The President's Daily Brief - October 20th, 2022. Listener Questions: War with China? Why Don't We Just Assassinate Putin?

Episode Date: October 20, 2022

It’s October 20th. You’re listening to the President’s Daily Brief. Your morning intel starts now. ------ Today we are going to do something special. It’s a podcast of only your questions. And we’re covering events from around the world.  First, Wayne from Eureka, Missouri asks - What’s the timeline for a war with China? Because I have a son, and he could be drafted. Second, Nick from Georgia asks - Why can’t we just kill Vladimir Putin and be done with this war in Ukraine?  Third, a whole bunch of you want to know - Who really blew up the Nord Stream Pipeline, and why’d they do it? Finally, James in Spokane, Washington asks - Why don’t we just label Mexican cartels as terrorists and drone strike them all? ------ Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of the President's Daily Brief. Email: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's October 20th. You're listening to the President's Daily Brief. I'm your host and former CIA Officer Brian Dean Wright. Your morning intel starts now. Today we are going to do something special. It's a podcast of only your questions. We're going to cover events from around the world. First, Wayne from Eureka, Missouri asks, what's the timeline for a war with China? Because I have a son and he could be drafted. Second, Nick from Georgia asks, why can't we just kill Vladimir Putin and be done with this war in Ukraine? Third, a whole bunch of you want to know who really blew up the Nord Stream pipelines, and why did they do it?

Finally, James from Spokane, Washington asks, why don't we just label Mexican cartels as terrorists and drone strike them all? So let's get started with these great questions from you all on this very special listener brief. First, let's tackle the question from Wayne and Eureka, Missouri. Missouri. What is the timeline for a war with China? And he asked that question because he has a son and he is worried that he might be drafted. Well, this week, Wayne, we actually got a bit more clarity on what the United States government thinks that timeline might be. And it matches the council that I offered you on Monday, which was this. President Xi of China wants to reunify

mainland China with Taiwan during the next five years before he steps down as president. And that process of reunification, well, it's almost certainly going to involve war because Taiwan is not interested in reunification. So after that council that I gave you on Monday morning, we heard from the U.S. Secretary of State, Tony Blinken, who was at an event at Stanford University. He spoke about this timeline issue for reunification, and here's what he said. Quote, there has been a change in the approach from Beijing towards Taiwan in recent years. This includes a fundamental decision that Beijing is determined to pursue reunification on a much faster timeline, end quote. Now, Blankin didn't provide details about that timeline, but yesterday someone at the Pentagon

did. Admiral Michael Gilday, who's the chief of U.S. naval operations, was speaking at an event at the Atlantic Council, and this is what he said. Quote, it's not just what President Xi says, but it's about how the Chinese behave and what they do. And what we've seen over the past 20 years is that they have delivered on every promise they've made, but earlier than what they said they were going to do. So when we talk about a timeline, there has to be a 2022 window or potentially a year 2022 window too. I can't rule either out, end quote. So Wayne, the short answer to your question is that we're starting to see signals

from the U.S. government at very senior levels that a war with China all over Thai. could begin anywhere from this year to the year 2027. But here's the real question for Wayne and all of us. Is the United States ready for that war if it comes? And is China. And ultimately, who would win? Well, this is a big set of questions with a thousand variables and lots of opinions. But I'll offer you this.

Our Pentagon actually does what are called tabletop exercises, where they plan out different scenarios for war. Now, the outcomes are all classified, but there was a series of unclassified war games done recently by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. What they found was that we suffered major casualties in and around the Strait of Taiwan, which is where most war planners expect that China will cross, and we quickly exhausted our supply of missiles within the first week of fighting. But nevertheless, most scenarios found us prevailing at the end of week one.

But my goodness, it would be bloody. We would lose tremendous numbers of our naval forces. And when week two started, we would lead probably to a point of very dangerous escalation that has, frankly, unknowable outcomes. So, Wayne, I offer you all of that with this final caveat. What we know is that President Xi wants to reunify with China in the next five years. But what's not clear is what price he's willing to pay, how much risk he's willing to bear. Nor is it clear what condition we will be in, either militarily or financially after our proxy war with Russia and Ukraine.

Plus, there's the question of would we have the oil and gas and diesel to fuel a war machine as we're pivoting our nation towards solar and wind energy? So lots of variables, but I suppose we'll find out soon enough. Speaking of pivoting, let's pivot from Wayne and Missouri to Nick and Georgia. He's asking, why can't we just kill Vladimir Putin and be done with this war in Ukraine? So Nick was joined in this question by Jay and the Netherlands, who asked a more delicate version of it, wondering if we could support groups inside Russia that might overthrow Putin in some sort of bloodless coup? So two things here to consider. First, there's something called Executive Order 11-9.

905, first issued by President Ford in 1976, and it's actually been supported by every president since then. The executive order says that we will not engage in political assassination. And that was actually done because the military and the CIA had up until that time been, well, killing lots of foreign presidents and prime ministers all around the world because of their politics. But there is some wiggle room with these things to include this executive order. Different American presidents have justified killing leaders or people because we labeled them as terrorists. Or we said that we are in a declared war, so a foreign leader is fair game. So Nick and Jay, we'd have to first address that legal issue.

But candidly, though, that's not the real concern that I want you to wrestle with. Instead, let's do a thought experiment. Let's imagine that you authorized the assassination of Vladimir Putin. And it worked. He's dead. So who takes his place? And what does that person do with Russia's nuclear arsenal? How stable does Russia become with the new guy in charge? Or does the whole place descend into chaos?

Now, these questions are really important. Because as it turns out, a recent U.S. history tells us that while we are very good at killing people, we are terrible at what's called the day after. So consider Iraq. we invaded Saddam Hussein died eventually and we installed a puppet, a man named Ahmed Chalabi. It turns out that nobody in Iraq liked him. He had no base of support and he was completely corrupt. Well, Iraq then descended into chaos and that spread radical Islam and its terror all throughout the Middle East. Oops. Okay, so let's now consider Libya. As Hillary Clinton infamously said in 2011,

about the Libyan dictator Moin Mar Khaddafi, quote, we came, we saw, he died, and quote. Yeah, we killed him, and she laughed. But really, it's not funny. Because Libya then descended into anarchy. It's been 10 years since Hillary Clinton made that joke,

and the country is still at war with itself. It's a failed state. Finally, let's consider Afghanistan. We all know that history, 20 years after invading and installing our preferred government? Well, Joe Biden just retreated one year ago. The government collapsed and the Taliban is back in charge. Never mind the 20 years of blood, sweat, and treasure that we all spent. The point for Nick and Jay and all of us is not whether Putin is a good guy or a bad guy. I mean,

I personally think he's a bad guy, but that's irrelevant. What's relevant is what comes the day after we would kill Putin. What happens to Russia? They're nuclear weapons. What about their scientists and the engineers who know how to build a nuclear program and would be out of a job or living in chaos? Who might be interested in hiring them? Killing Putin folks is the easy part. What history shows us is that the day after is when the real work starts. And America is absolutely awful at doing that. Anyway, just a thought as we think about killing more foreign leaders.

Let's take a quick break. And when we come back, we have got questions about the Nord Stream pipeline and Mexican cartels. We'll be right back. Olivia Rodriguez, the unraveled tour across North America with special guests. Get tickets Thursday, May 7th at Olivia Rodrigo.com. Ryan Reynolds here from MintMobil, the message for everyone paying big wireless way too much. Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop. With Mint, you can get premium.

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Welcome back to the PDB. Let's dive into our next set of questions this morning, all of which are from you. First, lots of folks wanted to know who really blew up the Nord Stream pipelines and why'd they do it. And when I say a whole lot of you, I mean it. I think that this issue has been one of the most popular questions that I've been asked since we started this podcast in April. Katie in Wyoming, Adam in Tennessee, Chance in Texas, Brad in Arizona, Mike in Colorado, Steve in the Philippines. The list earnestly goes on and on. Just a whole bunch of y'all are intrigued by this.

So let's first start with an update, the facts. But to refresh our memories first about three weeks ago, two major natural gas pipelines running from Russia to Europe called Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 exploded. Within a couple of hours, actually, seismologists from Denmark and Sweden confirmed that this was not an accident, but rather from explosions in the water and above the pipelines. Within another day or so, governments from Russia, Europe, and the United States all confirmed it was sabotage. Since then, there have been several official investigations conducted by the Danish, German, and Swedish governments. They're cooperating to various degrees and sharing results.

They're also getting assistance from the United States and other governments. However, there are two parties not involved or assisting in the investigation. and the first, as you probably might guess, is Russia. The three main governments investigating have all turned down Russia's request to be involved. Second, they're also turning down the company that operates the pipelines. It's a Switzerland-based company called Nordstream AG. So, folks, that's the latest. We don't know a ton.

Still, we can assume that at some point, there will be an unclassified report issued with the official findings. And we can also assume that, that this report will not be the final word. Because, frankly, the investigators are not exactly unbiased jurors. Let me explain. I want us to do a thought experiment, and I want us to imagine that we are investigating a crime. Let's say a murder. As a general rule, as we look for our suspect or suspects, we're looking for a number of things,

but let's just focus on one, and that is motive. Who had a motive to blow up those pipelines and what might it be? Well, I think that there are three likely suspects, the United States, Ukraine and Poland, or Russia. Now, before we dive into this, I want to make something very, very clear. This is speculation. It's a low confidence assessment. But I'm offering this as something for you all to consider and chew on as we look for facts and data to get our preferred high confidence assessment of exactly what happened. All right, with that caveat, here we go. The United States has for years been opposed to the Nord Stream pipelines.

From President Barack Obama to Donald Trump to Joe Biden, all three warned Germany and others in Europe that tethering themselves to Russia or Russian energy was a huge mistake. But they ignored us. In fact, European leaders literally laughed at Donald Trump for his warning. Remember this. Back in September of 2018, President Trump was at the United Nations delivering a speech, and he warned Europe about the dependency on Russian energy. And they laughed.

There's video of it. And it's just remarkable. Well, flash forward from that moment to February 8th of this year. Joe Biden was in the White House and he was asked by members of the press what he would do to the Nord Stream pipelines if things in Ukraine devolved into war. And here's what he said. Quote, if Russia invades, and I mean tanks and troops crossing the border of Ukraine again, then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring it to an end, end.

A journalist followed up and asked, well, how would he do that? And Biden responded, quote, we will, I promise you, we will be able to do that, end quote. And then he smiled. So why would Joe Biden authorize what would be a covert operation to blow up those pipelines? Well, here's the logic. Right now there is a fear. within our State Department, that Germany and others in Europe might agree to a peace deal with Russia if, come this winter, the people and the economies of Europe are freezing. In other words,

they might get weak need. And that would mean that Joe Biden and his team would have spent billions of your taxpayer dollars and hollowed out some of our military's most important weapon systems like the javelin, the high mars or the stinger missiles. And in return, we would get nothing for it. Putin would still be in power. So to avoid Germany or Europe making a peace deal as they freeze, well, you take that possibility off the table. You blow up the pipelines. And that means that Europe is now all in. No peace deal will bring Europe gas this winter. And that's why the United States is a suspect, if we're being fair. There's also another suspect, or combined suspects, and that's the country of Poland, some Baltic nations, and Ukraine.

So the motive here is similar to that of the United States. They don't want a peace deal that leaves Russia or Russian energy tethered to Europe. So blowing up the pipelines severs that tie. And it forces Western Europe into a more aggressive posture against Moscow. And it strengthens the defense of these Baltic, Poland, and Ukrainian nations. But for Ukraine, there's actually another motive too. Right now, Russian natural gas is actually still flowing into Europe via a pipeline that runs through Ukraine. And that gives Kiev or Kiev a degree of leverage if there are no other pipelines left.

Well, they get rid of the competition, as it were. Finally, on our list of suspects, there's Russia itself. Now, the scenario here is that Putin is afraid that powerful forces in his country inside the Kremlin or people who run parts of his economy, often called the oligarchs, well, they might want to remove Putin in order to reconnect with Europe. So perhaps then Putin blew up his own pipelines to signal to these oligarchs in particular that no, Russia will never reconnect with the West. It's now war. The future of Russia, he is saying through blowing up these pipelines, is with Asia, China in particular. Now, that could be true. It's not convincing to me. I think Putin was and is looking to make a deal

this winter. He wants Europe to agree to his terms of peace, and then he'll turn the gas back on. In fact, we've heard that such is his strategy for members of the Biden administration. So blowing up the pipelines doesn't fit with that. We have assessments from energy companies and a report from Reuters news that the pipelines will take many, many months to maybe even years to repair. Even still, I do think that Russia should be considered a suspect because of well, all the scenarios that I just laid out. The bottom line to all the listeners who asked is that I don't know who blew up the Nord Stream pipelines.

And candidly, I'm not sure that we'll know for a long time to come unless we would need a president in the White House who orders what we know declassified. And if America had any involvement in this, that would be a very big deal. and that takes us to our last question of the morning. Why don't we just label Mexican cartels as terrorists and drones strike them all? We'll be right back. USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day like superheroes and sidekicks or auto and home insurance. With USAA, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10%.

Tap the banner to learn more and get a quote at usa.com slash bundle. Restrictions apply. Welcome back to the PDB, ladies and gentlemen. One more listener question before I let you go. James from Spokane, Washington wrote in, and he asked, why don't we just designate Mexican cartels as terrorists and then drone strike them all? Well, James, I like your spunk. I suspect that we would be good friends.

At any rate, three years ago, then President Trump was on the verge of doing exactly what you're proposing. He actually backed off saying that he got an agreement for Mexico's president to crack down on the cartels. Well, that has not happened. So that's why one month ago, Senators Marshall of Kansas and Scott of Florida introduced a bill called the Drug Cartel Terrorist Designation Act. So there are lots of pros and cons to this designation, but there are a couple of key concerns that we should consider, because I can tell you that these concerns are really why Trump and his team backed off. And here's the big one, asylum cases. This is what I mean. right now, many folks from Mexico and around the world try to get into America and stay because they're claiming asylum. In other words, they say that they're being persecuted because of their race or religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion.

And if they can convince an immigration judge of that, well, they get to stay. Well, what happens when thousands, maybe even millions of Mexican citizens claim asylum because of a Mexican cartel? a designated terrorist group is persecuting them. That is a very real possibility that an immigration judge would look at, maybe even favorably on an asylum application. And because of that, we would open the door to a lot more migrants, millions more that as of today are not legally allowed to stay. So James, that is an unintended consequence that we would really need to discuss

and understand before we designated cartels as foreign. terrorist organizations. Personally, I think that there are other, shall I say, creative tools that we could still use to kill these cartel members and dismantle their networks. But we will say that for another day. And so, ladies and gentlemen, we conclude your special morning brief. A hearty thanks to everybody who wrote in, and please keep your emails coming. The email address, as always is PDB, as in the President's Daily Brief, at the first TV, as in television, dot com. Or you can find me on Twitter.

My handle is at Brian Dean Wright, or shoot me an email through my personal website, Brian Dean Wright.com. As always, folks, we close out the show reminding each other of why we are here, talking about our country and our world. It's the creed of every good spy and every smart American. It's from John chapter 8, verse 32. And you shall know the truth.

And the truth shall make you free. Good day.