AMB. Chas Freeman : Netanyahu Wants the US in All-Out War With Iran

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[00:00:52]What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now? [music] Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Npalitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, July 21st, 2026. Ambassador Chaz Freeman will be with us in just a moment on just how badly Prime Minister Netanyahu wants allout war resumed. But first, this today's headlines aren't just bleak.

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[00:02:37]Ambassador Freeman, welcome here, my dear friend. I missed you during my vacation and welcome you back. I know the audience does uh as well. Before we get to Prime Minister Netanyahu and his wos and minations, a few questions if I might Ukraine. If Ukraine is winning, I guess that means successfully repelling or pushing back uh the Russians as the Western media claims. Why are they bombing an Amazon warehouse and why fire the defense minister at the height of the war?

[00:03:15]>> Well, I don't think they are winning, but that is very much the propaganda of the day. Um, uh, the answer to why they do uh things like bombing warehouses and refineries and everything else is that they are not winning on the only battlefield that counts for their survival. uh and that is in Ukraine. Uh they may be retarding the Russian advance in some areas uh defending a line uh effectively. Uh certainly they've been very resourceful, innovative, and effective on the battlefield. No one would deny that. Uh but basically these long range strikes, strikes on other facilities that are basically irrelevant to the front line in Ukraine um are a diversion, a strategic diversion. First they do have the purpose of trying to weaken Russia, but their main purpose is to build morale and to bolster western support for Ukraine in what has become a forever war.

[00:04:21]I mean, do do we really care who the defense minister of Ukraine is, or is this um uh the tip of the iceberg either with respect to malfeasants in office, corruption or something else?

[00:04:37]>> No, I think we have to care. Um uh the ousted defense minister was a symbol of um relative property within a government in Kev that is notoriously corrupt. And it seems that um his stance on corruption, his effort to make uh the Ukrainian defense effort more efficient and honest and uh uh and and and free of corruption um had something to do with his ouster. Uh he's also given credit by many Ukrainians uh for turning uh the war more in their favor. Uh and therefore this makes his ouster all the more difficult to understand but it is an illustration of a point that is lost in the western media and that is Ukraine is not a democracy. We are not fighting to save a democracy. Ukraine is now an effective dictatorship.

[00:05:33]Uh it is bolstered by western support.

[00:05:36]Uh but it has uh outlawed its political parties. It's nationalized its media. It persecutes anyone who desents. Uh it has destroyed the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine as best it can. uh and uh it is basically conducting uh what is now a more and more direct western war on Russia with the risk that the Russians will abandon the restraint they've shown so far and strike back at the western backers of Ukraine directly.

[00:06:10]>> Ambassador, is the United States at war with Russia?

[00:06:14]>> In effect we are. Um the Russians believe that um uh NATO, the European Union and the United States are in effect at war with them. Um what was a somewhat indirect proxy war uh has become more and more direct. The American military involvement has declined. Um we have handed uh responsibility for fueling Ukraine's effort to defend itself to the Europeans.

[00:06:45]But our intelligence and other support for the effort to injure Russia uh to weaken and isolate it remains strong. So uh whatever form you wanted you wanted uh it depends I guess on your definite your definition of war. We're certainly at economic war with Russia. We are at an intelligence war with Russia. We are in a military proxy war with Russia. Uh the main problem uh in that is that our weaponry has been so badly depleted by uh the foolish adventure against Iran that we can no longer sell the Europeans the weapons they would hope to pass to the Ukrainians. Uh Ukraine has been the main victim of this war, no doubt, but u there's no relief in sight for it. Does Russia continue its slow march westward?

[00:07:44]>> Yes, that's my understanding. Um, you have guests on your show who are far more familiar with um directly familiar with military matters in Ukraine than I am. But yes, the the Russians are advancing. They're doing so with grave brutality. Um the theory that somehow they're still uh losing huge numbers of men on the on the battlefield is questionable because they've turned to the sorts of techniques of utter discuss destruction that they employed in the war in Cheschna. They are using glide bombs against Ukrainian positions. Uh they are conserving manpower. They are upping their counter strikes on Ukraine strategically in response to Ukraine's strikes on them and um uh well while the war is certainly not going wonderfully for them, it is advancing from their perspective.

[00:08:40]>> Okay. uh recently, I'm segueing now, uh although this obviously involves Ukraine, foreign Russian foreign minister Lavough uh made a series of uh I would call them out of character because they're so inflammatory statements indicating that the Kremlin is fed up with the West, is preparing for war with Europe based upon [clears throat] the statements made by European leaders is untrusting of Donald Trump and believes that the Anchorage meeting was a deception.

[00:09:23]Yes, these are very direct words and they do reflect the mood in Moscow. Um Moscow cons considers the uh European Union and NATO to be at war with it. Um, it has absolutely no reason to trust Donald Trump or his amateurish um um and somewhat self-interested envoys, Mr. um uh Kushner and uh uh his Mr. Witkov. So um uh yes, this is serious and it raises the question which I posed in the in in a few a minute ago and that is at what point are the Russians going to stop treating this as a proxy war in Ukraine and respond directly to the um people who are developing weaponry and producing it for Ukraine uh to attack Russia. Um and uh I think we're we the Russians have many options ranging from sabotage to direct strikes. Uh I don't know what what they will do but they are signaling pretty strongly that they have indeed had it with the west.

[00:10:35]>> What did Anchorage accomplish?

[00:10:38]>> Uh not much. Uh but the reason for that I think has to be laid at the disorganization in Washington. Um uh we do not have a policy process anymore in the US government. We have single decisions by Donald Trump. Very often his envoys don't have any professional staff support um at all. There's no record of what they said or what the other side said. There's no mechanism for followup. So how can you implement an agreement? If there were agreements at Anchorage, which the Russians thought there were, uh they were not followed up. They were not implemented on our side.

[00:11:15]So this is a measure of the disorganization and increasing [clears throat] incompetence of the US government.

[00:11:22]>> Jumping to uh Iran. Um what is the value of Trump's signature on the memorandum of understanding ambassador? If I can ask that with a straight face.

[00:11:33]>> Uh well uh you you may well ask that. Um it's a fancy signature. It signifies nothing. And uh that has been amply illustrated by our avoidance of compliance with any of the terms of the memorandum of understanding. Of course, in business terms, a memorandum of understanding is not a binding contract.

[00:11:54]It's a statement of intent and nothing more. Um but if you are honorable, you are meant to implement what you have promised to do. Um we do not claim to be honorable in this context.

[00:12:10]Take a look at this um recent poll from the uh Washington Post. Do you approve or disapprove the way Trump is handling Iran? Approve 29%, disapprove 69%.

[00:12:27]>> This overwhelming, Ambassador, >> uh well this shows that Lincoln was right. You can't fool all of the people all of the time. uh and um uh obviously people understand that Donald Trump is in a geopolitical straight jacket of his own invention. Um he is focused now on uh restoring the situation before the war when Iran did not have a nuclear program when it did not control the straight of Hormuz when the global economy was not being held hostage to American and Iranian blockades and counter blockades. when shipping passed freely through that straight and when um the bases that the United States had established in the Gulf Arab countries appeared to serve a useful purpose.

[00:13:15]Those bases uh by the way are now basically uninhabitable and unusable and increasingly the United States is withdrawing uh from uh from the region uh now even from Jordan. Uh this war began by destroying a a vast amount of very expensive American military equipment.

[00:13:36]It is now taking lives of soldiers and that raises the political cost of it somewhat, but apparently not enough to deter Donald Trump from pressing forward with a war that he has lost and has no prospect of winning.

[00:13:53]Uh, I'm going to ask you in a minute if there's a prospect for renegotiations, but first I want to play a clip uh from our friend and colleague Tita Parsy. I think you probably know him. Um, >> well, you will uh I'm sure you do as as do I and and many of us watching now. But uh this is fascinating uh what he said.

[00:14:16]Chris, number six, >> it is a problem if the parties are going to the negotiating table while still trying to shape the negotiation landscape through military action. And this is again part of the reason I think the Iranians are not likely going to come back to the table anytime soon because they see the United States failing to achieve what it wants to achieve at the negotiating table and then shifting back towards military action in order to be able to improve its situation. And as a result, the Iranians are not going to go back anytime soon. But rather they want to try to make sure that this round becomes as painful as possible for the US. So the temptation to go back to uh uh military action on the American side becomes significantly diminished. Until we have a full commitment for diplomacy and truly setting aside military action or other efforts to try to shape the landscape, we're not really going to be able to see diplomacy succeed.

[00:15:18]>> Great statement. The last line, I'm going to read it again. Until we have a full commitment for diplomacy and truly setting aside military action or other efforts to try to shape the landscape, we're not really going to be able to see diplomacy succeed. He's 100% correct, is he not?

[00:15:36]>> He is absolutely correct. And uh what we are doing is the opposite of diplomacy.

[00:15:42]There is no intent to negotiate a solution to the impass with Iran. um uh on any terms that are conceivably acceptable uh to the Iranians and they have learned the hard way that the United States uh freely gives its word and equally freely breaks it. So the prospect that they will go to the negotiating table is very slight. I think the Iranian strategy is basically to accomplish what the Houthies did. If you remember the American effort to humble the Houthies and end the uh blockade of the Red Sea by them um uh which ended with the US just basically declaring victory and sailing away. I think the Iranians are are um busily removing us from as a factor in the Persian Gulf militarily and are pretty confident that they can outlast us in terms of the suffering from economic pain and political pressures. uh so that we will eventually recognize uh that we cannot accomplish uh whatever it is we're trying to accomplish never been entirely clear uh in this aggressive war against uh Iran and I note that Iranian statements have escalated steadily with Much Kam the new the son of the former leader the new supreme leader at least ostensibly in Iran um declaring that Iran is no longer bound to keep to tit for um it is in fact destroying uh infrastructure in countries allied with the United States like Kuwait. Um electricity has had to be rationed in Kuwait. Desel desalination plants are being destroyed. Iran is demonstrating that it holds the upper hand. It holds escalation dominance and it's prepared to use it. Uh and the United States on the other hand if as is rumored Donald Trump decides uh to go back to full-scale war is pretty close to empty in terms of its supply of key uh systems. Um I believe that almost 90% of US and Gulf Arab uh interception capabilities have been exhausted. Uh and this is why uh an attack on Moafik Solid in Jordan, the air the airfield that um we had deployed uh and where uh several American soldiers were tragically killed and at least hundred seriously wounded.

[00:18:17]Uh this is why um uh the uh Iranians uh feel free to to strike that. If Israel joins this or if we concentrate our tankers in Israel as it's said to be uh in prospect, um then I think they will think about striking Israel. At the moment, they're just as happy to have Israel tied down in Lebanon and not to be directly at war with it.

[00:18:42]How badly does Prime Minister Netanyahu want or need Iran War 3.0?

[00:18:51]>> Well, I don't see how he survives otherwise. Um, he's enormously unpopular in many parts of the Israeli population.

[00:19:00]Um, they understand that um that Israel did not win its war with Iran. Um, they are bloodthirsty, of course. They are supportive of the Israeli aggression in Lebanon and some of them support the effort to enex southern Lebanon but um they are not being presented with a a choice based on on these factors in in the coming elections. Um, it very much turns on personalities and Netanyahu then needs to stay in office to avoid incarceration and punishment for corruption.

[00:19:40]Um, [clears throat] so he's desperate.

[00:19:42]Um, I I think what we're looking at here are actually two desperate um uh self-interested figures. Donald Trump on the one hand who sees that the writing is on the wall for him in the midterm elections. He's doing everything he can to try to deflect those elections to distort them or or prevent them. But um Benjamin Netanyahu does not have that option. Uh Israel is a functioning democracy for its Jewish population and um there will be a change in leadership very likely in the fall. Here's a very interesting observation from my friend uh and former colleague uh Tucker Carlson that Trump is not the most powerful person in the world. He's weak. Chris, number three.

[00:20:32]>> I I I don't think he's the most powerful man in the world. I have held him directly accountable. It's his fault.

[00:20:38]He's the US president. He was elected.

[00:20:40]Um that's his job. And a huge part of the job is resisting pressure from outside forces. I mean, and many presidents have to varying degrees resisted, you know, attempts to control them from outside and he didn't. So, he's weak.

[00:20:56]I'm not pretending otherwise. But it's also just a factually uh verifiable statement that Israel pushed us into this and Trump allowed them to do that.

[00:21:07]The Secretary of State himself said that on camera. So, it's this is not like a conspiracy theory. It's a fact. The United States is unwilling to or maybe unable, who knows, to restrain Israel.

[00:21:17]Like, you know, I'm on the outside. I I'm not talking to Trump anymore. I haven't spoken to him since late February. So, I don't really know, but I, you know, have a news feed, so I know that we did not restrain our ally and partner in this war, Israel. And so, of course, it was never going to work.

[00:21:33]>> Okay.

[00:21:36]>> What do you think? Well, in many in many ways we are a behaving like a vassal state of Israel uh in our policies uh generally and particularly in West Asia.

[00:21:49]Uh and I think Tucker Carlson is right.

[00:21:51]Um you cannot equate impetuousness uh with firmness of character. You cannot equate uh um you know winging decisions with an orderly process of considered judgment. Um, you cannot equate u opposition u anger uh at being pushed around with the ability to resist it. And I don't think we've shown any ability to confront um Netanyahu um in this administration uh or to disobey the instructions of um his uh his political backers and including um some very um odious characters in his covenant.

[00:22:38]>> Here's um a recent statement. We're going to put it up on the screen from [clears throat] the new uh Ayatollah and I'll read it for the benefit of those who are taking the show audio only. [clears throat] Ayatollah Maktabakamini.

[00:22:53]Now that the American enemy is seeking to escalate the conflict, thereby incurring even heavier costs and further humiliation, it should know that the noble nation of Iran and the resistance front have unforgettable lessons in store for it.

[00:23:09]What does he mean by in the resistance front ambassador?

[00:23:15]>> Um he means the various movements in West Asia, Palestinian, Lebanese, Syrian, uh Yemeni, Iraqi um who um who oppose Israeli expansion. uh and he may also mean um something beyond that because um there have been threats uh not to restrict the theater of operations against the United States to West Asia. It's entirely plausible uh that we will see some actions of an unconventional nature, we'll call them terrorism, uh here in the United States.

[00:23:54]After all, we have killed thousands and thousands of Iranians. And it is not surprising that much of a would be bitter about what has been done to himself and to his nation. Um uh his father was killed, his uh his wife um his uh sister-in-law, his brother-in-law, his niece uh in a mur in a murderous attack on February 28th, a surprise attack by Israel in the United States. This is not the sort of thing that predisposes anyone to be consiliatory, and he's clearly not.

[00:24:33]>> Ambassador, thank you very much, my dear friend.

[00:24:36]you have a very large audience that uh welcomes you back to the show and I deeply appreciate your time and look forward to next week.

[00:24:44]>> Well, welcome back and I'm glad to be with you.

[00:24:47]>> Thank you. All all my best. Uh coming up later today, if you're watching us live in 33 minutes at 9:00 this morning, Professor John Mirshimer at 10:00, Aaron Mate at 2 this afternoon. Isn't the United States running out of ammunition?

[00:25:04]Matt Hoe and on three this afternoon, how the deep state manipulates President Trump. Who else? Colonel Karen Quowski, judge the Paul Towner for judging freedom.

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