The Culture War - Tim Pool - September 08, 2026


Russian SABOTAGE ATTACK On NATO Sparks WW3 Fear


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24 minutes

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3,881

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Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Breaking news about a Russian plot sabotage on a NATO member in Romania.
00:00:07.500 Romanian Intelligence Service says it prevented Russian sabotage operation.
00:00:13.340 Now, if this is true, we have a potential Article 5 situation.
00:00:18.920 And for those that are not familiar, this is when a NATO member can say we were attacked by a foreign adversary and thus other NATO nations must come to our aid.
00:00:28.700 It's a question of whether or not Romania or other NATO member states are really concerned
00:00:35.320 about what they are claiming is an attempt by the Russians to attack military bases
00:00:40.920 or military installations in Romania that NATO uses.
00:00:44.440 At the same time, in Germany, they've shut down the Russian consulate, and Russia, in
00:00:50.180 turn, is shutting down the German consulate in St. Petersburg.
00:00:54.200 All of this is indicative of war.
00:00:58.700 between NATO and Russia, potentially not even Russia, but BRICS. Now, recently we saw the head 0.84
00:01:04.320 of the CIA fly to Moscow for a short private meeting with the Russians. It's reported that
00:01:10.100 it was not with Vladimir Putin, lasted only around 15 minutes. But the question is, what
00:01:15.000 needed to be said to the Russians from the CIA in person that could not be made over the phone?
00:01:23.120 Stories like this, as well as the shuttering of the consulate, as well as the Ukrainian attack
00:01:28.480 an Iranian shipment through the Caspian to Russia has many people concerned. We may be looking at
00:01:35.880 World War Three. Now, of course, it's sensational, I suppose. There's never just a true shot heard
00:01:42.980 round the world moment. I don't think we're going to get an overt declaration of war by the time a
00:01:49.480 war is actually happening between NATO, Russia or NATO and BRICS. You'll have already been in it 0.84
00:01:55.840 for some time. That is to say, perhaps in 50 years, we will look back and say this is the
00:02:01.420 moment World War Three kicked off. Perhaps they'll say there was never really a World War Three. We
00:02:06.040 just don't know. But my friends, the conflict that led to World War One, it was not just the
00:02:13.360 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. There were alliances and militarization happening much
00:02:18.360 before this. The tensions existed due to a variety of conflicts that had been bubbling up.
00:02:24.880 We can say the same thing with the Civil War for the American Revolution.
00:02:28.000 It was not just that one day overnight, the British subjects in the colonies said, you
00:02:34.160 know what, we're done with this.
00:02:36.180 It actually was over 20 years.
00:02:39.040 And the battles of Lexington and Concord, which kicked off, though we look back and
00:02:42.900 say the American Revolution, this was about a year before the Declaration of Independence
00:02:48.000 was even signed.
00:02:48.900 That is, we were in a war for independence before anyone actually voted on or agreed we should be independent.
00:02:57.740 So when you see a story like this, when you see the headline saying World War Three, we honestly don't know the extent to which this could escalate.
00:03:08.180 Meanwhile, internally in the United States, I will just add, the DSA currently has an
00:03:12.720 estimated 120,000 members in a nation of 330 or so million people.
00:03:20.240 At the time of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, there were around, I think the estimate
00:03:25.480 is 250 to 300,000 Bolsheviks.
00:03:28.180 But earlier in the year, they only had 24,000 memberships skyrocketed in a very short period
00:03:36.460 of time.
00:03:36.960 And this ultimately concluded with the 1917 revolution, the rise of the Soviet Union.
00:03:43.340 That is to say, my friends, these points about history are to show these changes happen fast as the saying goes gradually and then suddenly.
00:03:52.560 Let's grab the news. Before we do, my friends, we have a new show, the Tim Pool show, and it is popping off.
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00:05:01.080 Let's grab this from Reuters. Romanian intelligence service says it's prevented
00:05:04.680 Russian sabotage operation. Romania's SRI intelligence service prevented a sabotage
00:05:11.880 operation coordinated by Russia on Romanian territory, it said on Tuesday. European
00:05:16.760 countries blame Moscow for sabotage, cyber attacks and disinformation targeting supporters
00:05:21.860 of Kyiv's war effort. They include an August drone attack at Leipzig Hal Airport that ratcheted up
00:05:28.700 tensions between Berlin and Moscow. Russia has repeatedly denied any involvement in sabotage.
00:05:35.060 The Russian embassy in Bucharest did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.
00:05:40.200 SRI said a Russian citizen based in Romania had been under surveillance since February as part
00:05:45.420 of an investigation involving international partners, adding that his actions repeated
00:05:49.600 the pattern seen in previous cases. The Russian citizen was instructed by an intermediary to make
00:05:55.360 photo and video materials with targets of strategic military interest, including Ukrainian Antonov
00:06:01.380 cargo aircraft during their presence on the national territory. The investigation also
00:06:06.920 reviewed the Russian Federation continues to use persons from vulnerable categories to carry out
00:06:12.020 such illegal activities. Now, while this may be shocking to many people, I think it's important 0.98
00:06:18.920 to point out this is not the first time there has been suspected attacks on NATO. I want to pull up
00:06:26.740 this story from, I think we have, let's see if I can find this one. I don't want to, let's pull
00:06:35.280 this up. This is interesting. From Politico.eu, going back two years, Germany issued arrest
00:06:43.420 warrant for Ukrainian over Nord Stream bombing, reports say the suspect was able to evade the
00:06:50.260 arrest warrant. Now, this goes back to 2024. Now, naturally, there is a video of me saying
00:06:57.820 that Ukraine is one of the greatest enemies of the United States, for which the context was.
00:07:02.960 If it is true that Ukrainians at the behest of the Ukrainian government bombed a gas pipeline supplying a NATO country with energy, that would trigger Article 5 of NATO.
00:07:18.920 Germany has maintained this accusation against these Ukrainians into this year, saying these individuals bombed the Nord Stream pipeline where Germany was buying gas from Russia.
00:07:32.280 The argument is that Ukraine was trying to cut Russia off from a source of income,
00:07:36.360 which was being used to fund their war, and also to cut off NATO countries from a source of energy.
00:07:42.420 They wanted to separate these ties, and they wanted to blame the Russians,
00:07:46.060 for which many of the United States actively did.
00:07:49.480 The question is, who do we trust?
00:07:51.120 Our allies in Germany, a NATO member, or Ukraine, not a NATO member?
00:07:56.180 It's not easy.
00:07:57.400 It's not easy at all to know who to trust. 0.76
00:07:59.720 But were it true that a Ukrainian did this at the behest of the Ukrainian government to force the West into a war with Russia, that would trigger Article 5 against Ukraine. 0.76
00:08:10.700 But of course, my friends, interests here are largely divided. 0.60
00:08:14.460 Now, Donald Trump has tried to negotiate with Russia.
00:08:17.960 We recently saw something that affected the CIA director.
00:08:20.740 We don't know exactly what we don't know exactly what they were talking about.
00:08:23.380 The question is what needed to be said in person.
00:08:25.580 And there are fears that it was potential for escalation to nuclear conflict.
00:08:30.900 We have the story from DW.
00:08:33.020 Russia says it's closing German consulate in St. Petersburg.
00:08:36.720 The tit for tat reaction comes after Germany said it is shutting down Russia's consulate in Bonn and its cultural center in Berlin.
00:08:45.280 The Russian foreign ministry announced on Monday that it is closing Germany's consulate in St. Petersburg.
00:08:50.540 The German consulate in St. Petersburg must cease its operations by September 18th at the latest, according to the foreign ministry.
00:08:58.140 It was the German authorities who once again provoked a new round of escalation in bilateral relations, the foreign ministry said, adding Berlin bears full and complete responsibility for the consequences.
00:09:09.900 Russia also earlier ordered the closure of all Goethe-Institut branches on Russian territory.
00:09:14.900 The Goethe-Institut staff having to leave the country by September 13th.
00:09:18.400 They say the moves are a direct response to Germany's decision to close the Russian consulate in Bonn after Russia's cultural center in Berlin, a decision Russia labeled unfriendly.
00:09:30.420 Germany recently announced those measures after it said Russia was responsible for an attempted drone attack at Leipzig Airport.
00:09:38.220 The EU, too, said in a statement, said the incident had all the signs of state-sponsored terrorism.
00:09:44.140 The Leipzig airport is an important international freight hub also used for providing support to Ukraine.
00:09:52.140 Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov rejected Germany's allegations, calling them the beginning of a real war.
00:09:59.260 And this, my friends, from just 21 hours ago.
00:10:03.460 Now the story from Romania that Russians were attempting to strike a NATO ally and NATO used facilities.
00:10:14.140 The fear, of course, is, is this World War Three?
00:10:17.800 Honestly, guys, I'm not going to just come out outright say yes, because I don't know.
00:10:21.680 So I defer to you to comment below.
00:10:23.640 Let me know what you think.
00:10:25.660 Is this, is it World War Three?
00:10:29.640 There are concerns because the U.S. has pulled its last carrier out of the Pacific and into
00:10:34.320 the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf area, trying to get Iran to submit.
00:10:39.900 Trump, of course, claiming the Strait is now the Strait of America, or what is it called,
00:10:45.280 the Trump Strait and Territory of the United States. I got to admit, it doesn't look good
00:10:51.880 in the short term, especially with this report from the BBC. North Korea and Russia opened first
00:10:57.180 road bridge linking both countries. Indeed, it seems maybe like nothing. But the BRICS nations
00:11:07.000 are aligning as many countries as possible. That's Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa,
00:11:14.820 Iran now, of course, aligning itself with the BRICS nations, attempting to overtake NATO 0.50
00:11:19.960 as the dominant global power. One thing I think is important for millennials to understand is
00:11:24.540 the 90s were a golden age for us. I was born in 1986 at the near the end of the Soviet Union,
00:11:31.880 And I was a little kid when the Soviet Union fell. So I did not live all that long under this threat, this red scare, under a fear of nuclear war. When I was growing up, and many of you who are around the same age as me, it's important to understand that we had a massive economic expansion. We had global domination. The Soviet Union had collapsed. Our companies were dominating the international market in many ways.
00:11:56.300 Thus, the American people with now the global hegemon, we lived like kings, but it is not
00:12:04.220 typical. For the most part, human existence has been during times of war and conflict.
00:12:09.920 For much of this country's history, we were internally at conflict with either Native
00:12:14.740 Americans, foreign countries, even aided by France when we fought for independence against the crown.
00:12:22.140 One could argue that was a kind of civil war. If we hadn't won, it would have been a rebellion that was put down. And we've had conflicts even with Canada because they were under the British crown at the time. But you get it. And Mexico. For most of human history, war is the natural state. And I'm not saying it's good or preferable. In fact, it is often bad.
00:12:43.300 But understand that our perspective as millennials comes from a childhood of a golden age in which the United States dominated the world, for better or for worse.
00:12:54.240 The BBC says the first road bridge linking Russia and North Korea has opened, allowing the two countries to move to more easily move cargo and passengers between their borders across the Tumen River.
00:13:06.060 Pyongyang State Media said the bridge will be used for personnel exchanges, tourism and trade.
00:13:10.760 But Ukrainian investigation organization Truth Hound said the bridge is intended primarily to establish a covert military logistics corridor to support Russia in the Ukraine war.
00:13:22.220 It comes amid stronger ties between the countries since the start of the Ukraine war, with Russia's Putin and North Korea's Kim Jong-un previously pledging that they would help each other in the event of aggression against either country.
00:13:34.980 Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishuddin described the bridge as a new symbol of friendship,
00:13:39.980 while North Korea's Prime Minister Pak Fesong said it was a historical event.
00:13:45.380 Up to 300 vehicles and 2,323 people can cross the bridge daily, Russian state news TASS reports.
00:13:52.620 Satellite imagery reported by the BBC in May this year showed the kilometer-long bridge alongside several new access roads,
00:13:59.380 the border checkpoint, support infrastructure and parking facilities.
00:14:03.240 There were existing air links, as well as the rail link between the two countries.
00:14:07.040 But until now, the only road link was a makeshift solution, whereby special arrangement wooden planks were placed on the rail bridge to allow cars to travel over it, according to Reuters.
00:14:16.800 The Russian government said the bridge will initially be used to transport cargo.
00:14:20.920 Reuters reported before opening to passenger traffic later this year.
00:14:24.920 The bridge would provide a powerful impetus for the further development of trade, economic, scientific, technological, and cultural cooperation.
00:14:32.420 Indeed, my friends. Now, that's that's that story is not a part of this one. How did that get in
00:14:38.800 here? This is my friends. There is a concern, of course, that Russia, North Korea, China and other
00:14:47.760 countries are starting to strengthen their ties. China, of course, has the Belt and Road Initiative
00:14:51.940 where they are effectively operating their own international monetary fund system. For those
00:14:58.040 that aren't familiar, the liberal economic order established in the late 1950s or mid-1950s,
00:15:02.940 just following World War—actually, it may have been, I should say, in place, but it may have
00:15:08.540 been conceptualized before that. Following World War II, Western world leaders said,
00:15:14.620 how do we stop World War III? International trade. And thus, they established the liberal
00:15:19.180 economic order, that is, creating trade dependencies to prevent conflict. That has
00:15:24.060 been the strategy for most of our lives. Hence, you have the North America Free Trade Agreement,
00:15:28.900 the attempts at the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Of course, this all crumbled once Donald Trump
00:15:33.460 got elected. This is principally the reason why the machine state, as it were, that is,
00:15:38.400 the Uniparty fought so hard to stop Donald Trump. For generations, they had a play, a plan. And that
00:15:45.740 was, we give some of our manufacturing to other countries, be it Indonesia, be it China, be it
00:15:53.280 Canada or Mexico. We create dependencies between these nations and this reduces the probability of
00:15:59.980 war. Nobody in China wants to go to war because then they're going to lose access to milk or
00:16:04.620 whatever it is they're getting. Well, they're largely from Australia. But U.S. was exporting
00:16:08.420 culture and controlling the sale of oil in the international market. The U.S. gave, say,
00:16:14.040 aluminum refining to Canada so that this would reduce the probability of conflict between our
00:16:19.520 countries, though small as it was. It would uplift the Canadian economy, stabilize buying power
00:16:25.580 between the three nations. This had been the strategy for a long time. Now, from this, you also
00:16:30.320 get conflict in the Middle East, attempts at building gas pipelines, and the U.S. needing to
00:16:36.100 control all oil on the international market. If anybody was trading outside of it, this threatened
00:16:41.720 the liberal economic order. And thus, we saw the seizure of U.S. oil assets in Venezuela, as well
00:16:46.620 as Iran, basically saying we're not playing ball and controlling the Persian Gulf. Now,
00:16:52.440 the interesting question is, as many former MAGA Trump supporters have broken from Donald Trump,
00:16:59.040 accused him of working at the behest of Israel. The question is, is Trump now inverting where he
00:17:06.140 before shuttered the Trans-Pacific Partnership and changed the North America Free Trade Agreement?
00:17:12.400 Is Donald Trump back on track with the liberal economic order or is this Trump's attempt at
00:17:19.080 realigning it into his vision? Either way, we are seeing a protracted war with Iran 0.68
00:17:24.340 that seems to be going badly by almost every metric for metric for whatever reason you think
00:17:29.340 it is. We see the Ukrainians striking Iranian shipments to Russia, and it looks like we are
00:17:36.000 barreling towards, dare I say, World War III. I'm not the first person to say it. I'm not the last
00:17:42.680 person to say it. I didn't come up with it. Even the New York Times published a column suggesting
00:17:48.240 we may be in World War III already. There's no easy answers here. As I mentioned with historical
00:17:55.540 references at the beginning of the show, when we look back at history, the individuals in that
00:18:01.100 moment did not know if it was going to be a new world war, whether it was going to be war at all.
00:18:07.700 The greatest example, of course, being the Battle of Fort Sumter. Even after this battle,
00:18:13.800 the American people did not believe we were in a civil war, nor did they believe it was possible.
00:18:19.680 And thus, as you've all heard me say 20 million times, they picnicked on the hillside at the
00:18:25.040 Battle of Bull Run. Today, we could be watching something very similar as these conflicts continue
00:18:30.480 to escalate, of which some of the scariest signs would be the closure of a consulate now to basically
00:18:38.160 diplomatic ties are breaking and the Russians are being accused of trying to sabotage a NATO member
00:18:45.840 state. The question I have for you is what should we do? And I mentioned what your comments are
00:18:52.300 going to be? What should the United States do here? Should we declare war on Russia?
00:19:00.540 Should Article five be invoked by Romania and the U.S. can say enough? I suppose the scariest
00:19:08.380 question there is when any of these nuclear powered nations fear that they are on the verge
00:19:14.880 of extinction, they're going to use these weapons and thus a World War three scenario in any
00:19:21.060 capacity, no matter who you think is going to win, we all lose. Saying, of course, I believe it was 0.97
00:19:26.480 Einstein who said, I know not which weapons will be used in World War III, but I do know that World
00:19:35.160 War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. Is World War III possible is the question.
00:19:42.620 We had two great wars. The World War I was called the Great War, and it wasn't really the world at
00:19:48.900 war. Most parts of the world were untouched. And World War II is interesting because it was
00:19:53.520 largely just centered in Europe, though there were North African and Middle Eastern campaigns.
00:19:58.420 Japan never actually went to war in Europe. They were fighting in Asia. But we called it the world
00:20:04.600 war because it's the biggest we've seen. The question is, what would a modern world war really
00:20:09.220 look like? And then there's this question. Is it actually now? With the conflict in the Persian Gulf
00:20:15.480 and the war with Iran not seeming to stop at any time soon. The last U.S. character leaving the
00:20:20.740 Pacific, China, wanting to take Taiwan at any moment. Ukraine bombing the Iranians, fighting 0.53
00:20:27.200 with the Russians, the invasion and capture of Maduro in Venezuela, the surrounding and isolation
00:20:33.140 of Cuba. We are witnessing conflicts rise up around the world and the potential for them.
00:20:38.960 And it's getting scary. Now, I don't know because hindsight is 2020. When we look back at
00:20:45.340 history. We just think we do. But right now, I would just say this. We don't know. We really
00:20:51.180 don't. What I can say is this should be taken very seriously. Romania is a NATO member. They are
00:21:01.940 our ally, and they're telling us they captured a Russian sabotage operation in their country
00:21:08.300 on a member state. Should the United States just say no? Russia is going too far in their
00:21:18.160 desperation. They are going too far having lost the soft power battle. That's the reality. 0.62
00:21:26.040 Ukraine wanted to join NATO and the EU. That's the truth. These are wealthy alliances and
00:21:33.580 admittance to the Schengen zone meant Ukrainians would be able to freely move and work throughout 0.89
00:21:38.580 Europe. It was a dream come true for many central to western Ukrainians. In the east, many of these
00:21:45.220 people are more aligned with Russia due to proximity. Russia lost that soft power battle.
00:21:51.240 Crimea, home of their warm water fleet, was at risk. And so they chose war. 0.79
00:21:57.320 They chose war. Not trade because they lost that argument. And now we are barreling towards
00:22:05.840 something dangerous because they lost that argument. And I hate to be callous or but it
00:22:11.760 really was. It was an argument within Ukraine as to whether or not they would go west or east.
00:22:18.340 And Russia was concerned about what it would mean if Ukraine decided to join the EU and NATO.
00:22:23.920 It meant they could lose control of their Gazprom gas monopoly.
00:22:28.620 It would mean the U.S. has access to more.
00:22:32.220 Well, to Crimea.
00:22:34.840 Russia's Navy operating out of Crimea would be at risk having to either pay fees, submit or leave.
00:22:40.880 And this was because of an argument.
00:22:42.980 I want to stress this.
00:22:44.380 Now, you may not like the tactics of soft power, but the West won that argument inside of Ukraine.
00:22:50.180 And they didn't do it with war or violence.
00:22:52.740 they did it with economics, with political pressure, with soft power. If we are to live
00:22:58.480 in a world that has conflict, soft power is the preferable method by which we win influence and
00:23:04.440 expand our control. And that's always going to be the case. And the move of a desperate man of
00:23:10.180 Vladimir Putin in restructuring his government around a wartime economy and invading, that's
00:23:15.600 the losing position. We can agree that sometimes you lose in business, but resorting to conflict
00:23:22.540 escalated to this degree. And the same can be said of the United States with Iran. They just
00:23:26.940 could not get the Iranians into the fold. Choosing war and bombings is not the right path. 1.00
00:23:34.520 But my friends, war, it unfortunately seems to be the natural state of the world.
00:23:40.440 Smash that like button and share the show with everyone. You know, if you support the work that
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00:23:57.900 8 p.m. Thanks for hanging out, and we will see you all then.