fuss, trifle, trivial bustle, agitate, solicitous, nervous, quarrel tedious, boring, tiring, repetitive in the belly of the beast chief of staff US Secretary of State demented villain Rogue is a dishonest, unpredictable, or mischievous person. hegemony 0:000 seconds Welcome back. We are joined today by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, the chief of staff, sorry, the former chief of staff to the US Secretary of State. Uh I'm his chief of staff in heaven. 0:1111 seconds [laughter] 0:1111 seconds Yeah. 0:1414 seconds Well, of course, yes, he passed away, but uh yeah, no skeleton. 0:1818 seconds He would probably say upon hearing that remark, "What makes you think I got to heaven?" 0:2222 seconds [laughter] 0:2626 seconds Well, I I wanted to ask about um yeah, the the Ukraine war. Well, well, to be honest, that the I guess the folly of 0:3333 seconds the Iran war, it's somewhat similar to the war against Russia. That is, you know, with Iran, it's you know, the US 0:4141 seconds started the war that can't really be won and it's not possible to go back to the old status quo and the new status quo is not acceptable. And we see to some 0:5050 seconds extent a similar problem with NATO's proxy war against Russia. That is you know NATO contributed to this war in 0:5656 seconds Ukraine. And there's no path really convincing path to victory. And also yeah NATO can't accept the unfavorable 1:051 minute, 5 seconds outcome or conditions of peace at the moment. So uh I guess some of this should have been predictable. There is the willingness to fight as both these 1:131 minute, 13 seconds countries deemed this to be an existential threat. But what is it that you think the the Americans and the 1:201 minute, 20 seconds Europeans misunderstood about Russia's security interests? Uh well, again, in this part of the world, I don't think they misunderstood 1:281 minute, 28 seconds anything. I think they understood it quite well. When you talk about people like Victoria, Nuland, Kagan, and others, they understood it quite well. 1:361 minute, 36 seconds They knew exactly what they were doing. 1:381 minute, 38 seconds They were undermining Ukraine in a significant way so that Ukraine would have no choice but to find a leader, 1:471 minute, 47 seconds which they did. Uh I'm sure they were probably helped by CIA um and 1:541 minute, 54 seconds eventually put itself on the pallet, if you will, on the sacrificial uh fulcrum 2:012 minutes, 1 secondto um bring Russia down. That was their full motivation. That was Biden blinking. I call winking blinking and 2:092 minutes, 9 seconds nod Biden blinking and Sullivan and Nuland's goal. That was the goal of all the neoconservatives. Many of the, as 2:182 minutes, 18 seconds Doug McGregor says, globalists, he likes to distinguish between the two. I normally don't. I just call them all damnable neoconservatives. 2:272 minutes, 27 seconds And that's where we were that's where we were off to. And as I was just telling another individual just a moment or two ago in Moscow, 2:362 minutes, 36 seconds that's where Bill Clinton began the march to. Bill Clinton, that country bumpkin from Arkansas who had no 2:442 minutes, 44 seconds business being president of the United States. And the only reason he was president of the United States was because HW Bush was hated. 2:552 minutes, 55 seconds hated by the Israel lobby and by the leadership in Israel because he'd compelled them to go into the Oslo process which they thought was the worst 3:043 minutes, 4 seconds thing that had ever happened to them and were very fearful that it might succeed and which they derailed who Barack 3:113 minutes, 11 seconds primarily along with Clinton uh and Bush was anathema to them and so they got this country bumpkin elected his first 3:193 minutes, 19 seconds year of which I was with Chairman Powell and witnessed up close and personal and he was total neophiight. It was 3:283 minutes, 28 seconds chaos in the White House and his whole idea about America was that he was going to give it over to corporations and he 3:373 minutes, 37 seconds said so and when he got rid of Glass Deagle he did just that. He gave America to predatory corporate interests. And 3:453 minutes, 45 seconds what that demanded was some kind of plan for getting those corporate interests 3:523 minutes, 52 seconds which mattered the most. Think Loheed Martin, RTX or Raon and so forth into some better positions for selling their 4:004 minutesproducts. Voila, you need an expanded NATO. And you got an expanded NATO. It was that fundamental for William 4:094 minutes, 9 seconds Jefferson Clinton and that stupid violating everything that HW Bush had 4:164 minutes, 16 seconds promised me had promised Cole had promised Chevronic had promised Gorbachop had promised the people in 4:244 minutes, 24 seconds England like Thatcher and Major um everything was violated. everything that we jinned up in the first period after 4:334 minutes, 33 seconds the real collapse of the Soviet Union when Gorbachoff was almost putty in our hands. 4:414 minutes, 41 seconds We sacrifice we sacrifice that blooming good positive relationship with Russia 4:484 minutes, 48 seconds for the first time for the first time with the possibility of really meaningfully coming into Europe in a 4:574 minutes, 57 seconds political sense and being a partner. We sacrificed all that and we started it with William Jefferson Clinton and from 5:055 minutes, 5 seconds that point on with a slight hiatus with President Obama who knew better but didn't act on his instincts. Uh we've 5:155 minutes, 15 seconds been doing that and that's why we have the war. We have the war because we were duplicitous bastards. 5:225 minutes, 22 seconds We were cheats. We were liars. We were fabricators. We used our allies in Europe. We built our allies in Europe. 5:315 minutes, 31 seconds I'm going to give a speech in Williamsburg next week and I'm going to I'm going to tell people details about how we bought European parliamentarians, 5:405 minutes, 40 seconds European newspapers, European people who could then be Jyn Stolenbergs and Mark Rutas. How we bought school systems, how 5:505 minutes, 50 seconds we bought entire countries in order to get them to come into NATO. 5:565 minutes, 56 seconds All this was a plan. Every aspect of it was implemented fairly well. And CIA was at the head of it. Big time at the head 6:056 minutes, 5 seconds of it. And CIA is big time in Ukraine right now. And probably the most hated instrument in Ukraine by the Russians 6:126 minutes, 12 seconds because they are instrumental in everything that's happening there. Much of which the president of the United States doesn't even know about. 6:216 minutes, 21 seconds That's the way we do things these days. 6:246 minutes, 24 seconds Oh, by the way, we're also in Muldova still. We're in Chia now. We're in Armenia. We're back in Georgia. 6:326 minutes, 32 seconds When I say we, I'm talking about CIA. And of course, it's lackeyis like 6:386 minutes, 38 seconds SIS, now called MI6, GCHQ, NSA, all the good guys, all the guys that get more money than you shake a 6:476 minutes, 47 seconds stick at and spend that money on covert operations that contaminate the world. 6:526 minutes, 52 seconds And most presidents and most oversight committees in the Congress of the United States know nothing about what they're doing. And if they do, they bless it like Lindsey Graham. 7:047 minutes, 4 seconds I could go on and on in this vein, but we are being run largely and predominantly by inexpert people who are 7:147 minutes, 14 seconds being led around by the nose by the intelligence agencies. and what they want to do in the world. And what they want to do is continue their process of 7:237 minutes, 23 seconds making money for themselves and contaminating whatever they see that they feel is enimical to US interest. 7:317 minutes, 31 seconds all added to by the incoit feeling that we have and that's behind Elbridge Kobe and all these people wanting to retrench 7:407 minutes, 40 seconds and create a western hemisphere readout and eventually abandon all the people with whom we have some sort of security 7:477 minutes, 47 seconds agreement including Japan, Korea, Europe. That's what's behind their effort to defeat China because that's 7:547 minutes, 54 seconds what it's all about. It's about this inexraable movement of China in a more or less benign way in terms of wanting to fight people and kill people. 8:068 minutes, 6 seconds They want to stop that. This is enimical to their interests. They want to continue killing, continue sanctioning, continue exerting hegemonic power from 8:158 minutes, 15 seconds the empire. And China is saying no, no, no. That's what's causing all this trouble. 8:248 minutes, 24 seconds Well, to what extent though during your time in the White House, did you experience the I guess the intelligence agencies running their own foreign 8:338 minutes, 33 seconds policy in in I was out at Langley in the belly of the beast for seven days and seven nights watching them do it. and stupid me not 8:438 minutes, 43 seconds having the professional expertise to challenge Tenant and McLaclin and a host of others including the vice president of the United States who made 11 8:518 minutes, 51 seconds unprecedented trips out to Langley in order to coersse people in order to get them on his team. I was in the belly of 8:598 minutes, 59 seconds the beast. I saw it up close and personal. I know what we do. I know how we do it. I know with him we do 9:079 minutes, 7 seconds well often the in the 1990s everyone was more or less knew that this was a NATO 9:159 minutes, 15 seconds expansion or this was something that was going to you know the be received very unfavorably in in in Russia. You had 9:229 minutes, 22 seconds those who favored it who like Madlin who who recognized yes this would alienate 9:299 minutes, 29 seconds the Russians. However, if we have a conflict, at least NATO will be there. 9:339 minutes, 33 seconds That was kind of the logic. And then you have those who opposed it for well also recognizing that it would alienate Russia, but arguing that essentially it 9:419 minutes, 41 seconds wasn't worth it. But um but the overall assumption by many was that that some maybe the Russians would have to get 9:489 minutes, 48 seconds used to the new status quo. That was at least in Europe the thinking that is we'll just incrementally expand NATO 9:569 minutes, 56 seconds towards Russian borders and they have to they have no other options. They will have to get used to the new status quo. 10:0110 minutes, 1 secondSame with missile defense. We'll gradually incremental expand it. We'll start with 10 interceptors. We gradually expand it. They will have to get used to 10:0910 minutes, 9 seconds this new status quo. There's nothing they can do. And you know making a fuss would only uh you know work to their 10:1610 minutes, 16 seconds disadvantage and you know will gradually topple their government with these color revolutions. And again the assumption was that there's nothing they can do. So 10:2410 minutes, 24 seconds it's in their interest to simply adjust to a new status quo which is not favorable. Uh but and now and now Russia has proven that hypothesis to be totally false. 10:3410 minutes, 34 seconds But was it ever any realistic way to expand NATO without I guess eventually provoke this conflict? Not according to 10:4310 minutes, 43 seconds the conversations that Coen Powell, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the various service chiefs in the United States and the president of the 10:5110 minutes, 51 seconds United States and the secretary of defense who at that time was big Channy. 10:5610 minutes, 56 seconds Not as far as the conversations there were concerned. The conversations there were about the promises we'd made, the 11:0411 minutes, 4 seconds deals we had made, which HW Bush being a a gentleman of the old school, the kind of person who thought his word was his 11:1111 minutes, 11 seconds bond, there was no intention of bringing Russia to a point where she was an enemy 11:2011 minutes, 20 seconds again. There was every intention of using the reunification of Germany and its retention in NATO and all that that 11:2811 minutes, 28 seconds meant. And the most worried character about it was Helmet Cole because he had an instinct for what that would mean to Russia. And he was assured by both 11:3711 minutes, 37 seconds Sharon Modzi and by Gorbachov and by Jim Baker and HW Bush and other characters 11:4411 minutes, 44 seconds like Mitron that this would be a new Europe. 11:4911 minutes, 49 seconds And we started out with three prongs on it. the European security identity, which would be a 30,000man European brigade exclusively for European use. 12:0012 minutesThink about things like later the Balkans and so forth. Think about Umperor and you former Yugoslavia, things like that. That was the first 12:0812 minutes, 8 seconds part. The second part was the clear path for Russia to become a member 12:1612 minutes, 16 seconds of the political organization and then possibly if she agreed and the rest of 12:2212 minutes, 22 seconds the alliance agreed a member of the military organization and then third an entirely new security 12:3012 minutes, 30 seconds architecture with the ESI or European security identity being the principal pillar of it. 12:3812 minutes, 38 seconds an entire new architecture for Europe, Western and Eastern Europe. And that 12:4512 minutes, 45 seconds Eastern Europe included Russia, at least to the Euros. That was the plan. We worked on it on the joint staff. 12:5612 minutes, 56 seconds And we violated all of that. We violated all of that. The moment that country bumpkin draft dodging woman chasing 13:0413 minutes, 4 seconds Arkansas governor with Israel's help ousted George HW Bush 13:1213 minutes, 12 seconds and got himself in the White House and his first move with cigars on a lai in a hotel between being elected and being 13:2113 minutes, 21 seconds inaugurated was to tell the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Coen Powell, you will implement you will 13:2813 minutes, 28 seconds implement my campaign promise of gays serving openly in the armed forces of the United States. And pal said, "Well, 13:3613 minutes, 36 seconds you know, have you talked to the Congress?" And the president said, "I don't need to talk to the Congress. You will implement it." Understand? And Pal 13:4413 minutes, 44 seconds said, "Yes, Mr. President. I understand." Then it came time for him to be inaugurated. And a week after that, he asked how it was going and 13:5313 minutes, 53 seconds Powell had to tell him, "I just got off the phone with Sam Nun, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. You know what his words to me were, Mr. 14:0114 minutes, 1 secondPresident? Over my dead body will gay serve openly in the US Armed Forces. " 14:1014 minutes, 10 seconds Well, he hadn't called me. He did call him. He did tell him the same thing. 14:1514 minutes, 15 seconds Next thing is a phone call to the chairman from this novice president. Please get me out of this, Mr. Chairman. 14:2214 minutes, 22 seconds Please get me out of this. So we went six weeks beavering away designing don't ask don't tell, which is the best 14:3014 minutes, 30 seconds compromise we could come up with and that's what we implemented. But this was how stupid this man was, especially in 14:3914 minutes, 39 seconds his first year. And we were off to the races. Then we started alienating Russia in every way we possibly could. We 14:4714 minutes, 47 seconds started calling Yeltson a country bumpkin a drunken slvered and so forth and so on and private and we started 14:5514 minutes, 55 seconds letting these people these neoonservatives back into the government in force again and they began running 15:0215 minutes, 2 seconds things. There was a brief hiatus to impress Obama because I think he understood this was not what we should 15:1015 minutes, 10 seconds be doing, but he didn't have a lot of time to dedicate to it. So all he could do is occasionally say say things like 15:1715 minutes, 17 seconds he did it would be the stupidest thing in the world to make Ukraine a part of NATO. It really would be, you know, uh 15:2415 minutes, 24 seconds but he had to deal with other people too. Um, and when he gave up on the nuclear posture statement, it was quite 15:3115 minutes, 31 seconds clear that this was not a very powerful man in terms of the presidency. Fluent, eloquent, even, but he wasn't a very 15:3915 minutes, 39 seconds powerful man. He didn't know how to use the Congress. He didn't know how to do the kinds of things, for example, that Ronald Reagan did in his first term or 15:4615 minutes, 46 seconds that FDR did in his terms. Um, of course he had the war behind him to give impetus to it. But we haven't had a good 15:5415 minutes, 54 seconds commander-in-chief since HW Bush. And all of them in one way or another have gone along with this crowd that wants 16:0216 minutes, 2 seconds Russia as an enemy. Reluctantly in some cases, but in the case of Joe Biden loving it all the way down the road. Um, 16:1116 minutes, 11 seconds tell me it's Russophobia. Tell me it's hatred of Russia. Tell me it's a vestage of the Cold War. Tell me it's all about economics. 16:1916 minutes, 19 seconds A lot of that is part of it, but most of it is the fact that we just want to overthrow Putin and get rid of him and 16:2716 minutes, 27 seconds take Russia off the scene so we can get to the real problem which is Beijing. 16:3516 minutes, 35 seconds Well, the Europeans though they they seemed like they were pushing back uh to some extent at least up until 2008. Uh 16:4416 minutes, 44 seconds after that they began I think to fall in line and after 2014 the war. Yeah. I think 14 was the key here. Yeah. 16:5216 minutes, 52 seconds I I heard Angela Merkel the other day again and she was talking about that and and she didn't change a thing about what 16:5916 minutes, 59 seconds she said. In fact, it was a little more devastating. You know, we we used the time to rearm and refit. We had no no idea of complying with the agreement. 17:1217 minutes, 12 seconds And I listened to Alice Elizabeth Videll, I think that's the way you say her name, in the German Parliament with 17:1917 minutes, 19 seconds Meritz sitting there beside her just absolutely lambast him. And I said to 17:2717 minutes, 27 seconds myself, there's the new chancellor of Germany. No matter what Merch does, no matter what the Cognizanti in Germany, 17:3617 minutes, 36 seconds which really is Black Rockck, decides it wants to do to her, no matter what weight of German politics they bring to 17:4417 minutes, 44 seconds bear against her, she's going to beat the hell out of them because she's smarter than they are. Now, we may have a civil war in Germany. 17:5317 minutes, 53 seconds I mean it could be that he's talking about doing all matter of things like forbidding any German forces to move 18:0218 minutes, 2 seconds into that area because they might be traitors. You know, Germany's in trouble right now. Big trouble. And and they 18:0918 minutes, 9 seconds won't even admit Merritts and his gang, they won't even admit to what they did with with Nordstream, what they did to Germany because they let it happen. They let it happen. 18:2118 minutes, 21 seconds Yeah. I saw an interview today with [clears throat] Mertz where the journalists told him well you know one out of five Germans would like to leave 18:2818 minutes, 28 seconds the country now and then you know it was it's so dismissive it was just h oh where were you going to go where is so 18:3518 minutes, 35 seconds great I mean this is none he's a typical corporate chieftain he's a typical corporate chieftain in this predatory capitalist world that we the 18:4418 minutes, 44 seconds United States of America have created and are trying to govern predatory capitalist that's the difference between 18:5118 minutes, 51 seconds us in China. You can you can say, "Okay, it's Dung Xiao Ping and it's it's capitalism with communist 18:5818 minutes, 58 seconds characteristics. " It's capitalism with oversight. It's capitalism with a model of development 19:0719 minutes, 7 seconds that takes all people into consideration. It's not perfect, but it is so much better than what we are 19:1519 minutes, 15 seconds offering and what the EU is offering that the world is waking. I'm sitting here looking at the number of conferences that are being held right now. It was reported this morning. 19:2619 minutes, 26 seconds They're being held in Vladabas. They're being held in Petersburg. They're they're being held all over the world. They're going to be held in India. 19:3419 minutes, 34 seconds They're being held in Beijing. All these people are meeting to decide on new currency regimes to decide on how they 19:4219 minutes, 42 seconds are going to mold themselves into the Shanghai Corporation Organization or into bricks or into boat. to decide on how they're going to create a 19:5019 minutes, 50 seconds cryptocurrency outside Vladastasto for the Japanese and the Japanese are at most of these conferences. 19:5819 minutes, 58 seconds You can't make this stuff up, Glenn. The world is changing with a dynamism and a speed and elacrity that I never thought 20:0620 minutes, 6 seconds I would see. This is going a lot faster than the transition happened in the past between the east and the west and the 20:1320 minutes, 13 seconds west and the east turn returning the power to the east. 20:1820 minutes, 18 seconds Even National Geographic has a full spread on Central Asia right now. And you read that, it's just mundane like 20:2620 minutes, 26 seconds National Geographic does with a lot of beautiful photographs. But basically, it tells you where the robust happenings in 20:3420 minutes, 34 seconds the world are today. They're in Usbakistan. They're in all through Central Asia. 20:4220 minutes, 42 seconds They're in all those signature cities that have a history that goes back years and years. and years. And even looking 20:5020 minutes, 50 seconds at the Soviet history in many of them, they're turning some of those old Soviet state buildings into places where people 20:5720 minutes, 57 seconds now go and get the best food in the world, get the best drink in the world, have the best experience in the world, ride bullet trains between them and so 21:0621 minutes, 6 seconds forth. I mean, this National Geographic article ought to be required reading for every member of the Trump administration. Dudes, do you realize this is where it's at? 21:1721 minutes, 17 seconds Yeah, I was watching um well again they do have a lot to coordinate though again I think that's why they have now the SEO meeting then they're going to have bricks they have all this bilateral 21:2521 minutes, 25 seconds deals but again they have to worked how uh to establish more cooperation between their different tech centers their different tech industries they have to 21:3421 minutes, 34 seconds integrate the supply chains they're developing this new physical transportation corridors they did digital corridors they have uh new new 21:4221 minutes, 42 seconds banks currencies payment systems I mean it's so much they have to and coordinate. 21:4621 minutes, 46 seconds It is and it's absolutely telling that I see here that look at the people that are there. The Japanese are there, the Indonesians are there, the Vietnamese 21:5421 minutes, 54 seconds are there. I mean some of the most entrepreneurial and capitalist countries in the world in terms of doing it right 22:0122 minutes, 1 secondor nearly right is I mean it's written large. They're all there. It's like a magnet. They're going 22:1022 minutes, 10 seconds to be there because they know that's where their interests are best served. 22:1422 minutes, 14 seconds But then I switched to the G20 and I see the vice chancellor of Germany making, you know, the point of uh, you know, 22:2122 minutes, 21 seconds what a great diplomatic victory they had because he was uh he told uh he was able to have a they were able to have a group 22:2822 minutes, 28 seconds photo with which excluded the the Russian counterpart, [laughter] right? I'm thinking is this our diplomacy now? 22:3522 minutes, 35 seconds I mean the Europeans more or less invented the modern diplomacy after uh the piece of Esfalia and all of this and 22:4222 minutes, 42 seconds now and and now [laughter] it's it's a sad state though. I mean it's you know when you de-industrializing you criminalizing 22:5122 minutes, 51 seconds diplomacy war is the you know militarism is now the you know the pride in Europe the the excitement about how they're 22:5922 minutes, 59 seconds going to be great again. I mean surely they must know they're going down the wrong path here but there's yeah no course correction. Um but actually 23:0723 minutes, 7 seconds what it's going to it's going to take new leadership like I think Videll represents. Um not only is she a 23:1423 minutes, 14 seconds striking personality with a absolutely dynamic this is the first time I've seen her speak for about about it must have 23:2123 minutes, 21 seconds been about 45 minutes. Uh and he was sitting right there and the expression on his face was just like you were saying. It was like, "Oh, man. Sit down. 23:3023 minutes, 30 seconds Go away, woman. You're not the future of Germany." Right, dude? You're not listening if you're not hearing. But 23:3823 minutes, 38 seconds that's so much a part of this kind of Black Rockck mentality. They don't listen. They don't hear. And they don't 23:4723 minutes, 47 seconds take messages and do something about the problems that the messages have delivered. They just keep on the same 23:5323 minutes, 53 seconds path. Profit, more profit, and more profit. and a greater share of that profit. For me personally, these people 24:0124 minutes, 1 secondare on the wrong side of history in in so many respects. They're on the wrong side of history. And I feel some real 24:0924 minutes, 9 seconds pain because I know who helped them get there. Us. 24:1524 minutes, 15 seconds We weaponized liberal democracy and we weaponized uh what I would call the incredible width and breadth and depth 24:2424 minutes, 24 seconds of our intelligence services which are now the predominant part of our government from NSA to CIA to GCHQ to 24:3424 minutes, 34 seconds SIS you name it they're all the same and their purpose is not anything but 24:4224 minutes, 42 seconds enimical to our real interest and they're scared to death of China. They are frightened to death of China. 24:4924 minutes, 49 seconds They're frightened of Russia, too. But China is the real real behemoth that they're frightened of. And it's so funny 24:5724 minutes, 57 seconds because China really doesn't have the kind of intelligence apparatus that we have or that Britain has or France has or Germany has or that Israel has. They 25:0725 minutes, 7 seconds don't because they don't think they need one like that. Their intelligence service is essentially designed for 25:1425 minutes, 14 seconds actionable foresight. That is to say, what's happening out there? Who's the character in its happening that is going 25:2325 minutes, 23 seconds to influence us adversely? Be neutral or be positive. That's about the only thing they're looking at with regard. They're 25:3125 minutes, 31 seconds not looking at, you know, how many how much throw weight in nuclear weapons do they have. Yeah, they've got a branch of their military intelligence that looks 25:3925 minutes, 39 seconds at that sort of thing, but that's not primarily what their national intelligence looks at. We're the only people in the world that shape their national intelligence to look at things 25:4825 minutes, 48 seconds from the perspective of how do we kill you or sanction you? 25:5325 minutes, 53 seconds Well, uh, given that, um, [clears throat] the the attempt to expand NATO or at least uh, well, if not 26:0226 minutes, 2 seconds put the Ukraine inside NATO, at least put it in the NATO orbit, uh, helped to trigger this war. I mean, all all of this kind of reflects the the wider 26:1026 minutes, 10 seconds postcold war objective of organizing Europe around NATO and the European Union as this, you know, two legs of 26:1826 minutes, 18 seconds collective hedgemony that would push the Russians out of Europe. uh given that the war is going as well as uh well we 26:2626 minutes, 26 seconds had hoped we we're losing the Ukraine war. What does that tell you though about the future of NATO and and the EU? 26:3326 minutes, 33 seconds What what how will they be impacted by the direction of the war now? 26:3826 minutes, 38 seconds I think NATO is gone. Um it'll linger for a while, but I think it's gone. And this Elbridge cobby idea that we're 26:4626 minutes, 46 seconds going to establish a readout in the western hemisphere is that's really what he's talking about. A a nuclearbacked 26:5326 minutes, 53 seconds readout uh re-ub military term, you know, comes from the I guess it comes from the really from 27:0127 minutes, 1 secondthe very beginning of people building forts and things. But that that's what we're talking about. We're talking about having a western hemisphere that we 27:0927 minutes, 9 seconds dominate completely from Argentina to Canada, which isn't working out very well right now. And we're going to put 27:1727 minutes, 17 seconds our nuclear shield with that. And it's not going to be just a shield. We're going to contemplate using those 27:2427 minutes, 24 seconds weapons. Now, that's a big part of K's uh portfolio. 27:2927 minutes, 29 seconds Jonathan Pard, for example, big part of his portfolio, too. 27:3427 minutes, 34 seconds um that these people want to dominate what they can and what they can dominate they think is our own hemisphere. The 27:4327 minutes, 43 seconds real exception to that of course right now is Brazil and one of Marco Rubio's principal tasks right now is to recruit 27:5127 minutes, 51 seconds those Nazilike leaders in Paraguay and Argentina and elsewhere throughout South America. Get Bolsinaro back into 27:5927 minutes, 59 seconds leadership in Brazil and get rid of Lula. That's next to managing Venezuela's oil, which he's not doing a very good job of, and taking over Cuba. 28:1028 minutes, 10 seconds Rubio's other task is to engineer Lula's downfall in South America. Then we will be able to deal with South America in a 28:1928 minutes, 19 seconds much more comprehensive and favorable way is what we think. Um, this is not going to work out very well either. I 28:2828 minutes, 28 seconds don't think it's going to work out anything like what Rubio thinks it's going to do. One of the things he's run into right now is I'm told and by a 28:3628 minutes, 36 seconds competent authority almost every major if not every major in the world has told 28:4228 minutes, 42 seconds Rubio go pound sand a hundred billion dollars minimum to get Venezuelan oil 28:5128 minutes, 51 seconds back up to specs. That is to say where it's economical to recover it. It's economical to refine it once it's 28:5928 minutes, 59 seconds recovered. And it's economical to spread it out across the globe as you could if it were those two things, if those two 29:0829 minutes, 8 seconds conditions were met. No one wants to touch it. So he can't find a major that will go in and do what Trump wants done with Venezuelan oil, which is 29:1729 minutes, 17 seconds essentially to get it and use it immediately to relieve the tremendous pressure on the United States right now 29:2529 minutes, 25 seconds to even fly its jet aircraft to even drive its trucks because within another 29:3229 minutes, 32 seconds 30 to 45 days there'll be no diesel and no jet fuel. 29:3929 minutes, 39 seconds Also, if you're an investor in Venezuela, you would have to bank [clears throat] on the likelihood of uh the political stability of this colonial rule. 29:4929 minutes, 49 seconds Yes. 29:4929 minutes, 49 seconds Essentially sustaining itself, which is uh I guess you said it right. We're dragging the world, that part of the world, the readout. We're dragging it back to the past. 30:0030 minutesWe'll be the colonial master and they will be the slaves. 30:0430 minutes, 4 seconds I can see the logic though. If the multipolar world is coming to an end or has come to an end and the US can't dominate every corner of the world, 30:1330 minutes, 13 seconds obviously Europe's not a priority. So NATO will die and the US will retreat to some extent by at least dominating its 30:2030 minutes, 20 seconds own backyard and of course going to East Asia to confront the the the the Chinese. But again, a lot of this, you 30:2830 minutes, 28 seconds know, it's it's not the past. The countries do not want to be dominated anymore. So the Koreans and the Japanese are rapidly 30:3630 minutes, 36 seconds re-examining their situations rapidly. 30:4030 minutes, 40 seconds They they were not want to do so there for a while because we screwed the pooch so badly with North Korea and let them develop nuclear weapons. A lot of people 30:4930 minutes, 49 seconds don't understand that in the six party talks I saw it very clearly. The Japanese were more concerned than the Koreans. The Koreans living cheek and 30:5730 minutes, 57 seconds jao with the Kim Jong-un regime with Pyongyang. They were not as concerned as the Japanese were when we were talking 31:0531 minutes, 5 seconds about the possibility of North Korea getting nuclear weapons and then when they got them the Japanese were apoplelectic. The Koreans were like 31:1331 minutes, 13 seconds almost ho. We know what we've got on the peninsula both in terms of US support and in terms of what we can do ourselves 31:2131 minutes, 21 seconds and we're not all that fearful. Now they've changed their mind a little bit, the conservative wing of the Korean political structure and they're thinking 31:2931 minutes, 29 seconds about building their own system that would make them a latent nuclear power just like Japan is. But the Japanese are 31:3631 minutes, 36 seconds still very concerned about it. And an Asian scholar recently wrote it this way. 31:4531 minutes, 45 seconds Ukraine barked at Russia and look what they got. Japan barked at China and look what it's got. collapsing in and for the 31:5431 minutes, 54 seconds first time in Japan's modern history, not looking too good economically speaking because China's levied so many 32:0132 minutes, 1 secondtariffs against them in reciprocal actions against Japan. So who caused the dogs to bark in Ukraine and in Japan? 32:1232 minutes, 12 seconds I'll tell you who caused them to bark. 32:1432 minutes, 14 seconds The United States of America. How do you think the Japanese and others are going to deal with this once they realize 32:2232 minutes, 22 seconds what's happened to them? Well, the Japanese and the Koreans are moving out rather smartly. I think they're already looking at alternatives and they're 32:3132 minutes, 31 seconds already thinking about some sort of security relationship probably with China and possibly with Russia. 32:3932 minutes, 39 seconds And they're looking in down down down the road at maybe the possibility of becoming even more defensive defense 32:4632 minutes, 46 seconds capable themselves to include a nuclear comp a nuclear weapon complex. 32:5132 minutes, 51 seconds I don't know if it's going to go that far quickly, but I do know they don't trust us anymore. I'm going to speak to 32:5832 minutes, 58 seconds a group of Japanese professors this week downtown in Washington, ostensibly because they're bringing their students for me to lecture to them about this 33:0733 minutes, 7 seconds idea of China being the end all and be all of this movement that's happening in the world. And I had a long conversation 33:1533 minutes, 15 seconds with a couple of Japanese professors who were in their 80s. Um, Japanese tend to be that way these days. Um, and they're 33:2433 minutes, 24 seconds kind of disbelieving of the message I'm going to deliver. But I told them, I said, "You leave it to your students to 33:3133 minutes, 31 seconds make up their own decisions on what I'm saying and ask good questions and so forth. " But it's going to be an interesting interesting time. I think a 33:3933 minutes, 39 seconds couple hours downtown in the hotel. Um, and I haven't spoken to Japanese students in a long time. So being 33:4633 minutes, 46 seconds exposed to 20, 21, 22 year old Japanese students at university is going to be a good experience I think because I haven't been plugged in for some time. 33:5633 minutes, 56 seconds But I do know there's a lot of uh angst in Japan right now about the security relationship, about the trustworthiness 34:0434 minutes, 4 seconds of Washington, about the deceit in Washington, about the deception in Washington. Donald Trump has done some 34:1134 minutes, 11 seconds real damage to our relationships. But at the same time, I'm thinking to myself, maybe it's not a negative thing necessarily that we're doing this much 34:2034 minutes, 20 seconds more rapidly than what would otherwise and therefore have a lot of people hanging on by their fingernails trying to fight for the old world. Maybe we're 34:2934 minutes, 29 seconds going to do it really swiftly. We might do it under an idiot, but we're going to do it. Um, I don't know. I'm a mixed 34:3834 minutes, 38 seconds mind as to how this is going right now because I see so much ignorance in really central locations in the US 34:4534 minutes, 45 seconds government, most notably in the Congress, which is so behind this whole movement that it's pivotal. They don't 34:5334 minutes, 53 seconds understand, they don't grasp what's going on. And it's very important that they do because the kind of legislation we're going to need to deal with this once we really start dealing with it. 35:0335 minutes, 3 seconds And I call it a multinodal world, not a multipolar world. Um, got that from Chaz Freeman and I think he's right because 35:1235 minutes, 12 seconds poles are out there sticking up with something at either end. Nodes are out there just sort of floating and power 35:1935 minutes, 19 seconds accumulates as they float amongst each other and adhere or or back away. What's happening right now is a lot of 35:2735 minutes, 27 seconds adherence and and this whole I I've got the thing right here on the screen. it just meeting after meeting after meeting 35:3435 minutes, 34 seconds and everyone virtually who matters in the world today in in in terms of the twothirds of the world that has 35:4135 minutes, 41 seconds twothirds of the world's GDP and almost twothirds of its population. Everyone's there and they're all talking and 35:4935 minutes, 49 seconds they're all sitting down together and they're talking about things like establishing alternative currencies and alternative regimes to Swift and 35:5835 minutes, 58 seconds alternative regimes to the entire quote international rules-based order unquote. 36:0536 minutes, 5 seconds And they should be doing that because we are an abject failure right now. And 36:1236 minutes, 12 seconds there's no reason why their ships should go down with us. And they're beginning to understand that. 36:2036 minutes, 20 seconds Well, you see this uh discussions now going along how to adjust to this Yeah. 36:2636 minutes, 26 seconds post-hedgemonic world. You see what you refer to, you also see to some extent in the Gulf States. At least that's what I hear that they are discussing, you know, 36:3336 minutes, 33 seconds what what will the region look like after this war because and they're and they're sort of in a panic, too. 36:3936 minutes, 39 seconds Yeah. Well, it's more im urgent, I would say. Yeah, very. 36:4336 minutes, 43 seconds But uh but but as you say with South Korea and Japan, there's more or less two options though. Either they can arm themselves to the teeth and look after 36:5036 minutes, 50 seconds their own security or they can adjust to the regional distribution of power and adjust to new realities. That is you 36:5836 minutes, 58 seconds can't really set up a alliance system against China. You can't you know you have to take into account uh all all the 37:0637 minutes, 6 seconds major powers security interests. Uh again that has kind of been the problem with all the alliance systems that is the Middle East they they don't take 37:1437 minutes, 14 seconds into account the Iran security concerns indeed their alliance against Iran see the same in Asia but but also in in Europe though that is uh um you know we 37:2337 minutes, 23 seconds it created a Europe where the only country that shouldn't be a part of the continent is the largest country on the continent and somehow we're all 37:3037 minutes, 30 seconds surprised it it it turned out uh in this way but again now that the US the Europeans are also recognizing ing that 37:3837 minutes, 38 seconds the US probably won't be there in the future. Either the capabilities or intentions will will will make it leave. 37:4537 minutes, 45 seconds uh but uh but the solution kind of what they're discussing now is you know well let's make a new NATO without the US but 37:5237 minutes, 52 seconds they don't have them really the money to do this either and without the money they not only can't they arm themselves but also uh without the joe economics of 38:0138 minutes, 1 secondit the unity will start to wither away as well be also without the US I think there's yeah no pacifier to keep the 38:0938 minutes, 9 seconds Europeans together so I think they will start their squabble as soon as this war is over at the moment. Uh, hatred of Russia seems to be the only thing that unites them. 38:1938 minutes, 19 seconds That's one reason they're they're frightened. I I think they're afraid because they know that what you just said. They know. Uh, and so that's the 38:2838 minutes, 28 seconds only glue they have. They got to cling to it and they're clinging to it to the bitter end. Um, because it is that 38:3738 minutes, 37 seconds existential, if you will, for both the EU and NATO. Um the sad thing about it is they're clinging to something that's 38:4538 minutes, 45 seconds already dead. They're clinging to a cadaavver in both cases. And new leadership in the countries in Europe is 38:5238 minutes, 52 seconds going to do one of two things. It's going to recognize that and adjust to it, which includes dealing forthrightly 39:0139 minutes, 1 secondand up close and personal with China and Russia. Or they're going to fight it in amongst themselves and we're going to go back to a 1930s Europe. 39:1139 minutes, 11 seconds That would not be a smart move. 39:1539 minutes, 15 seconds Well, I wish the European leaders had joined other countries in East and sit down and talk about how to reorganize uh 39:2339 minutes, 23 seconds geoeconomics, politics, security, given that the distribution of power is so different, but instead they hardly even mention these meetings in the media. And 39:3139 minutes, 31 seconds when they do, it's usually framed as well, it's an anti-Western meeting and uh you know, it shows the threat, so we 39:3839 minutes, 38 seconds have to arm oursel. This is kind of the the logic, but uh but we're so used to this kind of thinking 39:4539 minutes, 45 seconds amongst a lot of our elite that it's a zero someum game and if you're on the zero side of that zero someum game, 39:5339 minutes, 53 seconds you're sucking. Well, what the Chinese model says, what Wong Yi and Sergey Lavough to a certain extent are saying 40:0140 minutes, 1 secondand have been saying for some time is it isn't a zero sum game. We can all participate. We can all share in this 40:0940 minutes, 9 seconds and we can all be successful. You don't even believe in your own system. 40:1640 minutes, 16 seconds America, you have contaminated your own system. It is so viciously maladjusted now that you have less than 1% of your 40:2540 minutes, 25 seconds country owning 60% of its wealth. You are terribly accommodating this new world. We don't like you. 40:3440 minutes, 34 seconds either change or go away. I mean, that's really the message that's being delivered sort of incoetely but 40:4240 minutes, 42 seconds nonetheless delivered. And that's a message that people like Elbridge Kobe and Pete Exathth and others are receiving and say not on your life. 40:5040 minutes, 50 seconds We'll bomb and sanction you until the last one of us is breathing his last breath. That isn't going to work. 41:0041 minutesYeah. Well, I think the Yeah. This this assumption about zero sum game. I think that's a common interpretation across 41:0741 minutes, 7 seconds the west about the west fowling system that you know because you have many states competing for security there has to be some kind of a game of thrones 41:1541 minutes, 15 seconds slit each other's throat before they slit yours but the kind of the idea behind the westfallian system was everyone can have security if you then 41:2341 minutes, 23 seconds also seek to manage the balance if you put yourself in the shoes of the opponent you seek to harmonize interest where it's possible you manage 41:3241 minutes, 32 seconds competition when it's not possible and uh you know but but but but when you criminalize diplomacy, you kind of throw 41:4041 minutes, 40 seconds all of that out the window. Um I'll hire you to be my secretary of state. 41:4541 minutes, 45 seconds Yeah, [laughter] I'll take it. 41:4841 minutes, 48 seconds Well, the the belief now in Europe though seems to be if they can pull the United States deeper into the war with Russia, then well, two things will 41:5641 minutes, 56 seconds happen. one the Russians can be defeated and also we can revive the relevance of NATO which would then give a clear 42:0442 minutes, 4 seconds political security and uh also an economic role for Europe again in the world. But uh um listen listen to what you said. A 42:1342 minutes, 13 seconds country of 11 time zones, the largest country on the face of the earth in terms of geography that Napoleon tried to take that Hitler tried to take. 42:2742 minutes, 27 seconds I could go back to Prince Nefki and the Huns on Lake Peepus and no one has really ever suess. They did it to 42:3442 minutes, 34 seconds themselves as a result of World War I and what happened there and then the revolution and they did it to themselves. But no 42:4242 minutes, 42 seconds external power is ever going to do what you're saying the Europeans want to do to Russia. Period. They just aren't 42:4942 minutes, 49 seconds going to do it. So why would you even try? 42:5342 minutes, 53 seconds And now Russia is the largest nuclear power as well, but the Germans still want to have another go at it. 42:5842 minutes, 58 seconds [laughter] 42:5842 minutes, 58 seconds Yes. 43:0143 minutes, 1 secondIt's it's just to me it's just insanity and you know but I understand humans are 43:0843 minutes, 8 seconds insane often but kind of the security blanket if you will for the Europeans is that if a direct Russia NATO war breaks out then 43:1643 minutes, 16 seconds article four five will be invoked and um I explained article five to a group of people the other day and they were thunder struck when I finish. 43:2443 minutes, 24 seconds Yeah I said of the actual text. Yeah. 43:2743 minutes, 27 seconds Yeah. I I explained it to them. I said basically here's what it says. It says that each country now 30 is it or 43:3443 minutes, 34 seconds something will consult its constitutional or otherwise formal process for war and come back and say 43:4243 minutes, 42 seconds whether or not they're going to join. It doesn't say that you know an attack on one is an attack on all and we'll all respond immediately. And I said what do 43:5143 minutes, 51 seconds you think we will do? Our constitutional process is broken. We will ask the Congress for a declaration of war on on 43:5943 minutes, 59 seconds who? On Russia and what will we get? You think Trump will do that? Probably not. 44:0544 minutes, 5 seconds Or will he just go to war and then what are we doing? We're tearing our own process up. But basically what I'm telling you is each country goes through 44:1444 minutes, 14 seconds its process of declaring war and then comes back and says to the joint arena, we will or we won't. It's not any 44:2244 minutes, 22 seconds automatic commitment to a war. So it's absurd to say that it is. And the most 44:2944 minutes, 29 seconds reluctant person, people, country in this whole thing is your big guy. Do you think Donald Trump is going to take an 44:3844 minutes, 38 seconds attack on Lithuania as an attack on the United States of America and unleash holy hell on the attacker? I don't. 44:4844 minutes, 48 seconds Not unless we're down the road a little ways and he's fully demented. I admit he's becoming more and more demented 44:5544 minutes, 55 seconds every day, but you got to be massively demented and you've got to be his cabinet that's massively demented to 45:0445 minutes, 4 seconds say, "Okay, Lithuania just took two hits. Uressnik killed a whole bunch of people who were supporting the war in Ukraine. 45:1345 minutes, 13 seconds Now we're going to invoke Article 5 and we're going to go after Russia. " I don't think so. 45:2045 minutes, 20 seconds Yeah. No, but no, as you said, well, it does say an attack on one should be considered not have attack on all. 45:2645 minutes, 26 seconds However, yeah, each every participant of the lines can respond in a way this fit. 45:3145 minutes, 31 seconds That is how the the response they deem necessary. I think it's a text and this and we made sure it was that way because 45:3945 minutes, 39 seconds our Congress would never have approved it otherwise because at that time we had little respect for the war power and con and Congress's constitutional responsibility therein. 45:5145 minutes, 51 seconds Yes, I remember that argument. I remember that argument because I I I essentially followed um 45:5945 minutes, 59 seconds Truman uh Aerson and who was the other guy that really got in involved in it? I can't remember 46:0646 minutes, 6 seconds now, but he was the guy who was the Republican who was dead set against NATO. His name just escapes me right 46:1446 minutes, 14 seconds now, but who's a senator. I think he was from the northeast, but he was dead set against NATO. And when I was studying 46:2246 minutes, 22 seconds that at the Naval War College and we were doing the case study, we were looking at how close a thing it was. Had 46:3046 minutes, 30 seconds the Korean War not come along, had Truman not made the decision he made without consulting Congress, had that 46:3746 minutes, 37 seconds not been a police action that drew Truman into going from 8 billion a year 46:4446 minutes, 44 seconds and directions to his budget guy that he would not spend a penny more to 53 46:5046 minutes, 50 seconds billion in about a week's time. And most of that money, most of that money they 46:5846 minutes, 58 seconds made sure went to Europe and to NATO and the new organization rather than to the war in Korea. So we fought the war in 47:0447 minutes, 4 seconds Korea on really the cheap. And people know that now after studying the data and so forth, but that was the only way 47:1247 minutes, 12 seconds we got NATO approved because this guy was so powerful within the caucus, the security caucus in the Congress that it 47:1947 minutes, 19 seconds was a touchandgo thing. And uh if it hadn't been for Truman in that war and his change of face, if you will, I don't 47:2847 minutes, 28 seconds think we would we would have been a member of NATO. It was a close run thing. 47:3547 minutes, 35 seconds Well, as I said before, perhaps it's time to rethink the utility of it. I often hear the argument that well, we need NATO. kept us safe during the cold 47:4347 minutes, 43 seconds war. But but uh you know the world has changed and even during the cold war we did recognize that having this zero sum 47:5147 minutes, 51 seconds rivalry between two blocks was not the ideal setup for security which is why we began the Helsinki Accords to try to set 47:5947 minutes, 59 seconds up an inclusive security arrangement where we could manage security competition for the benefit of all. So it didn't have to be so intense in terms 48:0748 minutes, 7 seconds of the zero sum rivalry. Uh but you know try to speak about indivisible security in any European 48:1748 minutes, 17 seconds uh yeah political discourse discussions at the moment and uh you know it's treated as Russian propaganda almost. 48:2448 minutes, 24 seconds It's um yeah it's become quite wild vile. 48:2848 minutes, 28 seconds It is. And you know, I go back to the March of 2004, I think it was. [clears throat] My memory serves. 48:3648 minutes, 36 seconds Powell had known Sergey Lar ever since he was deputy national security. 48:4248 minutes, 42 seconds Actually, I think he'd known him ever since he was military assistant as a twoar general to Casper Weinberger when Weinberger was secretary of defense and 48:5048 minutes, 50 seconds everybody said Rich Armitage and Coen Powell ran the Pentagon, not not Casper Weinberger, which was close to the truth. 48:5848 minutes, 58 seconds So he'd known Sergey for a long time and he had just been made foreign minister. 49:0549 minutes, 5 seconds March, I think it was in 2004. And this was April or May. We're in his office and he's talking. He just had I think he'd had his first meeting with Sergey. 49:1449 minutes, 14 seconds And he was waxing eloquent about how when Sergey spoke, he meant what he said and said what he meant. And he was one 49:2149 minutes, 21 seconds of the most direct individuals Powell had ever dealt with and very, very fine diplomat. 49:2849 minutes, 28 seconds And how do we go from that assessment to where we are now? 49:3649 minutes, 36 seconds And how do we go from the relationship that I think we still had at least a modicum of in 2004 to where we are now? 49:4649 minutes, 46 seconds Because I know Powell was still and and I remember Bill Perry meeting with my Marine Corps War College seminar when he was the middle secretary of defense or 49:5449 minutes, 54 seconds so for for Clinton. And I think Bill told me later out in California that one of the reasons he left was because 50:0250 minutes, 2 seconds Clinton was doing what he was doing. And when Bill had met with my seminar, he just come back from Moscow. And he was 50:1050 minutes, 10 seconds just full of the optimism of what the new relationship with the Russians was going to produce. What we were talking 50:1850 minutes, 18 seconds about in the early 90s was going to come to be. And Bill was a big advocate of it. and then it went sour with Clinton doing what he did and and Perry left. 50:2950 minutes, 29 seconds Um, but in the in that series of conversations, I saw what was happening in a way that 50:3750 minutes, 37 seconds was ex extremely enimical, I thought, to our interest in Europe and our interest in the world. But there was nothing we 50:4450 minutes, 44 seconds could do about it because it was moving in that direction. We no longer were in power and it was very frustrating to be 50:5150 minutes, 51 seconds on the outside. I kept get trying to get Powell to come down to the Marine Corps War College to address my seminar. I finally succeeded, but he was reluctant 51:0051 minutesto do it because he was so into the American Promise organization and what he was doing. And I kept saying, "It's 51:0751 minutes, 7 seconds going to pieces, boss. The whole thing we set up, the whole idea we had, the whole dream we had, the concept, it's 51:1451 minutes, 14 seconds going to pieces. It's going to pieces." and you're just sitting over there in America's promise and you're dealing with kids and you're doing things that are important and mean a lot to you, but it doesn't it doesn't compute with me. 51:2751 minutes, 27 seconds You're one of the people has a lot of power in this country and a lot of influence still and you're not using that. Um, we had we had a couple of, you 51:3651 minutes, 36 seconds know, nasty talks, but we saw it and he saw it and he was frustrated by it, but he didn't know 51:4351 minutes, 43 seconds what to do about it and he wasn't in position anymore to do anything about it except, you know, back channels and things like that. 51:5151 minutes, 51 seconds Um, when I saw Perry out in California later, I gave a talk and Perry came up to me with his wife and he said, "I 52:0052 minutesreally appreciated that, Colonel. There aren't too many people who think the way you do now. It was a pleasure listening 52:0752 minutes, 7 seconds to you. I'll never forget that. Um because I kind of halfway thought I was going to get from those Northern Californians a pretty testy reception. 52:1752 minutes, 17 seconds I'd kind of talk like I've talked with you. Um no, Bill and the people who were with him, I think it was the Northern 52:2652 minutes, 26 seconds California Monterey something club or something like that. But it it it really was 52:3352 minutes, 33 seconds interesting to listen to the questions and then to listen to Bill afterwards because he got it. He got it. We had 52:4152 minutes, 41 seconds screwed the pooch when we had screwed it most forcefully and most disadvantageously with Russia. 52:5052 minutes, 50 seconds Yeah. Know it's hard to argue against that we screwed up that relationship. 52:5352 minutes, 53 seconds That was the almost the only or the main strategic well strategy of the Russians after the cold war. Just uh integrate with the 53:0253 minutes, 2 seconds west and uh hey make the concessions required. If any country in the east slow you down just uh you know rush fast 53:0953 minutes, 9 seconds towards the west uh you know put all your eggs in the western basket. Surely they want to take advantage. 53:1653 minutes, 16 seconds And here we are. Little did they know I should have seen Anatoli Chuba and Larry 53:2253 minutes, 22 seconds Summers raping them with the fire sales to the oligarchs of all the Soviet Union hard assets and said as Putin I think 53:3053 minutes, 30 seconds did from his vantage point. I think he was in St. Petersburg at the time this is not good what these guys are doing to us. 53:4053 minutes, 40 seconds Colonel thank you so much for for taking the time. Uh truly thank you for the opportunity. Take care. --- In this discussion, Colonel *Lawrence Wilkerson*, former chief of staff to the U.S. Secretary of State, and Professor *Glenn Diesen* analyze the current state of *NATO*, the *EU*, and the shifting global geopolitical landscape. **Key Takeaways:** - **The Ukraine War & NATO Expansion: ** *Wilkerson* argues that the current war in *Ukraine* is a result of a long-term, deliberate policy by neoconservatives and intelligence agencies to undermine *Russia* (0:29 - 6:24). He suggests that commitments made to *George H.W. Bush* regarding the non-expansion of *NATO* were violated starting under the *Clinton* administration (4:03 - 5:02). za: Why Russian couldn't change leaders, reset negotiations with the wester world? because they couldn't do it under Putin's rule. It's not one-side failure, Russian also gets it's own contribution to the final results. - **The Decline of Western Institutions:** *Wilkerson* asserts that *NATO* and the *EU* are effectively "dead" institutions clinging to a "cadaver," driven by a singular, unifying hatred of *Russia* rather than a constructive purpose (38:03 - 38:54). - **Emergence of a New Global Order:** The conversation highlights a shift toward a "multinodal" world. While the *United States* attempts to maintain hegemony, countries across the global south and parts of Asia are increasingly gravitating toward new economic and security frameworks like *BRICS* and the *Shanghai Cooperation Organization* (19:20 - 21:54; 35:05 - 36:20). - **U.S. Foreign Policy & Intelligence:** A significant portion of the interview critiques the role of U.S. intelligence agencies, which *Wilkerson* suggests run foreign policy independent of civilian oversight, often prioritizing corporate interests and hegemonic power over diplomatic solutions (6:24 - 8:37). **Future Outlook:** - *Wilkerson* predicts that the *United States* may attempt to retrench into a Western Hemisphere "redoubt," though he is skeptical of the success of such efforts given the current economic and political instability (26:38 - 28:10; 29:53 - 30:04).