Ambassador Robert O'Brien, former presidential envoy for hostage affairs and National Security Adviser, joins the show to talk about the Ukraine crisis and what it means for the future of the country and the world. Lou Dobbs also talks about the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project and much more.
00:18:38.420They looked like a paper tiger, uh, in every sense.
00:18:42.240And I would think that she has to be wondering if he is not managing a paper tiger himself
00:18:48.220because his troops haven't been tested.
00:18:51.140Ours have under, uh, unfortunately, uh, whether it's Afghanistan, whether it's Iraq, uh, in
00:18:58.380Persian Gulf war, uh, your thoughts on the capacity of, of China and the willingness of
00:19:06.060Xi to support his so-called strategic partner who looks like an inept fool right now.
00:19:12.240Well, look, well, that's a terrific insight that most folks haven't, uh, gained from this.
00:19:20.220And that is how, how strong is the Chinese army?
00:19:23.300Now, let me go back to the Russian army for a moment.
00:19:25.960When I was in office as president Trump's national security advisor, we were briefed on the, the, the tremendous capacity and ability of the Russian army that Putin had modernized the Russian forces that they slimmed it down and.
00:19:38.680And they had 250 to 300,000 frontline troops that were much like the U.S. Marine Corps, very efficient and look, there was some evidence for that because the Russians have been successful in Georgia.
00:19:47.980They've been successful in the, in the 1st Ukraine operation that where they took.
00:19:51.760Parts of Donbass and Crimea, they'd been successful in Syria.
00:19:55.240And so there was this feeling that the Russians were state of the art.
00:19:59.460And what we found out is beyond, you know, the, uh, uh, the, the shock troops and, and the, the, the special operators that were used in some of those operations, there really was not a lot of depth to the Russian army.
00:20:11.160And, and, and most of that was because of corruption.
00:20:13.120I mean, we had, you know, Russian trucks that the, the tires were flat and couldn't, you know, and were, uh, crumbling under the weight of the trucks.
00:20:22.540The GPS systems had all been ripped out of the, uh, uh, uh, the, the tanks and the airplanes and, and had been, you know, sold off the, uh, the, you know, the Russian units were undermanned.
00:20:32.740If they had a unit that was supposed to have a thousand soldiers, it might have 500 soldiers because the, the commander and the sergeant major of the unit were reporting a thousand soldiers, getting payroll for a thousand soldiers, but only paying 500 and pocketing the rest and skimming it, which is, you know, that's an old, uh, army trick going back to the Roman times.
00:20:50.840So, you know, it was, it's a very corrupt society and the, and the, the military reflected the corruption.
00:20:57.300And so when you, you, you bring up the point about she, and the PLA people's liberation army, they haven't fired a shot in anger since 1978 in the, the Vietnam conflict, the border conflict.
00:21:09.280And, uh, that didn't go very well for the Chinese and I guess we shouldn't take too much pleasure, you know, out of that because it didn't go very well for us in Vietnam either.
00:21:17.220But the point is that the Chinese were looking at the Russians as the state of the art force.
00:21:22.100And over the past 5 to 10 years, they've been doing these massive military exercises with the Russians.
00:21:26.720learning Russian techniques, tactics, procedures, and hoping that that would give them an edge in a future conflict because that was how they were going to get the experience that you noted correctly that they don't have compared to the U.S.
00:21:40.000which has been in Somalia and in the Sahel and Iraq and Afghanistan and, and on the front lines in Europe, uh, highly skilled soldiers, airmen, Marines, sailors, Coast Guard men, uh, in our forces.
00:21:52.700And so I think the Chinese were hoping that the Russians would give them the edge.
00:21:56.540I think she's looking at the war as you point out and saying, hey, the Russians aren't doing too well.
00:22:01.100We've, we've incorporated their, their tactics.
00:22:03.980You know, are we going to do any better with their tactics than they're doing?
00:22:07.180And then number 2 on that point is most of the, the Chinese equipment, not all of it, but I guess some of it's been stolen and copied from us, but most of it is either former Soviet or Russian designed equipment.
00:22:18.460Uh, in some cases, the Chinese stole it from the Russians, just like they stole from us, but you know, they've got to be wondering, looking at that kit that's not performing very well versus, you know, modern Western weaponry and wondering, not only are their soldiers well trained, is their equipment going to work?
00:22:33.460And, uh, so I, I, I think in some ways that this invasion is probably given G a little bit of pause.
00:22:38.460Uh, as he's wondering, as you suggest, how will his forces perform under similar circumstances?
00:22:45.460Now, hopefully the Taiwanese have the backbone that the, uh, that the Ukrainians have shown.
00:22:50.460I think they do, because I think they saw what happened to the Uyghurs in Xinjiang and the Tibetans and the Hong Kongers and are kind of realizing at this point that there is no one country, two systems.
00:23:00.460If the Chinese take over, it's curtains for us.
00:23:04.460So hopefully they show the same panache and boldness and, and will that the, the Ukrainians are showing if they are attacked by the Chinese.
00:23:11.460Give us a, if you will, your, your perspective on U.S. readiness, U.S. forces, U.S. technology and capability for what, uh, 25 years.
00:23:24.460The army, uh, the U.S. military operating under, uh, the Petraeus doctrine of the long war, which is, uh, to me has always been, uh, a mindless, uh, ironic doctrine to, to chisel in granite, uh, for the U.S. military.
00:23:43.460Because, uh, you don't have to be much above a, uh, you know, a, a corporal, uh, in any one of the branches to know that the longer you fight, uh, the better the odds are for your opponent.
00:23:55.460Why in the world we chose that, I think is pretty clearly it's a mistake now, but why is something that I think probably should be studied at all the academies.
00:24:04.460Your sense of the strategy that's in place right now for U.S., the U.S. military, uh, obviously the controversies in the defense part, but the entire military over the woke policies, the mindless nonsense that has been spewed by the left and, uh, inculcated, uh, into, of all places, the United States military, uh, the inability to recruit and meet recruitment goals for all of the branches.
00:24:32.460Uh, it's, it's, it's to me deeply disturbing your thoughts.
00:24:36.460Well, look, the, the, the wokeness thing is really unfortunate.
00:24:40.460I mean, I've talked to commanders who say they're spending more time on training on, on HR videos and, uh, you know, social justice type things.
00:24:50.460And they aren't training on their, their soldiers on how to shoot their weapons and how to use their systems.
00:25:02.460It's to kill people and break things in the defense of our country.
00:25:05.460And, and, and hopefully if you have a strong enough military, and this is the old Reagan doctrine of peace through strength.
00:25:11.460It was George Washington's doctrine is that your military is so strong that your adversaries don't, don't attack you.
00:25:18.460And that's why in, in, in the Reagan years, we didn't have a new war Louis, as you recall, and we've had the grenade operation with us.
00:25:25.460There's really a kind of a, uh, you know, an expanded hostage rescue operation for the medical students in Grenada.
00:25:31.460But, but we didn't have a major war under Reagan.
00:25:34.460You know what the next, who the next president was where we didn't have a major war.
00:25:37.460Donald J. Trump, because our adversaries understood that we wouldn't countenance nonsense, but we also started rebuilding the military.
00:25:46.460The, the, the biggest thing that I found as national security advisor, even coming in 2 years into the administration, 2 years plus in the administration is the damage that was done during the Obama years with defense sequestration.
00:25:57.460It wasn't a decimation that would have been great because I would have only applied to 10% cut in our military.
00:26:10.460Desperately low, and it took really 4 years of the Trump administration just to rebuild our, our military to where it was and where it needed to be to defend our country.
00:26:19.460And so that our war fighters can defend themselves.
00:26:21.460And then there were things like hypersonics.
00:26:23.460We, we were the world leader in hypersonics.
00:26:25.460These are missiles that go Mach 5 plus really no defense to them.
00:26:30.460Uh, although we're, we're developing some, some, you know, very ingenious ways to deal with them.
00:26:35.460But during, during the Obama years and, and the early part of the Trump years, the, the Russians and Chinese raced ahead of us.
00:26:43.460Some of it, they got just for free from academic papers here.
00:26:46.460They figured out how to build hypersonics and they started deploying them.
00:26:49.460And my number one priority as national security advisor was to make sure that we had hypersonics to, to fight a modern war, uh, especially against the Chinese and the Russians.
00:27:02.460We were in some opposition with the office of the secretary of defense who didn't understand the issue and didn't understand the, what, what an advantage our opponents had achieved during the eight years of Obama and a couple of years of the early part of the Trump administration where we weren't focused on that.
00:27:16.460But we're now deploying this year, next year, uh, the hypersonics air force army Navy are all deploying hypersonic weapons systems that will deter the Chinese from using theirs against us because we'll, we'll return it in kind.
00:27:29.460So, so again, rebuilding the military.
00:27:32.460And putting ourselves in a position to, to defend ourselves and, and to inflict damage and, and kill our adversaries if they're foolish enough to attack America.
00:27:41.460Is is absolutely critical and I'm glad to see that most of the programs remained in place during the, the Biden administration. We've had a big plus up.
00:27:49.460Uh, not as big as you'd want it to be because of inflation as a terrible tax, you know, it's a 10% immediate cut on the defense budget, but we had a plus up this year.
00:27:58.460With the NDA with, and the Republicans in the house, I think are committed to, to making sure that goes forward. So I think our readiness is pretty good now, Lou. I mean, our technology is terrific.
00:28:08.460I wouldn't trade our technology for, for the Chinese technology or Russian technology any day.
00:28:13.460But what we are seeing is where we used to have a 10 or 15 or 20 year lead on technology against the Chinese that's shrunk to two, three, four or five years.
00:28:22.460So the Chinese are catching up, they're catching up fast.
00:28:25.460And the other thing that they have, Lou, which we, which we don't have, and you, you pointed this out with the recruitment front, but it's not just soldiers and sailors.
00:28:33.460We don't have the warships we need. We need a 355 ship Navy minimum, and we're about 287.
00:28:39.460Uh, we've got, we can't get, we can't maintain our ships.
00:28:42.460The Navy is trying to retire ships that are, have lots of ship life left in them because we can't maintain them and we can't, we can't crew them.
00:28:48.460And at some point, no matter how good our technology is and how great our tactics are and how spirited are, are fighting men and women are.
00:28:56.460And I truly believe they're the best in the world, but, uh, Stalin used to say quantity has a quality all of its own and our adversaries, especially the Chinese have a tremendous quantitative advantage over us.
00:29:10.460And, and no matter how good we are, at some point, we can be overwhelmed by quantity if we don't stay, stay in the game.
00:29:16.460And so we need to rebuild, continue to rebuild the military. We need it. We need a 355 ship.
00:29:20.460Maybe not to keep the global commons open and not to be the world's policeman, but to defend America and our key allies and, and our, and defend our way of life because the Chinese are on their way to a 500 ship, maybe.
00:29:31.460And, uh, they, they can be a little ahead of us and we can, we can narrow that gap with, with excellent tactics and, and better tech.
00:29:38.460But at some point we, you know, there, there's a potential for us being overwhelmed and we can never have that happen.
00:29:43.460And then lastly, on the, on the wokeness thing, it's just, there's no place for that in the military.
00:29:47.460You know, we, I've got, I've got 2 daughters who are officers in the, in the army and the air force. I couldn't be more proud of them, but.
00:29:54.460But most of the folks who are coming into the military, they're men and they're young men and they're from rural America. They're African Americans from the inner cities. They're Hispanic Americans.
00:30:05.460Asian American men, these guys aren't woke. They're, they're going to the military because they want to defend our country. They want to defend our way of life.
00:30:11.460They're tough and they're, they, they, they better be tough because they're gonna have to, you know, defeat our adversaries and, and turning them into social justice warriors instead of war fighters is, is not a good idea for the country.
00:30:24.460Not a good idea, but it is also the, the policy right now of the Biden administration, the Biden defense department, the civilian leadership are absolutely committed to it.
00:30:36.460Uh, we listened to General Milley, uh, the senior advisor to the president of the United States from the U S military, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
00:30:45.460Uh, he's talking blithering nonsense. He is a, he is a clown in the eyes of the very people that he is leading.
00:30:52.460They are not going to say that, but I will, uh, I haven't met a single person from the U S military or talked with them who does not think that this is an, uh, the senior leadership of the military are, are just driving, uh, our military, uh, to a place that they do not want to go.
00:31:11.460And the nation cannot afford the journey, uh, any further, uh, so I, I, I cheer you for your assessment.
00:31:19.460And I just wish, uh, frankly, that we were talking in the second term of, uh, the Trump administration, instead of waiting the, the next term in 2024.
00:31:30.460I wonder, as we, as we look at this, uh, in terms of high, hypersonic, uh, weaponry, uh, it is one of the fastest turns I've ever seen.
00:31:42.560Uh, it, it does my heart good to see what we were able to accomplish in this country, uh, in the span of about three years.
00:31:50.500Uh, now with this new stealth bomber, uh, that is in prototype, uh, with a capacity of 10 times,
00:31:59.860the speed of sound, a mock 10 hypersonic aircraft, it is stunning to contemplate.
00:32:07.260Uh, and I don't know the level of production that we'll be able to reach, uh, in the near horizon, but it is, uh, it's, it's nice to see us back in the lead, uh, on a, such an important front as, uh, the air force.
00:32:23.480It was, uh, it was my number one defense priority as national security advisor was get our hypersonic program.
00:32:29.860Uh, back in shape and, and, and, and to get the weapons deployed, not just to do the research, not to have the exquisite technology, but not, not be able to give our warfighters the tools they needed.
00:32:39.460And, and to their credit, the, uh, once the president, you may recall this, uh, I briefed the president on this.
00:32:46.140We were getting pushback from DOD and, and, and some folks that, uh.
00:32:50.160Uh, they just didn't think it was important.
00:32:52.240And, uh, and the president came out one of the rallies and talked about a super duper missiles and, uh, he, he got a lot of blowback for talking about a super duper missiles, but, uh, he was referring to hypersonics.
00:33:03.160And, and that really got the, uh, got the attention of folks and that they understood the commander in chief wanted this done.
00:33:08.420And, and again, we've got great scientists, we've got, uh, uh, great, uh, engineers and, and we turned it around and we've got, we've got it.
00:33:16.400Not just one, but about three or four different programs on the hypersonics are coming out.
00:33:19.960Uh, and then you're referring to a couple of things in the air force, our air force fleet is, uh, is really a, uh, in bad shape.
00:33:29.000Now, it's not that it's not, it's better than our adversaries, but we don't have enough aircraft and the age of the aircraft, except for the F 35 and the F 22 is really getting up there.
00:33:38.940And our maintainers have done a super job keeping the B 52 is flying the F 14, the F 15s and 16s and 18s, uh, but we need, we need to get new modern aircraft and, uh, and we're going to have some rolling out soon.
00:33:51.760The, the B 21 Raider from Northrop, which is going to replace the B two and the B 52.
00:33:56.400If we buy it in quantity, we need a hundred of them loop.
00:33:59.520I hope that the program doesn't get cut and we end up buying 20 or 22 or 24, like we did with the, the B two bomber, but that's a terrific aircraft.
00:34:07.740It's on budget. It's on time. It's rolling out. That's going to give our pilots a tremendous advantage and keep our nuclear triad really, really strong and modern.
00:34:16.840And then you were referring to the, the NEGAD, the next generation air defense fighter and, and, and some, some of the abilities it's going to have are science fiction.
00:34:26.340I mean, you, you know, you can't believe it. It's going to have drones flying with it as wingmen. It's going to, I don't want me to be careful about what I say.
00:34:32.700I'll just talk about what's been in popular mechanics. Uh, uh, you know, put, it's going to have both, uh,
00:34:37.740manned and unmanned capabilities. It's, it's, it's fast. It's going to be, uh, it's stealthy. Uh, it's going to have sensor platforms that, that, you know, can see the entire battlefield for hundreds and hundreds of miles.
00:34:49.920So, so we're doing some amazing things as a country, but the key is we've got to make sure we get them deployed.
00:34:55.740We can't just have them on the drawing board. We, we, we, we've got to get them built and deployed and get them to our pilots, our great, you know, Air Force pilots and Navy pilots and get them what they need so they can get out and defend ourselves, themselves, our, our country and defeat our adversaries.
00:35:10.060And because trust me, the Chinese and they're clever, they're hardworking as, as can be, they, they're relentless. They're honest on all fronts. And, and one of the fronts that are on us is, uh, uh, new weapons development.
00:35:21.860They, they don't sleep. And so we, we've got to stay ahead of them and we're going to have to redouble our efforts to do so.
00:35:27.200To that point, you were talking about the, the, the, the, the gap between the United States and communist China has been winnowed down to something like two to three years.
00:35:39.380Uh, and the fact is they're stealing hundreds of billions of dollars a year from us.
00:35:46.660Uh, they have closed that gap by stealth, by spying, uh, thievery, uh, whatever ingenious way they can.
00:35:56.940Getting our intellectual capital, whether it comes from the private sector or from the U S military, we, it seems have done absolutely nothing.
00:36:06.320I mean, we could invest trillions, but as we're going to continue to simply hand it over to the thieving Chinese, uh, we're never going to have the adequate, uh, deterrence power that we should.
00:36:21.300Well, Lou, you make a great point and it's a point that FBI director Chris Ray made, uh, in a speech that we, we had a series of four speeches that you recall Mike Pompeo, myself, Bill Barr and Chris Ray gave a series of speeches in the summer of 2020 to try and wake the American people up to the threat that was coming at us from the Chinese.
00:36:39.300And we each took a different topic. Chris Ray's topic was, this was exactly what you're talking about. The theft of our IP, the theft of our inventions. It's not just on the military front. It's on the commercial front and Chris Ray said it was the biggest transfer of wealth in human history.
00:36:54.300It is the theft of of our IP, our intellectual property, our inventions for America and taken to China. And it's so pernicious Lou, because I mean, think about this. You're, you're an inventor. You invent something here. You get a patent, or you, you've got to, you keep it as a trade secret.
00:37:08.300The Chinese steal it. So in the first instance, you're losing the, the licensing fees, the revenue from your invention, the fruits of your labor.
00:37:15.300But then the Chinese take it and they, they start manufacturing it cheaper in China than we're selling it here and they dump it here and they put your business out of business.
00:37:24.300And so now your business has gone under and the Chinese are the only ones manufacturing the item.
00:37:29.300Uh, and, and they've got a monopoly and it's coming and we're dependent on China for something that was now that was invented in America.
00:37:35.300I mean, this, this is how they hollowed out to the Midwest of our country.
00:37:39.300This is how they took our manufacturing and, and, and carted it off. Just like, like a Romans carting, you know, Luke from Dacia after the invasion and bringing it back to Rome.
00:37:48.300That's basically what the Chinese have done to us, but they've done it using cyber and, and that sort of thing and dishonesty and theft and spying.
00:37:57.300Now, one of the things that we did and bill bar did this in the Trump administration.
00:38:02.300As he set up a special unit in the, in the DOJ and the FBI to go after Chinese espionage, especially on the industrial front.
00:38:10.300Unfortunately, the Biden administration shut it down when they got here and said it was racist and unfairly targeted Chinese professors and Chinese students and that sort of thing.
00:38:19.300Uh, and again, it, it's not racist. It's not anti Chinese. We love the Chinese. We've got the greatest immigrants in the world here.
00:38:28.300Uh, and they contributed massively. We love the Chinese people. I mean, they're, they're great. What we don't like is the Chinese communist party.
00:38:35.300That's engaged in this espionage and intellectual property theft. And we've got to use every tool we've got, including the FBI and the DOJ to root that out and stop it and protect ourselves and maintain our, our qualitative advantage.
00:38:47.300Because heaven help us. And we don't, we've seen what they do. We've seen what they do to people that they subjugate. We've seen how it worked in Tibet and Hong Kong and, and Xinjiang with the Uyghurs.
00:38:58.300Uh, we have never seen an experiment with communism, Marxism of any kind to succeed, uh, except in China, because of, uh, really the, the, the perception of, of Americans, uh, American leadership, uh, the mindlessness of allowing someone to call us, uh, racist because we do not want communists stealing our technology, our intellectual property.
00:39:24.300Uh, is, uh, is, is as absurd as saying that we are racist because we do not want people entering this country from Mexico who are being sent here by the Mexican drug cartels and with them, sex trafficking, uh, human smuggling, uh, as well as, uh, tons of deadly drugs that are killing more than a hundred thousand Americans every year.
00:39:48.300Yet we have a president who's focused on Ukraine, but won't in any way protect the Southern border.
00:39:54.300I have never seen in my life, nor have I ever read about an American president who is as imperial, uh, and imperious, uh, and absolutely delusional about his powers to the point that he could think that an American president can act as he is here.
00:40:13.300And without protest from the Republican party, without protest from his own party.
00:40:18.300And in fact, instead, uh, conformity and unity around him to do exactly as he pleases.
00:40:26.300And he looks perfectly aligned with the Marxist Dems, whether they be in China, uh, whether they be in Venezuela, your thoughts.
00:40:36.300Well, look, it's when you don't have a media that's going to question the presidency when the fourth estate, you know, and there are folks like you, Lou and others, and, and, uh, you've got to have a press that keeps the administration honest.
00:40:48.300But unfortunately we do not have a mainstream press any longer that keeps the administration honest.
00:40:53.300If, if they're Democrats and, and it's, it's, we've got a regime media and, and.
00:41:00.300So that, that hurts and that's actually bad for the president.
00:41:03.300I mean, they may not, I'm sure they like it, but when you don't have any, any, anyone question what you're doing, you know, you can make mistakes.
00:41:12.300And so it's not good for the president.
00:41:14.300The 2nd thing is the Democrats have total party unity and they, they, they don't, you know, put up with any nonsense from anybody in the party who's going to dissent on anything, whether it's abortion or immigration or manufacturing, whatever.
00:41:26.300Uh, on our Republican side, we're not, we're not as well organized and we're not, uh, we don't have the party discipline that the Democrats have and we need to.
00:41:34.300So we need more Republicans because we're always going to have folks even on the, the far right or the far left of the party that are going to.
00:41:40.300You know, get off the, you know, the train and, and, and, and not, uh, not help. So we need a big Republican majority. We don't have that. Now we're going to need to get it in 2024.
00:41:48.300You know, when it comes to this whole issue of Ukraine in the border.
00:41:51.300You know, I understand that the concern and then some of my friends on the, uh, on our side on the, the, the, the, you know, make America great again for the American 1st piece of strength world say, well, why are we, why are we fighting for Ukraine's borders and giving them what they need and leaving our borders open.
00:42:08.300But it's not an either or decision, because here's the problem that this administration has decided that the southern border is not a problem. That's not an issue. And they're welcoming these illegal aliens in as, as, you know, as fast as they can come.
00:42:20.300And it undermines American jobs, but it also undermines our security because we all came here as immigrants. I'm, I'm Irish American. People come here for better jobs and a better life.
00:42:30.300But with this wide open border, as you point out, we've got these fentanyl traffickers and keep in mind, the fentanyl originates, the precursor drugs originate in China.
00:42:38.300I mean, this is China declaring war on us, sending the fentanyl into Mexico, and then having to smuggle into the, you know, finished off as a finished product and smuggled into the US.
00:42:47.300But it's, it's the smuggling of antiquities. It's a smuggling of people. It's sex trafficking. It's labor trafficking. It's despicable what's happening and the borders wide open. But look, it doesn't. We can still help the Ukrainians and keep the border secure.
00:43:02.300It's not an either or point, but, but this administration, even if we shut down our aid to Ukraine, they're still going to leave the border open. The only way we're gonna get the border closed.
00:43:11.300We're gonna get the border closed and get border security for this country is to elect a Republican House and Senate in 2024 and a Republican president.
00:43:18.300I mean, that's just the fact of the matter. If it doesn't happen, the borders can remain open. That's, and it is what it is. And as you point out, there are great powers in the presidency.
00:43:26.300The president can be checked by the media. It can be checked by the Supreme Court and by the court system. And some of that's happening, but that takes time. And so in the meantime, we've got a president who's, who's, you know, they complained when President Trump signed executive orders or President Bush signed executive orders.
00:43:44.300But I think we've had more executive orders by this administration than we've ever seen in history. So look, folks on our side need to wake up and realize that this is a time to roll up our sleeves and elect Republicans in 2024 if we want real change in the country.
00:43:59.300I would absolutely second your statement, affirm it. So long as Republicans are America first, they want to make America great. But we cannot afford, frankly, any more of the so-called liberal Republican, the rhinos who have been as devastating as they could possibly be.
00:44:23.580And I can give everyone names if they want. I think everyone knows who I'm speaking of, and many of them are in the U.S. Senate. In fact, one, the minority leader there. Inexcusable, they hamstrung a house that should have had control of their budget for this fiscal year, but did not because of the omnibus bill that was supported by the liberal Republicans of the Senate, much to their shame and discredit.
00:44:50.260We always give our guests here, Robert, full opportunity for the last word. We even insist on it. So if you would, Mr. Ambassador, I want to just say as we go into this, it's great to have you with us. I've enjoyed our talk immensely. I know the audience has as well. If you will, your concluding thoughts.
00:45:11.500Well, first of all, Lou, thanks again for having me on. And you've been in this fight for a long time. I've been a big fan long before I was in government watching your show on TV and for years and years and years. So thanks for staying in the fight. And the podcast is great.
00:45:26.920Look, I want to end with the, you know, there's a lot of bad news out there. We can talk about Iran. We can talk about Russia and China. And we face a lot of threats as a country. But look, I'm still very optimistic about America and our future and our role in the world.
00:45:40.780I think Ronald Reagan had it right when he said we're the last best hope of mankind. And I kind of expand that to womankind on Earth. And we need to be that shining city on the hill. We need to be a beacon to the Chinese people that they can look to us just like the Soviet citizens looked at us and saw a brighter future over the seas.
00:45:58.440And that communism didn't have to be there and totalitarianism didn't have to be their way of life. So, you know, I would never bet against America. I think we're going to do great.
00:46:09.280But we have to roll up our sleeves and we have to win and we have to make sure that our values and rebuilding our military and peace or strength, at least the national security front and ending the wokeism and division in this country that's being spewed by the left happens sooner rather than later.
00:46:25.580But if we can get things right in this country, we can have a really glorious future. And I think our best days are ahead of us.
00:46:33.140But this coming election in 2024 is going to be critical. And we've got to win it and get back to the Reagan-Trump doctrines of peace or strength and America first.
00:46:43.880And if we do, not only will America be safer and more secure and freer, but the entire world will be.
00:46:50.000And we'll give these dictators, the Xi Jinping's and Vladimir Putin's and Ayatollah's, we'll teach them a lesson.
00:46:58.080And the lesson is that freedom works and America is going to remain the leader of the free world.
00:47:04.140And we're going to do it in a way that we're not going to be the policeman of the world.
00:47:08.980We're not going to let people take a free ride, but we're going to lead our allies.
00:47:11.560We're going to contribute and we're going to ask them to contribute greatly to make sure that the world stays free and our way of life is protected.
00:47:27.260Ambassador Robert O'Brien, great American.
00:47:30.160And thank you, everybody, for being with us today.
00:47:32.300Please follow me on Truth Social and Twitter at Lou Dobbs.
00:47:35.960That's at Lou Dobbs on Truth Social and Twitter.
00:47:39.300Here tomorrow, coincidentally, our guest will be Devin Nunes, CEO of Trump Media and Technology Group, which includes Truth Social and Rumble.