The Team House - Easter “Truce” Lasts Less Than an Hour | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

Episode Date: April 20, 2025

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Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics. I'm here with Mick Mulroy, Jason Lyons, and I'm Dmitri Contacos. Happy Easter to everybody who celebrates. A lot cooking, as usual, world falling apart at the seams, it seems like. Let's kick off with the Iran negotiations because we're shooting this on Saturday at 11 a.m. And they just wrapped up maybe an hour, an hour and a half ago. And instantly on Iranian State TV, it's at the end. the talks were constructive. It was happening in Rome. There was some confusion last week about, like, is it happening again? Is it in Rome or is it happening in Oman? As long as they're happening, I think it's a good thing. I mean, you have seen over the last week or so since, like, it's come out where, like, they're talking about a jipoah number 2.0.

Like, that's what I see a lot of people talking about it as. That's just crazy. Like, we shouldn't do this and stuff. And I get it. Some Iran Hawks are Iran Hawks. and they're going to do what they need to do. But, Mick, I wanted to ask you, because I'm sure you've been in, like, meetings like this,

or at least, like, seeing this go down, like how these talks go, because they're saying that there's two, the two parties are in separate rooms, and there's a mediator running between them both and stuff like that. And it seems to me, like, very odd. Like, these guys just can't sit in a room together. You know what I mean? Like, it just seems like a weird buffer, at the, anyway.

Yes, I can see how that would be the, case looking at it. And I think it really stems from when the U.S. assassinated Kossam Soleimani, right? In Baghdad, the Ayatollah said that they would never sit down with the Americans again. So that's probably a factor in this. Got it. I would say, although it makes sense, I guess, at the beginning stages of this negotiation,

to have the Omani's going back and force. And this is in the Oman embassy in Rome. And Oman has traditionally played this mediator role between the United States and Iran. But if they really want to get into the weeds of this, this is a very complicated, very technical type of negotiation. They're going to have to not only be face-to-face, but they're going to have to bring in experts as well. They can't just, I don't think, have some guy running back and forth

talking about, you know, how many centrifuges are going to allow or, you know, what's the device that's going to be on the Iraq, with the A-R-A-K, heavy water treatment plant. I mean, there's all sorts of, and I think it's important, D, to go back to the 2015, so people understand what that was. And then we can see how this is shaping up to either be a 2.0 version, that should be an improvement or essentially going back into the same agreement. But so that was a P5 plus one.

So U.S., UK, France, Russia, China, Germany in the agreement. Basically, it capped uranium enrichment at 3.6 something, 6, 7, I think. So far less than it was now. Right now we're at 60. I mean, the Iranians are at 60, and that's easier to get to, obviously, 90. apparently exponentially easier to get to 90, which is weapons grade. The 2015 agreement capped how many centerfuges they could have, where they could have those centrifuges, which was that non-tons,

so that when it came to the IA-EA inspecting anywhere to go, they had to send out the spent fuel from, you know, civilian energy to, I think it was Russia, so they didn't have it around. The water treatment plant, or not treatment, but the heavy water plant at Iraq had this device on it so they couldn't make plutonium, which is another material you can use to make a nuclear bomb. It had a lot. So it's very technical, very specific.

There's other, there was other, oh, snapback sanctions, for example. So if Iran violated the 2015, that sanctions would be automatic that Russia and China couldn't veto. That was a specific part of the 2015. So that is kind of the framework, if you will. We elected to get out of it 2018. Now we're looking to get back into some version of it. Hopefully it is improved. But the criticism back in 2018 was it didn't address proxy forces,

which Iran apparently is not even talking about now, so it looks like it won't again. And I think to a certain extent people were concerned, that it wasn't transparent enough. So I hope we get a better agreement, but quite frankly, even if we end up back in the similar agreement, it won't be bad for the U.S. national security interest in the region

because it'll prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. So I hope that's the case. I think it's headed that way, although Iran has put, at least in reports, put out specifics like, they won't dismantle their nuclear, anything they've done so far, which is unacceptable. It's way above where it was in 2015. So hopefully the U.S. doesn't accept that.

They have to dismantle it back. Everything should go at least back down to 2015. Right. Because if they leave everything in place, then there's just one quick step from being able to be a nuclear weapon. And I think the U.S. in this area of foreign policy is on the, right track. We're using the threat of legitimate military options as a pushing point for them. And it looks like we're headed toward an agreement that would be beneficial. But last point, I'll turn over to Jason. To your point, Israel's not going to like it. They just didn't like

the 2015. They pushed hard to get out in 2018. I get it. I'm, I am very concerned about Israel's security and pro-Israeli. But ultimately, the concern is, if we do the military option, it will be a continuous thing. So we'll be essentially at war militarily. And Iran has options to retaliate, which will not be good to include shutting down the Straits of Hormuz, attacking partners in the area, going, you know, gray zone, killing diplomats. I mean, there's issues that we have to at least acknowledge. And again, I'm not against the military option.

I think it's a viable option. But it's not just to pull the trigger and this thing's over. It could trigger a much broader conflict. And that's something we have to take into account, including Israel. Yeah, I agree. I mean, there's not much for me to add to it. The only thing I would add, and you touched on it, is I'm not one of those bombing back into the Stone Age. So there's nothing left.

And I'm also not one of those. Let them have whatever they want. We have a nuclear, you know, we have nuclear weapons, one of those people. I don't believe that they should have it, and I hope they don't get it. But I also don't believe that we should completely dismantle their program. If when I say program, what I'm saying is their civilian program to be able to generate energy because their people are suffering. And even, I believe, if I heard it correctly, President Trump during a ceremony for Dr. Oz, I don't even know what the hell he was. doing for him. But I feel weird even saying Dr. Oz. But for him said, he mentioned Iran and he said,

I want them to thrive. I want them to do well. So I'm hoping that that includes leaving the apparatus in place for them to be able to safely produce electricity for their people, but take away, dismantle the ability for them and the mechanism for them to have weapons-grade material. So yeah, we'll see. And as far as Israel's concern, I wholeheartedly agree. I think I would assume that they're going to give us a, hey, your guys are pushing it and we're going to do this on our own. But I don't put it past them just doing it. And like you said, I think if that happens, it's going to be a continuous thing. Because one strike, especially without verification that it, you know, took out the intended targets is not going to be enough.

So and there's also, like you said, we could actually BDA that we took out the, you know, the intended targets. But like you said, they have other tools in the toolbox. You know, they could go gray zone. They can do other things. So, you know, hopefully it won't get to that point. Good point. The other issue is if Israel does take a strike, then the negotiations will probably be kaput. Because the way the Iranians will view it is U.S. and Israel are essentially one.

So they'll view it as a U.S. trying to get this agreement at the same time, given the weekend to strike. I think you're right. They might do it without our approval. That'd be a big step for them. But ultimately, I think the goal should be preventing Israel from, I mean, excuse me, Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. And if they do comply with the, with, and I think Secretary Rubio and Mike Walser and

write on this. They have to be like hardline, especially going into the negotiations, and then it gives them some wiggle room to come back closer to the middle. And hopefully it's, hopefully it's a better agreement than 2015, but quite frankly, if it's the same, we'd still be in a better place. And to your point, Jay, they, the Iranian people will benefit, right? So the sanctions will come off. And they are very innovative, very educated society. I think they'll do really well in the global economy. The only thing that's hindering them is, is the regime because of the sanctions?

And they're, you know, seemingly endless desire to destabilize a region, a region of which they could prosper in if they would just, you know, stop that. And it'll let the Iranian people compete on a fair playing field. I think they'll do very well. Yeah. I think it's good that, like, yeah, we're willing. like we're saying we're willing to hit Iran for now. I mean, you got to do that to bring them to the negotiation table, right?

The wild card, like you mentioned, is Israel. Also, there's nobody else involved in these negotiations, right? Like the last one was a multilateral kind of deal. This one's pretty bilateral. And like our proxy, for lack of a better term, Israel, which is not our proxy. But you know what I'm saying? can literally destroy it with one with one go of it right and if Israel did do that unilaterally they're probably not destroying it I mean we couldn't the word is we're not going to be

able to destroy it ourselves I'll be able to bring it back in three to six months right we've spoken about this so I don't know where it goes besides making a deal of some kind um it's funny though because like we you know the whole Trump agenda early on was how the first agreement was BS and we're getting out of it and like we're back here in the same place where it's probably going to look if we're lucky probably going to look like the same exact agreement or like very similar wild um same place same region hoothies we've been bombing the huthies for like what seems like an eternity it's been over 30 days um they're still obviously capable they shot down another mq nine drone fifth since march 15th and 20thes for

since October, 20, which is kind of a wild, that's a lot. It seems like a lot. They obviously seem to still be capable after 30 plus days of us continuously bombing them.

What needs to happen? Is this just going to be an ongoing thing? Like, I don't, what happens now? Mick? Yeah. So, yeah, this, I agreed with the need to escalate.

I'll start there. I also think it's fair to say that you've got to be realistic about what you can actually do from the air, right? Air is a major component in any conflict. It has been for many decades. But it's one of those continuously debated, although I don't know why, that it can't essentially win a war without any kind of ground component. So again, I think, you know, hats off to all the servicemen and women that are out there carrying this out. It was the right move to escalate, but it is not having the desired effect, at least completely the desired effect, which is removing the Houthi's capacity to attack commercial vessels and military or military assets and our partner countries if they chose to do so.

They'll never stop the desire, but the only thing we can do is keep them from getting the weapons, and basically just dismantling them, like the Israelis did to Hezbo. But they also used the ground component, right? So they send in Israeli troops. So then the question becomes what's going to be the ground component? And I don't think anybody has a desire politically to send, you know, you know, the Marines or conventional army forces in on the ground to be that ground component. Because we're going to fight people who are heavily entrenched in their territory in the mountains.

And we all know where that's going to go, even though we're, we are the most effective military in the world. We will lose a lot of soldiers of Marines. So I don't think that's even in the cards, thank goodness. But there is a sizable Yemeni capability that we've worked with before. There is a legitimate government of Yemen that is not, of course, the Houthis, Ansar al-A. It is a recognized by the U.N., the U.S., they're headquartered out of eight. there has been a plan for their forces to take Qaeda going all the way back to 2015.

We're the ones that kind of pushed them not to do it. We were concerned about kind of the humanitarian issue, rightfully concerned. But essentially, if the coalition forces took Qaeda, they would cut off Sanah, right? And that's where the Houthis are. So there could be a combination where we have, you know, soft forces from both the military and the agency working with this partner force in conjunction with, of course, Intel and air. And it would be, it would make them very effective. And I think they could actually take the port. And that would change the tide.

It would cut off the Houthis. And on the humanitarian front, the World Food Program just cut off. aid going to the Houthi controlled areas because all the age is being taken by the Houthis for their fighters. So it's not even going to the people. So that kind of took away that, that one component of the Houthi data operation. So I don't know exactly what they're looking at, but that's what's in the media. And I think it's very doable. And it would have a big impact on the Houthis. I want to talk to you for a moment about how you can support the show. If you've been watching it, enjoying it, but you like to get a little bit more involved and help

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But they're also for sale on the merch shop. And additionally, they got t-shirts up there, water bottles, tote bag, coffee mugs, all that good stuff. So please go and check them out and support the show. We really appreciate it, guys. Thank you. Yeah, agree. Reed, I, from the, I was thinking about, as you were talking about, air, can't do it all.

From the time that I was a baby grunt at School of Infantry down in Luzune, you know, we were always taught, hey, it's about you guys. Everything else is supporting arms, you know, you support the warfighter. So you can bomb all you want. And I think we prove that in, in Gulf War I, that, you know, you can have a 100-day air campaign all you want, you know, you're a little, the highway of death, all that stuff. until you put boots on the ground to hold that, it's kind of a moot point. So I agree. But I also, I also think, too, on the far end of that, if you cut off the supply from Iran, which I don't think is coming anytime soon, when that well dries up, that might have an effect, you know, a positive effect as well. So I know it's not probably not in the cards for the negotiations,

but at some point, I think that should be addressed. Good point. Hopefully it's some kind of sidebar to this. You know, they won't, Iran won't put anything like that into an agreement because they view them as their allies, right? They'll say, well, why don't you cut off support to Israel then? But I agree with you, Jason. It could be a side thing. It's like, we're going to have this agreement, but we're also going to see weapons flow stop from Iran to the Houthis in Yemen. And in our intel will know that. Or we don't even have to have intel. If there's an Iranian weapons, that's getting shot at, you know, the USS Carl Vinson, there you go. Yeah. Exactly. So I hopefully they do include that as kind of sub-roza or, you know, maybe an untalked-about portion of that agreement. Yeah. Yeah.

So where's Saudi Arabia in all this? Because Saudi Arabia for a long time is going at the Houthis and stuff like that. I know they've had a ceasefire and stuff like that. Where do they come in? What intelligence-wise, I mean, clearly we're probably. going to be flying stuff out of there. So they have excellent intelligence, and you're right, when I was referring to the 2015 discussion on Houdada, it was the Saudi-led coalition that was the air component

of the effort against the Hussians. Yeah. So we just replaced them, but it was Saudi Arabia. UAE was on the ground. They have really effective special operation forces, and they're probably the ones that would be fully embedded with perhaps, I don't know, but certainly was at the time. the Yemen forces that would take Kudeda. So I think they will be involved, certainly on the Intel side,

and they have a lot of capacity there, especially UAE. So I think it would be a combined effort against the Houthis, but it's much needed and it's past time. They have, I mean, think about it, every shot that they take at a commercial vessel is the International Terrorist Act. Terrorism Act, right? These are civilian, unarmed commercial vessels that have nothing to do with nothing when it comes to, you know, the war in Gaza, which of course, the Houthis were doing this before the war in Gaza even started. So they're just using it as a rallying right now. But it was done far, it's time for them not to be able to take the world hostage and essentially target commercial vessels and international waterways. And everybody should be for this shouldn't just be a U.S. thing. This should be like, where's China? this. 40% of the energy goes to, of the world comes out of this

area and most, a lot of it goes to China. We don't even need it. Yeah. So, yeah, we should get a lot more support. If not military support, it should be political support to do or do it. I mean, is there any talks like from us

talking to China about like, hey, do you guys want to help here? Or it's like, that doesn't work. We can't talk to China because they're the enemy when it comes down. We talk to them, but. Right. Right now, you know, we're in a trade war with them. I'm going to get to the topic.

But now there's Chinese soldiers showing up on a battle building Ukraine. So, I mean, we think we can split this group, but we have not proven that to be the case. And every step that we see, they come closer together, whether it's, you know, what I'm talking about, of course, is China, Russia, Iran, North Korea. They are becoming more intertwined. and their relationships seem to be more and obviously are more important to them than any kind of detente with the, the West, especially when the West is separated like we are now, you know, talking about. Sure. Yeah.

Oh, God. Why don't I never feel better about these conversations, guys? Jesus. So moving to Ukraine just happened just now as well. Putin put out a thing where there's going. going to be an Easter truce, I think, for, I don't know what it was, 36 hours from the 19th, that's 7 to the 21st. And then Zelensky came out maybe 40 or so minutes later saying that the Russians are still

targeting areas in Kursk and the Belagrad region. So who knows what's going to happen with this truce? There have been a number of like some offenses that the Russians have been taken in the last few days that have failed. Maybe that's the move, like, to replenish their, their lines or whatever. Also, in terms of, like, talking ceasefire and some kind of, like, stop, aren't, like, stopped to the fighting. The U.S. came out a couple days ago saying that they were possibly okay with acknowledging

Crimea as part of Russia. And, uh, help me, help me figure this out. when you negotiate in public by just giving the other side more and more shit, doesn't that make, I mean, I'm not a business guy. I mean, I've owned businesses, but doesn't that make your position of negotiation weaker? Yes, especially. Yes, absolutely. Especially with one of the parties not being an honest broker when it comes to negotiations at all.

I think it's clear that Russia is not interested. in a ceasefire. Last month, March, in Saudi Arabia, the U.S. offered a ceasefire 30 days. Ukraine accepted. Russia did not. Russia continued not only to attack Ukraine, but attack civilian infrastructure and civilians in Ukraine. They are not accepting this because they do not see what's in it for them, because the U.S. hasn't put more pressure on Russia to get to that point. We could have secondary sanctions, which means sanctions against China in India for buying Russian oil. That's how they feed their war machine. We could increase our support for Ukraine so that Russia sees no realistic in-state coming to fruition because the support to Ukraine keeps growing, not subsiding.

If we don't do that, Russia is just going to keep nodding, winking, taking the compliments and continuing their war. and if they're successful in Ukraine, the chances of them going into another country, particularly European country that is not NATO, goes way up because, you know, one of the old Russian adages is going back to the Soviet times. When you proceed with bayonets, if you strike steel, withdraw,

if you strike mush, as they call it, you proceed. And that's what they're seeing, mush. So if we're not going to increase our capacity to arm and supply Ukraine, and apparently we rejected them purchasing patriots. Patriots are a defensive weapon. Like, think about that. That is only used to defend yourself against missiles that are flying at your cities. So it might be, and I think the U.S. should stay involved.

Obviously, I think we should increase our support. But if the U.S. isn't going to do anything to push Russia into a position where they want to negotiate and support Ukraine, and punish Russia the aggressors that perhaps we don't need to be involved in the ceasefire negotiations because we're not even a neutral party in this. And maybe Europe needs to step up, which is probably going to happen if this keeps going like this. And I mean, Secretary Rubio, I think, should be leading the effort, not a special hubboy. But if he's saying that they're going to withdraw, I think the people in Ukraine and Europe are like, fine. I mean, you're doing nothing to actually hold Russia accountable.

They claim they took the ceasefire and did it. And then the next day, before the special envoy even left, Russia, they were attacking. So they're making a mockery out of us. So as much as I think the U.S. is on the right track on the Iranian thing, I don't understand how we think this is an effective way to negotiate with Russia and try to get to a ceasefire of Ukraine. We have to actually show Russia. consequences to their continuation of their unlawful, unprovoked attack on Ukraine.

Yeah, I think I think Europe's going to step up, like you said. I really think they, they don't have a choice at this point. And I think Ukraine is going to not necessarily turn its back on us for support, but it's going to blade away from us and be like you're, you know, what can you guys do for us? Because as it stands right now, even if we stepped out right now, There was breaking news and we said, we're done with the negotiation. We have left Russia in a position of power just by our words. You know, just even saying we would consider, you know, recognizing this territory as Russia's. That's enough, you know.

In that aspect, all that is just sticks and stones. All that doesn't count because words do count in this instance. And yeah, I think Europe is going to step up. And I just think we're digging ourselves into a really bad hole with this, the things that we're saying and doing as far as Ukraine is concerned. I think as far as Iran is concerned, we're in the right direction, basically. But with Ukraine, we're digging ourselves in a bad hole worldwide. Yes, absolutely.

And to recognize Crimea as Russian. territory essentially just promotes the idea that if you're strong, you can take territory, period. I mean, it's, and of course, nobody else will, except Russia. And then, and then of course, in the United States, there's always a shift in, you know, who's the president, who's not, and they'll go back to not recognize it. So it's, it all not only show a bizarre deference to Russia, one of our most significant adversaries. It's not going to last as long. It's not going to last. It's going to just. And Ukraine's going to keep fighting and Russia's not going to be successful in taking over Ukraine. And to Jason's

point, the Europeans are definitely going to step up. They are stepping up. They realize, like, they have to, they have to spend a lot to ensure that Russia loses Ukraine. And I think they're willing to do it. And they have the economies to do it. Yeah. The interesting thing is, like, we've, like, bled Russia big time over the last three. 800,000 casualties, 800,000. probably around 300,000 dead. Yeah. Yeah, that's like incredible. Because like I imagine, imagine a war the U.S. was involved in and we had that kind of casualty count.

Yeah. There would be riots in the street. Oh, yeah. It would be like this is. In Vietnam, all of Vietnam, 58,000 deaths. Yeah. Yeah. Over 300,000.

And just the blatant disregard of Putin and his regime for like Russian people is. kind of unfucking believable. It's like biblical. It's World War II number stuff. Annihilation of a whole generation of young Russian. Yeah. I think I read something about it as like one percent. It's one percent of their male population or something like that has been wiped out.

Yeah. And a lot more had fled. Yeah. Who's going to get? Who's in a clip Putin, bro? Let's let's make a let's do it. Let's let's devise it right now. There's got to be something in the works like Ukrainian or some kind of.

of like S, S, uh, S, uh, SBA or whatever trying to figure it out or the polls. I'm sure they're, they're involved heavily. Um, the scary thing is, I know it's like more speculating. Like if that were to happen, like who takes over after Putin? And is it more of a lunatic, which is hard to believe, right? Um, or somebody who would be looking to, looking for the off ramp here. Um, you know, I don't know. It's just unbelievable.

It's a transition. just from the normal, you know, life cycle of a leader, and Putin gets to pick him, then I imagine it's going to be somebody aligned with him or potentially even more fervent. If it's an organic overthrow of the government, who knows, right? Yeah, who knows?

Total crap. I mean, he stayed in power this long. He's a former KGB colonel. He knows security. He, I mean, he knows how to keep his regime in place. so we can't count on on a change in leadership sure and i'm sure like uh probably scared the shit out of him went down with uh uh progosion right um i'm sure like after that he probably clamped clamped down times 10 um yeah there seems to be a real schism in the trump administration

of, you know, the Wiccoffs and the Rubios, the Rubios catalogs and the Wiccoffs and everybody else, basically. I honestly don't know how Rubio's doing this, how he wants to do it. I mean, I would say that there's a traditional Republican view, which, of course, is Russia is our adversary. The U.S. should lead the free world, you know, kind of the Reagan view. and I think Rubio kind of represents that in the current administration, and so does Mike Wals to a certain extent.

So I hope they stick around because it's important, you know, from a person who kind of views the world that way, that that is represented. The idea that you can go kowtow as some have to President Putin, and somehow that's going to work out well for you is just lost on me. It just ignores essentially all of human history, especially when dealing with a, an autocrat, right? They never go, wow, this guy's really nice, so I won't take advantage of them. They go, wow, this guy's really nice. I am definitely going to take it.

Yeah, right. Yeah. Right. All right. It's, I'm sure the Russians are baffled. There's even reporting that they're, like, they're confused, you know? Yeah, like, is this a move? Like, what's going on? Yeah.

It's just too easy. Yeah. I mean, listen, are you, you hear Steve Wikov speak and he's the he's the point guy right for this at this point at this point in time and it literally like you listen to it and you're like

what is going on like this isn't a real estate deal this isn't a deal where like everyone can kiss each other's ass because everyone's going to get rich this is like real life people living and dying civilians dying like in both Ukrainians and Russians fucking dying too like and just like to flip it kind of like yeah we're all buds here is head scratching um

it's head scratching for a lot of reasons but i can i can tell you and anybody's ever done with russia knows they don't view us as a friend they never will they never will you can say all that stuff and they'll be like yeah yeah yeah and so you left the room they're like at that guy yeah they know i mean they they they they like part of their existence is to be counter to whatever the U.S. It's just how they, it's how a lot of autocracies work, right? They build up nationalist sentiment by having an enemy. Right.

Well, we're the enemy. They're not going to change. Yeah. They'll say things and appease things and, you know, not peas, but be conciliatory, but they don't mean it and they never will. And, you know, we've had other presidents that, you know, have thought this and proven wrong. And they even acknowledge it, you know, in a blush with the looked into the eyes.

Yeah. You know, and it's just not the case. It's time to be realistic. It doesn't mean we can't deal with them. We should deal with everybody in the world, right? We should do everything we can to mitigate another world war, because I think people have forgot just how horrendous a world war is. So I'm certainly not saying that we should be at fist of cups with Russia at all time.

So we also ought to be smart enough to realize that they have no interest in being conciliatory to the United States in action. And the interesting thing is, too, they've done some polling on this too. And like almost 60% of the United of American people are like, yeah, we should continue to continue to support Ukraine. Yes. So like the polling's there. Obviously, it's number 12 on the list or whatever of people who things can't care about.

But at the same time, there is sentiment in the United States where people are like, yeah, we should continue to help them out. Yeah, absolutely. It is in our own interest. It's in our own national security interest. It's not charity. and it's important that we stay as a main leader in the world. This is it.

If we pull out of it, that people view it for what it is. The U.S. is withdrawn for being the leader of the free world. And who takes over? Who takes over? Probably be some European, or probably Europe in general. You talk in terms of like in general, generalities, the leader of the free world or like the guy, the person who takes over, the country that takes over,

like fills the vacuum there. I think it's China. Obviously not having to die. I think China, even though there have been reports of Chinese fighters on the ground in Ukraine. And there has been a report too of some Chinese officials going over to Ukraine to like observe what's going on or Russia to observe what's going on. Well, China will try to take over as the world's superpower. Right. Correct.

Because they're not even a part of it. But the U.S. is the one who set up the current system. worldwide after World War II with us essentially at the helm, which is a good place to be, security-wise, economic-wise, and everything. We don't want that, even just looking at, if you want to use the term, America first, America first would be to maintain our leadership of the free world. It's in our own interest, financially, security, everything. So we don't want to be replaced.

No. But we have to actually do more than just talk. We have to actually act. And we have. But we just need to continue to do so. My humble opinion. Yeah. We'll see what goes down.

Another bit of news coming out from Mickey shared this with us yesterday. Do you want to give a rundown of what went down? It looks like the program to help the folks that helped us in Afghanistan is getting its funding revoked and make if you want to give us some more specifics on that. So of course, going back to the horrendous withdrawal of Afghanistan, obviously a lot of people, but certainly veterans became involved in the evacuation of our partner who fought alongside us for 20 years. It was quite frankly an embarrassment the way we left it. But a lot of things were put into place to help those that were left behind.

since it was such a precipitous withdrawal, even people with SIVs, which is special immigrant visas, to come to the United States, didn't come because they didn't get a halfway out. They've been trying to ever since. So it looks like the coordinator for the Afghan relocation efforts, which is CARE, the acronym for the office, is going to be closed down this month, which would leave people essentially stranded, people who fought alongside us who met the qualifications for SIV or were very close. Of course, the Taliban doesn't care if you met it or were very close. They're still going to kill you.

And they have no place else to go. And I would point out that this is one of the most heavily screened populations of any person coming to the United States. They went through extensive background. And, of course, many of them, if not most of them, supported directly U.S. military in the fight against the Taliban. So it would be a horrendous change, in my opinion, and it would be essentially abandoning our promise to these folks. There's a lot of other veterans,

and I was involved in a group called the T.F. Dunkirk, but a lot of other veteran groups that have stayed and really done a lot of lot of a lot to continue this effort. Sean Vandibir was one, I think it's Afghan Evac. Hopefully we can get them on the show and you guys can interview them, but that are still very much attracting this can go into much more detail. But essentially, this needs to happen. There's a lot of vets left, right and center who think this should happen and are going to be

pushing for this and talking to their congressmen and women about making sure we don't abandon these partners. Yeah, and just to note, this was funded through 2027, or supposedly supposed to be funded to do 2027. And it's, check my time, it's not 2027. Congress funded it, which is how the Constitution works, which maybe we should do that. And I think, you know, the blowback in terms of like,

what are other allies going to think? If we're trying to use a partner force and stuff like that, they're not going to believe a fucking word we say i wouldn't right if i have some CIA guy coming in me you're like you're gonna fucking abandon me too the minute like the political will is gone um yeah yeah and as a guy who spent a lot of my time with partner forces yeah that's a big problem i mean at the same time i'd be like i'm gonna take your money and stuff but you know i'm not expecting that much from you guys if i'm completely honest yeah yeah past his prolog man that's what i would i would be asking the same question

if I was in their shoes. Yeah. And remember the earlier part of this discussion, not that we're going to promise all these Yemeni fighters, you know, SIVs, but we're talking about using a partner force right now, right? Exactly.

And it's going to, that's, that's the way of modern warfare, regular warfare, a partner force operations are a key component for a reason. We don't like to, it's a big political decision to put conventional U.S. forces on the ground in arms way again. And after 20 years of fighting Afghanistan.

In the Middle East. It's very unlikely to happen again, or at least it's less likely. So partner forces are going to be key going ahead. And if we don't keep our word, it's going to change the attitude they have toward us. Yeah, and listen, me as being like a regular citizen that doesn't, hasn't done anything, that's just been experiencing the last 20 years and stuff like that. I can kind of get behind, you know, a handful of ODAs, a little piece of the raged regiments and J-Soc and CIA. you know, facilitating the Yemeni army into going after the Houthis and stuff like that.

Like that I can buy, but not, you know, 150,000, 100 first airborne guys or Marines and stuff like that. Like that's, that's it. It is a political no-go in this country. Yeah, it should be. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I agree 100%. And not just because my son's in the 100 first. Right.

I mean, I mean, seriously, and when it comes to committing U.S. force on the ground, it has to be an absolute direct U.S. national security interest and no other option. That's what I would, that would be my policy. Until then, yes, part of force operations, special operations, Intel, for sure. Yeah. I mean, that's the name of the game.

That's what they do best, right? So I'm down with that. You know what I mean? But I don't want it to be another quagmoth. in Yemen, where when it's like there's no coalition really, like an international coalition, especially what you would think, though, an issue like what's going on in the Red Sea with navigation and freedom of navigation should be more likely to induce a coalition to get together to do something like this.

Yeah. Because everyone's economically involved and affected by this stuff. It's a good point, because there is a coalition. I don't remember how many countries, but it's, it's, um, Operation Prosperity Guardian, I think. Mick, you're an expert. You're an expert and you couldn't remember.

Like, because like, what's this fucking coalition actually doing? Yeah. Right. Sorry. I'm getting, I'm getting, I'm getting red hot. And we had that, we had the International Maritime Security construct when I was at the Pentagon. So it's the same thing, basically.

Because there's, especially when it comes a naval power. There's political, like, hey, we're with you guys. But then there's actually capacity. Right. And very, very, very few countries actually have naval maritime air capacity. And it's basically the U.S., the UK and France. Right. So this coalition of, I don't know, say 35 countries boils down to like three.

Yeah. And nobody holds a candle to us. So I hope, especially with their European partners, they start realizing that they have to do more, they have to bring more to the game than just, you know, what they're doing. And I think you're seeing that because they're concerned about Russia. But that's why these coalitions sound huge, but you can't remember who's in it because you never see any of them actually doing anything. They'll send staff folks to our jock, right? And that's them participating. They just stand there with like a clipboard.

Yeah. That's what you know. Everybody does. But yeah. And I'm not diminishing it. We need politically. We need other countries. So it's not the, U.S. But when it comes to naval capability, there's not a whole lot of countries out there that can even participate at this level. Yeah. All right. Is there anywhere somebody could go to help out with, like, maybe putting the screws to

the administration about not pulling this funding from Congress? You already said it. Call your congressman. And there's plenty of veteran congressmen on both sides of the aisle. who are and have been very big staunch advocates of this program. So I think this is, this is, that is where people should go and, and have them explain why we're abandoned and our partners after not only promising them then, but promising them after we withdrew and left them.

If not, there's going to be, there could be a lot of them are in other countries. I think I read 90 different countries are, and they're on their way here. again they are completely vetted and if they're not vetted they shouldn't come but if they are vetted and we're you know we're confident they are who they said they were and they fought alongside of us and they're not a threat those are the kind of people we want to be american right you would think yeah i mean they already fought for america right yeah they've done more than most most people that were citizens of america so myself included so it's like and i know a lot of them not that I mean, anecdotally, they come and, man, they're like a lot of immigrants to the United States.

They come. They're driving an Uber the first generation and the second generation. They own a business or, yeah. Yeah, right. Going to fancy pants schools. I mean, they are here to, they're not here to mooch. Nope. Right.

They do really well. They have a very tight-knit community. We're tied into them just because people I knew in Afghanistan. And they look at for each other and they do really well. They are very productive members of society in general. I think everybody knows that. Yeah, very well said. Anything else, guys?

Oh, we covered a lot. Yeah. Do us a favor. Go and check out the links down in the description. If you want to find Mick on LinkedIn or Fogbo, Lobo, any of his publications, the links are in the description. The links are in the description. Andy Milburn, great book, When the Tempest, gather. Sorry, you could I make it today? He's in the gym.

Link is in the description as well. And if you want to help support the show and get the team house ad free and early access, eyes on geopolitics, ad free and early access. Go to our Patreon. Patreon.com slash the team house. Buy some merch. He sold Mick, drinking that of the Eisen mug. It looks incredible. And yeah, guys, happy Easter, whoever celebrates. Everybody, happy Easter. Best place to celebrate.

Greece. God damn right. I'm not just throwing it out to you, man. If you ever did a chance to be there on Easter, that's a place to be. Yeah. Yeah. You'll know what I'm saying once you go there and celebrate Easter. Jason sent me an Instagram story yesterday, stereotyping us Greeks.

And you know what? It was what goes on during Easter and stuff like that? It was pinpoint, perfect. That's literally what's going to be happening tomorrow. My aunt's house. Awesome. Thanks, guys. Yeah, thank you.

Have a great rest of your weekend. All right, Jens. You too. Happy Easter.