The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway - Gaza, Ukraine, and the End of American Reliability — with Ian Bremmer

Episode Date: October 2, 2025

Scott speaks with Ian Bremmer, president and founder of Eurasia Group, about the state of geopolitics at a moment of uncertainty. They discuss Trump’s combative stance at the UN General Assembly, the possibility of a peace deal in Gaza, and America’s shifting strategy on Russia and Ukraine. Ian also weighs in on whether the United Nations still has a role in solving global crises, and what all this means for the future of U.S. leadership. Follow Ian, @ianbremmer. Algebra of happiness: who do you owe? Prof G Conversations is a Signal Awards finalist. Vote for us in the Listener’s Choice Award here. (voting ends October 9). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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It's up to you. We'll take the laundry. Rinse. It's time to be great. This week on Unexplainable, zombies. In a world where a team of scientists, they're studying zombie bugs, and they're like, Oh, hey, wouldn't it be great if we could manufacture an artificial version of this zombie virus and release it into the wild? What could possibly go wrong? Everything goes wrong.

Kill them. Kill the cockroaches. You can't kill a cockroach if it's already undead. All unexplainable, wherever you get your podcasts. Here is a big existential question for every media company today. Do they fight the AI tech overlords, or do they just take their money? So far, most of them are taking the money. But a few are fighting. One of them is Zip Davis.

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I've been telling women recently that I came into some money. It just sounds better than I've been masturbating into ATMs. Oh, that's bad even for me. Go, go, go, go! Welcome to the 367th episode of the Prop G-Pod. What's happening? I'm in London after going to New York for a speaking gig in Nashville, where I waited an hour at some place called Hattie B's for a chicken sandwich

that I think was worth 38 to 45 minutes. It's not worth an hour away. But anyways, you know, nothing good, true, nothing gained. Then I went to Aspen for a conference, which I very much enjoyed. It was beautiful there. And then I came back. I'm happy to be home. It's a gorgeous day in London, which is not something you hear a lot.

And I went to look at, I'm at that point now where I'm freaking out about my son leaving. So he's like, I want a poster from my room. I'm like, well, let's go look at posters, and let's just hang out and walk around. So I'm in that kind of like, dad won't leave me alone phase where I literally walk him around the house. Anyways, more importantly, some news here. Propheed Conversations is a Signal Awards finalist in two categories this year. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

I just wet myself, business people and entrepreneur, shaping culture. That's me. Shaping culture. We're shaping culture. Also, the category, best host. That's right. Okay. Something tells me we're not going to win that. Anyways, if you're so inclined, you can vote for us in the Listeners Choice Award at the link in the description. Voting is open until October 9th. And today's episode, we speak with 14-time guest Ian Bremmer, the president and founder of Eurasia Group, the world's leading political risk research consulting firm. We discussed within the state of global conflicts, shifting global power dynamics, and what it all means for America's role. So I've been asked to come on. Pierce more. We're going to talk about Radical F versus. is radical right being responsible with the Charlie Kirk shooting. And the reality is

that is literally like saying like Tottenham accusing Arsenal being responsible for climate change and Arsenal accusing Tottenham for the, I don't know, for income inequality. It's just it is an entirely false debate. Yes, evidence shows that as you try to categorize these shooters, there's more from the radical right than the radical left, but it's a false debate. It doesn't make any fucking difference because if our elected leaders are actually interested in solving the goddamn problem instead of pretending or cosplaying Obama and saying that we need to turn the heat down and I reach across the aisle and I go golfing and do master swimming and play Padel with people on the other side of the aisle. Well, good for you. Well, good for you. I hope that gets you

another one or two straws in a Poland aisle. Well, folks, if you're really interested in preventing a tragedy of commons, the legs of the stool of political violence, mass shooting, and essentially all shooting violence in the United States is three things. One, 98 percent, 98. six percent of the mass shooters are wait for it men the vast majority of them are in their 20s sometimes in their 30s but generally speaking you don't get a you know you don't get an 85 year old dude shooting up a place and you never get women in general doing this to the rage machine being connected to profit we've never found anything as profitable as rage that's it's created more shareholder value than any of the magnificent 10 traffic and rage and so much attention they're

sequestering young people from the rest of the world and finally access to guns. Enough of the turn down the heat. We need to come together. Oh, fuck you. Go to Iowa, collect your straws and then do your goddamn job. So with that, here's our conversation with Ian Bremmer. Ian, where does this podcast find you? I am back in New York City, where you and I just saw each other last week. That's right. We did. I have a nice time. And I met some really impressive people. No surprise there. So just a quick note, we're recording this conversation with Ian on Tuesday. So if any major headlines have broken since then, forgive us.

Anyways, Ian, let's pass right into it. Last week, world leaders gathered in New York for the 80th edition of the UN General Assembly. We'd love to get your thoughts on Trump's speech and what the conference revealed about the state of global politics. It was so interesting to have, you know, 194 countries all come to New York City. A lot of those leaders was the first time that they had been in the U.S. since Trump's latest inauguration. And it is the United States and the level of uncertainty around what the U.S. stands for, what it's pushing for, how much you can rely. eye on the U.S. That was the biggest question mark. And a lot of those leaders are deeply unsettled by it, right?

I mean, again, the United States created the United Nations 80 years ago in America's image. And yet it was Trump's speech, that 55-minute speech that you and I both saw that was most critical of the United Nations, of all of the countries there. Right? I mean, for a long time, there was this view globally that, well, the U.S. may be in decline and China's rising. And so the U.S. is going to be trying to hold on to its position in the global order as a leader and China is going to try to knock it off. That's not what's happening at all, right? The United States is not in decline. Its allies are. And the U.S. is saying we don't

want to be the leader of our own architecture. We're not interested in that. We want to change the rules to benefit us more. So it's the incumbent that wants to change the rules. And it's the Chinese and most everyone else that's saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, we kind of would like to keep it sort of the way it's been, you know, we don't want, we don't want the, all of the uncertainty. And that was what Trump's speech was about. That was, it was like, it was about that on trade. It was about that on borders. It was about that on sovereignty. It was about that on how Trump is, of course, the greatest leader ever. There's always a lot of that. You know, the one piece of Trump's speech that everyone was supportive of is his legitimate effort to end.

And also his failure at the time that he had given the speech on both Russia, Ukraine, and on Gaza. Of course, there's been a lot of progress made on the Gaza file over the last few days, not so much on Russia, Ukraine, but still, that's where you see the alignment, where on U.S. leadership more broadly and commitment to things like collective security, free trade, and, you know, sort of rules of the road, there the Americans are upsetting the apple car. So we'll come back to Gaza in a second and what we're hoping is progress there. But Trump took a pretty hostile tone as you question the purpose of the UN as an organization. And right as, you know, the UN is currently experiencing an unprecedented funding crisis.

What do you think in? Is there some legitimacy to the notion that the UN has kind of lost its purpose? It's 80 years old, and certainly the Security Council is broken because there are countries in it that don't align and have permanent vetoes and will stop anything useful from happening, Russia in particular. You also have countries that clearly should be in the Security Council that reflect the values enshrined in the U.N. charter that can't be in because no one will let them in, like Japan, and Germany because they lost World War II or India because they weren't even a country in 1945 when the UN was founded. I mean, those are stupid reasons.

And it's because the UN has been blocked in structural reform by the nature of the organization and the unwillingness of countries to allow it. So, yeah, the Security Council is broken. The General Assembly is a massive food fight. where everybody gets to make a statement and does reflect all of the different countries around the world, many of which are completely unrepresentative of their people. That's a problem. But I think it's very valuable to have it because it allows for those countries to engage in ways

that otherwise they wouldn't. And then you have other things that are done by the UN Secretariat, by many of its constituent bodies that are becoming much more important, even though they're weak and poorly funded, because otherwise nobody's doing it. I mean, a lot more people would die of starvation if it wasn't for the UN, especially once the Americans kill USAID.

A lot more forcibly displaced migrants living in very poor countries without proper governance would face insecurity that would be incredibly dangerous for them if it wasn't for the UN. So these are important things to do, but it's certainly true that Americans, Europeans, others don't very much value that goal. And then finally, you know, you've got the direct role of the Secretary General, you know, Russia, Ukraine is this horrible war ongoing for three and a half years.

And the only significant diplomatic breakthrough since the war started was made not by the Americans, not by the Europeans, not by the Chinese, but by Antonio. Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General, when he managed to cobble together this Black Sea peace deal, a grain deal that allowed for food and fertilizer to be exported, despite the fighting from Russia and Ukraine, which meant that people around the global south were getting access to food and fertilizer at a lower cost and therefore were less likely to starve. I'd love to say other people were doing that. They weren't. So, I mean, yeah, I think that we as Americans should actually be really proud of the United Nations, despite its weakness and ineffectiveness. We're not. We're not at all. And I fear that some of the reason for that is because the UN reminds us of a lot of the things that we used to stand for after World War II that we're not so sure we're standing up for.

anymore. So I want to, just for the purposes of exploring the notion of whether the UN is worth the lift here and the energy and the funding, all be, no UN or the UN is outdated or primitive or just obsolete at this point, and then I'd like you to respond where I get it right and where I get it wrong. So you had mentioned sort of structural veto gridlock, right, that the Security Council is held hostage to its five permanent members. And a veto from Russia, China, or the U.S. paralyzes action. So its governance model is designed, as you referenced, for 45, 1945, not 2025. There's an enforcement gap. They can pass resolutions, but they have no teeth. Aggressers and autocrats shrug off all these strongly worded statements.

You know, it strikes me as like Charles Schumer times 1,000 when I listen to any UN General Assembly meeting. A mismatch legitimacy. It states with little Democratic. Democratic legitimacy hold equal votes in the General Assembly. Humanitarian feelings. These peacekeeping missions are chronically underfunded, slow to deploy, and often tainted by scandals. And then there has been innovation around this type of organization. The G7, the G20, NATO, bilateral deals. The UN has become a stage for speech is not solution. So isn't the UN where kind of these big global problems go to die of bureaucracy it's more like you know it's not the united nations it's sort of a united inaction yeah i like that your thoughts well first of all um to be cute about this but also

to be honest um you know i i love your podcast i love what you stand for i thought your last book was fantastic um you have no enforcement you have no teeth you have no ability you have no ability to to take your great ideas and make them happen. And yet, I think you're very valuable. And I would hate to... You're comparing me to the UN? Yes. I'd hate to see you stop doing what you're doing.

And the idea that the only things that matter are things that have teeth and enforcement, in my view, is not very humane. It's also not our human experience. And the fact is that in the Security Council, which desperately needs reform, it's actually the only place where the Americans

and the Russians regularly have informal direct connection and discussion between our governments that's really important so a forum for discourse not just discourse

it's not just discourse it's actually it's actually becoming aware of what the policies are knowing what consequences are knowing what red lines are that's that's not this is more than discourse it's diplomacy. It's back channeling that can help to lead to breakthrough. It can help to avoid unnecessary escalation. So much of what the UN is about is that you can't fix anything unless you

both understand what the problem is. You can't do anything positive unless you know what the opportunity is. So climate change. The UN has no enforcement capacity on climate change. And I'd be very uncomfortable if it did. I don't I don't like the idea. of a global government telling us, here's what you have to do. But it turns out that the UN was the body that got all the countries of the world together to have a common definition of what climate change is. People were disagreeing that it even existed. You know, big oil companies were paying lots of money.

Studies that they knew determined that climate change was real and then they buried them, right? and that persisted for decades. And it was when the UN set up the international panel on climate change that you got all these scientific actors together that said, okay, here's the parts per million of carbon in the atmosphere. Here's how much the temperature has changed. Here are the implications of that for different sorts of for famine and for floods and for droughts and for lack of biodiversity and all these things that matter.

the countries will then have to decide what they want to do. Do they ignore it? Do they adapt to it? Do they try to, you know, sort of slow it down? Do they invest more in renewable energy? But none of that happens efficiently or effectively unless the world agrees that it's happening. And now they do. And they do because of the United Nations.

I think that's enormously important. So, you know, maybe in our world of winners, making headlines. The UN doesn't make the great headlines. It doesn't, you know, sort of cause. And certainly the Secretary General, even that breakthrough that I talked about, which Russia, Ukraine, the most important war, ongoing war, dangerous war over the last three plus years, that they were the ones that made the consequential difference. And yet they made almost no headlines because the Secretary General doesn't really care about talking to the media that much. And maybe that's really quaint and antiquated and not the way we want the world to work.

I don't care. I also still want people to read books and not become illiterate by just looking at videos on their social media. And I think the UN is a part of the world that we need to have. It's kind of like eating our broccoli, you know? I mean, the fact that you don't want to do it and the fact that it doesn't make you Popeye immediately doesn't suddenly mean that you want to throw it away. I feel pretty strongly about this. Yeah, yeah, and I think you make a compelling argument, and you feel that discourse, communication, I mean, there's no doubt about it. I haven't as many of these things as you, but people are so cynical about things like Davos or Allen and Company Conver, or whatever, it is, Milken, and they throw stones at it. But I think

it's important people get together and talk to each other, and you're just less likely to declare war on or tariff people you've met, and you realize, well, they seem pretty rational. Maybe I'll calm up and i want to i want to give you another real example because i live in new york right and i spend a lot of time in dc which i'll never get back um and uh you know countries around the world they they send on balance their most important most capable diplomats they send them to Washington, Beijing, and New York. Now, why? Why? Why would they send them to New York? Right? I mean, you know, the UN is nothing compared to the United States and China. And so you wouldn't, you wouldn't, you wouldn't just send them to Brussels? Wouldn't you send them to like, you know,

to Tokyo? I mean, some other important economy, at least. And the answer is that smaller states in particular. And most of the world's countries are smaller states. They send a diplomat to Washington and that person will have like occasional engagement with an assistant secretary of state. In the United Nations, every one of those countries has a seat and they engage with all of the other countries of the world. And these are incredibly smart diplomats who are, you know, trying to better understand the state of play, better promote their own country with other countries in the world, and lead to concrete cooperation frequently in countries. They don't even have the money to have an embassy in that country. So, I mean, the UN is the one place that allows for the

world's governments to engage with each other constructively. Like, I mean, if it didn't exist, you would have to recreate it. And the fact that that's in the United States, where, by the way, has incredible intelligence gathering. I mean, the surveillance alone that the U.S. government does, even if you didn't care about the rest of the world, even if you were only America first, you'd say, don't you dare put that in another country because we need that information for our own national security. I mean, just, it's ridiculous that people just use this forum as a punching bag. We'll be right back after a quick break. support for the show comes from vanta as a founder you're moving fast toward product market fit your next round or your first big enterprise deal but with ai accelerating how quickly startups build and ship your security expectations are higher earlier than ever getting security and compliance right and unlock

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time. Support for the show comes from Ship Station. Running a business is tough, running an e-commerce business in the age of online reviews, even tougher. Consumers have higher expectations than ever, and you can't afford to let any of them down. That means you need a platform that can offer fulfillment excellence. In other words, you need ShipStation. Ship station goes beyond shipping labels. With scalable features that help ensure accuracy, you and your customers can rest assured

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That's shipstation.com slash prop G. support for the show comes from grunes they used to say that an apple a day keeps the doctor away well that's a nice thought but even so you still won't get all the nutrients you need that way here's a tip add grooms to the mix grunes isn't a multivitamin a green gummy or a prebiotic it's all of those things and then some at a fraction of the price and bonus it tastes great all grunes daily gummy snack packs are packed with more than 20 vitamins and minerals made with more than 60 nutrient dense ingredients and whole foods and for a limited time. You can try their groony Smith apple flavor just in time for fall. It's got the same

snackable, packable, full-body benefits you come to expect. But this time, these tastes like you're walking through an apple orchard and a cable-knit sweater, warm apple cider in hands. I've tried Grooons. I find it very convenient. And in general, just super easy to get kind of that health boost, if you will. Grab your limited edition Grooony Smith-apple Grooons available only through October. Stock up because they will sell out. Get up to 52% sent off when you go to G-R-U-N-S.com and use the code PropG. Let's move on. You brought up Gaza. I'd be really curious to get your state of play around what we're hoping is an end of the war. Your thoughts on what's going on here,

what you think might be going on that's different than the narrative or what's in the news today regarding a potential peace deal in the Middle East? First of all, this is a big deal, right? I mean, we've had the war going on now since October 7th, and the war has just escalated, right? It's been more and more bombs and efforts to take out Hamas. in Gaza as well as elsewhere. It's also expanded against the axis of resistance, so-called, including with Israel hitting Iran itself and knocking back their nuclear capabilities.

This is a big deal. The Arabs and the Palestinians get an Israeli commitment of no annexation of the West Bank or Gaza, no displacement of the Palestinians that are living, in those places, some language about Gaza eventually being connected to the West Bank, and also language that keeps a two-state solution alive. Doesn't mean it's going to happen, doesn't mean it's imminent, so that's what they get. Israel gets a release of all hostages.

Hamas has to lay down its arms and plays no role in governance. the Arabs shoulder the burden of security, as well as reconstruction in coordination with Israel. So this is objectively, if it happens, it is a really big deal. And Trump deserves and will get my congratulations and credit if they make this happen. If this gets implemented, just as he did when the Abraham Accords were signed in his first term. So that's the first point. It's just a recognition of what it is that everyone is pushing, and the Americans are pushing it, the Arabs are pushing it.

You've seen support from the European leadership, from the Canadians, from Australia, and from Israel. Now, we haven't seen, of course, support from Hamas. That's the toughest one to get over the line, not least because a lot of them have been assassinated, and also because they are the most extreme of all of the parties here. But be that as it may, why did we get to this moment? We got to this moment because the Americans have leverage that they have been extremely reluctant to use, and they're now using it.

And that came because they showed Israel that there were going to be hard consequences if Israel didn't accept this deal. You know, for over a year now, almost, you know, we've seen almost two years. We've seen no consequences to Israel from the military actions that they have taken. No one that they're hitting has any capacity to hit them back. And everyone around the world is saying,

we don't like this, we condemn it, we're angry, a bunch of countries, MBS Muhammad bin Salman said this is genocide, you know, we've got a ruling against BB and his secretary, his minister of defense and others at the International Court of Justice, all of these things. But there's no real consequences. Suddenly, the United Arab Emirates came out and they said, if you proceed with annexation of the West Bank, which Nanyahu said he was going to do, or if you proceed with occupation and displacement of Palestinians from Gaza, ditto, then we, the UAE, will leave the Abraham Accords. And that was a real consequence. And they told Trump directly last week, that's what we're

going to do. And that's when Trump came out and said, there will be no annexation. He didn't say, I'm going to tell BB or there'll be consequences. He said, there will be no annexation. if he was making the decision for Israel. In other words, they're going to be big consequences here. And I've seen the Israelis, they're really angry that all these countries are in the West are now recognizing a Palestinian state. And he says they're siding with the terrorists and all these, these tough statements from Israel, they have not made any tough statements against the UAE because they understand

that those consequences, they don't want to touch. That will bite. So that stopped BB from announcing an. And then Trump, led by Jared Kushner and by Steve Whitkoff, you know, were engaging with the Israelis, with all of the Arab world behind them. They met in a summit meeting this last week in New York. Again, happened in the sidelines of the U.N., the U.N. facilitating all of this. That's why it happened last week.

They all said, you have to accept this deal. And so then it was all set up, and the pressure on Bibi was immense. and his far right and his coalition doesn't like it one bit. Not happy about signing this, but when Trump was in that meeting and said, you're going to do this and even said, I'm calling the Quddery Amir, and you're going to get on the phone,

and you're going to apologize for striking his country, and you will not do it again. And Bibi said, I'm sorry, and I won't hit Qatar again. So, I mean, this is what it is. This is the United States, which is Israel's principal ally, It's one ally of true consequence, providing immense amounts of defense support and technology

and diplomatic cover and economic engagement and trade telling Israel, enough, you're going to accept this deal. And now, Hamas has to accept this deal, and we'll see if it's going to happen. Yeah, it is. It does feel really hopeful. Let me just express, I would love for you to assuage or comfort me in my time of, I don't know if it's being. common sense, cynicism, or paranoia, but I believe that Netanyahu is much smarter than Trump and that Trump's team of diplomats, and you probably know them better than me, including,

you know, great real estate developers, that there's a chance that Netanyahu is playing Trump and that has figured out a way to ensure Hamas will not sign this. I keep hearing how everyone is in favor of this deal and likes it, except for the other side. side. And that is, I don't think we've heard a lot from Hamas, either rejecting or endorsing the deal. And that we're playing with, essentially, unlike most recent wars, where people decide that they love their children more than they hate their enemy, I haven't seen any evidence of that. And I wonder if Netanyahu has done the math and says that his survival, political survival, and how he stays out of jail, is to remain on a constant war footing. And we'll

figure out a way to structure a deal such that it looks as if he's trying to get a deal done, but ensures a deal actually never happens. Put to rest my fears and cynicism here. I can't. I can't. But I want to contain it because the annexation that he has promised that he will not engage in has nothing to do with this deal. That has to do with do you want consequences or not. Trump said you're not going to do it. Even if Hamas doesn't accept the offer, you, Israel, are not annexing the West Bank.

So there's a hard constraint there. The Americans made it very clear that they are not now pushing for taking a couple million Palestinians out of Gaza. You'll remember when Trump met with the king of Jordan and he said, ah, the Palestinians will all want to leave. And that's not that that was, that was U.S. policy. That's not policy anymore. So even if Hamas refuses this deal, and I think that there's every likely, that the deal might not go forward, though Hamas itself is under immense pressure, then that means the fighting in Gaza continues, but the Palestinians, Israel's not going to force

them out, and they're not going to annex the West Bank. So you have kind of squeezed what had been a, we're going to keep doing, we're going to keep moving until we get a greater Israel, this more fundamentalist position, of the Israeli far right in the coalition, that has been cut off at the knees, and that's important. Now, if Hamas doesn't accept this deal, then it looks a little bit like the Abraham Accords, right?

Where, I mean, Trump offered in Bahrain, in his first term, a roadmap for what a Palestinian state would look like, and the Palestinians were unable to accept it. They didn't have the governance in place and, you know, the Hamas was essentially running Gaza and the Palestinian Authority was ineffectively running the West Bank. And so the Abraham Accords happened, but there was no movement towards a Palestinian state. And the Palestinians were largely blamed for that, including by the Gulf Arabs that were supportive of the Abraham Accords. If Hamas refuses this offer that Israel accepts, then the law.

war in Gaza continues, and the Gulf states will be like, well, this is on you, Hamas. This isn't on the Israelis. But so, I mean, in other words, you've constrained the conflict. You've made an offer to both sides. One is accepting it. Maybe Israel is not accepting it in fully good faith. I'm prepared to buy that argument in terms of the Israeli prime minister. But ultimately, Hamas is the organization.

organization that needs to be smoked out and they're either going to let they have to let these i mean you'll remember during trump's speech last week at the u.n he had one significant applause line from the people other than when he finished his whole speech and and that was when he said i want to end this war and the way you end this war is you let all of these hostages go and that was a line that received applause from many, many delegations from all over the world. It wasn't just Israel and a couple of close allies. And that is this peace deal, which the Gulf is completely supporting, which Israel is supporting, which the U.S. is brokering, requires Hamas to let these hostages that they took

on October 7th, release them, release them. They now can end the war if they release them. and they have to do it. They have to do it. Are we dealing with something? I think it's natural that the West looks at the fact pattern around how wars end and assume that this war will end the same way. And that is, at the end of World War II, the German leadership after Hitler committed suicide, decided, okay, we've lost the war and we don't want to see our more death and destruction here.

And they had unconditional surrender. Japanese emperor, who a lot of the Japanese public thought was a god, said, I can't tolerate more punishment on behalf of my people. And that is, at some point, people realize they love their kids more than they hate their enemy. And what I see here, quite frankly, is a group of people, Hamas, who don't appear to love their children more than they hate their enemy, that they think of their, they implant or embed their children in military targets. And so, I mean, aren't we just dealing with a different format here. I mean, I was asked the same question. I'm sympathetic to when people say the war needs to end. I get that an occupying force has an obligation to ensure

there's a certain level of humanitarian aid in that region they're enforcing or occupying. At the same time, I asked myself, would we have allowed Nazis to stay in Germany? But we're under the assumption that they're thinking the same way the Germans and the Japanese sought at the end of World War II when they'd clearly lost the war. And aren't we just dealing with an entirely different complexion where the leadership of Hamas sees future deaths of their own citizenry as just martyrdom? Sure. But, I mean, we're also, I think a more relevant analogy would be al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. And, I mean, it's not like we didn't kill bin Laden. We did. And I was very comfortable and supportive of that decision, right? I mean, the Americans

absolutely needed to take him out, I probably would have rather if he had just died in prison, but either way, I mean, he was, you know, a terrorist that was responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians

and in that regard, very similar to what Hamas perpetrated on October 7th. And those leaders have been killed. They've been killed. Now, the United States then engaged in an incredibly bloody war that last,

lasted decades long that cost trillions of dollars that, you know, sort of destroyed far more lives than it possibly saved, that led to the reestablishment of the Taliban in Afghanistan that are now putting incredibly repressive rules in place, mistreating their citizens, particularly their women. Did the United States fight to the very last member of al-Qaeda? No. No, they didn't. And, you know, I'm sure that there's a lot more radicalization on the back of how far and how long the Americans fought because of all of the civilians that were caught up in the crossfire. So I'm very comfortable with the fact that the military leadership of Hamas has been targeted and eradicated. I'm not comfortable with the idea that a radically more powerful Israel can continue a war that is mostly at this point, leading to the suffering of the Palestinian people

as opposed to further degradation of Hamas. And it's not particularly contributing to Israeli security in the near media more long term. So I have a hard time making that argument. I don't like the idea that Hamas fighters are going to get amnesty. I'd like to see everyone responsible for their crimes. I'd like to see Israelis that have committed war crimes

held responsible for those two. But at the end of the day, we live in a very imperfect society, and what we're trying to solve for is less humanitarian destruction, less killing of civilians that are innocent, innocence. All of the Jews that were killed on October 7th were innocent, and they should have been protected,

and they weren't. So many of the Palestinians that have been killed over the past nearly two years, are innocent. So a lot of them are kids, and I want to protect those people. I remember kind of the first book that really moved me. I read this book called The Winds of War by Herman Wook.

It was the first big book I ever read. I think I read it in the 10th grade, and I remember asking my mom all these questions about it and my history teacher about it. And kind of the first lesson I ever took away from an end-up look at war is it's near impossible to find moral clarity in war. It's just, it just means a lack of moral clarity.

But anyway, one of the things I really admire about you is you are able to maintain a certain level of impartiality, and I have a difficult time with that. I'm not a fan of this administration, and I have a tendency to, I think, see everything through dark colored glasses, and you are able to sort of parse through, I think, more objectively, certain actions and give credit where credits do. Can you, for me, describe America's view on Ukraine? What is our approach and our policy right now on Ukraine? Well, first of all, I appreciate you saying that, Scott, and it's not like, you know, I'm some automaton internally. I mean, I have very strong views. I just know that the world doesn't respond to my strong views. And, you know, the fact that I like or don't like something, I spent all my time doing international affairs,

I really feel compelled to try to understand what's going on here either way. And so, you know, I do legitimately believe that Trump wants to end wars. I think he looks at Israel, Gaza, he looks at Russia, Ukraine, and he wants to end those wars. And yeah, he wants a Nobel Peace Prize and he wants credit for it

and that's the way he's wired for everything and he wants more credit than he deserves. I mean, Armenia, Azerbaijan, he ended that war and they weren't even fighting at the time. You know, a lot easier to end a war when they're not fighting. But I think he legitimately thinks

that these are senseless. He doesn't like the video, he doesn't like seeing, you know, the people, the brutality, and he wants to end it. And, you know, that's a place where there is a lot of alignment between the world, the community that's there at the U.N. and Trump. And on Russia, Ukraine, he wants to end the war. And then he's tried. He's tried.

And, you know, usually Trump, one of Trump's political skills, and it served him very well, is that when he fails at something, he moves on. He never refers to it again. It's as if it didn't even exist. He tries to get an attorney general confirmed, doesn't happen, never talks about that guy. It's as if the vote didn't even happen. I got my Pam Bondi now, right? Same thing with like, you know, sort of a doesn't, has a problem with Modi.

Modi's economy is failing. But now he wishes him happy birthday and now it's a great Indian economy, right? And we have so many examples of this. Trump wanted to end the war between Russia and Ukraine. he has failed at it he's not letting it go he's actually upset about it and he has even admitted publicly that he has failed he's like i thought that my relationship with putin would lead to influence and it hasn't he's brought it up when he hasn't even been asked the question that's that's kind of unique there's no other global issue out there like that for trump he's really pissed off

that he's put effort in and he's given Putin he's given him phone calls a face-to-face meeting he's treated him with respect on the global stage he said he's willing to take off the sanctions

engage in joint investment all of this stuff none of which Biden would have done no other president was going to do it and Putin's responses go screw yourself I'm going to kill more Ukrainians Trump's really angry

about it. And he wants the Europeans to do more of the lifting. And they are. And he wants to blame other people primarily. But he understands that like this state of play is no bueno. And he's leaning into it. And so what I see happening in the last week is Trump really trying to squeeze Putin on his economy and specifically on oil. He's talked about it a bunch now for several weeks, but in the last few days, he's sharpened it. So first it was the Europeans are buying all this oil and they shouldn't, but he wasn't focusing on the countries doing the most because they're his friends. Now in the last few days, he's gone directly to Victor Orban of Hungary, who's buying more oil than almost anyone in Europe. He's saying, I want you to stop. I want you to stop. He's

going to Redsep Erdogan, Turkey. Trump gets along with him well, strong leader, right, meets with him directly one-on-one, says, I want you to stop buying Russian oil. Modi, Trump hasn't talked to him directly about this, but Marco Rubio has been doing the direct engagement. They're talking about getting Trump to India for a summit meeting. What Trump wants his return is he wants India to stop buying Russian oil. And the Indians have said, well, you know, we can't do it immediately, but we can phase it out over time. And they're now negotiating this. So it seems pretty clear that this is not just a headline to blame other countries. Trump actually wants these countries to implement. And in return, he's willing to do more. And one of the most interesting bits that I got from

the UN meetings last week was when Trump met with Zelensky, they talked about the U.S. buying a whole bunch of the ramped-up drone production that Ukraine is engaging in with, you know, very technologically advanced with all of this real-time data collection. And in return, the United States would provide more advanced weapons, including cruise missiles that could more effectively target Russian energy production deep inside that country. Now, that's really interesting, right? I mean, it's a, it would be a, it, All of this implies Trump leading a significant escalation of stick against Putin because the carrot by itself has failed.

I mean, watch this space. And Trump is capable of changing his mind five times before you and I have another conversation about it, Scott. But this is not just a headline to be forgotten. Yeah, the pushback I would put forward in. And again, this might be. some of my bias coming out, is that I can't think of an administration maybe where we were, you know, with Iran and Iraq war, we were kind of hoping the bullets would win and would support one side when we saw one side winning. I can't think of a past administration that wasn't actively engaged in trying to solve wars. So I get that he might hate death. I don't think he hates death in wars any more than Secretary Blinken or Secretary Clinton did. The quote-unquote ability to move on, if you will, I would describe a sclerotic form. policy that makes it very difficult for us to be seen as a steadfast ally or enemy. He invites

Zelensky to the White House, makes a fool of him, puts pressure on Zelensky, oh, you've got to face reality, you can't win this war, and now all of a sudden he's angry of Putin. It seems very ego-driven as opposed to any sort of thoughtful, long-term strategic goals around increasing investments in cyber command or asymmetric warfare. The one thing I think we find common ground on is that I think it is a waste of time and poor strategy to expend calories trying to reduce the demand side on the oil. Oil is the great. Fossil fuels are still the greatest economic arbitrage in history. The Russians will always be able to find a buyer if they lower the price far enough. Where I do think there's real common ground, and I think should be the strategy focused,

what we should be rallying around, is figuring out a way to go, the key number is 17%. and that is Ukrainians have been able to damage 17% of Russia's oil refining capacity. I think if we can increase that number, 1% every two weeks, once it hits 25, 2830, I think Putin all of a sudden comes to the table because this is an economy that's 50% of the GDP. It's basically a gas station with a government right now. So it strikes, just as Newt Gingrich said in the, I guess it was in the 90s, go negative, go early. both candidates always start out with this flat. This is going to be about the issues.

And one person goes negative and he goes, you're both going to end up going negative, just go negative, go early. We have been reticent to provide the Ukrainians with the permissions and weaponry and cash to damage Russian infrastructure. And I think the sooner we get there, the sooner this war is over.

Your thoughts on supplying them with a long-range, long-range artillery and missiles such that we can take that 17 number up to 30 or 35, which I believe ends this war, Your thought? Yeah, I think that, well, we'll see if it ends the war. I mean, Putin, the Biden administration thought that the economic measures that they took would be adequate to force Putin to the table. They were wrong.

You've had a million-plus Russian military casualties in this war. That would bring most leaders to their knees. It has had no impact on Putin. I'd like to believe that having a significant impact on his oil money would stop. him. I think it has a greater chance of doing so than what we've seen so far, but how long will it take and how much more Ukrainian land and how much more damage can he do to Ukrainian civilian population and its military population in the interim is an open question. But I do think the nature of the war is going to change. Now, look, I fully accept the criticisms of Trump that you just laid

on his door. No question. And you and I've spoken about them before. I want my president to do well, irrespective of who that person is. It's not up to me. It's up to the president. What I'm getting at here is that it is very surprising, especially in the context of a lot of Trump haters who have been saying consistently that Trump is a cutout for the Russians, that he's somehow in their pocket, that he's, you know, carrying water for them, that we've seen a dramatic change in Trump's policy.

on Russia from January to now. A dramatic change. It's a real change. And it's obviously not consistent with him being a cutout of the Russian government, which is lazy analysis. I agree with you that pretty much all presidents would like to have a level of peace and end wars. They want to have diplomatic successes.

But Trump has been exercised mostly with. himself and he doesn't seem to care very much about things like human rights and other things that most presidents really do care about even though it may not be on the top of the priority list. Ending wars is something that makes Trump a more normalized president compared to his predecessors and compare with other leaders around the world. Now, I agree wholeheartedly that Trump is not just an unpredictable president. He is seen by most of the president. He is seen by most of his allies as an unreliable president. And as a consequence, they are taking longer-term steps

to hedge away from the United States, to rely less on the United States, that will truly hurt the US. We've also seen that Trump's advisors, some of whom I consider very capable, like Marco Rubio, some of whom I consider completely incompetent, like Pete Hague Seth, but none of them are willing, willing to actually give Trump direct criticism.

We saw that with Signalgate, and we're seeing that just in the last 24 hours with the Secretary of Agriculture, you know, texting the Secretary of Treasury and saying, how can we be supporting Argentina when they're just going behind our back and selling cheaper soybeans to the Chinese and hurting American farmers? But is she going to say that? or is he going to say that directly to the U.S. president? The answer is no. So, I mean, we have a president who demands loyalty, Uber Alas,

and is therefore not getting good information from his team. And he's making capricious decisions because he's right all the time on everything, and he's the best leader ever in history anywhere in the world. And it's all exaggerated. And a lot of it damages the U.S. So it's not like I think he's fit to be president, but within the – he is president, and he won a free and fair election, and he got the electoral and the popular vote, and he is president of a very powerful country, the world's most powerful, and he's also consolidated a lot of power around him. And he's doing a lot, and some of which is successful. So, you know, it's all – I mean, I could spend all of my time just saying how this guy is unfit.

Okay, let's stipulate that he's unfit, but now let's look at the implications of what he's doing as president. And the reality is some of that stuff is really damaging and some of that stuff is pretty consequentially positive. We'll be right back. from Anthropic. Clod is the AI built for people who don't settle for good enough. It's not just a chatbot, it's a true collaborator that works with you, not instead of you. Whether you're

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Running a small business isn't just a full-time job. It's about a dozen full-time jobs that you rarely, if ever, get to clock out of, at least until you get to the point where you can start hiring the dream team. And if you've made it that far, you already know there's no time to mess around. That's where LinkedIn jobs comes in. LinkedIn makes it easy to post your job for free, share with your network, and get qualified candidates that you can manage all in one place. And LinkedIn's new AI feature can even help you write job descriptions and then quickly get it in front of the right people with deep candidate insights. And if you decide you want to go to the extra mile to find the perfect candidate, LinkedIn says that promoted jobs get three times the number of qualified applicants. It's all these little things that let you find help fast without compromising on quality, which has, up to you finally having extra time in the day for, I don't know, relaxing.

Or knowing my listeners, you'll probably use that extra time to expand your empire even further. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com slash prof. That's LinkedIn.com slash prof to post your job for free. Terms and conditions apply. So just to return to Ukraine for one moment, And I ask this question generally for illumination, not to make a point. I have no sense for who has the momentum right now, the Russians or the Ukrainians. Just tactically on the ground, what do you think is going on?

That's actually a great question. I wish more people would ask it because it's hard. The Russians have the momentum on the ground, on the ground. It is limited momentum, right? It is grinding. They don't, they're not able. to throw the numbers of troops because of the Ukrainian drone capabilities. It's like, you know, sort of two to four troops here, two to four troops there. But they're also able to get a lot more

military capability to overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses nearby. So it's hard for the Ukrainians to defend in depth. On the ground, the Russians have momentum. In terms of hitting critical infrastructure, right now the Ukrainians have momentum. They've been doing more damage with their drone strikes on Russia's jet fighters, for example, a $300 drones taking out $100 million jets, and also in terms of hitting a bunch of Russia's refining capabilities, some domestic oil production, and the like. And so I think it depends on what part of the military you're talking about in terms of who's doing the most damage. I think Ukraine is under more time pressure right now, right now.

That could change depending on to what extent what I described to you in the change of Trump's position is lasting and is implemented. That could change. It might be that the Russian economy ends up facing more pressure than, you know, Ukraine's on the ground defense capabilities. As of right now, that is not true. So for right now, I would say Russia has the momentum, but I think it's very much in flux, very much in flux, in a way that it hasn't been for two years. So on our remaining time here, and as well, is really generous with us, I want to return to domestic politics. And granted, we're recording

this. It is 5.50 Greenwich Mean Time PM. So what we say here, it could be. be obsolete in a matter of minutes. I'm just curious what you think is the likelihood of a shutdown and give me your sense for some of the semantics at work here. My latest from the administration from people I trust is 75 percent. They're closer to it than I am. I don't think the Dems are far off that. So sure, I think it is likely to happen. And if it does happen, then, you know, you are going to see some serious consequences in terms of people fired. And Trump, the fact that Trump is willing to break some furniture gives him the upper hand in the negotiations.

And, you know, in terms of who gets blamed, the other side gets blamed. I mean, it's we're living in this, you know, kind of upside down. No, no, there is, there is no information space in U.S. politics that is shared. So I would take the other side of that because my sense is, to your point, Americans don't like parties threatening a shutdown for political opportunism. They're against that, whether it's to build the wall or to get rid of or to reduce payments for Obamacare. In this instance, though, I think the Democrats are being shockingly strategic and they're going after a very pointed, we want tax credits for Obamacare, which is popular not only among Democrats, but in many of the Republican states, that this could, in fact, divide Republicans, and that it's very pointed, it's very easy to understand, and there's a lot of support amongst Republicans themselves, and that this might be a winning, and quite frankly, the Democrats have to show an ability at some point to punch back. I mean, it's like leader Jeffries and Senator Schumer, it's kind

like, at this point, wet meat blanket. I mean, the Democrats are just sort of, I think, starved for some sort of reasonable pushback. So I would, the surveys I've seen have said that the Republicans are more likely to be held accountable for a shutdown than the Democrats. But you think this is, you think right now that Republicans have the upper hand? I think the Republicans have the upper hand in terms of, well, I think Trump has the upper hand because he is in charge. He controls a party. And the Democrats are much more divided. They don't have a leader. They're week. We don't really know what they stand for. And I think the action in the U.S. is not really about the shutdown. I think the action is about Trump's continued efforts to flood the zone to weaken

checks and balances on executive authority across the government. And in some areas, he's having real success. And in some areas, it's more mixed. But the number of unprecedented things that Trump is throwing at American democracy every week, most of which is noise, like the latest Pete Hegsef rally or the cuttery plane, but some of which is real. And I think the Pam Bondi investigations, that's real. You know, you now have an attorney general that is not independent in any way from the president. And that's a meaningful win for Trump in consolidating authority against a political opposition. I think that the response to the assassination of Charlie Kirk, you and I haven't spoken publicly since that's happened, but obviously creates a lot

of momentum for Trump. I think Trump won. For me, the thing that made me convinced that Trump was going to win his second term was after he was convicted as a felon, for specifically for charges that would not have been brought against other people. When there were charges, plenty of charges that he should have been convicted on in other cases that would have been brought against anybody else. But those weren't the ones he was gone. As soon as I saw that, I'm like, uh-oh, grievance base is going to work. And I mean, you know, then he survives two assassination attempts, one that almost kills him. And now Charlie Kirk is killed. I mean, I do think that all of this plays more effectively for a president who has won

on the back of they are trying to get me. I am here to protect you. And, you know, this ability to create some form of moral equivalence that I'm only doing to them what they already did. They already canceled us, so I'm canceling them. They wanted to investigate me and jail me, so I'm investigating and going to jail them. It is not equivalent.

It is the other, you know, what Biden was doing was not weapon the institutions anywhere near to the same degree and same breadth that Trump is. But I do think that they are seen as equivalent by Trump supporters. And that is an enormous strength that he has managed to win in the information space. And that, to me, is where most of the action is for U.S. domestic politics right now. Last question before we wrap up. Are you able to do when we're in, so electronic arts has been taken private and the largest take private in history. And in my world, that would have just been

enormous news. But there's so much chaos, so many things flying overhead. And, you know, I teach at a business school. We barely even notice the largest take private in history because there's so much other stuff going on. Do you find periods like this, especially because you're right in the center of it, do you find it intoxicating and intellectually inspiring and I know it's good for your business or does it start to affect you mentally do you start to get anxious when you see all of this tumult and chaos in the world what where does what happens to you personally in an era like this i continually think of things that i'm not exercised by um you know my it's funny uh one of the things um that uh you know that update that i send you on monday mornings

I mean, I got a note back from my friend Bob Iger, right, who was like, there's so much in here, you know, and, you know, you didn't even, you didn't even say anything about Kimmel. And I'm like, you know, I, in the grand scheme of stuff this week, I wasn't all that exercised by Kimmel. And he said, I think you're the only person in the country. And my response was, well, right now I'm not that exercised by Hegsev. And this was before Hengseth did his thing. And a whole bunch of people this week were asking me, how come you didn't write about Hegseth? And I'm like, because I think he's just going to,

he's just trying to do a performative rally to like ingratiate himself with Trump after he screwed up in the signal gate and he had the big defense, you know, parade and it didn't go very well. And they kind of mailed it in. So I thought he was just trying to bolster himself but it wasn't really news.

And I'm constantly looking for the things out there that I'm not exercised by. There are a lot of them. And I think it's really, really good to be like, yeah, I don't care about that. I'm not sure I need a view on that. And I think that's okay. Like, I really want to be in a position where the stuff that I'm opining on strongly is stuff that I actually have some real expertise. And the other stuff, it's not like it doesn't matter.

It's just that, you know, you and I, we only have so much headspace. And, you know, I've seen you speak live a bunch of times, Scott. And I love the way you can go through a deck and you can talk about how corporates are and aren't positioning themselves to be valuable and what that brand means. And you're better at that than anyone I have ever seen personally. And I don't, when you're doing that, I don't feel like, oh, there's so much information that Scott's being flustered by it. I don't feel that way. I feel like if you ever get flustered, it's probably because you're suddenly getting taken in by Gaza,

which is something you're emotional about, but you don't have a lot of expertise on. And I just don't spend a lot of time. I don't get very emotional about stuff I don't know stuff about because I kind of feel like there are other people out there that are doing what Scott's doing in his space. doing in my space, give that to the people who do that with their space, you know. There it is. Ian telling me to stay in my own line. There you go. There you go.

14th time on the podcast. Is it really? Holy shit. 14th time. Ian Bremmer is the president, is the president and founder of Eurasia group, the world's leading political risk researching a consulting firm and G0 Media, a company dedicated to providing intelligent and engaging coverage of international affairs. Ian, always appreciate your time.

and go United Nations. Team United Nations. UN. There we go. We get together and have discourse. Ian, very much appreciate your time. Glad you're well. Thanks, man. Algebra of happiness, who do you owe? There's a great scene in true detective season one when Matthew McConaughey is trying to get Woody Harrelson

to come look at some data he's been collecting on an investigation. And Woody Harrelson wants nothing to do with this guy. And Matthew McConaughey reminds him that he has a debt, that you owe me. And if you've seen this here, as you know, why. And I think it's actually really constructive to think who do you owe or what do you owe. And that is to think about all the wonderful things in your life. If you've registered some prosperity, have a good family, try and reverse engineer as far back as you can to what are

the things that led to your success that aren't your fault. Yeah, it's easy to credit your grit and your character and I'm a baller and I work so hard. But really look at the underpinnings of your success or what was the infrastructure. So I went through this process. And why do you do this such that you can focus on what you're passionate about maintaining, what you're passionate about maybe participating in, devoting some of your time or your treasure and your talent to ensuring that those wonderful things that provided opportunity for you continue to be present. When I went through the process, I went all the way back to assisted lunch, which I got in elementary school, a 74% admissions rate at UCLA. I didn't get in the first time. I didn't get in the

first time. I was one of the 26 that didn't get in. Pell Grants is the only reason I could stay at UCLA. I didn't have any money. Family planning. My mom got pregnant when I was 17 and had we lived in a red state. We weren't very sophisticated. I imagine she would have been forced to carry the baby to term, at least possibly. And if my mom had had a baby when I was a senior in high school and me being the only man of the house, the only person in the house, I doubt I would have been able to go to college. So family planning is played or bodily autonomy. for women has played a huge role in my life. State-sponsored education, see above UCLA, and then coming of age during the internet, middle-class households finance this post-apocalyptic communications

background called DARPA or whatever, or DARPA was the agency that funded it, funded the internet. And I made most of my wealth in businesses related to the internet. So, and also a risk aggressive culture, you know, public education teaching at NYU or public funding of education, including private institutions. You know, all of these things that have led helped me have a remarkable life. Now, that's the chip. The salsa is I'm a fucking monster. I'm not, I am not humble. I'm hardworking and talented. But without these things, it just my hard work and talent would have amounted to a lot less. There are people, as or more talented to me, in Iran, Angola, in Thailand that don't recognize nearly the success or prosperity that I've been able to recognize.

So you write all these things down and then it feels good to be very supportive of them, to be vocal about them, maybe to give a little bit of money to them, to vote for people who continue to support these things, recognizing that these are the building blocks, right? In sum, a lot of your success isn't your fault. And it feels good to try and figure out what are the things that really kind of what was the you know the wind beneath your wings so to speak because it helps inform for me my political viewpoint what I want to be supportive of and where I want to give back right what things led to your success and and kind of indicate well if those are the things where success is not my fault.

This episode was produced by Jennifer Sanchez. Our assistant producer is Laura Jinnair. Drew Burroughs is our technical director. Thank you for listening to the PropGPod from PropGMedia.