"Start PREPARING For What's Coming..." - Col Douglas Macgregor's Most Dire Warning Yet

Added: 2026-05-19

[00:00:00]I think his problem is uh frankly one of bluff. You know most of what he does if you watch him carefully in foreign and policy but here at home as well is an exercise in psychological bluff. You know he he wants the outward show of success and he's managed that to some extent and struggles with weak inconstant leaders in Europe and I would argue in Venezuela to a limited extent.

[00:00:22]But when he employed the bluff against Iran it failed and his bluff is being called. He never expected this. This is hard for him to imagine. So that's why I've tried to tell people that project freedom was abandoned in favor of a new project called project nowhere. His game of power and coercion on behalf of Israel has reached its limits. He's lost the strategic initiative. It's not difficult to understand why, but he never never understood what he was up against. He didn't understood the limitations of what he has. And in fact, President Netanyahu or excuse me, Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke quite recently, just a few hours ago, as I understand it, saying that the war is not over and it must continue. And I think that's what he wants. He doesn't care what it costs us. He doesn't care what it costs the world. He doesn't care how many people starve in the global south. He doesn't care whether or not inflation is going to destroy us along with large numbers of governments all over the world. It's it's irrelevant to him. He wants complete dominance, [music] control, hegemony over the Middle East.

[00:01:22]The only way he can get it is with us.

[00:01:24]So I think unfortunately uh Trump can't [music] blame it on the Israelis.

[00:01:29]>> There are losses you can spin and then there are losses that are impossible to hide because the consequences show up at your grocery store, your gas station, and eventually your government. This is coming from Colonel Douglas McGregor, retired US Army Colonel and former senior defense adviser. He lays out in this interview a picture of an administration that went allin on a geopolitical bluff with Iran, got called, and now has nowhere to go. He says Trump walked into this confrontation believing the same playbook that worked on weaker targets, pressure, spectacle, and the implicit threat of overwhelming force. What he ran into instead was a country that had been preparing for exactly this moment for decades and had no intention of folding. And the fallout from that isn't just strategic, it's economic, institutional, and spreading in ways that Washington hasn't [music] fully reckoned with yet. Also, before we get into it, only a small percentage of my viewers are actually subscribed. If you enjoy geostrategy content, consider subscribing. It's free and you can always change your mind later. Here's McGregor on what it means that even Robert Kagan, the intellectual godfather of neoonservative foreign policy, has now admitted that Iran has effectively [music] defeated the United States and Israel. Colonel, how telling is it when arguably the leading Leo neocon in the country, Robert Kagan, the other half of the Kagan Victoria Nuland marriage, can write in the Atlantic that Iran has effectively defeated the United States and Israel.

[00:03:01]>> Well, I think on one level he's mourning the death of the host that he as a parasite has infested for years. This is someone who is always in search of a place to commit US military power, money, and uh capability. So now he's finally found something that we are incapable of mastering. And it's no longer possible to disguise. And so he's essentially dismissing the United States, its armed forces, its people [music] as unworthy of further support from Robert Kagan. What a great man. I think President Trump probably lives in a bubble of his own making and people are very reluctant to pull him out of the bubble. Now, that doesn't mean he had doesn't suspect, you know, he's hit a concrete reinforced wall that he can't penetrate. I think he probably knows that, but he refuses to convey the impression that he hasn't [music] won this war. You know, I think his problem is uh frankly one of bluff. You know, most of what he does, if you watch him carefully in foreign and policy, but here at home as well, is an exercise in psychological bluff. He wants the outward show of success and he's managed that to some extent in struggles with weak inconstant leaders in Europe and I would argue in Venezuela to a limited extent. But when he employed the bluff uh against Iran, it failed. And his bluff is being called. He never expected this. This is hard for him to imagine.

[00:04:26]So that's why I've tried to tell people that project freedom was abandoned in favor of a new project called project nowhere. His game of power and coercion on behalf of Israel has reached its limits. He's lost the strategic initiative. It's not difficult to understand why. But he never never understood what he was up against. He didn't understood the limitations of what he has. You know, one of the things, and we've talked about this before, that distinguished Eisenhower from all of his successors is having lived through the Second War and then gotten to know what it took to wage that war. Eisenhower always had a very acute sense of American limitations. He understood that the American people were not interested in, nor would they sustain a long, brutal war. That was simply an impossibility. He also understood that World War II had effectively tapped us out. And people don't realize that that we reached a point where we were running out of manpower to send overseas. So the the bottom line is that there there was never a sense of limitations with Trump.

[00:05:25]He felt as though he was the child that broke into the candy store and he could eat as much as he liked and no one would interrupt him. It hasn't worked.

[00:05:33]>> You uh refer to him as surrounded by a bubble. It's a bubble of sycopants. I mean, we keep hearing these stories that General Kaine, the chair of the joint chiefs of staff and the vice president might not have been part of the sycopant group and might have expressed opinions to him contrary to what he got from Secretary Rubio, Secretary Hegsth and the others. I don't need to mention all of their >> Well, actually speaking, Judge, I spoke over the weekend to some people in the White House and they said the opposite.

[00:06:01]There was no one more enthusiastic about going to war with Iran than JD Vance.

[00:06:06]And that's my only own experience with him. Uh I I saw this up close and personal and he was always talking about going to war with Iran. So I don't believe that. Before we leave this topic completely, I think it's worth pointing out that right now behind the scenes, [music] at least I'm being told this, that uh the argument is that President Trump was misled by his quote unquote Israeli friends, and that had he paid more attention to his American adviserss, the narrative goes, then events might have taken a different course. But the truth is there is a mountain of evidence that like President Lynden Johnson, Trump [music] and his inner circle, including Vance were really driving military action and escalation from the beginning. And Trump seems to have rejected advice from anyone in or out of uniform who opposed it. But very few people that opposed what he wanted to do ever got to the White House, if any. [music] We developed a lot of uh sort of self-d delusion in the '90s. We involved ourselves in Bosnia Herziggoa and at one point we bombed the Serbs in and around Sievo and convinced ourselves that this was the dramatic turning point when in reality at the time I was on the ground in Bosnia and I was talking to British and French officers that were involved and they pointed out to me in great detail that the British and French artillery had done infinitely more damage with greater precision than the air strikes. So I sort of tucked that away. But if you go back to Hullbrook, who was the ambassador at the time that Clinton had appointed to deal with all of this, he became a huge advocate for the use of air power. That [music] was his sort of uh favorite topic. Then we get into Kosovo and it was made very clear to General Clark that he could have whatever he wanted, do whatever he wanted. Obviously not nuclear weapons, but that never ever came up for discussion anyway. But he wasn't going to get any ground force. And so whatever he did, he had to accomplish with air power. Well, he accomplished a great deal, but it wasn't enough. And ultimately, we had to send Strobe Talba to Moscow and bribe the Russians to abandon their Serb friends. At which point in time, the Serbs realized they weren't going to get any coal or oil or food or medical support of any kind during the winter that was coming. So, he said, "Either I get out now or I'll face a winter and hundreds of thousands of Serbs will die." But it wasn't exclusively by any stretch of the imagination because of air power. But the story was spun up to make people believe that air power had been successful. And then when you move on to the Middle East to Iraq, you know, the Iraqis were many things, but they were never, you know, 10 ft tall, even though people described them that way. And the Iraqis were in no position to resist us for any length of time. And it was never required to bring in a large number of ground forces. Now, the neocons understood that, but they made the fatal mistake of having once gotten there staying. But again, you know, I think the glossy uh cover to this uh sort of narrative of self-d delusion is air power Uber alas.

[00:09:07]>> And I think Trump fell victim to it. Now everybody's backpedaling and trying to get out from from under the problem. But it's it's not going to work. Everybody who's being part of this judge [music] is ultimately going to go down, I would say, politically for what's happened.

[00:09:21]point out there are a lot of people who are blaming the Israelis behind closed doors, but they're all afraid to say so publicly. And I think part of that is that they don't want to admit that, you know, the Israelis have led us down the uh the path to destruction eagerly. And in fact, President Netanyahu or excuse me, Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke quite recently, just a few hours ago, as I understand it, saying that the war is not over and it must continue. And I think that's what he wants. He doesn't care what it costs us. He doesn't care what it costs the world. He doesn't care how many people starve in the global south. He doesn't care whether or not inflation is going to destroy us along with large numbers of governments all over the world. It's it's irrelevant to him. He wants complete dominance, control, hegemony over the Middle East.

[00:10:05]The only way he can get it is with us.

[00:10:07]So I think unfortunately Trump can't blame it on the Israelis. Whether he likes it or not, he's going to be held responsible.

[00:10:15]>> Quick update before we continue. The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the April 2026 CPI report today, Tuesday, May 12th, and inflation came in at 3.8% annually. That's the highest reading since May 2023, and it came in above forecast. Energy costs drove over 40% of the monthly increase with gasoline [music] up 28.4% over the past year.

[00:10:40]Food prices rose 3.2% year-over-year with beef up nearly 15%. The number that hits hardest, real average hourly wages fell 0.3% annually. Wages are now losing to prices for the first time in three years. This is what McGregor means when he talks about food, fuel, fertilizer, and feed stocks. Those four categories move together. When energy gets expensive, so does everything that depends on it to be produced, packaged, and transported. And here's the part that doesn't make the front page often enough. Economists say even if some resolution in the straight of hormuse happens within the next few weeks, it might take two months for the supply chain to start normalizing and in a pessimistic scenario, 6 to9 months to get back to where things were in January. Meanwhile, on the nuclear side of this, Iran's position has hardened further. Trump dismissed Iran's latest response to a US proposal as unacceptable, while Iranian state media described Washington's terms as excessive demands. The two sides remain stuck on exactly the issues McGregor flags. Iran's insistence on sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz and the US demand for a complete end to uranium enrichment. The deputy speaker of the Iranian parliament put it plainly this week. The Strait of Hormuz is our nuclear weapon. That framing tells you everything about how Thrron has recalibrated its leverage. When McGregor says the strategic initiative has been lost and there is no exit, that doesn't look like a loss. That assessment is now being priced into American family budgets in real time. Back to McGregor because he has something specific to say about what all of this is doing to the global balance of power and where wealth is moving as a result.

[00:12:25]>> So, let me ask you a couple of uh questions about it. Has the war in Iran pushed Russia, Iran, and China closer together? Has the war in Iran accelerated the movement of wealth and power eastward? Oh, absolutely without question. Let's look at this for a second because initially Russia, China viewed India as a p potential strategic partner. But India has been unable to solve its own problems. It's been unable so to say to get out of its own way.

[00:12:55]Iran is very different. And in contrast to us, I think both the Chinese and the Russians viewed the Iranian state nation and population as strong enough to resist us. Uh that's one of the reasons that they helped and they assisted. But the Iranians would never allow them to bring in their their troops, their forces, [music] their navy, their air force or anything else. And the Chinese and the Russians also saw Iran at the center of this uh central Asian Eurasian landmass project known as Belt and Road.

[00:13:25]The idea being that you build [music] this tremendous network of transportation uh and movement of commercial goods back and forth across the continent all the way from Europe to Shanghai, you know, from from the west coast of Africa all the way to uh east coast of China. All of this is now part of the reason for Iran's success and the confidence that now the Chinese and the Russians have in them. So what we're seeing is a reversal of what what used to exist. Remember in 1492 when Columbus crossed he discovered a new world and very rapidly that discovery powered Europe. How did it power Europe? Mainly through the acquisition of huge quantities of gold. We had a series of empires that rose and fell. But the living standards rose. Our technology developed faster. Well, that's over. And that kind of wealth is now being generated in the place that used to be the dominant creator of wealth in in human history. And that's China. China is now the the wealth engine. It's the it's the workshop of the world. It's the production center for the world. We're not happy about that. But we've ultimately squandered our wealth [music] pointlessly and needlessly. President Trump is going to go over to China and he's going to play what he thinks are cards. He's going to look at his cards and there may be baseball cards, but they're of no value in this discussion with the Chinese. And China is weathering this terrible disruption that we've created through this war. They have tremendous stocks, stockpiles of everything from oil to coal to various kinds of energy creation. Uh we could go on and on. Food, you name it. China is ready to deal with this. And the rest of the world is seeing it. And China has skillfully avoided being being involved in any of the disputes that we've started. stayed away from all these wars and conflicts. While with each passing year, we found a new reason to go somewhere in the world, Africa, Latin America, wherever it happens to be and intervene, to disrupt, to meddle, to push. China has not done that. China is certainly willing to do business with everybody, but China has demonstrated conclusively it's not interested in changing regimes or countries or societies. So [clears throat] this is why you're seeing this tremendous shift in wealth and power and I don't think we can reverse it. Now there are ways for us to benefit from it. Strangely enough we can alter our behaviors and ultimately the world can become more balanced in time but for the moment uh the wealth the technology is moving east again. In addition to squandering wealth unnecessary [music] on things that are absolutely not profitable to us instead of reshoring industries which should have been President Trump's top priority, securing our borders, ending illegal immigration, enforcing the law, all of those things are things that he ran on, but he hasn't done it. Instead, he's done, I think, what Scott Ritter is alluding to. He's wasted uh the tremendous foundations of power [music] that were built up in 30, 40, 50 years of cold war. There's no question about it. Now, is it to the point where if we were dragged into a war at this at this stage with a major power uh that we would be at risk of being destroyed? I I don't think it's gotten that far, but in time it will. But I think the greater danger is not so much the low stocks of precisiong guided missiles and weapons.

[00:16:58]It's this tendency that we have to create alliances against us. You started off with a critical question. Has this brought Russia, China, and Iran closer together? Absolutely. I would go one step further and say that most of the global south sees itself now aligned with China and Russia against us. And the Europeans that spoke out and warned everybody about this, like Mr. Orban, they're not on the stage right now. And they desperately need to get on the stage and soon because they used to be the soberminded ones. They're the ones that said, "What do you want to go to Vietnam for? What are you doing?" Well, Desert Storm looks good, but I don't think we really want to be part of it.

[00:17:38]They were the ones that talked sense to us. they became vassels of this greater sort of neocon fantasy world in which uh we were going to dominate everybody everywhere all the time. Well, that's crazy nonsense. It's nothing that anybody with a right mind should even [music] strive to achieve. So bottom line is judge, I think Scott's right, except that I would go one step further and I find the second part of that answer far more dangerous. The possibility that people are just aligning against us. How do you see the Iran escapade ending? What offramp does Trump have?

[00:18:15]>> Well, as we've discussed before, I don't think he has one. And every time that one might have surfaced in some way, it involves some form of concession from us that was anth. So I think at this stage, you know, whatever he does, whatever decision he makes is going to convey the impression that we have lost strategically in the Persian Gulf. That means that the only other alternative is to go back to attacking Iran in the hopes that maybe this time around you'll hit the right targets. This time around you'll do enough damage [music] and this time around the Iranian state, society, and and people will fall apart. That's not going to happen, Judge. Absolutely will not happen. And in fact, earlier today, a spokesman for the Iranian government stated that if they are brought once again under attack by the United States, they may consider enriching uranium to 90%. [music] In other words, produce the plutonium that is critical to a nuclear weapon.

[00:19:14]They haven't done it, and I still hear voices telling me that they don't want to, but if they are attacked again, that's something they have to consider.

[00:19:24]And I think this is the greatest tragedy of all. Uh, you know, obviously I'm, you know, my heart goes out to the hundreds of millions of people around the world that are now going to be desperately hungry because Donald Trump in his war has single-handedly reversed the green revolution, right?

[00:19:42]>> You know, you go back to the 60s, the population was half the size of the population today. Well, there's a reason for that. because we were able to produce the green revolution and people could could eat on a scale and live on a scale they never have before. Well, he's he's destroyed that, I think, at least temporarily over the next 12 months or so. He's set inflation loose. But the worst part of all is that he has sent an unmistakable message. If you don't want the United States and or Israel to attack you, you better invest in nuclear weapons.

[00:20:16]What a disaster.

[00:20:18]>> McGregor's warning here isn't really about one war. It's about a pattern.

[00:20:22]Every military adventure that didn't work out, Kosovo, Iraq, and now Iran, got spun as a success story until the evidence became impossible to manage.

[00:20:31]The difference this time is that the economic consequences are landing on ordinary Americans before the spin can catch up. Inflation at a 3-year high, real wages falling, gasoline is up 28% in a year. governments around the world watching and adjusting their relationships with Washington accordingly. And Iran sitting on 440 kg of uranium enriched to 60% with its enrichment facilities damaged but its leverage stronger than ever. Whatever brought Washington to this point, the structural result is the same. The United States has spent down decades of strategic credibility and military stockpiles across Ukraine, [music] Israel, and now Iran. The global south is consolidating around China and Russia. [music] And the allies Washington is leaning on, South Korea, Japan, and Australia are quietly declining to be dragged into the next confrontation. Drop your take in the comments. Do you think there's any way to stop this war? Or are we days or weeks away from a full-blown war with Iran? Let's listen to McGregor. I think if you pay attention to this administration for any length of time and you try to follow what they're saying or doing, you're going to develop a severe case of whiplash. Really at a loss to explain anything anymore. I don't see any, and I've never have to be blunt, any coherent strategy. Somebody decided a long time ago that you could essentially bomb in support of some inevitable uprising, which absolutely did not happen. They didn't kill 30,000 people. 3,400 lost their lives, including 400 policemen because [music] of Assad. And the CIA passed out weapons to the people in the crowd and shot some of the policemen. So that was a fraud.

[00:22:11]Then the next fraud was, "Well, we'll decapitated. You know, we'll kill this the leadership." The Israelis said, "If you do that, this place will fall apart.

[00:22:20][music] It's fragile." Well, we see how well that worked. And then having gone from those two sort of self-diluting objectives, we then said, "Well, I guess we now need to destroy [music] Iran and that will cause pain. The Iranians will give up and tell us we can have whatever we want." Well, that hasn't worked.

[00:22:36][music] In the meantime, it wasn't really Iran that closed the straight. It was Lloyds of London [music] because they're not going to ensure any ships that go through it while it's a war zone. And that really hasn't changed.

[00:22:47][music] Now, in the meantime, Iran has demonstrated that they can control the straight. And they can do that from land with tactical ballistic missiles, short-range ballistic missiles, unmanned systems. They don't really need a navy.

[00:22:59]They don't really need an air force.

[00:23:01]They figured out that with space-based surveillance provided by the Chinese and the Russians and data links that they've developed that they can send data on whatever they see out there instantaneously to thousands of different kinds of weapon systems and launchers and attack at will. We're not [music] prepared for this. This is war that we should have seen coming. We saw lots of evidence for it with the Russians against Ukraine, but we didn't pay much attention. And so the old World War II force we call the US armed forces rode out there and said, "Well, we're going to show these Iranians and we're [music] stuck." And I think what I'm hearing now is that Trump has said he's not going to take action or allegedly won't take any further action until after he visits China next week. Well, I don't know what he expects to happen because I think the Chinese are just in [music] hysterics laughing at us seeing how utterly incompetent and stupid we've been. So if he goes over there, I think he's likely to face humiliation. not publicly, [music] but certainly in private behind closed doors. I also don't see any evidence that they're going to be helpful in any way, shape, or form [music] to Trump. And that brings us back to the subject at hand, which is precious metals and resources.

[00:24:08]And let's be frank, right now we're in a lot of trouble [music] because so much that's so important to the entire world, to us to some extent as well, but really to the entire world in the Persian Gulf is no longer available. And that comes in the form of food, fertilizer, fuel, feed stock, a whole host of minerals, you know, from nitrogen to rare earth, you name it. Everything that you can think of, especially specific metals like aluminum and so forth, they can't [music] leave the Gulf. They're just up in that place. And it's doing enormous damage to the global economy. Right now, we've got hundreds [music] of thousands, maybe millions of people that are facing famine in the next sort of 6 months because we can't grow the food. We've single-handedly reversed [music] the green revolution depending upon where you live in Asia or Africa, the Middle East, Europe, you know, you may be in a lot of trouble. And this doesn't seem to bother President [music] Trump very much. He never brings it up. And now the Chinese have said, "Well, we're tightening our export controls. you're not going to have any access to the rare earth that you need in order to develop and field all these exotic weapons.

[00:25:15]We're not going to allow you to do it.

[00:25:16]So when when you put all of this together, it's hard to imagine a worse set of circumstances [music] for us to be in. And all of this at the end of the day has been done not because it's in our [music] interest. We have no vital strategic interest at stake with Iran.

[00:25:30]Iran presents [music] no real threat to us at all. And in fact, this sort of demonization of Iran, which the president and his supporters have engaged in, is a lot of nonsense.

[00:25:40]They're not the leading terror state in the world, that's all crap. So, what are we doing? Well, we're there because of Israel. And this is beginning to sink in here. As our gas prices rise, and we talk about fuel, you know, if you if jet fuel, forget it. That's over $250 a barrel now in Singapore. You've got airlines going out of business. It's not just jet fuel. What about LPG, LNG?

[00:26:04]These [music] products are just incredibly expensive now. So, you know, the question that people are asking Donald Trump, I think globally, how do you expect us to survive? This is all because of your vanity [music] project against Iran on behalf of Israel. But diesel moves trucks, trucks deliver everything. If you don't have diesel, you're in trouble. We use diesel [music] on on railroads as well to haul tremendous amounts of commercial goods.

[00:26:29]You know, you can't print molecules.

[00:26:31][music] You can't print materials the way you can print money. So, we're printing money, but we can't survive [music] just printing money. That's not going to rescue us or save us. So, I mean, if I was asked a year or two ago to cook up [music] what's the worst thing in the world that could happen to Donald Trump, I could have thought of a lot of things. I never expected him to attack Iran, but attacking Iran has turned out to be exactly that, a a blunder no other in American history.

[00:26:55]>> Yeah. Yeah. Uh so this ceasefire with Israel and Lebanon I know that was part of Iran's uh you know uh request or you know in part of their negotiation what's happening there I haven't heard anything is is that with or >> no it's absolutely not over with and the Israelis will strike [music] anybody anywhere whenever they care to so ceasefires don't mean much I think in the space of [music] the last what is it 60 70 years the Israelis have have broken something like 1100 ceasefires I've forgotten the exact number so I think The word ceasefire doesn't hold much meaning for them. [music] What we do know is that they have withdrawn some of their ground forces and brought them back to Israel to com commit them in in Gaza and the West Bank [music] ostensively for the purpose of finishing the job of murdering or expelling the human beings that live in those [music] places. But otherwise, I think southern Lebanon is scheduled to be a next to Israel all the way up to Lutani River.

[00:27:50]And again, this is all about this this insanity [music] called Greater Israel Project, where a little less than 7 million Jews who live in Israel are are going to dominate permanently [music] hundreds of millions of people all over the Middle East. I mean, this this greater Israel thing is, but we're we're backing it, Daryl, unconditionally, not [music] questioning anything. We're turning a blind eye to all of the atrocities. Doesn't make any sense. And I think Americans are beginning to figure this out. And they're going to figure out a hell of a lot more when things get worse. Because Darl, here's the bad news. Even if we end this war [music] immediately, the problems that we've created for the global economy and here at home for our own economy are going to endure for another year or two. In other words, we're going into a serious recession. The question is, will the world go into serious recession or face depression? That's how bad this is.

[00:28:40]>> A quick update before we continue listening to McGregor. Earlier on May 11th, three super tankers successfully exited the Straight of Hormuz with their transponders [music] switched off. Two were carrying Iraqi crude and one Emirati. They disabled their tracking systems to avoid detection, a tactic that is becoming increasingly common for tankers attempting transit. One of those vessels had already made two failed attempts before getting through. That's what open looks like right now. There are approximately 170 million barrels of crude oil, jet fuel, diesel, and other refined products still stuck aboard 166 tankers in the Gulf. Trump's [music] administration launched what it's calling Project Freedom last week. A guided escort corridor meant to shepherd ships through. Energy prices didn't fall after the announcement. Oil futures climbed above $100 a barrel, and gasoline futures jumped, too. Meanwhile, Trump flies to Beijing on Wednesday for a two-day summit with President Xi. It will be the first visit by an American president to China in nearly 9 years.

[00:29:45]The timing could not be more loaded.

[00:29:47]China has refused [music] to recognize Washington sanctions on Iran's oil sector and hosted Iranian foreign minister Abbas Arachi last week. So Trump arrives in Beijing seeking Chinese help on a crisis that China has been quietly benefiting from, buying discounted Iranian oil while the rest of the world scrambles. China is already positioning itself as having weighed in with Iran on reopening the strait, having brokered Iraqi's visit to Beijing. And here's the piece that connects directly to what McGregor said about food and fertilizer. Japan sends 70% of its Middle Eastern crude through Hormuz. Europe gets 12 to 14% of its [music] LNG from Qatar. All of which previously transited the strait. Qatar Energy's force majour declaration is directly affecting European energy supplies heading [music] into spring.

[00:30:36]This isn't just about oil. It is about food fertilizers and [music] a question of how the global economy keeps functioning when its main energy corridor has been closed for 2 and 1/2 months. Now let's continue listening to Colonel Douglas McGregor. I think a couple of things is first of all this notion of hedge hedgeimonyy is dead. I would argue that our global military dominance is gone. We've been exposed as incapable of defending our lives. We we again as when we started this tried tried to make the point didn't pay attention to the direction in which warfare has developed and that [music] was evident and it still is in the Ukraine war but we didn't really fully grasp it. Now it's being [music] administered to us the hard way. a very difficult lesson. We're living in a new world where these vast surface fleets with aircraft carriers that [music] we've maintained for decades simply won't work anymore if you try to use them against anybody [music] who has the kind of capability that Iran has. And remember, this capability was built for roughly [music] 1% of the amount of money that we spend every year on national defense. Think about that. They didn't spend trillions of dollars. They took the technology that was there. They organized [music] it differently and it works. So that's the first thing. Our historic reliance on all the instrumentalities [music] World War II and new forms is over. So what are we looking at at this point? I think Iran has done more than [music] survive because Iran now has something even more valuable. Iran has a relationship with Russia [music] and China that is steadfast and strong. The Chinese and the Russians have both decided they are not going to allow Iran to be destroyed. So they have not only provided valuable assistance but they made it clear [music] that should it come to the destruction of Iran they could potentially intervene. I think we know that well this this is a fundamental sea change in international relations for us. And I think we're going to see more of this in the future [music] because if you look at the numbers of nations and countries and states in the world that are aligning themselves with Iran, China and Russia, [music] it's substantial. I think to most of the world, Iran is seen as this heroic figure that is standing up to the international bully called the United States [music] as well as to Israel.

[00:32:50]Israel has never been popular and has often been hated in the Middle East.

[00:32:54]Now, I think it is widely loathed on a scale that is [music] it's hard for us to even imagine. But remember, we allied our stealth with the Israeli state and the Israeli state made it clear that all of their neighbors were subhuman, [music] that they were unworthy of life.

[00:33:09]the best thing you could do for them was to dispose of them, eliminate them, bomb them into submission, drive them out. I don't think we want an ally like that, [music] but that's what we've got. And so this pariah status is now increasingly being applied to us. And that has all sorts of terrible economic implications [music] as we discussed. I think we're going to try to find some agreement that results in a return to the status quo in so far as remember before we started the war and attacked Iran headon everybody had access to the Gulf. So what do we want? We want what we had before. You know when Rubio spoke yesterday he said what we really want is to open the Gulf and go back to what we had. And everybody said well then why did [music] you start a war? You know pretty stupid. Now, your goal is to have what you had to begin with. You've got to look at the Iranian demands. The Iranians have now published a number of points [music] that they want widely accepted about the future of the Persian Gulf. They want to say [music] in how the Persian Gulf is run. Initially, they're going to run it. And who's to say they shouldn't? They have the longest coastline bordering the Persian [music] Gulf, and under the circumstances, they're in the best position to control access. But they're making it very clear that they're not interested in limiting access. That's not their goal. They but they have to recover from this war. And one of the ways they're going to try [music] and recover is collect tolls for the vessels that come out full of oil or fertilizer or whatever they're they're carrying.

[00:34:40][music] These are things that we're not prepared to accept at least publicly.

[00:34:43]But I think if we want this straight to open, we're going to have to sign on [music] for some version of that. But that's a temporary temporary outcome. I mean, there there talks saying, "Well, we just need a quick agreement in place for 30-day ceasefire during which we can sort out what we're going to discuss down the line." That includes the plutonium, the enriched uranium, and these other matters. Maybe >> the real question is, and this is what you've you've [music] asked, and you're right to ask it, who holds high ground?

[00:35:11]In other words, in Trump's words, who hold holds the cards? I think it's pretty obvious Iran does. Iran holds the strategic [music] initiative. They've beaten us back. They've prevented us from achieving any of our aims in the air, at sea, and or on the ground. And they've come out of this stronger.

[00:35:28][music] If you look at the performance of their forces in the 12-day war, and then you look at what they did subsequently to that, they got much better. There's a lot of evidence that they're now more capable [music] and more dangerous to their opponents, that is the United States and Israel, than they were before the whole thing started. In other words, they've gotten stronger. [music] Now, they've got a lot of problems economically, and they'll be the first to admit it. But we have tended to imputee to them the same sort of value orientation that [music] we have. We assume that as soon as their gas prices are too high or they don't have access to [music] this or that or the next thing, they're going to immediately throw up their hands and say, "Stop.

[00:36:06]Stop. Stop." Doesn't work that way.

[00:36:09]These people are in what they know is an existential fight. This is a fight for the Iranian nation, its civilization, [music] its identity. Go back and look at the terrible things that Trump and Netanyahu have said. Trump said he wanted to end a civilization overnight.

[00:36:24]He wanted to bomb these people back into the stone age. Well, if you have any selfrespect or guts at all, what are you going to do? You say, "Well, then I have nothing to lose. [music] I'm going to fight like hell."

[00:36:34]>> I think he praised Allah in the process of saying that. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:36:37]>> You know, add insult to injury and offend these people in religion and culture. It doesn't make any sense. You know, he's unstable. And I think that's the way people view him now. So this trip to China, you know, I'm anxious to see what [music] happens there. But I think he's going to have to keep something in mind. You can print money, but you can't print your materials.

[00:36:57][music] You can print the diesel that moves your truck. You can't print the diesel that moves your trucks. You can't print the fertilizer that grows your crops. [music] You can't print the natural gas that powers your factories. The Chinese know that. They're going to tell him that.

[00:37:09]And by the way, I think they're also going to tell him that, you know, [music] just in time logistics is going to become just in case. You know, instead of holding enough on hand to try and somehow another be ready for a crisis is not going to be enough anymore. The Chinese understand that.

[00:37:24]That's why they've been building up [music] stockpiles of not only oil and gas, but also precious metals, rare earths, and increasingly fertilizer. So, the Chinese are really in the driver's seat right now. We're we're going there with hat in hand [music] and I just don't see any evidence the Chinese are going to help us in any way. So right now the Chinese are steadily reducing their holdings of treasuries. They're reallocating their reserves, hard currency reserves [music] toward harder assets like gold. So, you know what what has to happen here is that we've got to get this [music] Trumpian obsession with the belief and the utility of military power and force [music] intimidation and bullying to shape his foreign policy and achieve American goals. It's time for him to learn a little humility and develop some cordiality in the way he deals with others. But Daryl, I I don't know that we can expect the man to do that. Do you?

[00:38:16]>> The national debt is scheduled to be at like 185 trillion or [music] something of that nature. That was a massive number since >> but we'll never get there, Darl. Come on.

[00:38:25]>> Yeah, >> we're never going to get there. This is going to fall apart before that. It's impossible. I mean, that's what nobody wants to say. Well, in 2030, where do you think you're going to be in 2027, 2028? You better worry about what's coming in [music] front of you because you combine the this wasteful stup stupidity [music] overseas in a war you can't win because country you've attacked is the size of Western Europe [music] has 93 million people in it.

[00:38:49]It's a developed society. It's a civilizational society that's been around for over 2,000 years. [music] It's surrounded by mountains like the Rockies. And to the south you have practically impassible deserts with the highest temperatures in the world. Oh, sure. This is easy. [laughter] Are you completely nuts? Anyone with an ounce of common sense would know that. But the problem is we have too many people that want to bet too heavily on what we call air supremacy. The notion, well, we can bomb from high altitude and they can't touch us. I think that's going to end, too. But for the moment, we can still get away with some of that.