00:03:10.160They really come out onto the streets of Budapest to celebrate.
00:03:13.680These are TISA supporters who understand now not only that Peter Magyar has won the election,
00:03:18.940becoming the new Hungarian prime minister,
00:03:21.280but also that the TISA party has achieved the two-thirds majority in the parliament,
00:03:26.860giving it that supermajority that Peter Magyar had promised he would use to return the rule of law to Hungary.
00:03:34.540And as you can see, a lot of celebrations going on here in Budapest.
00:03:37.400there we've heard we've spoken to young young people sort of in their 20s who've told us look
00:03:42.560victor orban had been uh in government in power practically all of our lives they can't quite
00:03:49.280believe that it's finished and i think one of the most surprising things and what's at the heart of
00:03:54.460some of this disbelief here on the streets tonight and all of this enthusiasm it's the fact that
00:03:58.960that victor orban conceded as quickly and as easily as he did and i think the theory is that
00:04:05.220And it's proven such a landslide for Peter Magyar that really the numbers were simply against him and it was the only thing that he could do.
00:04:13.560So a fair amount of disbelief, a lot of joy, a great deal of excitement.
00:04:18.900We've watched the growing men leading this party crying, hugging each other earlier on down by the Danube where they were holding their celebrations.
00:04:28.300But as you can see, it is all of Budapest, really, that has come out now to show their support, their enthusiasm and a certain disbelief that this has actually happened in such a dramatic way.
00:04:43.040The figures really are quite astonishing.
00:04:44.840We've watched parliamentary seat after parliamentary seat held by some of the founders of Viktor Orban's party, Fidesz, people who've been European commissioners, people who are ministers, lose their seats.
00:04:55.280So it is an extraordinary landslide tonight for Tsitsa.
00:05:01.280This is the primal scream of a dying regime.0.95
00:16:52.440We still have Kurt with us from the American Conservative.
00:16:55.140Kurt, before I let you go, your latest thoughts on everything going on at the Strait of Hormuz,
00:17:01.260what you think the future of that very important pathway looks like in the near term and long term?0.99
00:17:07.960Look, it's entirely possible the Iranians maintain control of it.1.00
00:17:11.960This is, I think we poked the bear.1.00
00:17:14.220I think this is something the administration should have taken more seriously, the fact that they would be able to easily close the strait.
00:17:20.260There's going to be an attempted blockade on a blockade.0.79
00:17:23.280But the reality is, I think that the Chinese are going to cash in their chips with President Trump and complain about it.0.87
00:17:29.900And so I don't know what the long term there is.0.71
00:17:33.240The blockade has been championed by sort of uber hawks such as John Bolton.
00:17:38.540But the reality is that the president isn't John Bolton.
00:17:43.120This is not someone I don't believe who wants to use every last scintilla of his political capital to do a regime change war for Israel.
00:17:52.120And so I think you're going to see another half measure.
00:17:54.460But the problem with half measures is they often don't solve anything.
00:17:57.520And so I still believe that the president should either just walk away now.1.00
00:18:01.880That is not the worst outcome possible or do a responsible deal with the Iranians.0.94
00:18:07.800There's mixed reporting about whether or not the negotiating table is still open, whether or not they're going to resume talks in Islamabad or Geneva or Vienna later this week.0.91
00:18:17.380We shall see. There's a ton of smoke and mirrors on that, even more than normal.
00:18:23.300But I urge the administration to make a deal.0.87
00:18:26.000You can still get a better deal than JCPOA, better than the Obama-Iran deal, and that's much better than an Iran war.0.82
00:19:44.160dr fair i want to bring you on help us understand what what we're seeing and what it means kind of
00:19:54.080here at home, but also if it's related to what's going on in the Middle East. Give us your
00:19:58.720assessment. Well, Natalie, great to join you. It is related to the Middle East. Rising fuel prices
00:20:05.600provoked a reaction in Ireland among drivers and farmers, everyone who's using, of course,
00:20:11.880fuel intensively. Last Tuesday, really, protests started again by the drivers and by farmers,
00:20:20.020And that's escalated through the weekend where the individuals are using their trucks and farm equipment to cause road closures and slowdown on many of Ireland's motorways, as well as O'Connell Street in Dublin, of course, one of the most famous streets there, historic street.0.93
00:20:44.160This is being driven not really by the high fuel cost, but it's caused by immigration.0.92
00:20:51.400Most folks don't know that over one out of five people living in Ireland is not native-born,0.96
00:21:10.320So you've seen incredible population change in the Emerald Isles over the last 15 years or so.
00:21:19.000And that is all sorts of ancillary effects, right?
00:21:23.300The lack of housing, which upsets so many individuals.
00:21:26.720They're not able to buy a home because they aren't available.1.00
00:21:30.300Or they're given to migrants, as they're called.0.99
00:21:34.560Or they're given to the equivalent of H-1B workers.0.65
00:21:38.380This is going to accelerate as a result of the EU's agreement reached in January with India, where the EU is going to facilitate more Indians moving to Europe.0.64
00:21:51.280Many of those, of course, are going to go to Ireland, which has lax immigration policies and you've got good, easy access to the UK.
00:21:59.440So these protests are driven by by immigration fundamentally, and it really illuminates the problem.
00:22:07.140You have an earthquake in Ireland, essentially, with these protests, and you have on the other
00:22:12.020end of the continent in Hungary, really another earthquake with Orban's defeat, and it illustrates
00:22:18.960a fundamental problem with states in the EU.
00:22:22.360The Irish case illustrates that you can have a popular protest, you can have popular uprising,
00:22:29.360grassroots level, but it's very difficult to connect to any political change, of course,
00:22:34.720because the political parties across the board, the major political parties are all in the EU
00:22:40.220camp, right? They're all bought and paid for by the European Union. So the elite aren't going to
00:22:46.040tolerate. They're not going to allow any change. You've got a big disconnect then between what's
00:22:50.800happening at the grassroots, where people want change, and the elite who put their fingers in
00:22:57.800their ears and pretend they can't hear and are just going to ride out or attempt to ride out
00:23:04.060the protest there'll be a no confidence motion tomorrow tuesday uh in the dale and so what we
00:23:10.820would expect of course is perhaps the government's going to fall but that's twiddly dumb and twiddly
00:23:15.900d you're going to replace one uh pro-eu government with another with orban's election you see the
00:23:24.080reverse where you did have in fact a popular leader was elected victor orban of course for
00:23:30.00016 years in power. But the EU, when hammered tongs at him, every year he was attacked as being
00:23:39.760anti-democratic, of course. We're familiar, of course, with all the slurs, the defamation that
00:23:45.460was directed his way. So you have a different set of problems there, that even if you are able to
00:23:53.560elect a populist, he's isolated by the EU. And ultimately, they're greatly celebrating his
00:24:00.680defeat, as the cold open demonstrated. So big problems in the EU with the democratic deficit,
00:24:07.640right? You have an EU which is fundamentally anti-democratic, and it's going to use its might
00:24:15.060either to ignore or to crush, undermine protestors in Ireland, or in the case of Hungary,
00:24:21.940isolate that leader in an effort to do their utmost to get rid of them, of course, as they
00:24:29.860did this weekend. So a lot of unrest in the continent. And guess what's to blame? Brussels
00:24:35.520is to blame in their policies of endless immigration, right? The fact that the 11th0.86
00:24:41.140commandment is that you can never have too many immigrants. And that's the answer to all of the1.00
00:24:46.240problems that the EU faces is to bring in more and more immigrants, facilitating, of course,1.00
00:24:53.440the decline of Western civilization, which isn't theirs to destroy, of course, belongs to all of us.1.00
00:25:01.920So big problems in Europe and Ireland and Hungary are demonstrating some of the depth of that
00:25:09.940problem. I'm curious your thoughts on the projections of how what is going down in Iran
00:25:15.680and surrounding countries could potentially trigger a whole new, probably considerably
00:25:20.460more sizable refugee wave into Europe, certainly, hopefully not the United States.
00:25:25.720But do you think that that has the potential to exacerbate what you're talking about even
00:31:35.480Dr. Thayer, I want to bring you in on that.
00:31:37.120That's obviously just one very small part of everything that's going on with what is,
00:31:41.400I think, a new conception of spheres of influence as the United States sort of regressing
00:31:47.240in the regions that they're focusing on. I think you can see it in the realignment and orientation
00:31:52.800of virtually all of our military right out of the Indo-Pacific. But I'm curious to get your
00:31:59.260sort of nuanced perspective on how what is going down in Iran is kind of impacting PRC leadership,
00:32:06.960their thought calculus back at home when it comes to things that are probably more critical and
00:32:12.420crucial to them, things like Taiwan, their just conception of, you know, American power,
00:32:18.260the geopolitical realignment. What's your sort of bird's eye view?
00:32:23.200Well, Natalie, it's a great question. To my mind, this gets down to deterrence. We don't want
00:32:30.100communist China to aggress against Taiwan. And deterrence is a function of political
00:32:37.000considerations and military capabilities. The political considerations, to some degree,
00:32:43.620have been helped by Iran, right? What has PRC leadership seen? They've seen President Trump
00:32:49.520use force, Venezuela, Nigeria, of course, in the course of since he's returned to office.
00:32:57.660In Syria, President Trump is willing to employ U.S. military power globally. The Venezuelas,
00:33:06.120of course, potentially Cuba as well. And President Trump, of course, is an individual who wants to
00:33:16.340maximize his freedom of action, his opportunities, and doesn't make him predictable in all circumstances.
00:33:22.800That feeds into the political considerations about deterrence. That's positive for thinking
00:33:30.240through what we need to do to deter communist China from attacking Taiwan. On the debit side
00:33:37.080of the ledger, of course, conventional deterrence depends on capabilities, a defense industrial base
00:33:43.800that can produce the weaponry that we need to have to have a robust conventional deterrent
00:33:49.720in the Indo-Pacific, in Japan, South Korea, in the Philippines, in the waters surrounding Taiwan.
00:33:57.080And that arsenal is being used up. A lot of it is being consumed, of course, in the war with Iran.
00:34:05.800So the U.S. military presence in the Indo-Pacific is not ideal from the standpoint of having a robust conventional deterrent to keep China, communist China, from attacking Taiwan.
00:34:19.160We would like a defense industrial base that can produce weaponry in the size and scope that we need to have all of the time, whether that's the ships and the submarines, the aircraft, but the weapon systems themselves that we need so that if communist China is thinking about attacking Taiwan, they look at the size really of the U.S. arsenal and its deployment.
00:34:44.280and I think not today. We're not going to do this today because the U.S. has got too much power
00:34:49.820in the region. So Iran, the CENTCOM, essentially orientation of so much of the U.S. military0.82
00:34:58.460remains and the military capabilities with respect to deterring an attack on Taiwan are not ideal
00:35:06.460from the standpoint of a robust conventional deterrent. In the Cold War, we solved that by
00:35:12.600having tactical nuclear weapons and theater nuclear weapons, as well as strategic nuclear
00:35:17.400weapons. In the post-Cold War period, we greatly reduced our tactical nuclear weapons and
00:35:23.240essentially eliminated our theater nuclear capabilities and even drawn out our strategic
00:35:29.480forces. So a lot needs to be done at the nuclear level, too, in terms of our strategic forces,
00:35:35.320increasing tactical nuclear capabilities and returning theater nuclear forces so that we can0.87
00:35:41.500ensure that not only can we meet an invasion with conventional forces, but if communist China
00:35:47.440escalated, we'd be able to meet them at any level up the escalation rung, whether it be tactical
00:35:52.860nuclear weapons or theater or, heaven forbid, strategic. So there's a lot of work that we need
00:35:58.800to do. And Iran is illuminating some of the problems that we have. China's also looking at
00:36:06.260what's going on in Iran and looking at some of the vulnerabilities that we have, how we use force,
00:36:12.680and I'm sure they're learning lessons from the conflict as well.
00:36:19.040Dr. Thayer, we always appreciate having you in the war room. If people want to read all of your
00:36:24.840work, stay up to date with everything you're posting, I see you've got a profile picture.
00:36:29.000We're still working on getting a banner picture on your Twitter, but where can people go to follow
00:36:34.640you. Natalie, you've worked on me for years on that. I'm a hard case, I suppose. But great to
00:36:43.380join you. I'm at Brad Theron X and Bradley Theron Getter and Truth. Thanks very much, Natalie.
00:36:48.280Thank you, Dr. Theron. I think the other key point here is a lot of the right technological
00:36:54.760advantages that we have against the Chinese Communist Party in certain countries where0.91
00:36:58.980we're going and doing these military excursions, right? Venezuela, where they use Chinese air0.81
00:37:02.800defense we were able to go in unscathed but then all of a sudden you see you know certain anomalies
00:37:08.340going on in iran which also uses chinese air defense systems were you know hemorrhaging and
00:37:13.140sort of giving away a lot of i think you know tactics covert over otherwise um that would
00:37:19.320matter a lot more i think if we were to see escalated confrontation in a kinetic style
00:37:23.480um with china whether it be taiwan or who knows where um i want to bring sam faddis on partly to
00:37:31.260to talk about that feel free to pick up where i left off with dr taylor on the china front but
00:37:34.980i'm curious your thoughts too on sort of this story we've seen i like how the legacy media
00:37:41.500was treating it like it was this huge thing that nobody knew that you know china has been like
00:37:45.380arming iran and sending them weapons it's like wow their entire drone infrastructure and ecosystem0.83
00:37:49.920it's basically uh founded if not buttressed by uh you know chinese communist party and hong kong0.52
00:37:56.160linked entities. But your thoughts on the sort of nexus there, and just in general, what we're
00:38:02.220seeing go down? Well, I mean, look, the Chinese have been in bed with the Iranians for a long
00:38:10.260time, and they assist them in all sorts of ways and have for a very long time. And look,0.70
00:38:17.460they're going to continue to assist them throughout this crisis. At every opportunity
00:38:24.760they get, understanding that, you know, this is realpolitik at its best, right? And so the
00:38:32.960Chinese help the Iranians to the extent that it helps the Chinese. And they will calculate at all0.97
00:38:39.180times in very cold-blooded fashion how they're going to assist them, what it really involves0.74
00:38:45.660is what's good for China. And that will be a risk versus gain analysis. So they're not going to say,
00:38:53.740hey, these are our blood brothers and come charging to their defense necessarily,
00:38:57.920nor are they going to walk away, nor are they going to do anything productive on our side.
00:39:02.380And at every step of the way, they will repeat that calculus. In terms of the broader picture,
00:39:09.160look, I think what people have to understand is we all hope there is a resolution soon,
00:39:17.460first and foremost me. I'd love to wake up tomorrow morning and find that the Iranians1.00
00:39:22.760have agreed to something we can live with, and this is all over. I don't think that's going to1.00
00:39:28.460happen. You know, we started a war that I guess we thought was going to be over very, very quickly.
00:39:35.360It wasn't, and it never was going to be. Now we're blockading the Straits.
00:39:41.560And what I'm hearing from a lot of people is this expectation that this will be the1.00
00:39:48.760move that ends it, that certainly the Iranians will quit now, become reasonable, however you0.92
00:39:56.520want to characterize it. And again, I will hope to God that that is true, but I'm not betting any1.00
00:40:04.180money on it. That is not my expectation. I think we are going to have to apply a lot more pressure
00:40:11.180to these guys. Right now, they do not believe they are losing this war. And that may frustrate
00:40:15.940us, but it is still true. And in terms of what that pressure looks like, what do you think,
00:40:23.760two kind of questions here. One, what do you think the accurate and, you know, right ways to apply
00:40:29.140pressure would be? And do you think that for the administration that the only real way to achieve
00:40:34.160the goals that they've outlined is by putting more conventional boots on the ground or what
00:40:39.200are the other, you know, kinetic tactics? Well, look, I'll start with the caveat that I've repeated
00:40:44.880on this program about 50 times by this point in the last few weeks. You know, if I had been
00:40:50.720advising the president before he made the decision to start the war, my advice would be don't start
00:40:55.300the war. If his decision was we're going to start the war, it would have been don't do like the plan
00:41:03.900as it is laid out here will not work. So if you're hard over that you have to do this, you need a
00:41:10.900different plan. So that's just, that's my caveat right now. Unfortunately, we don't have a way
00:41:17.040back machine or a rewind button. So we're now in it. And as much as we'd love to just walk away,
00:41:24.240we can't just walk away. We kind of broke it. If we walk away and we leave the Iranians
00:41:32.240effectively having won and now dictating terms in the Middle East, the consequences0.99
00:41:40.060are unthinkable. So in terms of pressure, closing the strait is a really, is a good step,
00:41:46.920good start. You also got to close every land border. And we can't do that with the U.S. Navy,
00:41:52.460obviously. So that means we have to apply pressure on all of the neighboring countries
00:41:57.940to seal them off. They have a lot of funds, they being the Iranians, billions and billions of1.00
00:42:05.020dollars sitting around the world in accounts, but most of which is frozen. Give up on the whole,1.00
00:42:12.160I mean, forget about the whole frozen thing. Take the funds, take their money, seal them off from
00:42:18.440the world. There are still cargo aircraft flying in and out of Tehran from a lot of places where
00:42:26.320you have no idea what's on this cargo plane. If you're going to blockade the place, you need to
00:42:30.620seal off air travel as well. And then obviously, you need to stop waiting for them to do something
00:42:38.740and then figuring out how to react to it. You know, they're going to, they have already taken
00:42:44.160out the pipeline across Saudi Arabia, by virtue of which the Saudis are moving oil to Yanbu on
00:42:51.100the Red Sea and getting oil out that way. They've already taken it out once. The Iranians are going
00:42:57.120to take it out again. And they're going to hit it as many times as they can and cause damage that1.00
00:43:01.240you can't fix in a day or two. And they're going to start taking out, at some point, desalination
00:43:06.820plants and leaving 100 million people in the Gulf with no fresh water to drink. And they're
00:43:12.580going to start taking out oil production facilities. It's going to go, I mean, assuming we allow them
00:43:17.840to do that. And increasingly, this comes down to their capacity to use drones, right? And people
00:43:24.420keep trying to give a count of how many drones they have. There's no such thing as a count of
00:43:29.740how many drones they have. They can make these drones in a garage. They use motorcycle engines.
00:43:34.640They're mostly fiberglass. They can make them for nothing. So they literally, in any civilian
00:43:40.800residence, you could be making drones. So we're shooting down 90, 95% of them. That's great.
00:43:49.120And all credit to the people that are doing that. But if you fire a couple of hundred of them
00:43:52.620at a big petrochemical plant and five, 10% of them get through that, that's still a big problem.
00:43:59.840Sam, if you can hang with us through the break, I've got a few more questions I want to ask you,
00:44:04.220and I got a Hillary Clinton cold open for you. So the audience is definitely going to hang around
00:44:09.200or Boston don't go anywhere. We'll be right back after this short break.
00:44:17.780Everyone's focused on how the conflict in the Middle East is raising oil prices,
00:44:21.220but there's another grim reality to this contention.
00:44:25.900Oil isn't the only resource being constrained.
00:44:28.300About one-third of global fertilizer trade happens through this region.
00:44:33.180And with spring planting season on top of us,
00:44:35.640American farmers are sounding the alarm,
00:44:37.940with some saying they can't afford to plant their fields.
00:44:41.040When one piece of the supply chain gets hit this hard,
00:44:44.280you know what comes next, higher fruit prices, reduced availability,
00:48:07.260My dog knows more about national security than Hillary Clinton.0.99
00:48:10.600So, look, for the love of God, what what stuns you when the woman speaks is the audacity, the lack of self-awareness,0.96
00:48:22.140The somebody with no record of accomplishment ever in protecting this country and associated with policy that just gave away the farm to the Iranians who now wants to lecture us on how this should be conducted.0.97
00:48:39.000I mean, good God, that's just that's obscene.0.97
00:48:42.100And, you know, as far as Swalwell, I'm sure Fang Fang or Ling Ling or whatever her name is, is waiting for him on the outside.0.50
00:48:48.780So I'm sure there's a happy ending there.