The Tucker Carlson Show - Impeachment Looms Over Trump After the Pentagon’s Leaked Nuclear Plans. Joe Kent on What Comes Next.

00:00:00.480 Recently, our company's softball team lost the big game by one run.

00:00:04.800 Then Dale tried to console us with the quote,

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00:00:30.000 there's something about catastrophe that's very difficult for the human brain to process

00:00:40.100 something terrible happens and most people refuse to acknowledge it as it begins talk to anybody

00:00:46.680 who's seen a shooting for example and they'll tell you most of them will tell you if you interview

00:00:53.360 them i thought it was fireworks or a car backfiring most people perceive a house fire in the first

00:00:59.040 moments as burning toast. Again, there's something about people that pushes away evidence of

00:01:06.960 disaster. And so with that in mind, how would the average person assess the risk of nuclear war,

00:01:13.880 which to state the obvious, or what used to be obvious, is the worst possible thing. A nuclear

00:01:18.900 war ends inevitably in the destruction of all human life on the planet. So there's nothing

00:01:24.660 worse than nuclear war ask your average american are we close to nuclear war and haven't seen

00:01:31.260 polling on it but nine out of ten would almost certainly say well no of course not because it's

00:01:35.100 just not imaginable and let's hope it remains unimaginable but the evidence is mounting that

00:01:41.840 some people are imagining it and therefore we are moving much closer to it what's the evidence well

00:01:46.620 it's all around us and it's only our unwillingness our native hesitancy to add it all up that

00:01:53.860 prevents us from seeing that. But here are a couple facts that might be worth considering if

00:01:58.340 you're trying to assess, are we actually close to a nuclear war? Russia has revised its nuclear

00:02:03.900 doctrine. Nuclear doctrine is exactly what it sounds like. It's the rules that a country sets

00:02:09.000 for itself about when and under what circumstances it will use nuclear weapons. Most countries that 0.62

00:02:14.640 possess nuclear weapons, not all, but most have what's called a no first use policy, meaning they

00:02:20.880 pledge to the world, but also to themselves, we will not be the first to press the button. We will

00:02:25.720 use nuclear weapons in defense only. Notably, the United States and Israel do not have a no first 0.88

00:02:31.120 use policy. They have reserved the right to use nuclear weapons offensively if they so desire.

00:02:39.440 But until very recently, no one imagined that the United States or Israel or any country would ever

00:02:45.140 launch nuclear weapons unless nuclear weapons have been launched against them.

00:02:49.420 and that's why for over 80 years nuclear weapons have basically preserved the peace horrifying as

00:02:56.020 they are or perhaps because they are so horrifying we haven't had a global war since 1945 because the

00:03:03.700 idea is nobody would win mutually assured destruction is the phrase that people often

00:03:08.580 used for this and so it's a big change when states start to think about using nuclear weapons in the

00:03:16.420 same way that you would use, say, artillery or bombs or missiles. That has never been considered

00:03:25.740 before. But now, clearly, it is under consideration by a couple or maybe several different countries,

00:03:32.780 and those would include Russia, the United States, and Israel. Again, how do we know that?

00:03:37.760 Well, Russia has revised its nuclear doctrine. The United States is now in the process of revising

00:03:44.200 its nuclear doctrine. As for Israel, well, the government of Israel and successive governments

00:03:48.700 of Israel have over more than 50 years at various points threatened the use of offensive nuclear

00:03:57.040 weapons. So we sort of know that Israel is capable of that, at least if you take them at their word. 0.98

00:04:02.180 But the United States is a country most Americans never imagined would seriously consider lobbing 0.97

00:04:08.040 nukes into another country unless it was attacked first. But it is a fact that that is now under

00:04:15.640 consideration. And not just under consideration, it has been proposed in writing within the

00:04:22.480 Pentagon. Reports in the last two weeks indicate that during meetings within the Pentagon about

00:04:29.600 how to respond to Iran in that current war, the possibility, the option has been floated of using

00:04:36.720 what are called tactical nuclear weapons, which are just nuclear weapons detonated at a higher

00:04:41.540 altitude or at a lower strength, but they're still nuclear weapons, that discussions about

00:04:49.080 their use have taken place in the Pentagon. And we're here to confirm that that is absolutely

00:04:53.860 true. And not only have there been discussions about the use of nuclear weapons, tactical nukes

00:04:58.140 against, say, Karg Island or Pickaxe Mountain or various spots within Iran, those discussions have

00:05:05.480 included slide decks, which is to say somebody wrote down on a computer screen, hey, maybe we

00:05:12.660 should use nuclear weapons in this war, this war of choice, this war that we started for objectives

00:05:18.500 that have nothing to do with America's national security or national interest. Now, you would 0.51

00:05:24.100 think at that point the meeting would stop, and the person in charge of the meeting would say,

00:05:29.320 who wrote that? Who's suggesting that? Who actually put on a screen in letters in English

00:05:36.140 the idea that we would use nuclear weapons in the Persian Gulf? And the person running the meeting

00:05:43.960 would find out that he would call the president. And then legal proceedings, criminal proceedings,

00:05:48.780 would begin against the person who wrote that down. Because anyone who suggests the use,

00:05:53.460 the voluntary use the offensive use of nuclear weapons is putting at risk the life of every

00:06:00.860 person on the planet and that would include your children and grandchildren and you that person is 0.95

00:06:05.460 by definition a lunatic a dangerous lunatic who should not only be removed from any decision 0.89

00:06:10.720 making authority but probably should go to jail like immediately especially in a country that 0.91

00:06:16.100 routinely puts people in jail for i don't know tax evasion the guy who suggests ending life on this

00:06:22.140 planet probably should face some kind of sanction and the rest of us should join in in saying that's

00:06:28.000 not acceptable and again anyone who suggests that is dangerous is a crazy person is in fact a

00:06:35.020 criminal because that's true people who suggest killing every human being are criminals but

00:06:41.780 nobody said that in part because the president of the united states has repeatedly suggested

00:06:46.700 using nuclear weapons in the war against Iran. Now, if you were to pose this question to the

00:06:52.180 White House press office, they would say the president has never suggested using nukes. But

00:06:55.020 of course, that's not true. Because in statement after statement, posted on the internet, on True

00:06:59.600 Social, the president has threatened the total destruction of Iran, of the civilization itself.

00:07:06.680 And of course, you can't achieve that with any conventional weapon. There's only one way to

00:07:11.060 achieve that, the total destruction of a civilization, and that's with nuclear weapons.

00:07:15.320 and so openly in public for the world to see the president has threatened the u.s president has 0.70

00:07:22.660 threatened the use of nuclear weapons in this war and so we should consider that a real possibility

00:07:30.780 but of course we don't because we can't metabolize something that horrible so in recent weeks we've

00:07:37.240 been hearing that the situation in Russia, not in Iran, but in the war ongoing against Russia,

00:07:46.420 has deteriorated to the point that the Russians are considering using nuclear weapons.

00:07:51.980 And so we've done everything we could by calling people to find out, is that true?

00:07:58.520 And it's hard to know exactly if that's true, but here's the way to think about it.

00:08:05.280 so the war in russia despite getting almost no attention in american media is not only ongoing

00:08:13.060 but it's accelerating that's the first thing to know and it's accelerating because nato

00:08:18.960 the united states and the western european powers are hitting targets including civilian targets

00:08:26.840 and energy targets deep within mainland russia and that would include a school killing people

00:08:32.660 on beaches with drones hitting the kremlin itself multiple times in drone attacks so that's becoming

00:08:40.980 more intense public opinion in russia clearly is moving in a more bellicose direction

00:08:47.860 there are elections underway in russia right now which end september 20th the duma elections the

00:08:53.460 lawmakers elections and it's very clear that more and more russians and it's hard to quantify this

00:09:01.860 precisely but are surprised and dismayed that their government is allowing attacks not by

00:09:10.700 ukraine but by ukraine sponsors nato and the united states against russia and it's not destroying

00:09:18.500 the russian economy we haven't been able to do that but it is hurting the russian economy and

00:09:24.120 of course it is a threat to ordinary russians people are getting killed on beaches by drone

00:09:31.420 attacks paid for by the united states or nato and if those attacks are being targeted with

00:09:38.840 coordinates given to the ukrainians by the cia and that's exactly what's happening

00:09:44.300 then your average russian is beginning to wonder why aren't we doing anything about this and so

00:09:51.140 there is mounting pressure on the leadership of that country vladimir putin who despite american

00:09:55.900 and western propaganda is not an absolute totalitarian dictator which is to say he can't

00:10:00.360 make any decision he wants he is subject to the opinions influenced by the opinions of all kinds

00:10:05.720 of different power centers within that country including public opinion so the point is pressure

00:10:11.260 is mounting on putin to do something to stop these attacks on russia and of course the people

00:10:17.360 mounting the attacks paying for them it's not the ukrainians by the way there is no real ukraine

00:10:23.080 anymore its population has been decimated in this war the big decisions are made by outside powers

00:10:28.600 Ukraine has no sovereignty, unfortunately for Ukraine. But the people who are making the

00:10:34.380 decisions, and that would include the CIA in the United States, the NSA in the United States,

00:10:40.600 the heads of state of Great Britain and France and Germany and basically the rest of the West,

00:10:46.980 those people clearly understand that we're moving toward some sort of more open conflict with

00:10:53.640 Russia. And that's kind of the point. Push Russia to do something radical against the West, blow up

00:11:00.140 Kiev, for example, the Ukrainian capital, hit Poland, maybe even lob some kind of weapon into 0.56

00:11:07.980 Western Europe. And at that point, you get what they've wanted since day one, which is an open 0.94

00:11:12.700 war with Russia that they expect that they'll win somehow. Of course, they won't. But the delusion

00:11:19.100 that western powers can control russia by force is long-standing i mean many leaders have fallen

00:11:30.300 to that delusion napoleon himself in 1812 famously invaded russia got all the way to moscow occupied

00:11:37.700 moscow for a month in 1812 and then retreated and destroyed the entire french army hundreds of

00:11:44.520 thousands of french soldiers died on the march back to paris but totally undeterred crazed with

00:11:52.020 hubris napoleon continued to pick other wars and in less than three years he was defeated finally

00:11:57.700 famously in a fight with the brits at waterloo and died at 51 in exile and france was never again

00:12:04.720 to this day a global power so he destroyed france and the french empire because he thought that he

00:12:11.600 can control russia through force and of course you know 130 years later almost within living memory

00:12:19.240 the german government under adolf hitler did exactly the same thing in operation barbarossa

00:12:23.740 and marched all the way to moscow once again and was once again totally destroyed so there's

00:12:28.400 something about russia and the idea that outside powers can conquer it take its resources or

00:12:33.980 something prevent it from becoming a global power that is very alluring to western leaders but there

00:12:40.060 is zero track record of success. Now, once again, within living memory of the last attempt, which

00:12:46.940 was the German attempt in 1941 to do the same thing, European and American leaders have decided 0.75

00:12:53.020 that, no, this time it will be different, and we will control Russia through force. But of course,

00:12:59.520 that's not going to happen. It will not work, and it could lead to nuclear war. So in any case,

00:13:06.520 we have been talking to as many people as we can about this. And one of them we interviewed

00:13:13.020 yesterday from Moscow, Leonid Slutsky, who is the leader of a political party in Russia,

00:13:19.080 a sophisticated, very knowledgeable person, very well connected within Russia. And to ask him,

00:13:26.200 how close are we to some kind of conflict? Most Americans are not paying attention.

00:13:30.660 The American administration is totally distracted by the war with Iran. Do you think

00:13:35.420 that we are moving toward some kind of nuclear conflict now unfortunately that interview is

00:13:42.320 it's not possible to air most of it because it got screwed up by a translator um but we're going

00:13:47.660 to show you one clip so in this slutsky says look we don't plan to use nuclear weapons unless and

00:13:56.120 until some other power some western power sends nuclear weapons to ukraine here he is

00:14:04.500 If tactical nuclear weapons supplied by Zelensky's patrons are used against us,

00:14:12.240 perhaps we will ultimately have to consider the possibility of taking asymmetric steps. 0.62

00:14:19.240 But so far this has not happened, and I very much hope.

00:14:23.240 I repeat, I very much hope it will not happen.

00:14:29.000 NATO sending nukes to Ukraine?

00:14:32.140 is there a crazier idea well no because of course this war began in the first place because Russia

00:14:40.220 didn't want other people's nuclear weapons on its western border its border with Ukraine

00:14:45.360 and it was the threat of that the threat of Ukraine joining NATO provoked by the Biden

00:14:51.120 administration and administrations before Biden including the Bush administration it was that

00:14:56.280 threat that pushed the russians into invading eastern ukraine and the war now more than four

00:15:03.440 years old is the result and the deaths of hundreds of thousands hundreds and hundreds of thousands

00:15:09.140 total unknown but clearly the depopulation of ukraine was the result the total destruction 0.80

00:15:14.860 of the nation of ukraine was the result and that was predictable it was knowable but less than five 0.55

00:15:21.680 years later, we can say that if you push Russia hard enough, and if you threaten to put nuclear 0.82

00:15:28.080 weapons on its border, you will get a maximalist response, of course, as you would from any power. 0.69

00:15:35.040 You tried to do that too. So the question is, are the European powers, is the United States

00:15:41.900 crazy enough to do something like that? Well, of course. So the two things to know, and we're 0.75

00:15:49.380 going to speak to Joe Ken about this in just a minute, but the two things to know as you try to

00:15:53.180 assess where is this all going is, one, the United States, despite claims to the contrary, is in

00:15:59.840 charge of the war against Russia. It's not a war to liberate Ukraine. No one in the West wants to

00:16:08.140 liberate Ukraine, of course. The United States sponsored a coup in Ukraine in 2014 to make

00:16:14.700 certain that we could control its governance. So there's no interest at the policymaking level in

00:16:20.420 any Western country in allowing an autonomous sovereign Ukraine. We don't want that. We've

00:16:25.040 never allowed it. So ignore those claims. This is not about liberating Ukraine. This is a war

00:16:30.880 against Russia, and its purpose is to separate Russia from Ukraine, because as Zbigniew Brzezinski

00:16:37.060 famously said, if you combine Russia and Ukraine, you have a superpower. The resources of Ukraine,

00:16:44.700 the manufacturing capacity of Russia,

00:16:48.600 the size of Russia,

00:16:49.580 you have, by definition, a superpower. 0.73

00:16:51.780 So if you want to prevent Russia 0.82

00:16:53.420 from becoming a superpower, 0.84

00:16:54.440 you have to divide Russia from Ukraine. 0.69

00:16:56.720 Of course, it's not as simple as saying so, 0.93

00:16:58.520 but that has always been the object.

00:17:00.380 And there are probably other motives here,

00:17:02.040 complicated, historic motives

00:17:03.960 for what we're doing,

00:17:05.380 ugly motives,

00:17:07.560 motives that have to do very much 0.99

00:17:09.220 with the reimposition of Christianity

00:17:10.820 on Russia by Vladimir Putin

00:17:13.080 over the last 26 years.

00:17:14.700 But whatever the motive, you should know that the United States is now waging a war against

00:17:20.820 Russia. 0.59

00:17:21.400 That's just a fact.

00:17:22.940 And there's a lot of pretending that, oh, no, we're not. 0.96

00:17:24.860 We can't control the Europeans. 0.97

00:17:26.020 But that's a lie.

00:17:27.060 And we know it's a lie because a couple of days ago, John Ratcliffe, who's the director

00:17:31.240 of Central Intelligence, who runs the CIA, flew into Moscow on an American military plane.

00:17:36.940 And we don't know exactly what the conversation was between Ratcliffe and his counterparts

00:17:41.380 in Russia. But we do know, because the CIA has told us out loud, that before he left, before the

00:17:47.280 plane took off from, I think, Latvia, John Ratcliffe called the Ukrainians and told them to

00:17:52.380 stop any offensive action against Russia for the time that he was there. He halted the Ukrainian

00:17:59.820 offensive while he was in Moscow. Well, the person who can stop the fighting is in charge, 0.95

00:18:06.260 of course, by definition. And so in doing that, John Radcliffe showed the rest of us who's actually

00:18:12.260 running the war against Russia, and it's him. It's the Central Intelligence Agency and the

00:18:16.660 Trump administration. The Trump administration is waging a war against Russia. And it's important

00:18:22.040 to say that out loud in the United States because most people don't know it here, but in the rest

00:18:26.460 of the world and certainly within Russia, everybody knows it. So once you start waging a war against

00:18:33.420 the country with the world's largest nuclear arsenal, there are risks involved, of course.

00:18:39.820 And the main risk to you, if you're an American, is you don't even know what's happening.

00:18:44.480 And so it's impossible to protest against it, to protest against the risk that is being imposed

00:18:49.860 on you, the risk of the total destruction of your country and the world, the death of your children.

00:18:54.080 That's exactly what they're risking. So that's the first thing to know. The second thing to know

00:18:59.880 is that powers, nations, like people,

00:19:02.860 become much more dangerous when they become weaker.

00:19:07.260 The world has very little to fear

00:19:08.980 from a legitimately strong country.

00:19:11.120 A strong country simply wants to preserve the status quo,

00:19:13.700 its own interests, its trade routes.

00:19:15.780 It doesn't want to be threatened by other countries,

00:19:17.520 but it doesn't seek, say, territorial expansion

00:19:20.040 because why would you take the risk?

00:19:22.720 When you're strong, when things are going well,

00:19:24.980 why would you want to change them?

00:19:26.780 The risk always comes from the weaker party, the party that is cornered like an animal

00:19:33.820 or a short man in a bar fight.

00:19:36.460 That's the dangerous opponent, is the opponent who feels that his options are running out,

00:19:43.060 that he has no choice.

00:19:44.500 And that is exactly why there are conversations now in the Pentagon about using offensive 0.78

00:19:49.160 nuclear weapons against Iran, a non-nuclear arm power.

00:19:52.520 a strong country would never have that discussion because a strong country would for example

00:19:58.500 use its navy its trillion dollar navy to i don't know open the strait of hormuz and restore balance

00:20:06.060 to global energy markets that's the point of having a navy but we have demonstrated over the

00:20:11.200 last six months that we can't do that our navy is not for a bunch of reasons capable of opening

00:20:16.000 the Strait of Hormuz. And so the United States is facing a very tough decision. And you do have,

00:20:23.000 as reckless and crazy as this is, you do have some sympathy for it. If the U.S. leaves the Persian 1.00

00:20:28.580 Gulf with Iran in control of the Strait of Hormuz, there's no lying about what just happened. 0.93

00:20:35.360 We lost the war. The U.S. is much weaker than it was at the outset. And we're going to have to 0.84

00:20:41.480 live with the consequences of that up to and including a monetary reset globally, which is

00:20:48.360 to say the loss of global reserve status for the U.S. dollar. And that has huge implications for

00:20:54.940 this country domestically. The end of empire is always ugly, and it can be extremely ugly

00:20:59.740 for the nation that administers the empire. And so the U.S. has an awful lot to lose. It's hard

00:21:06.340 to walk back from what we've done in a graceful way that preserves our power and our prosperity

00:21:12.280 at home. So the Trump administration is in a really, really tough position. The question is,

00:21:18.880 will it make it much worse? Will it get everyone on earth killed rather than accepting the

00:21:27.560 inevitable loss? And at this point, that loss is inevitable, unfortunately, tragically.

00:21:31.780 so in this case and it pains me as an american to say that the dangerous party here is not iran

00:21:41.600 and not russia and it hurts even to use those words because it was unimaginable even 10 years

00:21:48.040 ago that the united states would be the threat to world peace but in this specific instance

00:21:51.960 yes because the united states doesn't actually have many options left there is no conventional

00:22:00.240 way to beat iran in this war there is no conventional way to beat russia in this war

00:22:06.900 and so at this point the option is pull back or accelerate into nuclear holocaust

00:22:15.500 and it's important to say this out loud not to scare people but so that people know where we

00:22:22.120 are right now at the end of August, 2026. And perhaps a public outcry can get the lunatics

00:22:30.780 who are marching toward annihilation to pull back. Storm season is on the way, and that means

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00:23:33.700 Recently, our company's softball team

00:23:35.680 lost the big game by one run.

00:23:38.000 Then Dale tried to console us with the quote,

00:23:40.400 winning isn't everything.

00:23:42.340 Well, Dale and I are very different.

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00:23:54.540 Thanks, Bet365.

00:23:56.160 Must be 19 or older, Ontario only.

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00:23:59.940 or the gambling of someone close to you,

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00:24:06.880 Get 20% off almost all regular-priced merchandise.

00:24:10.060 And with that, we're grateful to have one of the wisest and best-informed people we know assess where exactly we are.

00:24:30.160 That's Joe Kent, most recently the head of the Counterterrorism Center in Washington, and our friend, Joe Kent.

00:24:36.640 Joe, thanks for doing this.

00:24:37.920 um don't want to be alarmist don't want to scare people don't want to be scared but the evidence

00:24:44.440 suggests that the u.s is running out of options and the logic of this escalation gets us to

00:24:51.540 uh first use nuclear strike that that's my interpretation of where we are do you think

00:24:56.980 that's right i think if you zoom out and you get beyond the the day-to-day kind of back and forth

00:25:04.460 Are we sanctioning them? Are we going back to some kind of a conflict? And you play out the scenario based on the parameters that our leaders, especially the president, have outlined.

00:25:14.020 I mean, the president has he said a bunch of different things throughout this entire conflict, but he started out with, hey, we need a total surrender.

00:25:21.280 And we were using the rhetoric of regime change. And at times we walked that back.

00:25:26.700 But every time that we appear to get a deal, the MOU is a great example.

00:25:29.980 We're in another period right now where we're trying to get a deal, but we're still implying 0.96

00:25:34.440 that the Iranian regime, as we know it, must collapse, that there has to be some kind of 0.53

00:25:38.800 a total victory. 0.98

00:25:40.260 And, you know, that sounds like, okay, maybe we could do that.

00:25:44.260 Maybe people thought that, you know, in February, March timeframe, but now here we are at the

00:25:49.160 end of August, and that still hasn't happened with the military tools that we have, you

00:25:53.240 know, at our disposal.

00:25:55.100 And so if our goal is to completely and totally, you know, collapse the regime, have the regime

00:25:59.940 crumble or surrender in some way, shape, or form, we've kind of got two options because it's not

00:26:04.720 going to happen through sanctions. It's not going to happen through the limited air campaign that

00:26:07.560 we've done up to this point, because if that was going to work, it would have worked by now,

00:26:11.920 or we'd be doing more limited air campaign. So we've got two options, and that's to escalate

00:26:16.240 by putting boots on the ground. And if you just take a look at how big Iran is, how big, you know, 0.98

00:26:21.420 how the terrain actually is, even if we had the full scope of our military called up like we did 0.92

00:26:28.380 for the 2003 invasion. Even if we had a coalition like we had in 2003, a ground invasion inside

00:26:35.740 Iran just is not feasible whatsoever, even if we had the national will to do it. The country is

00:26:40.820 simply too big. The terrain is too much. And then even if we could come in and topple the regime

00:26:45.000 like we got rid of Saddam, well, then as we know, we have this thing called the insurgency. And so

00:26:49.460 the ground option really quickly, that's just not a serious thing. And then also we don't have the

00:26:53.720 political will for it. So then you go back to square one, our goal is for the regime to totally

00:26:58.780 be collapsed. And so quickly you arrive at, well, we kind of have to use a weapon of mass destruction

00:27:05.660 or a nuclear weapon of some sort. And so really, if you just play out the scenario for long enough,

00:27:11.920 you arrive at weapons of mass destruction fairly quickly. And then even if we set the bar at just,

00:27:17.520 we want Iran to not have the capability to develop a nuclear weapon. And now we've set our sights on 0.86

00:27:22.960 pickaxe mountain we've gone back and forth between saying you know the three nuclear sites were

00:27:27.280 completely obliterated to they may still have some nuclear dust in them and that's where i think

00:27:31.660 we're tempted to use you know a limited tactical nuke um which on a specific target as opposed to

00:27:37.740 a population center but i just think the longer that you you play out the math you kind of come

00:27:41.880 back to the japan scenario which is where we were the last time the only time thankfully that we've

00:27:46.340 used nuclear weapons we didn't want to commit the ground forces necessary to take japan because we

00:27:51.540 had already expended so much. The Pacific campaign had already cost us so much. And so we said,

00:27:55.620 actually, the best thing that we can do is drop a nuclear weapon. And so I think we would be

00:28:00.820 fools to think that this couldn't happen here in this current scenario, especially as the 0.76

00:28:05.560 administration scrambles for a way out. So now and then, both of those calculations began with 0.99

00:28:12.700 the same demand, which was total submission. So before, really before the modern era,

00:28:18.320 defeat didn't necessarily mean unconditional surrender right you just you want to resolve

00:28:26.460 whatever the the conflict is but that doesn't necessarily require you to enslave your opponent

00:28:32.100 at the end um and so maybe the problem is our original demand of the president's original

00:28:38.780 demand for unconditional surrender i mean you can imagine a world in which you just said look it's

00:28:42.640 it's enough that you don't have an active nuclear program and we can back off and let you run your

00:28:46.740 world or your region. And this is a fundamental problem we've had with this last iteration

00:28:53.580 of this conflict. We've really failed to set the parameters. We failed to say what our strategic

00:29:00.040 goal is before we got into the war. We got into the war and then we fished around and we've moved

00:29:05.300 the goalposts several different times. And so that's had many ripple down effects. I'd say

00:29:10.280 mostly with the Pentagon, with the Department of Defense, who's trying to come up with viable

00:29:15.240 solutions for the president, using the tools they have at their disposal, which is military tools,

00:29:20.160 they really haven't known exactly what the president's wanted because he came out and he

00:29:23.500 said, okay, the total surrender, the regime's going to fall, et cetera. But then we backed off

00:29:27.160 from that. And now it seems like we're just trying to get basically the Straits of Hormuz

00:29:31.580 opened up once again, but then we kind of fall back on. Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. 0.84

00:29:36.940 And so there's a lot of different angles there that you and I have discussed before on why we're

00:29:41.040 fixated on the nuclear dust. I think a lot of this, the vast majority of it is due to

00:29:45.780 the pressure from the Israelis and the Israelis want regime decapitation. They're completely 0.77

00:29:49.980 comfortable with a scenario where we're constantly mowing the grass. They're comfortable with the

00:29:55.000 chaos, but they know Americans aren't. And so they've had to sell us some kind of an objective, 0.73

00:30:00.000 but the president has failed to define that. So if our goal was just to come up with a solution

00:30:05.320 to the Iranian nuclear option, number one, the negotiations were working. That's why the

00:30:09.600 Israelis had to shotgun through this war so quickly in the lead up to the 12-day war. 0.85

00:30:14.160 Midnight Hammer, I believe, took that off the table. And I think that was the president's intent

00:30:18.500 was he was done talking about levels of enrichment. He was sick and tired of the Israelis pressuring 0.99

00:30:22.500 him. And so he just took it off the table. I think the Iranians actually went along with that

00:30:27.080 because they went right back to the negotiating table. But now we're back stuck in this space

00:30:32.420 where we're demanding some kind of a total capitulation from the Iranians when really 1.00

00:30:36.760 that's just not feasible at all. And we seem to have recognized that at varying points. Again,

00:30:39.960 the MOU, I think is a great example. The president even said, we have to do the MOU because we're

00:30:44.300 facing an economic disaster in this country. So for a brief moment there, he realized he needed

00:30:50.280 to be pragmatic and say, okay, good enough. Our main goal has to be Straits of Hormuz being opened

00:30:54.960 up again, some kind of a status quo or a working relationship we could have with the Iranians, 0.50

00:31:00.760 and then we'll discuss their nuclear file later on. But he couldn't even tolerate the pressure

00:31:05.240 internally from the pro-Israel lobby because immediately we, you know, dispatched Marco

00:31:09.820 Rubio over to Lebanon where he cut a basically a side deal that negated the MOU. And then we also

00:31:15.260 started pressuring or allowing ships to come through in violation of the MOU, come through

00:31:20.060 the Straits of Hormuz. So we seem to not know exactly what we want. And this is why I think we

00:31:25.020 should be very, very concerned about something that most people will think isn't feasible,

00:31:29.780 like a nuclear weapon being deployed because there is so much confusion and friction and

00:31:34.900 chaos in this entire process yeah i mean i you know so many things to say but i mean i i was

00:31:41.500 opposed to impeachment the two impeachment attempts against trump strongly opposed the whole thing was

00:31:46.760 absurd um i believe in stability i think elected leaders should serve out their terms i don't hate

00:31:53.600 trump personally so with all of that said the second any president actively considers first

00:31:59.820 use of nuclear weapons that person should be removed from office immediately immediately

00:32:04.300 because that's got to be the red line destroying all of humanity in a with a nuclear strike i mean

00:32:11.300 i like so why isn't there an attempt to remove him from office like immediately anyone who would

00:32:17.780 even tolerate that kind of talk from any of his subordinates or employees is by definition unfit

00:32:25.540 that's the total destruction of the world no yeah the contrast is pretty wild i mean they wanted to

00:32:31.800 impeach president trump before because he had the audacity to question if you know mail-in ballots

00:32:35.880 were legitimate or not uh and he said go go march peacefully and patriotically onto the capital to

00:32:41.840 to protest this uh this election however he has threatened to annihilate an entire civilization

00:32:46.580 and the so-called opposition party, they seem to be completely okay with that. I mean, every now

00:32:51.720 and again, you know, in a hearing, they'll throw out some barbs and jabs about, oh, didn't you know

00:32:55.820 that your interceptors were being depleted? But there doesn't seem to be any actual, you know,

00:32:59.660 pushback from the Democrats. And I think this really points to the true bipartisan consensus

00:33:04.440 in Washington, D.C., which is they always want more war, especially this war with Iran. And I

00:33:10.160 think that really speaks to the amount of influence the Israeli lobby has over our elected

00:33:14.600 officials. But I mean, even with the Ukraine war, I mean, now, because the president has said

00:33:19.260 different things, Republicans, I think, are a bit more torn than they were before when Republicans

00:33:23.800 weren't in power. But even with the Ukraine war, there was a lot of pushback. There was a lot of

00:33:28.220 back and forth. But with this war, there has been no real pushback from the Democrats. And then by

00:33:34.380 and large, I mean, the most resistance I think you've seen has been from Republicans or former

00:33:38.680 Republicans that are saying like, hey, this is what we actually ran on. So I don't know. I think

00:33:43.520 this has been a great unmasking that just shows there's only one party in Washington, D.C.

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00:34:03.360 There's basically a survival tax of 20 percent interest or more. So why keep handing your money

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00:34:39.820 card debt. I mean, it is just crazy to borrow money. No judgment, but it doesn't make any

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00:34:55.140 americanfinancing.net slash Tucker. I agree with that completely. And, you know, I think there's

00:35:03.560 going to be a huge political shift after november i would think but i just can't get past the fact

00:35:12.080 and it is a fact it's not a guess it's a fact that the use of first use of nuclear weapons

00:35:19.280 offensive use of nuclear weapons has been discussed in pentagon meetings and put in slide decks

00:35:24.360 and marjorie taylor green tweeted that a couple of weeks ago and was you know dismissed that's

00:35:29.520 not true well it is it's it's factually true and now everyone in the administration knows that it's

00:35:34.120 true i don't understand how that can be tolerated again it's not a partisan question it's not about

00:35:39.880 trump's personality or it's not about anything it's not about any of the debates that we normally

00:35:44.160 have that has to be the end you cannot allow that but no one seems to think that like everyone's

00:35:51.260 fine with that i mean i left the trump administration and i think that there's a very

00:35:57.120 odd, I guess is the best way I could put it, probably the most polite way I could put it,

00:36:01.260 culture throughout the entire administration that you just need to go along with whatever

00:36:06.920 the boss says, which is the job that we all signed up for. And if you can't do that, you should

00:36:10.600 leave, which is what I did. However, there does seem to be an erosion of, I would say,

00:36:16.760 norms is cliche, but I would just say an erosion of any kind of moral compass where people should 0.98

00:36:21.880 stand up and say, we shouldn't be doing this, or why are we letting a foreign government put us 0.94

00:36:26.780 in this, this position. I'm not sure why it's not reaching the president that the best thing

00:36:31.200 that we should do right now is just pick up and leave before things get far worse. I, for the

00:36:37.120 life of me, don't understand that. I do think there's a major cultural issue right now within

00:36:40.540 the administration. We should be seeing a lot more people from the administration stand up and

00:36:46.120 leave. They don't have to do it the way, the way I did it. I mean, there's a lot of criticisms you

00:36:49.200 can make of how I left. I mean, that's fine. However, the fact that we haven't seen more

00:36:53.680 people leave the administration and say like i'm not going to go along with this this is taking our

00:36:58.960 country in a disastrous direction i i think just you know speaks volumes to the incentive system

00:37:04.720 that is created inside washington dc and unfortunately the people who end up in these

00:37:09.680 positions um that's something that we have to fix if our country is actually going to be saved

00:37:14.960 or or the world i mean just again any leader of any country who suggests first use of nuclear

00:37:22.640 weapons has forfeited his right to lead he has to be removed immediately i think that's just a fair

00:37:28.180 standard any normal person i think if we're kind of cool the temperature a little bit and just ask

00:37:33.240 objectively is that fair yeah of course that's fair you you can't risk the destruction of the

00:37:38.000 world you're not allowed you didn't build the world you're not allowed to do that so so back

00:37:42.400 to the the internal incentives here that are driving us toward destruction and it is destruction

00:37:47.420 i have just heard that israel uh that the netanyahu government which is facing an election

00:37:55.060 in october is considering an acceleration in lebanon like more aggressive more killing in

00:38:03.580 lebanon um do you think that's true and if israel does that what will the u.s response be do you

00:38:10.620 think? The easy answer to the latter part of your question, what will the U.S. response be to

00:38:18.460 anything that Israel does? At best, we'll allow some U.S. official to say, we really don't like

00:38:24.020 it that Israel did that. And then a couple of days later, they'll walk it back and say, yes, 0.60

00:38:27.260 but Israel has the right to defend itself or some other boilerplate line. Unfortunately,

00:38:31.720 regardless of sometimes using more strongly worded tweets or public statements against

00:38:38.440 the Israelis, we have yet to change the relationship with the Israelis whatsoever,

00:38:42.480 regardless of how many times the Israelis have publicly violated what the president has told

00:38:46.760 them to do or not to do in this conflict in particular. We continue to provide the Israelis

00:38:52.620 basically with whatever they want. I mean, we're merging and people don't like it when I say 0.96

00:38:56.500 merging, but we're giving the Israelis access to some of the most sensitive capabilities within

00:39:01.640 the Department of War, within our intelligence community, as part of the National Defense

00:39:07.080 Authorization Act. We're still giving the Israelis nearly $4 billion in assistance. We launched this

00:39:11.740 war at their behest, which has cost us, I think, somewhere to the tune of $300 billion and 18 0.77

00:39:17.060 fallen Americans, tragically. So we have yet to really change the nature of our relationship with 0.75

00:39:23.360 the Israelis. So we should not expect the Israelis to change how they behave. Now, the Lebanon piece, 1.00

00:39:28.500 I think, is very, very interesting because the Israelis are very smart. They understand American

00:39:33.120 politics very well. I think they know that they ran up to the limit where they can publicly

00:39:38.560 humiliate the president by going and taking offensive actions inside of Iran, because that's

00:39:44.420 just a blatant smack in the face of the president. They got away with it on multiple occasions,

00:39:47.660 and they got us into this war. They know that they don't need to put the president or Republicans in

00:39:51.720 the hot seat any more than they already have going into the midterms. But that's where Lebanon is 0.99

00:39:56.500 much easier. Lebanon is right on their borders. They don't need any assistance from America to 0.99

00:40:00.440 reach inside of Lebanon in the way they do with Iran. However, because this war has gone so poorly

00:40:06.180 for us, the Iranians have moved their support from Lebanese Hezbollah. They've moved it away

00:40:11.540 from being clandestine and covert. And they've said, okay, now we are actually going to act as

00:40:16.060 a true regional power and we're going to hold the Israeli government accountable whenever they do

00:40:21.280 something inside Lebanon that we don't like. And in the past, this would just be covert support

00:40:25.280 to Hezbollah, but we've seen them actually launch ballistic missiles now against Israel. So Israel

00:40:30.340 knows they can restart the war the iranians i think in a way to attempt to reign in israel 0.91

00:40:35.780 they put lebanon as part of the mou and that's one of the first violations that we made and it's

00:40:40.500 one of the the first failures that we had with enforcing the mou is we cut that side deal that 0.62

00:40:45.300 allowed the israelis to to maintain their presence and to continue to go on the offensive inside

00:40:50.820 lebanon so lebanon is going to be essentially the easy button for the israelis to kind of poke at

00:40:56.020 the Iranians to flare back up this conflict. And right now, I think the Likud government,

00:41:01.040 they're in a very dangerous position because they're facing re-election. So they want there

00:41:05.320 to be a hot war. They want to show their people that they're going on the offense against Hezbollah. 0.88

00:41:09.460 So again, for us to put ourselves in this position, I just think is incredibly reckless. 0.92

00:41:15.660 So the future of the United States hangs on the fortunes of the Likud party in a country of 9

00:41:21.080 million people and their elections in october which most americans know nothing about don't

00:41:26.320 even know they're happening but like our children's future depend on that like bb's desire not to lose

00:41:32.440 yeah when you say it out loud it's absurd um and most people if they just heard that if they just

00:41:38.280 heard that statement they would be like well you know tucker and joe were being hyperbolic and

00:41:41.680 that's just ridiculous however if you just look at the last i mean six months i mean obviously

00:41:45.940 there's there's a longer history prior to that but if you look at the history since basically that

00:41:49.520 we got into this war in February. That is essentially the scenario. We got into this

00:41:55.520 war and don't take my word for it. Listen to Secretary of State slash National Security

00:41:59.100 Advisor Marco Rubio. We got into this war because the Israelis were about ready to launch an attack 0.99

00:42:03.620 in Iran. And we knew that this time, this iteration of the conflict, the Iranians wouldn't 0.97

00:42:07.480 take it on the chin. They would actually hit us back because they had already been through 1.00

00:42:11.020 one iteration of conflict before. And so we got into this war because of the Israelis and we're 0.99

00:42:16.060 staying in this war, the Israelis have killed several of the moderates, the so-called Iranian 0.81

00:42:20.380 moderates that we were negotiating with, or actually at the negotiating table with us.

00:42:25.060 The Israelis got us on board with killing the Iranian supreme leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei,

00:42:31.120 which has led to a more hardline leadership class coming into power inside of Iran. So we can't get

00:42:37.840 ourselves out of this war because the Israelis got us into it. Every time we think we're trying 1.00

00:42:41.380 to get out of it, the Israelis take some action, primarily at this point in this juncture inside

00:42:45.260 Lebanon that keeps us in this war. We refuse to change our relationship with the Israelis. So 0.91

00:42:50.380 the Israelis have no incentive to change their behavior whatsoever. We've never held them 1.00

00:42:53.520 accountable. So when you look at it through that lens, the fact that the internal politics of

00:42:59.540 Israel and the Likud party and the Likud party facing reelection and the Israelis knowing in

00:43:04.100 the back of their head, they know that Donald Trump is probably the last pro-Israel president

00:43:08.320 that they're going to have. So essentially they're going for broke. They're trying to get as much as

00:43:11.920 they can right now out of the United States of America, out of the U.S. taxpayer, out of the

00:43:16.380 blood of American soldiers before, you know, the ride comes crashing to a halt sometime in January

00:43:21.200 of 2029. So when you look at it through that lens, everything that you just said about this

00:43:26.860 tiny country because of the influence it has over our politicians driving, you know, basically the 0.51

00:43:32.240 fates of the world, the world economy, the potential use of nuclear weapons, it's 100% 0.81

00:43:36.420 true and it should scare everyone. And it's not just to run. I mean, the same donors who

00:43:41.140 push trump to follow israel into this war who who have a hammerlock over this administration

00:43:48.140 are exactly the same people who pushed us to war with russia so they're not different people it's

00:43:55.920 the same it's the same group it's and so i don't understand why trump is still their slave i mean

00:44:02.520 he's very frustrated this is destroying his legacy it'll hurt his family it's hurting the

00:44:07.360 country it's wrecking the republican party like it's all downside for trump so i don't and he's

00:44:11.720 mad about it obviously he said so in public why is he still under the control of neocons

00:44:18.700 right now that's the question of of our era and i and um i hope we get answers to it at some point

00:44:26.220 but i feel like this this question will be studied for quite some time i mean president trump came

00:44:30.100 to power uh on i'd you know say three major principles and number one was foreign policy

00:44:35.940 He called out on the debate stage how foolish the Iraq war was. 0.94

00:44:39.440 I mean, he has said over and over again on the campaign trail how foolish the Ukraine 0.95

00:44:43.980 war is and how he would solve it.

00:44:46.820 And this was like the key premise, I think, of his 2016 campaign, most certainly his 2024

00:44:51.020 campaign.

00:44:52.480 There was also immigration, of course, and there was a secure border.

00:44:55.240 There was a lot of labor and trade issues there.

00:44:56.800 But the foreign policy and the ramifications of American foreign policy is something that

00:45:00.960 President Trump just he understood at a gut level.

00:45:04.720 I mean, this is why I supported President Trump from the time that he attacked Jeb Bush on the debate stage in South Carolina nearly a decade ago.

00:45:12.060 That's why I supported him because I was like, hey, the guy from The Apprentice actually understands foreign policy better than all the so-called experts.

00:45:17.520 And me and most of my friends had spent the last decade and a half in these foolish wars.

00:45:22.020 And so what I still, for the life of me being on the inside, I don't understand how someone who understood that at a gut level – and he actually understood too, more importantly, how the American people felt.

00:45:32.580 He really knew that this was a sensitive issue with the American people.

00:45:36.680 And so to see him get walked into a scenario that he knew was going to be a disaster for

00:45:41.840 our country, but then also for him politically, I mean, President Trump has great political

00:45:45.640 instincts.

00:45:46.260 And so to watch him just walk into this, you know, glaring bear trap off a cliff, whatever

00:45:51.240 analogy you want to use, it's something that shocked me.

00:45:54.500 And I'm still trying to wrap my head around and people will say, you know, the Israeli

00:45:58.780 lobby, the neocons, they played to President Trump's ego.

00:46:01.820 they got them at the right time. They said, hey, the protesters are on the street. Venezuela,

00:46:05.900 most certainly, I was concerned when the Venezuela operation happened, as were many of my peers and

00:46:10.500 colleagues and even guys in the military. They were concerned that this was going to give

00:46:13.520 President Trump the false sense that any country that we had a problem with, we could just swoop 0.73

00:46:17.640 in, grab or kill the leader, and it'd kind of be end game. That concerned me a lot too. And so,

00:46:22.900 yeah, did they give President Trump the pitch at the right time and tell him, hey, this is going

00:46:25.860 to be super easy? Of course, I think all that happened. However, for President Trump to even

00:46:30.380 begin going down this road before the 12-day war is something that still baffles me. At the

00:46:36.340 beginning of the administration, early 2025, he was utterly just not interested and kind of

00:46:41.580 disgusted with people even entertaining the idea of military operations in Iran. He put all of his

00:46:47.160 chips in with Steve Whitcoff and his negotiations. And why he flipped on a dime, I don't know. And

00:46:53.240 this is why I say that we should look at every single factor that could influence his decision

00:46:58.240 making everything from Butler to the breaches of his security, to having one of his closest

00:47:03.380 political advocates who was against the war in Iran, who was against the 12-day war, who was

00:47:09.100 actively petitioning the president not to get back into the war when he, Charlie Kirk, was

00:47:13.840 publicly assassinated. I think we should factor all that in too. And again, I can't individually

00:47:18.540 connect all these and say that they are all intertwined and it's the same group or some

00:47:22.920 you know, vast conspiracy. However, I do think all of these things can, should be included when

00:47:28.960 we're trying to assess why President Trump made the decisions that he made. Lots of people are

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00:49:15.040 your pc optimal map to get your coupon if you talk to people around trump um which i still do

00:49:25.320 they will say you know he just got convinced he just got over his skis and venezuela played a

00:49:31.740 huge january 4th kidnapping of maduro played a huge role in this it was easy minimal loss of

00:49:37.980 life, minimal expense, you know, huge upside glory. And he was told by, not by U.S. intelligence

00:49:47.120 agencies, but as you know, since you were there, but by Mossad, that this would be similar in Iran. 0.90

00:49:52.540 Just kill the Ayatollah and it'll work. That's their view. Okay. Or they say that's what they 0.92

00:49:59.380 think. Who knows what they really think. But anyway, it's impossible to believe that after

00:50:05.680 the Israelis sabotaged Trump's effort

00:50:08.660 to get a negotiated settlement to this.

00:50:11.340 We don't have a negotiated settlement 1.00

00:50:12.740 because of the Israelis.

00:50:14.200 And Trump hated that

00:50:15.760 and sent his vice president out to criticize them.

00:50:18.520 And like, there was this moment,

00:50:19.740 if you, I know you remember the summer,

00:50:22.420 where it was like, oh gosh, Trump finally gets it.

00:50:24.540 But now we're back to where we were

00:50:26.460 in the opening days of the war.

00:50:28.260 So like, you can't argue

00:50:30.700 that he's been fooled at this point.

00:50:32.420 He knows perfectly well,

00:50:33.340 but he's still doing their bidding.

00:50:34.640 despite the fact it's destroying him.

00:50:36.760 So like, what?

00:50:40.240 This is, yeah, this is what I can't wrap my head around either.

00:50:43.360 I would think from his business perspective

00:50:45.200 and then just him probably being mad at everyone who gave him this advice,

00:50:48.820 if it were up to him, he would pick up and leave.

00:50:52.120 And look, President Trump is very politically savvy.

00:50:54.660 I know that all his critics then would come after him

00:50:56.760 and they'd be like, oh, you're retreating, all this narrative, that narrative.

00:50:59.340 I mean, nobody can drive a domestic political narrative like Donald Trump.

00:51:03.040 And so Trump knows that.

00:51:04.640 So there's no reason why he wouldn't just pick up everything and say, hey, we're going to deal with this later and then come back and say, hey, I won the war. Don't listen to the fake news that says I lost. And then he would just simply switch the topic. We'd still have to deal with all the ramifications from the war, but I think we could do that quietly.

00:51:21.060 Why he's not doing that, I have no idea, but that points back to why I think we do need to

00:51:26.120 assess all of the potential external factors and even the factors that are much darker and some

00:51:32.500 would even say are kind of conspiratorial because at the end of the day, nothing that we're doing

00:51:36.300 right now is logical whatsoever. Our relationship with Israel, the way that we're letting them 1.00

00:51:41.240 continue to sabotage these deals, the fact that we're just staying locked in this mess. I mean, 1.00

00:51:46.800 President Trump has been cutting business deals his entire life. For him not to be able to assess

00:51:51.480 that right now, the Iranians, they're not primed for a deal. The Iranians are not going to give us 1.00

00:51:56.060 a deal on a piece of paper that he wants. That doesn't mean that we can't work out some

00:52:01.540 arrangement where the Straits of Hormuz are open back up again. I would think President Trump would

00:52:05.480 understand that. And I think he does understand that. So why he's not just simply walking away

00:52:10.980 before this escalates and gets even worse? I truly don't know. I don't think it's the most

00:52:17.200 obvious answer. You know, people are saying like, no, Trump is just a, he's a captive of his own

00:52:22.160 ego. And, you know, I'm sure some of that is true to a certain extent. However, he wants to be

00:52:27.300 politically successful. He doesn't want to get, you know, blown out in the midterms. He's saying

00:52:31.120 right now, like, oh yeah, the midterms, I don't really care. That's Republicans' fault. He's

00:52:34.620 saying all that, but I don't think that that's actually his heart. I think he wants to be

00:52:38.180 successful. So for him not to pick up and walk away, there's a much deeper and darker answer

00:52:43.380 there, I fear, that I think we should continue to probe and ask about. Because anytime we ask

00:52:47.920 about these questions and we say, hey, there's something influencing President Trump that's not

00:52:52.160 just his ego, it's not just bad information, we are attacked to a certain extent because people

00:52:57.260 don't want to look into those dark places. But I think the more that we look into those,

00:53:02.600 hopefully we can put some light and hopefully figure out who actually runs our government.

00:53:08.180 Yeah. I mean, I talked to Trump as much as anybody in the weeks before this war began,

00:53:13.440 and my strong view then and now was he didn't want to do it. So that's my opinion based on a

00:53:20.120 lot of conversations with Trump about this. So maybe I'm wrong. Maybe he was lying. Maybe he

00:53:25.100 secretly really wanted to do it. But I feel like I knew him well, and I didn't see any enthusiasm

00:53:30.220 at all, only kind of resignation and dread. So I think anyone who dismisses questions about how

00:53:38.200 that happened as conspiracy theories is a liar. That's what I think. So one of the darkest things

00:53:45.160 I've ever seen, shouldn't have surprised me, but it still did, this week, Keith Kellogg, former

00:53:51.080 general, Fox News contributor, former negotiator for Trump in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, is in

00:53:58.920 ukraine and starts telling the ukrainians that they need to start drafting women and feed their 0.99

00:54:06.000 women into the meat grinder of this war and exterminate all their women because that's 0.99

00:54:10.880 honorable or something um did you see this and what do you make of it 0.99

00:54:15.780 i saw it and it's it's disturbing i think it's disturbing anytime american officials go over

00:54:22.480 to Kiev and basically are allowed to continue to pressure our government to support this war.

00:54:30.220 I mean, that to me is a decision that the president should be making. I mean, we can't stop

00:54:33.740 individual civilians from traveling and speaking their mind, et cetera. But I think for us to try

00:54:38.460 and pressure this war to continue, and we know it's going to result in some kind of an escalation,

00:54:43.400 I'm sure we'll get to this, but we just had the CIA director in Russia yesterday. There is some

00:54:48.760 form of escalation that's brewing. I mean, you can see that in the way that the two conflicts

00:54:53.160 are becoming blended, but also, I mean, just, this has been a stalemate. Russia is kind of

00:54:57.700 grinding it out and winning. The only reason Ukraine is remaining afloat. Number one, I mean, 0.88

00:55:02.040 look, I respect your Ukrainian people for fighting for their territory, like can't underplay that

00:55:06.740 whatsoever. And you know, they, they have every right to do so. However, the only reason Ukraine

00:55:12.240 is still afloat is because of the support that the United States government has given them.

00:55:16.380 And then also, you know, the UK and NATO, et cetera. But we are essentially using them as a proxy because we still have this obsession with trying to hurt and bleed Russia. And so we're using these young men and now these young women basically as our proxies. 0.74

00:55:33.580 And you get people like Kellogg, the former vice president Pence over there saying like, oh yeah, we need more young Ukrainians. We need young Ukrainian women to go out there and fight and die and basically be cannon fodder because the West has some kind of obsession with Russia or really wants to accelerate us closer towards the third world war. It's just sick and it's insane. And then again, this is another one where you wonder like, what is the actual point? Why are we telling more Ukrainians to go into the meat grinder?

00:55:59.300 why are we inspiring genocide in ukraine which is what we're doing like just exterminate the 0.98

00:56:03.820 entire ukrainian population and then the president the sort of non-ukrainian president of ukraine 0.66

00:56:08.780 who's not elected by the way won't have elections he's created a police state banned the biggest

00:56:13.980 christian denomination like this bolshevik takeover of ukraine that guy's like oh we'll just 0.72

00:56:18.460 import indians into ukraine it's like to replace the ukrainians killed in this totally pointless

00:56:25.580 war that he could have gotten out of but didn't i mean it does raise questions like what is this

00:56:30.960 and it seems to me like the extermination of a population that's what it looks like to me

00:56:35.480 on purpose yeah there's no other way to read it i mean it's we it's definitely on purpose because

00:56:41.380 we have been encouraging them we've been funding it it's definitely the extermination of a population 0.71

00:56:45.600 because russia is massive they can pour way more bodies at this conflict than the ukrainians can 0.86

00:56:50.380 so the ukrainians have just ran out of bodies and zelinski's saying yeah we'll import more for i

00:56:54.560 guess he's taking a playbook out of the West. We'll import more foreigners to replace all of

00:56:59.380 our native Moran people and then let BlackRock do the reconstruction. The whole thing is absolutely 1.00

00:57:04.520 sick. And again, too, just the stakes. The fact that we are pushing a nuclear power,

00:57:11.020 one of the world's biggest nuclear powers, they have the most nuclear weapons. They're the world's

00:57:14.340 biggest natural resources producer, massive landmass. We are pushing them to a point where

00:57:18.900 they feel that they need to use nuclear weapons. And that's not a justification for anything Putin

00:57:22.720 is done, et cetera. But why are we pushing them? What gain do we get from this? As a matter of

00:57:28.720 fact, I would say that the war in Ukraine, who controls the Donbass doesn't matter to anybody

00:57:32.780 in America. It's debatable if it matters to really anybody in Europe that's not even close

00:57:36.700 to their borders. It definitely doesn't matter to us, but we're paying for this. But if this

00:57:40.940 goes sideways, if our calculation is completely wrong, if Putin isn't restrained or if for

00:57:45.700 whatever reason, some of the hardliners inside Russia take over or gain more influence of Putin

00:57:50.700 and he uses a nuclear weapon or a limited nuclear weapon well you know where are we or you know what

00:57:56.380 if in the scenario we just discussed us or the israelis use a limited nuclear weapon inside iran

00:58:02.300 what message does that send to putin putin's gonna say oh okay well america if you guys set the new

00:58:06.380 norms i got you loud and clear those are the new norms i'm going to use one now on kiev and then

00:58:11.820 where are we and at the end of the day for what what gain what are we getting out of this it's 0.67

00:58:17.580 absolute insanity right we're upon as the ukrainians are in a larger in a larger plan

00:58:23.660 obviously what was the cia director doing in moscow this week well one would hope that he

00:58:30.540 was there um you know trying to cool tensions and saying that hey we're going to tell the ukrainians

00:58:35.580 to back off on all the targeting of infrastructure and targeting civilians uh that they're doing and

00:58:40.620 we would hope that you would do the same and hey maybe because of the energy crisis in the straits

00:58:44.780 of Hormuz. Let's stop targeting energy for the sake of the world economy. If we're going to put

00:58:49.740 a favorable lens on it, hopefully that was the message. However, considering the fact that we

00:58:54.520 may be at least wanting to keep escalation in Iran on the table, I do think that he's saying

00:59:01.380 to the Russians, now is not the time. You better back off. You better not escalate. You better just

00:59:07.320 take all the hits that you've been getting. You better just keep taking those on the chin because

00:59:11.240 The Ukrainians have been targeting a lot of energy infrastructure inside Russia. They've targeted Russian civilians. They've done targeted assassinations of political officials. So the Russians at some point are going to have to respond. So I would imagine we are asking the Russians, if not demanding that the Russians don't respond outside of the battlefield inside Ukraine. 0.97

00:59:32.580 Now, why the Russians would feel any obligation whatsoever to listen to us at this point, I don't know. I mean, this is a big problem with the sanctions package, the Biden administration threw at the Russians kicking them off swift. The thought process there was we were going to really hurt Russia, but in really hurting them, we kind of took away a lot of the leverage that we had.

00:59:51.820 And if we were still doing a lot of trade with Russia, we'd have different levers that we could pull. But right now, since we've taken away a lot of those different options, we're basically at this, you know, this kinetic, almost kinetic phases, pre-kinetic phase, where we just say, like, if you do this, then we're going to do some other kind of kinetic action.

01:00:08.080 So, again, it's very dangerous. And again, I don't know why the Russians would really take us very seriously at this point, because President Trump said he was going to get a peace agreement. We never stopped funding the Ukrainians. We never stopped sharing intelligence with them. The Russians know what we're up to inside of Ukraine. So I just don't know why the Russians would really listen to any American official right now at this point based on our behaviors.

01:00:29.280 So there's a lot going on in the world, as we often say.

01:00:32.040 A new war in the Middle East, closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the global energy crisis.

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01:02:24.660 hurt why do you think i mean i my read from talking to him a lot about it was that trump

01:02:30.260 was sincere in his desire to get this conflict over he blamed biden correctly for this conflict

01:02:38.860 the russia ukraine war he didn't think it was good for the united states he said in public

01:02:44.160 repeatedly it just drives russia to china that's a threat to us this is terrible we should be

01:02:49.680 friends with russia like or at least not at war with them and i can fix this in a day he said that

01:02:55.220 many of course was silly of course but he did want to fix it but he never really tried very hard

01:03:01.700 and now he's prosecuting a war against russia like how did that happen do you have any idea

01:03:07.080 i i would say he never got full control of the cia and our intelligence apparatus and the

01:03:14.640 military industrial complex i mean the military industrial complex in terms of the weaponry that

01:03:18.900 we're sending over to Ukraine. That's come back to bite us now that we've gotten into basically

01:03:22.140 a conventional fight against Iran. But at the time that was a cash cow for the military industrial 0.66

01:03:26.140 complex, but also post war on terror, post Afghanistan withdraw. I mean, the CIA was

01:03:32.000 looking for a new mission. The whole intelligence community was looking for a new mission. They

01:03:35.940 found one. Biden gave them one with this proxy war inside Ukraine. And so because the president

01:03:41.860 didn't go in and I would say micromanage that all being shut down in order to get the Ukrainians

01:03:48.740 to the negotiating table. All of that just kept churning in the background. And that's a big

01:03:53.120 thing that I learned inside government, and especially in the first Trump administration,

01:03:56.880 when Trump tried to get us out of Syria, that cost my late wife her life. And then also in

01:04:03.280 Afghanistan, the same thing happened. I mean, the president said, I want out of these conflicts, 0.98

01:04:06.860 go make it happen. At one point in time, he's having to pass handwritten notes to his aides

01:04:10.780 because he doesn't trust the system. I mean, he should have learned that you have to micromanage

01:04:14.680 these things almost like a psycho. You have to go in and say, I want these done, here's steps one

01:04:19.840 through 10, and I'm going to be supervising every single step. If you're going to be serious about

01:04:24.520 actually making the intelligence community and the Department of Defense do what you say.

01:04:29.360 So this is a big problem in Ukraine. He came in and he said he wanted negotiations,

01:04:32.260 but he didn't aggressively go and shut off all the offensive capabilities that we are giving 0.92

01:04:37.940 the Ukrainians. And the Russians saw that. And that's where you have Putin saying like,

01:04:41.820 okay, well, the president may have changed out, but the men, whatever phrase Putin uses,

01:04:46.080 the men in the dark suits are still in charge. Because he sees that even though Trump came in

01:04:50.080 and Trump uses much different rhetoric than Biden and may have the best of intentions,

01:04:54.060 at the end of the day, the battlefield realities didn't change in Ukraine. So Putin just said,

01:04:59.240 okay, I don't really care. Might be a new guy. He might say he wants some talks,

01:05:03.500 but we're not changing what we're doing. This is existential for his country. So he's going

01:05:08.680 continue on and i think president trump got really frustrated that putin didn't automatically change

01:05:13.000 his behavior but the reason why putin didn't change his behavior is because we didn't change

01:05:17.560 the intelligence apparatus that was propping up ukraine and going on the offensive against russia

01:05:22.600 yeah i don't i don't think one in a thousand americans understands that we're at war with

01:05:26.280 russia that we're running that war with russia um and that we're doing it in a way that's totally

01:05:32.120 outside of civilian control like no elected leader has control over our government and and

01:05:39.720 and over this war i mean that that that's not democracy

01:05:44.680 it's not and this is a huge problem um we need people who understand how the intelligence

01:05:49.560 community works and functions a lot of times even guys like like ratcliffe like even though

01:05:55.160 he was the dni before he doesn't have a background in the intelligence community so when he comes in

01:06:00.040 the intelligence community is great at receiving him and making him feel like, you know, he's the

01:06:04.320 number one, you know, spy master. He runs the CIA, et cetera. But, you know, he doesn't understand

01:06:09.560 the nuts and bolts of how it actually runs. And so the apparatus keeps on churning and doing

01:06:14.200 whatever it is that it wants to do. And it's already set on an azimuth and ran by people who

01:06:19.080 have viewed Russia as an existential threat to America, you know, for a wide variety of reasons

01:06:23.380 now, but for decades. And they got the mission of a lifetime when Biden allowed them to go over

01:06:29.080 and support the Ukrainians. And so even really, if we look at it, you know, charitably and say

01:06:33.760 that Ratcliffe came in there and attempted to do everything he could, he's one of two political

01:06:37.020 appointees at the CIA. And so without those two having intimate knowledge of how the CIA runs,

01:06:42.440 in particular, you know, a lot of the pointy edge programs of the CIA, they didn't really have the

01:06:48.080 ability to go in there and start changing things. And then the president immediately got frustrated

01:06:51.560 and thought that, you know, Putin was just trying to rub it in his face. And so then we're at this

01:06:56.020 point where the president says okay well maybe i will go with what the europeans are saying

01:06:59.420 and then you get the military industrial complex that comes in and shows him all the incentives

01:07:03.000 um for continuing the war and the next thing you know we're now here in almost the second year of

01:07:08.480 the trump administration and the war is you know becoming more and more dangerous potentially going

01:07:13.340 nuclear and potentially expanding past the borders of ukraine do you think either one of these

01:07:18.760 conflicts russia or iran is fixable in the short term in the short term with the right

01:07:25.940 leadership. I think they are. I mean, I still remain optimistic, even though President Trump

01:07:30.880 might not like me or you very much. I still think he's very capable if he decided to reclaim his

01:07:36.960 agency and he took some drastic measures, I think he could turn them around. I think if he pulled

01:07:42.820 our troops and our blockade out of the Middle East, if he withheld the Israelis, like seriously

01:07:48.340 started pulling away a lot of aid from the Israelis and went to the Iranians and said,

01:07:52.300 if you guys want sanctions relief, if you want your assets unfrozen, let's talk shop about how

01:07:57.100 we open up the Straits of Hormuz and we'll work out everything else there. And I think that would

01:08:00.280 take down the tensions. There'd still be a lot of diplomatic work we'd have to do, but that would

01:08:03.680 take down the tensions that would take down any potential of the war expanding. It would get the

01:08:08.280 Straits of Hormuz open back up again. It would be clunky. It wouldn't be pretty, but I think it

01:08:12.100 would work. And I think President Trump could do that. He would just have to, again, micromanage

01:08:16.700 it almost like a psychopath. And then I think Ukraine is going to be a little bit tougher of 0.92

01:08:21.040 lift, but I still think that he could do it. I think he could take down the tensions in Ukraine.

01:08:24.680 Could he completely end the war? That I don't know. I'm a little bit more skeptical on it

01:08:28.840 because I think the Russians, again, they view this as being existential to them.

01:08:33.460 But I think if we made it very clear that we don't think who controls the Donbass is existential to

01:08:37.340 us because it's not, there's no world that exists where who controls the Donbass or Crimea is

01:08:43.180 existential to America. If we made that very, very clear and we stopped all the support that

01:08:47.660 we are giving to the Ukrainian government and we exerted the control that we should have over our

01:08:53.220 NATO partners to stop that and simply said, hey, we're walking away from this. We're happy to help

01:08:57.960 broker a ceasefire. I think that would take down the potential of this thing becoming a nuclear

01:09:03.440 event or expanding into a wider war. So again, I really think that President Trump, if he decided

01:09:08.880 to put his full super political powers against both these problems, I think he could do it.

01:09:15.600 And why he's not doing it, especially in the latter part of his presidency, I simply just

01:09:20.020 don't understand.

01:09:21.080 Yeah.

01:09:21.560 Well, as you said, that's the question of our era.

01:09:24.980 You were the first person to raise it in public, and I hope that we get to an answer just for

01:09:31.100 future generations.

01:09:32.720 Joe Kent, thank you very much for that.

01:09:34.700 It's great to see you.

01:09:36.240 Absolutely.

01:09:36.820 Thanks, Andrew.

The Tucker Carlson Show - August 28, 2026

Impeachment Looms Over Trump After the Pentagon’s Leaked Nuclear Plans. Joe Kent on What Comes Next.

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