with the Thai military. They tried to pass an NGO law. I think Georgia tried. Did they actually succeed in passing the other law?

They did. But it's, there was, I mean, we reported on it. I mean, and the protests are still going on. Yes.

Yeah. And so they tried to hear. And who is protesting? It was literally all the U.S. government funded organizations that would be held accountable and scrutinized under the law. And it wasn't,

banning them. It was just demanding transparency. Tell us who's funny. People are coming out to the streets because of things you're saying at a minimum to have a right to know why you're saying these things. And it's not because you care about people's interests, it's because the U.S. government pays you to say these things. And yet they still cannot do it. So it's very complicated. And what countries like Russia and China, I think they are doing is help give nations the backing, the tools, the space, the alternatives that they need to make this transition. to secure their information space the same way they secure their borders. Sparky says, Brian, if the U.S. need a modern-day grenade invasion to get its military groove back,

wouldn't it be better to choose to invade Greenland instead of Venezuela? The fact that we're even talking about any of this, I mean, it's kind of a joke, but at the same time, it's not because they actually talked about doing this. And so this is the mindset the U.S. is in it, is trying to murder and shock the world back in line under American leadership, which just means unipolar world order. That's what they're trying to do. And having talked to people in governments around the world, these are real human beings. They have families.

They have their lives. They're worried about that being taken away from them. And the U.S. knows this. And that's why they're doing. The Romans used to do things like this, terrorize, terrorize people and always have an axe hanging over their head so that they would stay in line. That's what the U.S. is doing in modern terms. Yeah, go to the New York Times, North Korea story that they put out just the other day

from 2019. And fishermen were killed by Navy SEALs. These are some guys who just in the morning, they wanted to go fishing, get some food, and they ended up getting shot by Navy SEALs. And that was during negotiations. And this is what a lot of people are trying to point out that the U.S. is never, it's the whole premise of its foreign policy is to maintain primacy. So whenever it negotiates, it is always negotiating in bad faith because at the end of the day, it wants to impose itself on use. So what type of negotiation can take place within that framework?

And so, you know, it doesn't surprise me that that was going on. It doesn't surprise me that in the middle of negotiating with Iran, U.S. armed Israeli planes tried to carry out. the decapitation strike. These things don't surprise me. All right. One more for you, Brian. We answer more than three, but the questions keep on coming in. Anyway, Bonas asks, Brian, after recent three months spent in Greece, was daily talk of Turkish threats,

with the U.S. distracted and chaos in the Balkans, what should us Greeks expect? Thanks again. I mean, that is something that you, Alex and Alexander, you will know way more about than me. But I would say that. I don't think Turkey would do anything without asking the U.S. first, no matter how hard they try to pretend that they're anti-Israel and independent and their dislike of U.S. policy, they're going to ask the U.S. first. I would agree. I would agree. I mean, I don't get the sense that there's an attack from Turkey coming anytime soon.

No, but don't believe anything that Erdogan is just saying, by the way. Nothing at all. At all, yeah. Anyway, all right. Thank you, Brian, for answering some questions. Thank you, thank you very much from everyone. Thank you. This is my pleasure.

Thank you so much for having me on. Brian, before you go, where can people follow your work? Again, just go to YouTube, type in The New Atlas, And then at the bottom of every video is a video description has all the other places you can find my work. X, Telegram, and Rumble. And thank you again. I will have those as a pin comment. Those links as a pin comment.

They are also in the description box down below. The great Brian Berletic, thank you so much for joining us on this live. Absolutely. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Brian. Yes, thank you. Take care, Brian. Bye.

Bye. All right. Alexander, you with us? Absolutely. All right, let's answer their remaining questions. A fantastic show, by the way. Absolutely. And look, the news, the news,

what happened in Nepal and this terrible event in Qatar, which, by the way, is an armed attack on Qatar. Yeah. Yeah, you know, I did my, I already did my video. I recorded my video for the day and I mentioned Nepal. But I thought that it had been resolved in my video. I said that the government had pulled back. And it looks like the protesters got what they want.

But look at how things have now turned. Just in the matter of two, three hours. Yes, I know. Instead of it, it reminds me a bit of my down in a way. You know, the government thinks that it's resolving the problem. And it says social media is, okay, we're not going to ban social media. forget about it, we're walking, whatever we're thinking of doing, we're walking it back.

Yeah. And then you have the escalation to remove the government. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, which also, I don't know your thoughts about this, Alexander, which also may indicate that Georgia did the right thing by pressing forward. Absolutely, I have no doubt about it. I've absolutely no doubt about it at all. All right, Haruko, thank you for that super chat.

Nikos says, one second, Alexander, let me pull it up. This is a two, a three-part question. Duran, you've talked about the U.S. pulling out of the Ukraine conflict, but it doesn't seem so. Everything is ramping up in Ukraine, Gaza, Venezuela, Iran, et cetera. the U.S. is behaving like the Soviet Union before it imploded when it was run by zombies like Andropov and Chernenko causing conflicts everywhere. We are in Cold War 2.0. It started in 2017 when both China and Russia became superpowers again and the U.S. wanted to stop them.

Only this time the U.S. is run by retards and nuclear conflict is desirable by them. Well, I think you're being a little bit of guides to Andropov and Chenenka. actually. I remember I lived through that time. I was there. The Soviets were starting very well, they weren't starting wars to anything like the kind of extent that we see playing

out at the moment. Now, about what's the news today, I mean, what's happened in Nepal is appalling. What's happened in Qatar is worse, actually. I mean, that is a massive escalation.

And it basically is a signal that all attempts to try and achieve a ceasefire in Gaza are now being blocked and are being blocked in the most kinetic way, if I can say it that way.

Antanty says it would appear that Putin is about as isolated as the sun. Yeah, true. Iranian Kido says Russia don't need a treaty to sell arms to Iran. They could do it today. That's why you keep hearing

Iranian generals brag about Iranian made arms. It's to compensate for the lack of military support from the so-called allies. Well, well, can I just say, of course, that's absolutely correct. The Russians and the Iranians don't need an actual treaty to be able to buy arms. And there have been problems. I mean, the Iranians did buy or thought they had bought S-300 missiles from the Russians. and then the Russians supported sanctions against Iran, and they called off the deal. And obviously that made people in Iran very, very angry. And rightly and justly so.

But the fact remains the Russians are prepared to supply weapons to Iran at this time. And there is a treaty now between Iran and Russia. And at this particular moment in Iran's history, when it is facing an absolutely ruthless and adversary and a very powerful one. And we've just seen today how ruthless they are with this attack on Qatar. Do they have the luxury of turning help away?

That's the only point I am making. Iranian Kido says, I'm sure Alexander will disagree with this again, but Russia will never sell advanced weapons or signed a defense treaty with Iran. Israel calls Iran. the enemy of the Jewish state and Russia is worried to cross Israel's red lives. Well, the answer is the Russians have already said that they are prepared to sell advanced

weapons to Iran. They said they were prepared to provide Iran with advanced air defense systems to create an integrated air defense system. This is something that Putin himself said and the Iranians rejected the offer. So it doesn't seem that that is true. not seen the Iranians themselves contradict or dispute what Putin said. Staying with Iranian kiddo, so let's not muddy the water and connect current events to the past conflicts or whether or not the Soviets supported Saddam against Iran in the 80s.

Their current actions take precedent over what they did in the past. I completely agree. So, if they're offering help accepted, put aside. Put aside what happened in the 80s and focus on the situation now. Iranian kiddo says you can't expect Iranians to see Russia as our ally out of the blue. And I'm not talking about Islamic Republic. I mean the average Iranian. Once those Suhoy jets finally land on the tarmac in Iran, then we know how our allies are.

Well, go ahead and buy them. I mean, again, it's not everything that I am getting. all the information I am getting is that the offer to supply these weapons, an air defence system is there. I've even been told, and I believe this is true, the source that has provided me with this information

has been consistently reliable that the Iranians are currently training on S-400 and S-300 systems in Russia itself, that deliveries have already been agreed. Let's just go ahead and move forward with all of this.

By the way, I think Just to say this, I think in Iran itself, they understand this now. I think the leadership in Iran is already made that decision. Alarijani went and met Putin. I never can remember the name of the Iranian Defence Minister for which apologies. But he was there in the meeting as well. They had a meeting with the defence ministries. There are apparently lots of contacts going on.

So I think the decision actually has been made. Nigel Green says in Korelekko at the moment Be safe, Duran family Thank you, Nigel for that. Nico says, did the French government collapse today? Yes. But Macron is still there. Macron is still there.

Nico says, you questioned Putin's restraint and the military disagreement of it. Levan has told me he didn't vote for him because of this restraint. Are the soldiers in military loyal to Putin? How strong is his authority? with the people. No, he is enormously popular and very strong, and his authority is huge, but that doesn't mean that people aren't able to disagree with him, and they often do.

One of the reasons his authority is as strong as it is is because people trust him, and the reason they trust him is because, as I've said many times, his heart beats with Russia. he ends up doing those things which instinctively Russians want him to do. Nikki Ball says, what is happening in Burkina Faso? Are they under EU sanctions yet? I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if they were, but I don't know. Let's see here.

One second, Alexander. Nikki Ball, thank you for that super checks. Nico says, what is your view of Tucker lately? he is losing me by trying to defend Trump and his pompous evangelical mission. He also caved in and started to walk back with his message from his interview. I haven't watched Tucker for a short time,

so I'm not up to date with what he's doing. Yeah. Sparky says, I welcome the U.S. name change back to the Department of War. It will be more difficult for Congress to justify a trillion-dollar budgets for a war department than a euphemistic defense department. There's a strange decision, actually,

but on balance I would agree. I mean, why hide behind euphemisms? Nico says, I see all these conservatives like him, like Tucker, promote God, but it only reinforces my atheist beliefs because when I see Israel starving children, I don't excuse their actions or mine to God.

It's all on us. Yeah, absolutely. Anmi 19 says, Alexander, in 1987, Blinken published the book ally versus ally main point no cheap russian gas for europe well now it's done do you think for blinking and co in their heads it's a win yes absolutely no question about it they definitely think it's a win mark says due process is the foundation of civilization sadly most americans have been sold on bullying instead absolutely uh christina says

Alex, what is going on with Cyprus and Israel and also Turkey and the British military base? Thank you. Well, I think a big question, actually. It's not so big a question. I think it's been made out to be a big question, a bigger question than it is. I mean, you guys see me doing my videos from Cyprus almost every day. Alexander, the British military base is more than a base. The British overseas territory.

Yes, true. I mean, people think it's just some base and Cyprus has control over it. But my understanding of a British overseas territory, Alexander, is that this is British land, right? Yeah. It is a British jurisdiction. Absolutely. So there's really not much that Cyprus can do about it as far as this territory is concerned. Correct?

Correct. All right. As far as Israel, we answered that question last live stream, Christina. Israeli investment has been happening at Cyprus for the better part. of 10 15 years this is not a new thing it has increased over the past yeah five years i would say yeah but you have a lot of investment from a lot of uh of countries a lot of countries including including russia including ukraine including uh lebanon including britain and also germany so keep that in mind um let's see barkey we answered that

Alex Shirazi, the Zionist Sackler family has killed millions of Americans over the years with oxycatin opioid pharma products. Why doesn't Trump go after them, L.O.L. Well, I must admit, I don't know anything about this, so I can't comment. I mean, this is, I don't know who these people are. I'm sorry. Game of Chair says, just a crazy thought. Would you think that Israel will smuggles small nuclear devices into Iran and detonate them at key sites? I think that would be an incredibly difficult operation to pull off.

I understand, I know again that in Hollywood movies, you get people moving around atomic bombs and planting them in all kinds of places. But I understand that it is nowhere near as straightforward as that. And I would presume that the Iranian security services were detected. So no, I don't think that's what the Israelis would try to do, actually. Matthew says, will the Russians strike the UK in response to long-range missiles? Well, they haven't yet, but they said they might. They're leaving it ambiguous.

I think it depends very much how it plays out. At the moment, the Russians feel themselves to be on the brink of victory in the war. I think they do, by the way, Putin's latest comments, Gerasimus, strongly points. to that. So I don't think that this is at the moment their priority, their priorities to destroy the Ukrainian army on the battlefields. Does Turkey have a large interest in Cyprus? Turkey occupies 36% of Cyprus. Exactly. They've been occupying it for the better part of 50 years. Monty 105 says, Alexander, you can try reading Guy Metin's book, creating Russophobia. it he also saw professor gleason's description of the origins of rusophobia in britain as incomplete

yes good i will look at i will look at that up you david we answered the duterte question aniko says the reason the sino-soviet split happened was because mao zadang liked Stalin and his version of a fully authoritarian communism mao was the problem Well, I think there was also another problem, which is that the Russians, the Soviets, saw themselves as the leaders of the international communist movement. And they saw Mao as somebody who wasn't prepared to follow their line. And they weren't able to bring Mao to heal. And so they made a disastrous decision, which was to stop economic and other aid to China. It was an attempt, in other words, by the Soviets to impose sanctions, and it backfired.

And I've heard many, many Russians tell me that this was the stupidest mistake that they made during the Cold War and that in some ways lost them the Cold War because it meant that they had to garrison their eastern border as well as their Western one, and that left them massively overextending. and it was one of the events that caused the Soviet Union to crack. Matthew says, Alexander, do you think we will get through this without all-out war? I think so. I think in the end we will. I think that the people who are driving these events are driven and deluded and even deranged, but I don't think they're suicidal.

Zachary Jarvis says, oh my God, pray for Nepal. Yeah, true. Peter says, as always, thank you, the Duranian Quito says, the question is, what are they trying to achieve by targeting Iran? The Constitution has provisions that specifically cover the situation if the leader, president, or vice president is incapacitated. Yes, but I don't think that they understand that. I don't think that they take Iran seriously as a state policy.

I think that they imagine that the government of Iran is a much more fragile entity than it actually is, and that the entire state structure in Iran is likely to collapse and collapse very quickly. Speaking of which, by the way, just to mention, I was reading in that there's a very strange magazine that gets published in Britain called The Free Press, which is written by various neoliberal meocom people.

Anyway, one of them went to southern Lebanon, expecting to find the collapse of Hezbollah after the attacks that had taken place on Hezbollah. And this is somebody who's very, very anti-Hesbullah, very pro-Israel. And he was absolutely shocked to find that Hezbollah has actually survived its decapitation strike and is massively present across southern Lebanon. So, you know, they don't understand this. They do assume the decapitation strikes are the way. to go because they imagine these structures, the governments, the political movements to be weaker

than they really are. Turkey is anxious about Cyprus becoming polycreators or Turkey is not anxious about. Who's telling these people this stuff? Who's giving you guys this information? Agreed. Oh my God. Alexander is reluctant to talk about Cyprus. I do walks and talks from Cyprus every single day. Next time I'm in Cyprus, I'm going to show everybody, everything that's happening in Lima, Yerma Soya, including all of the Russian cafes and all of the Russian businesses. I'll show it all to you,

just so you guys can understand what is going on in Cyprus. Obviously, walking around Cyprus and talking about Cyprus is not enough. Anyway, right. Who will liberate Canada, USA, the EU from global statinists, from the people of these countries. Dirk Diggler says time for UN 2.0. Time for what? So, UN 2.0.

I think the best thing to do would be to stick with UN 1.0 and try to make it work, actually. There's a lot of good things within the structures that could be built on. And I think the reason we are in this crisis is because we drifted away from them. Just a second. Brett Harris says, who would watch the Duran? Monty says, I've always wondered why the Finnish dislike Russia, but not Sweden, when it was Russians who taught them how to get their state up and running.

Well, indeed, I mean, but to repeat again, within my very recent lifetime, Finns did not hate Russians. But at least that was absolutely my impression. The relations between the countries were very close. And during the 50s and 60s and 70s, it was trade with Russia that made Finland the very rich and affluent and strong country that it became. So why Finns want to turn their back on all of that, I really cannot understand. Alexander Stubb. Well.

EDC, thanks for your good work. Iranian kiddo says that's the point Iran doesn't have to take on Israel nor the United States. Ask an average Iranian on the street. You'll be surprised that most people have very positive views of the U.S. That's just the reality. Oh, I know they do. I mean, as they used to do in Russia and all sorts of other places. The United States is attacking countries.

where many of the people want to be their friends. But the question is not what the Iranians want. It's what the Americans and the Israelis want. That's the problem. That's the question. I know we read the Kosovo. Yeah, we did the Kosovo I. Arcane, Eclectic says,

is just going to, yes, is just going to to allow Israel to violate them. It's Qatar probably. Is Qatar just going to allow Israel to violate them? Well, we'll see what they do. I mean, obviously Qatar by itself isn't in a position to do very much, but we'll see what the response is and what the response of the other Gulf states is.

I think this will be a shock action. Alana Zenkova Garcia, thank you about a super sticker. Mark says, has the United States been so narrative numb that it falls for a cut rate version of the Gulf of Tant in to justify a war. Yeah, I think it does. I mean, the problem is that the mythology, I call it mythology, but of course a lot of it, some of it is based undoubtedly on Frank. But the imagery, if you prefer, about the drug cartels and all of this is very, very well embedded in America. And going back to that point that the person made earlier, absolutely. Many, many

Americans experience the problem with illegal drugs. So it's easy to construct this narrative about what is happening in the Caribbean now. And if there is an attack on Venezuela, an awful lot of people are going to support it because it fits very well into the world that they believe they know. Vailma Thomas, thank you for that super chat. Fuzzy Ball says, was Stammer condemned by the Supreme Court of the UK 11-0 for trying to circumvent British law by trying to reunite the UK with the EU? No, he's not made a formal attempt to do that. No, I have not heard anything like this. Iranian kiddo says Palestinian plight is an Arab issue. Islamic Republic unfortunately bore the burden on Iran. Israel is committing genocide and it's horrible, but it's the Arab countries that should

rally behind them. Well, that is a big topic, and I'm sure there are many people in Iran who think like that. But to repeat again, it's not a question of whether Iran has some issue with Israel or the United States at this present time. It is Israel and the United States that appear to have an issue with Iran. They are not attacking Iran because it is backing or has expressed support for the Palestinians. They are attacking Iran. or saying they're attacking in Iran because of Iran's nuclear enrichment program, which is a completely different issue. Jamila says, I tried to give a comment, but YouTube did not let me.

My question is, those American armies, do they know what they're fighting for around the world? Well, I'm not aware that we try to... I mean, I just didn't see your question. I mean, it's very difficult sometimes to keep track of all of the questions. What do American soldiers think they're fighting for? I think as in many armies, soldiers tend to do carry our orders because that is what soldiers do. And I think most American soldiers serve in the US military in complete good faith and out of patriotic reasons. The United States, or at least the government of the United States, has betrayed the trust of those soldiers in using them in all sorts of

of ways that they should not have been used. And a lot of these soldiers are very angry about it, and they're not always very clear about their anger, but you see some of them like, say, Tulsi Gabbardt and in his own complicated way, Pete Higgs says, trying to express their anger in all kinds of ways. Latimeros says voting is overrated. It is an illusion for the population. Unfortunately, it is a great concept, but I don't see it works in the United States. Well, that's a a cynical view which I, by the way, don't share.

I mean, I think if we did away with voting, we would soon and very quickly notice the difference. But it is a view you often hear and it is consistent with the cynicism and a demoralization and loss of faith in institutions and democracy that we see in our world today. David, but erosa says

the latest from Candace is that Bridget M. Sirius is that he was a part of the Stanford prison experiments. No wonder they are crazy. She's 100% correct on target in my view. Okay. Thank you for that. Sanjava, we answered Sanjava's question. We answered the Grenada question. Pirewe-R says the Department of Defense formed in 1947 under the NSA has never been in a declared war, not one.

True enough. Monty says it's really difficult to explain just how pervasive the NGO octopus is. They managed even to create a fake science called transitology. Yeah, absolutely. The NGOs are a pervasive thing.

And when I was in Georgia a few months ago, People would tell me quite straightforwardly that the Georgia, the political system there, until a very short time ago, was, as they described it, an NGO state. Government was run. The people who ran things were from the NGOs and continued to be in the NGOs, even as some of them sat on the cabinet. So they were getting incomes from the NGOs, which were from the West.

They were getting salaries in the NGOs. And at the same time, they were getting Georgian. government salaries. Sparky says, but Brian, what about truth, justice, and the American way? Truth justice in the American way. Klaus says there are rumors that several top figures, ministers, et cetera, have escaped Ukraine. Do you know more about that?

Yes, something very strange, something very strange is going on with Koleba. And he said something to Corriela de la Cera, now he's contradicted it, but it does suggest that something, something is happening. Jeff Bigford says, thank you, great show. Internet veteran says when the U.S. says India tariffs offset benefit of Russian oil, are they referring to money India makes from oil exports, or does it include offsetting benefits of cheap oil to the Indian agricultural economy? Well, you make an excellent point basically there,

because, of course, the exports, India's exports, benefit a real estate, relatively small number of people in India, relative to the size of the Indian population, whereas imports of Russian oil affect everybody. And that's a fundamental difference. So in monetary terms, there may be some balance, but in societal terms, it's absolutely obvious, which is more important. Sanjewa says Nepal case is a bit complicated. The present government was involved in a Maoist insurgency in the early 2000s and was anti-Indian. Also, post-earthquake situation has been even worse. Any incoming government will be more pro-Indian, just like in Sri Lanka.

Well, maybe. Let's see. Black Tie, thank you for that super sticker. Too cool for school says about a year ago, Nafos started saying that China is planning to invade Russia to capture Siberia. Is this just Neo-Kan hope or is there any truth to it? There is no truth to it whatsoever. No. I mean, it's something you hear it.

You read all the time, but I mean, there is no reality to it. Neil Meta says, Alex, what are your thoughts? Israeli citizens buying lots of property in Cyprus. It's becoming an issue in Cyprus. Am I right to say? Yes and no. The property situation, as far as Cypriots are concerned, is that the property is too expensive.

We just can't afford property. And that's because of all of the foreign investment. So that's the real issue is that it's just difficult to buy a home, especially if you're a young Cypriot. Sparky says the Hamas administrators in Qatar long sponsored by Israel and the U.S. knew too much, so had to be silenced. Well, yes, maybe. but as I said, it's still an incredible thing to do in this way.

Latimeros says, somebody please take away Iranian kiddo's credit card. Just joking. Just joking. Thank you for that. Latamuro. Mack I says, could you list three must-read history books, Alexander?

Oh, goodness. For me, I will give three examples. Mark Blocks, feudal society. Bernardinand Brodell's book on the Mediterranean world in the 16th century and AJP Taylor's the struggle for mastery in Europe from Boris USSR fallen because the system has the system has rotten from its core Khrushchev started counter-revolution that's why China distanced itself from the USSR very again a lot of

an awful lot to discuss here and doing a pro well the sino-soviet split perhaps requires an entire discussion action iranian kiddo says demitris lascaris did a vlog in cyprus that showed some of the resorts becoming effectively israeli majority lascaris is a reliable source yeah there are resorts that that are israeli and there's true and and and and and and and and and And I'm sure there are results which are largely British and results which are... Iranian kiddo, actually, I think I've done a video in front of war gaming. I don't know if anyone plays World of Panks or those games. And Nicosia, you have the huge, massive headquarters for war gaming,

which is, I believe, are from Belarus, actually. So they have huge headquarters in Cyprus. I mean, you know, pick your resort, pick your headquarters. Xenus, E. Toro, all kinds of international companies and resorts and hotels are located in Cyprus. Yes. Jamila says, I tried to give comment.

We answered that, Jamila, we answered that. Mikai says the books. Jopcad answered that. Was it twice? Did you list the three most history books? I think that came in twice. Thank you, Megai, for that. Utvara once.

says the MOD said they take Dombas by the end of 2025. Brian said offensive is going great and that Israel is the one being used. Can't take him seriously anymore. Where did the Russian MOD say that they would take Dombas by the end of 2020? Nowhere. I can absolutely say for an absolute categorical fact that they have never said any such thing. One of the problems is that the Ministry of Defense, at least for analysts, is that the MOD and Putin, they say nothing about the goals, the tangible territorial goals, I guess you could say.

The SMO, I mean, you know, they talk about root causes and demilitarization and denotification and stuff like that and recognized the Russian language. Yeah. They never talk about territory, even attrition. No. I mean, Yadazimov, that was the first time that I think he actually talked about attrition was. Correct. About four or five days ago. Correct.

Absolutely correct. Iranian kiddo says, no, the real issue is Iran not recognizing Israel since 1975. It's not the nuclear issue. It's a facade. In fact, Israel helped Iran with the nuclear program before the 1979 revolution. Yeah, but the point is not whether that's the real issue before, the real issue today. What is your suggestion? Are you suggesting that Iran, there's massive?

mantle its nuclear enrichment program, establish diplomatic relations with Israel, do those things. If that is what you think Iran should do, then please say so. I mean, you know, it's for Iranians to make those decisions, but so long as Iran continues with its nuclear enrichment program and continues to conduct the kind of foreign policy, which it is conducting at the moment,

which is an foreign policy of independence, then obviously it is going to be a subject to attack. But if you think that Iran should pursue a different policy, by all means, tell us what it is. Latimer Rose says, Dear Alexander, you will get the same cynical view on U.S. elections when you see Lindsay Graham get selected over and over again. Oh, I understand that.

I completely understand that. Samuel Maroni says how independent UK nuclear arsenal is from the US. It isn't. Straightforwardly. I mean, we have the warheads, but the missiles upon which the warheads are launched are actually American-owned. We lease them. And the Americans have a right of refusal of use. So it's not independent at all.

It's called independent, but it's not. Sparky says it may be different now due to the ease of info from smartphones, but when I was in the US Army four decades ago, as young enlisted soldiers, we followed orders oblivious to their geopolitical implications. I'm sure that's true. I'm sure that's still true. Iranian kiddo says Anabasis book by Xenophon is a great book if you're into Greek antiquity. I'm kind of in the middle of it. I agree. Alexander, I think that is...

everything. Not as I do one final check. Well, I mean, extraordinary use. I mean, Nepal is extraordinary use. I think the attack in Qatar, which I still don't have the details, by the way. I mean, it was an airstrike, even more so. But I mean, if it was any kind of, I mean,

what was done in Qatar is extraordinary. And we should not just accept this as something routine. I mean, it violates every single established rule of international relations, murdering negotiators, doing so on the territory of another country, doing it a country that is an ally of the United States, and which Israel itself has accepted as a mediated. One more question, Alexander, from Jeff Rook, Nepal riot, French government collapses, Japanese Prime Minister resigns. UK tensions rise.

US tensions rise as Venezuela concerns do as well. How connected do you think this all is? It feels like financial economic currents are flowing under the surface that are pushing everything forward. Everything is connected. It always is. In international relations, in human history, everything is connected. Trying to understand the connections is not always easy,

and it's what we try to do on these programs. Alexander, that is everything. So we will, one second. We will end the live stream there. Absolutely. Thank you to Brian Berletic for joining us. Thank you to everyone that watched on Odyssey and Rumble and Rockfin, YouTube, and the duran.orgals.com.

And thank you to our minds. I think Zareel was helping to moderate, as was Brett and Harry was also moderating. So thank you to our moderators. Did I miss anybody? I think those were our moderators. All right. Thanassiz, thank you for that super chat for joining the Duran community. And Sparky says, Brian is not pro-Israel.

He's categorized it as a fake country. Israel was military outposts for the British and essentially plays the same role for the U.S. So that's the super chat from Sparky. And on that note, we will end the live stream there. Take care, everybody. Take care.