Trump Unaware of Russia's Terrifying 'DEAD HAND'! W/Larry Johnson

All right, hello everybody and welcome to Geopolitical Trends, where truth matters. Excited to be with you. I'm even more excited because Larry Johnson is here. You guys gonna notice something very interesting once I bring in Larry here. Uh, before I do this, guys, I want just to give you a heads up about tomorrow. Uh, make sure to join me for live about stream. Of course, I'm going to be talking about how Beijing is shrugging Trump's threat over China's Russian oil purchases. It's like, I don't know what Trump is thinking. So anyway, I will be talking about this tomorrow. So for now, let me bring in my dear friend Larry Johnson. Hi, Larry.

Hey there, David. Congratulations, you win the shirt competition.

There we go. That was the reason why I wore it. And there were some members in the community who were asking or complimenting about your shirts. And I said, well, that's good. But I said, you know what, today I'm going to do something different. So I'm going to dress like Larry for today.

So yeah, life's too short to be boring.

It is indeed. It is indeed. So I'm very, very excited about you being here. And we're going to be addressing some really key topics. And I know this— the decision of Donald Trump to move the nukes happened a few days ago. I didn't want to talk about it. I wanted to wait a few more days because I was also working on, on some other stories pertaining to that, and I had you in mind. So this is why I decided to wait, uh, till I bring you in here. So, so I want to ask you, Larry, about really how irresponsible of Trump to really embark on a, on, on, on, on a misadventure. I don't know, I don't know what to call it. You do not move the nuclear subs near Russia's doorstep.

Well, A, those subs were already out there, okay? But you don't go public with it and make a, you know, where you're really making a threat to launch a nuclear attack on Russia. Now, that's the only reason he said that. Um, so, you know, because the Russian— you know, the Russians monitor pretty carefully, uh, using a variety of satellites when, when subs, you know, they, they surface at some point, they go into a base, and then when they leave, they keep track of how they leave. Now, I don't know, um, what sort of detection systems the Russians have deployed around the world to make sure they can locate, but it is locating nuclear submarines is a priority in their strategic doctrine, as it is on our side. So this was just, this was Trump again not being wise because threatening Russia with a submarine which has a first strike capability is not going to cause the Russians to calm down. If anything, it's going to heighten tensions, and it's just like anybody that's ever fired a gun. If you keep putting pressure, pressure, pressure on a trigger, at some point it breaks and boom, you got an explosion, and that's, I fear, what's going on right now.

Now, did the Did the— the US, of course, didn't disclose what type of nuclear submarines. I'm, you know, sort of— I understand how, for example, the Ohio-class nuclear-powered submarines, those are basically can carry up to 24 Trident D5 ballistic missiles. I am suspecting here, Larry, and please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm suspecting that it was either Seahawk or some other type. But my thinking is, if the US didn't disclose even the name of the type of nuclear weapons, will that give the Russians the upper hand already?

No, no. I mean, look, the Russians, as I think Peskov reacted, he goes, okay, yeah, there are submarines out there with nuclear weapons that could be fired at us. We know that, that, you know, that's been the case for 50 years, 60 years. So, you know, we're not gonna, we're not gonna go crazy over this right now. However, notice what Russia's response was, uh, the day after they announced, uh, we are no longer going to abide by the terms of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty. I made it. So, and what that means is that now Russia is free, says it's free to produce and deploy intermediate-range ballistic missiles on, uh, that would be pointed at every, every capital, every military base in Europe. That's what, that's what, that's what Trump has achieved with this. He's basically given Russia to say, okay, we're just going to show you that we're going to be ready to respond in a very effective way with nuclear weapons if this thing escalates out of control.

Which is indeed, I mean, I recall when I wrote my Russia book, I did address back then that, and I wrote back then, short-sightedness of part of the US government to limit the dialogue with the Russians because we never get into exactly what plagues the, the, the sort of the US-Russia relations to the differences, not only about the key strategic interests. My concern was, as I argued back then, I was what lies ahead sort of makes me even more concerned. Well, yeah, because of the US-Russia relations, I wrote back then, are sitting on the edge of outright conflict, especially in the aftermath of the death of the INF Treaty. And here we are today. We found out that the Russian President Vladimir Putin suspended the last remaining nuclear arms treaty with the US, which signals now a complete, in my opinion, a complete breakdown from Western cooperation. How do you interpret it, Larry?

Well, you know, the very first classified information I saw was I entered on duty at CIA in September of 1985. Mm-hmm. And shortly thereafter, we were handed documents, classified reports coming out of Europe about the deployment of the Pershing II missile, which was US intermediate-range ballistic missile, and the Soviet deployment of the SS-20, and the protests that were popping up in various parts of England and Germany against the deployment of the Pershing II missile because of its nuclear capability. So I was there at the beginning of talks that were taking place behind closed doors between the Soviets and the members of the Reagan administration. Two years later, so in 1987, December of '87, Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan sit down to sign that Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty. And that treaty, what it basically did is put a halt to the development of ground-launched intermediate-range ballistic missiles and the removal of those from Europe and to minimize any chance that there would be that kind of conflict. Well, Donald Trump then comes into office in 2017, in January 2017, and the following year, I believe in 2018, he withdraws from the INF Treaty. Now, Russia didn't withdraw. Russia said, well, we're going to continue to abide by it. But again, here's the United States, we're out. And then now, by withdrawing, as Russia confirmed its withdrawal yesterday, You no longer have that protection, so you're going to get this flood of missiles. And the United States is talking about deploying next year a Typhoon launcher and then something called— was it Dark Eagle? And the Dark Eagle is the hypersonic missile. Well, they're supposed to deploy those in Germany. If that happens, If they go forward with that deployment, I think you're going to see Russia take it out with a, an Arashnik missile. They're not going to step back and wait, wait and see, because these two missile systems that are being deployed are capable of carrying nukes. And already we've seen that the United States has reintroduced nukes. So Trump, instead of bringing peace to the region, is stoking it for an explosion.

Yeah, that, that's very, very clear. To go back to your point about the INF, and, and I couldn't agree more with you, Larry, because once again, when I wrote the book and did the research, I did find out that it was the US that it withdrew from the INF at the time and criticized Russia for saying it was Russia that sort of violated the— it was the other way around. So that was— I confirmed it with the reference regarding that one. So And that is very, very concerning given where this is going to lead to, like you explained. All this now happening on the— against the backdrop of another major event. And the other major event has to do with both the Russians and the Chinese conducting the joint naval drills in the Sea of Japan. How is that fits in within the calculations of what's going on?

Well, you know, and I think through your experience, you know that those kinds of exercises don't just happen on a moment's notice, or they didn't, they didn't call each other up 2 weeks ago and say, hey, you're going to be busy on August 3rd? If not, why don't we get together and do a military exercise? No, this, these things usually they're planned anywhere from 24 months to 18 months before it actually happens. And within that, you develop, um, you know, what's called the MISELE, the Master Sequence of Events List. You have a series of events because the objective of the exercise, you know, in this case, what's the objective? The objective is to ensure, to, to demonstrate that Russian and Chinese navies can operate simultaneously against a specific threat. In this case, they're good, they're looking for a submarine. Huh, that's convenient. So by doing this search for a submarine, they find out, do they, you know, do the radios work? Do they have communications? What language are they going to communicate in? I mean, what if you're going to communicate with the— if you're Russian and they're Chinese, what's the language? Are you going to pick a neutral language, English? Or are you gonna do simultaneous Russian-Chinese translation, you know, something just as practical as that. So this is, this is just one more indicator of this growing relationship between Russia and China, where they recognize that they are really being threatened by the West, and that if they stick together, work together, they'll be able to provide an effective counter to the pressure from the United States and Europe.

Well, that's for sure, given what Trump now threatening the Chinese for with more tariffs if they don't stop purchasing oil from Russia. I mean, it's really, it's ridiculous. It's really ridiculous how we can dictate to other country who they purchase oil from. And I just, it's not right. It's not right.

Well, you know, it's one thing to do that with India, if we're in a position where we can dominate India or dominate China.

Yeah.

But as we saw with China, China's control of rare earth minerals and magnets forced Trump to back off on a lot of these tariff claims. Number one. Number two, India. India also has some leverage over the United States in the realm of pharmaceuticals. Some critical pharmaceuticals that we don't have an alternative for. So, you know, a lot of this I think is, it's going to backfire. Trump, you know, I think some of the early predictions that the tariffs are going to have an immediate negative economic effect were off simply because they didn't understand that people could do, you know, for example, some merchants rushed out and they bought huge inventories at the old existing price. And then store them away. So then when the tariff time comes, they don't have to buy the more expensive stuff. They, they can sell it, or they can even raise the price slightly, just saying, claiming it's because of the tariffs, when in fact, you know, their cost basis is still much lower and they can make more money. But, but in any event, what, what Trump is doing is antagonizing these countries and forcing them to say You know what, maybe the United States is not worth all the trouble of having relations with. That, you know, think of it like if you're, if you're dating a girl or dating a guy and they turned out to be one of these drama queens, and you know, they're making incredible demands and they're spending all your money and they're, and they're not, not reciprocating with any affection. You know, at some point you say, you know what, I don't want to be in this relationship. And that's what's happening. Actually, it's happening now with Brazil, and we're seeing it now with China and India, particularly with, you know, India's reaction today. I thought these were supposed to go into effect something like on Friday. Why is Trump jumping the gun? Why has he moved the deadline up 2 days. You know, who did— what did India do to force that? They didn't do anything. I, I think it goes back to Trump's erratic behavior. Uh, there's, there's something off about the guy. Yeah.

Uh, should we blame also the advisers? Because to me, it became clear, Larry, maybe he has incompetent advisers around him that's giving him the wrong advice, especially when it comes down to, to a Russia issue. The tariffs are something different, but for the Russia stuff, who's advising Donald Trump?

Yeah, well, the advisors are part of the problem, but again, it comes back to the question: who selected the advisors? Who made that decision? You know, this is all on Trump. Trump's responsible for selecting the people around him and that he allows to give him advice. And instead of him, you know, he's supposedly, you know, from his television show The Apprentice, he was supposed to be good at firing people. That weren't good workers or gave bad advice. You know, we now know that that was just an act. He was playing a character on television because in real life he's terrible about hiring and terrible about firing.

Well, that becomes clear in his policies. So let's go back to Russia. I want to go back to addressing the Russian matter because it's of great concern, especially with having Donald Trump issued that order, which is irresponsible in my— what I want to get, Larry, is your take regarding a specific concept in the Russian military doctrine which you, you're aware of, is the dead hand concept. Most Americans, I'm sure some in our community might not know, but if you will be kind and just break this down for the community to understand what is this dead hand concept is.

Yeah, the dead hand is to ensure that in the event that there's a decapitation strike on Russia by the United States or some other nuclear power, or if there's a first strike by the West on Russia, that if the leadership who would normally make the decision to launch a retaliatory strike are dead or incapacitated, that the strikes could still go on. So the, the system's been set up in such a way that there will be— they detect both blast, heat, radiation, and if those reach a certain level, it goes with the assumption that there, there has been this kind of attack. And there's, there's a radio communication signal that is being broadcast Essentially, I think the way it works is if it stops broadcasting, then that triggers another electric, you know, electronic command that designates all of these different nuclear weapons that are in missiles and on submarines to be launched. So this is really sort of saying, don't ever try to attack us with a nuke in any way. Because if you do, you will be destroyed regardless. Even if your attack succeeds in killing our leadership, you'll still be destroyed. So that was developed in the '70s. It's been updated, but it's, uh, you know, this is, uh, something like out of the movie Dr. Strangelove. Yeah, yeah.

I'm, I'm gonna ask a weird question, Larry, you know, to some might be whatever. Was Trump, in your opinion, aware of this concept?

No, no. Oh, I, I guarantee it wasn't. In fact, you know, when he saw the term Walking Dead and Dead Hand, he thought probably Dead Hand was a character in the television series The Walking Dead, you know. So I, I— because the way, if he had understood it, he would not have reacted to Dmitry Medvedev's tweet or posting on social media as he did, because the correct way to react to Medvedev in that case would be, well, let me assure you, Dmitry, we have no intention of launching a first strike on Russia. We're about wanting to promote peace, you know, that kind of thing. But instead, you know, he just acted like that was a threat to attack the United States, which it wasn't, or at least to an unprovoked attack against the United States.

Well, the way I interpreted that, Larry, is a provocation, straightforward. But here's the interesting thing, is that the White House was saying, well, wait a minute, you know, we are hoping that Putin— this is what the White House statements, and I'm paraphrasing here, stating that, well, we hope that Putin understand that, uh, sort of Trump's sub-diplomacy is not meant as provocative. Well, how would you interpret that if you are Putin?

Well, again, if you're Putin, you got to sit back and say, what's wrong with Trump? Does he have anything better to do than to get into a social media, uh, you know, towel fight with Medvedev? I mean, Medvedev's not— he's, he's, he's on the number 2, I guess, in the National Security Council. But other than that, he's not a government official and he's, he's in no decision-making capacity right now. He can offer advice. So why, why is Trump getting into a brawl with him? You know, that's like, uh, you know, a boxer walking to the ring and deciding to get in a fight with somebody in the audience. And in the process breaks his hand or gets all bloodied up even before he's in the ring to fight who he's there to fight.

I mean, it just doesn't make sense.

Yeah, you know, Medvedev, he's a world-class troller. You know, the man knows how to troll other people, and, uh, man, Trump fell for the bait.

Before we move into— we're going to continue the conversation regarding Russia because there is some event also took place. I want to just play a quick clip here. Liking this video so far? Don't just be a watcher. Go ahead and hit the like, share, and subscribe button, and don't forget to tap the bell so you will not miss any of my videos or live streams. This way, you will be supporting a channel that stands for the truth and objective reporting. The choice is yours.

Thanks for your support.

I want to get back to talking about the recent visit of the special envoy, Werikow, who met with the Russian president, I think after 3 hours. Yeah, based on what I read. And first of all, Larry, is Werikow qualified to be dealing with such a hot issue with the Russians?

If you're going to say, is he qualified by virtue of his knowledge of the history of Russia-US diplomatic relations? The answer there is no. Okay. Is he qualified by virtue of being a close friend of Donald Trump and Trump listens to him? Yes, he's qualified on that point. Very, very odd meeting. So they both come out the Kremlin is not going to give any kind of readout until Trump has been fully briefed and basically the White House makes a comment about the meeting. That may happen today, happen at 4:30 today. So the comments though after the meeting, Putin was smiling, Witkoff was smiling, and the Kremlin readout, albeit brief, was, yeah, no, it was very positive. It they thought it was productive. Now, I guess about what does this mean? Is Russia now having a complete change of heart and going to declare a ceasefire? I don't think so at all. In fact, I think if Putin tried to do something like that, he'd be overthrown in a military coup. I don't think the general staff is going to put up with that for a minute. Did Witkow come and offer something more conciliatory? Because candidly, Apart from Trump's comments about the nuclear submarines being deployed, he has, you know, deployed the B61-12 gravity bombs into Europe, England in particular, but I think 6 other places in Europe in the last 3 weeks. Then You know, prior to that, you've had, had the events that started June 1st with the spiderweb attack, uh, in, in Europe and on the strategic bases in Russia. Then the decapitation attempt in Iran, again, where the United States claiming that it was, uh, promoting peace. Um, then you jump ahead to the same week that the United States is deploying those nuclear gravity bombs You got General Donahue, the US European commander, talking openly about the plans that they have exercised for invading and taking control of Kaliningrad, which is an exclave, not an enclave, but it's an exclave, which means it's located outside of the territorial boundary of Russia. And so you take all of this together, if you're the Russians, you gotta say, these Americans are coming after us. And they're coming after us with nukes. So that's why when you look at this meeting, then, uh, you know, Putin wasn't— he didn't show any kind of overt signs of being angry or terse. He was pretty relaxed and smiling. So we'll see what was said.

Yeah, well, I did read also his statement, meaning Putin's, that, uh, in which he— and I'm paraphrasing here, uh, because based on the reading of the translated version from the Russians— is that, uh, for this war to stop, the four provinces will be under Russian authority or, or, or sovereignty. Odessa will be also. And Ukraine will have to officially, uh, sign a document, or whatever way they're going to do it, that they will never joined NATO. And to me was, once again, will I be wrong if I am saying, or if I am thinking of this, Larry, as this is Putin's way of saying to Trump, your bluff, your kind of this combative attitude is not cutting it with us. Here are our objectives. Till we achieve these objectives, there will be no end to the war. Will I be wrong in this assessment?

No, no. I mean, look, Putin first levied these demands, I think it was June 14th, June 14th, 2024, a year ago, more than a year ago now, coming up on a year, 2 months. He has reiterated those demands, and it's not just the international recognition of these new federal republics that are now part of the Russian Federation. But the removal of NATO forces, NATO troops, NATO training, intelligence support, all of that's got to go, got to get out of Ukraine. They've been very, very consistent with this, and I'm sure today was Putin reminding Whitkopf what those demands are. It remains to be seen whether Whitkopf will take it to heart. I'm sure he'll go back and communicate it to Trump, ball's in Trump's court right now. But with respect to Donald Trump, I think we've got a serious issue of his mental state. He is not acting rationally. You know, for example, he said Russia had 9 days. Well, you got 2 more days before that deadline's up, and now he's acting ahead of that deadline. And particularly going after— if he's at all keen on reaching a deal with Russia, then why is he punishing India? That's just, that's just, in fact, you know, if I'm, if I'm one of the hardliners in his government and Putin comes in and says, well, Larry, listen, I think, I think we can make a deal with the Americans. This is what they're offering. I said, Mr., Mr. President, with all due respect, Trump's playing you for a fool. You know, if he was sincere about doing a deal and wanting to accommodate with you, why is he hitting our friends in India, punishing them because they have a relationship with us? So if you do this, if you give in to the Americans, that's just going to tell the Indians that you— they can't trust us either. No, you can't do that. You know, I'm sure that, that there'd be something like that discussion going on. So this is not— um, Russia is not going to back down. I, you know, I— if they— if Trump— if Putin does, then, you know, the West will get their wish. Putin will be gone. But yeah, they only got half the wish because what will replace Putin will be somebody that'll have a quicker finger on the trigger.

Yeah, and they won't hesitate to use it if they are threatened, if the sovereignty of Russia is threatened. So you mentioned earlier, Larry, about the presence of the intelligence in Ukraine. I had a chance when I went to Ukraine myself a year and a half ago on a personal visit, just I wanted to see with my own eyes. And one thing that came to my attention as I was crossing the border was the presence of British individuals. And of course, you know, as a former military myself, you can spy and who's who and just by the demeanors and all that. And my question was, what are you doing here? Oh, we're just trying to help some sort of organizations providing food, shelter, and all that. I say, well, that's a good intention. So let's hope you accomplish that. The reason I'm bringing this up, Larry, because it came out too late as of this morning. To my knowledge, uh, it came to light that 3 high-ranking officers from the British military, uh, were arrested inside Ukraine by the Russians, and those were involved in the— were setting up the missiles and so forth. Do you know anything about this?

Yeah, so about— it actually took place 9 days ago, about the 28th. Um, Spetsnaz the Russian Spetsnaz, the special forces, launched a raid on a Ukrainian command post that was on the Black Sea. And when they broke— when they, when they stormed it, they encountered this, uh, a British colonel, a British lieutenant colonel, and an MI6 officer. And they had documents and plans. I did post at sonar21.com couple of days ago, uh, the photograph of the two men with their passports. You can see their passports sitting on their legs. So, um, what Russia has said is that they're not going to treat these guys as prisoners of war. They are not. They are acting outside of that protocol, so they can be, they can be charged as, as spies. Executed or incarcerated, which I think they'll go for the incarceration because they've got two valuable bargaining chips there, three to be precise.

And what, uh, how, how, first of all, why is Britain so adamant about antagonizing and provoking the Russians? Well, this is the deal with them.

Yeah, again, this goes back to the end of World War too. If you recall, they made, they made a big deal about bringing a number of Ukrainian, um, soldiers, or former Ukrainian soldiers, uh, into, uh, into the UK. And then a lot of them made their way over into Canada after that. So, um, the, the British animus towards Russia, it's almost It's a little bizarre because it's not like you can pinpoint Russia did this specific thing. UK has been embarked on a long-standing propaganda campaign to portray Russia as, you know, carrying out assassination plots in the UK. You know, they had the Skripal father-daughter they were supposedly attacked with a nerve agent by the Russians. Again, these are all Western fabrications. They're designed to paint Russia in a particular light, but I really, I don't, I for the life of me don't, there's no rational basis for this kind of animus.

Yeah, I quite don't understand it. Yeah, I don't. Yeah. Larry, I want to get your take about your understanding of the Russian missile capabilities versus those of the US, and even for the defense aspect. I had a conversation yesterday with Dr. Postol, Ted Postol. Yes, it was, it was, uh, uh, we had a conversation about, and he detailed the stuff about the missiles. That's his background. In your opinion, Larry, do you believe we do have the capabilities to defend against the likes of the, uh, the, the RS-26, the, let's say, the DF-5, the Chinese one, uh, the, the, the Russians' RS-24? Do we have the capability to defend against this?

Not really. Um, once you know, Russia's— Russia now has 3 variants of the hypersonic missile, which means not only does it travel at speeds in excess of Mach 7, but, uh, it's maneuver— they are maneuverable. That's where the, you know, the real development comes in. Otherwise, it's just a fast, fast-falling object. Um, the United States supposedly has now successfully finally tested a hypersonic missile called the Dark Edge, and it has a range of about 1,500 miles. But I know somebody that was involved with that project and it was not going well. So it's still not clear how capable it is.

Yeah.

And it's not anywhere near to being mass-produced. So then, then you look at the air defense systems on either side and the United States doesn't have anything that compares with Russia's S-400. S-400 or S-500 system. You know, we've got the Patriot, we've got the theater high— the, I guess, the terrain high-altitude area defense weapon, THAAD. And none of those are very, very expensive systems, and, and they've been proven ineffective against particularly, um, hypersonic missiles. But they've been proved only marginally effective against ballistic missiles.

Yeah, so there is already a problem with the American system in ensuring defense against the Russians or the Chinese missiles. What about the Iranians? What about the Iranians that developed now— or not developed, rather, I take this back— disclosed about the Khorramshahr-5? This is a picture of Khorramshahr-4. I don't have a picture available for me at this point. For the Khorramshahr-5, which is an ICBM, is this means that now the US and Israel will have to think twice about attacking Iran again?

Well, yes, not only that, but we've seen um, movement of Russian military transport aircraft. You know, they're sort of their version of our C-17. There have been at least in the last couple of weeks 7, 8 flights. So the Russians clearly are moving some equipment into Iran. I believe that Iran is getting a full complement of S-400 air defense systems. Then, and so with that, Iran is both bolstering its ability to defend against future attacks such as it experienced during that, you know, those 12 days in June, but also they've got these missiles, they've got a whole variety of missiles and drones that can be used in a variety of combinations to defeat any remaining air defense system that Israel has. And, um, you know, I think there is the expectation that Iran, maybe with the encouragement of the United States, will launch another attack on Israel— or on Iran.

On Iran.

But, uh, Iran is now ready to respond and retaliate. Iran, for example, they They reorganized, let's call it, their National Security Council, basically minimizing, reducing the role of President Pashashkian and some of the other civilians, elevating the role of the Iranian military and the Iranian clerics. So Iran recognizes that it could very well face another attack, and it's prepared for it.

And within this context, Larry, will it be fair to say that Iran is an undeclared nuclear weapon or nuclear force.

I know that Ted has said that, and it did indeed. Yeah, um, Iran has the technical, scientific, engineering capability to produce a nuke. There's no question about that. Um, the only thing they've lacked is the enriched uranium that would be required to create a functioning device. Are they doing that now? I can't say that. I can't say no. I know before they were— they ruled it out on religious grounds. Uh, now I'm not so sure. They may have ample reason to say no, we're gonna, we're gonna get it because it's only if we have it will we be safe.

Yeah, well, it's— is this means they're gonna go the North Korean path?

Yeah, potentially. Absolutely. Look, nobody's messing with North Korea right now, for sure. For sure.

For sure. Because we, we understand that the North Koreans don't bluff, and this is why we are not willing to take that risk regarding this, right? So where do you see things going forward, Larry? Uh, before I let you go, I'd like to have your take on two fronts, one of them with West Asia or the Middle East, and the other one with respect to Russia-Ukraine conflict. Where do you see things moving forward?

Well, let's start with Donald Trump. I think his popularity is tanking, tanking for sure. And I don't know at what point the White House will finally acknowledge that they have a problem. And that they'll have to set out to do something to try to rehabilitate his image. He has done enormous damage to himself on the whole Jeffrey Epstein affair. And what's fascinating about that is we just got news yesterday that Epstein was an FBI confidential informant. That to me explains why he was murdered in jail. You know, because when he was going to come to trial, he was going to say, well, look, I've been an FBI informant for years. They've known all about my activities. They couldn't, they couldn't let that information get out. I mean, that, that now is the clearest motive for, uh, you know, them getting rid of him. Um, so what does this all have to do with foreign policy? Well, uh, Trump's support, unyielding support for Bibi Netanyahu, is costing him votes and support in the United States because the images of these starving children, just, they literally look like people that were, that walked out of the German concentration camps like Bergen-Belsen and Sachsenhausen and Dachau. So that is affecting Trump's personal support. And then if he's, if he's going to up military support for Ukraine and try to continue the war, uh, that's just going to further alienate his base. So, you know, I think at some point he's going to have to start taking actions that are going to fulfill on this pledge. I just noticed today DOD confirmed that they are withdrawing US forces from 3 bases in Syria. So, you know, now we're starting to pull out of there. That, that's a good sign. Uh, regardless of what Washington does, Russia is going to beat Ukraine, and they're going to beat them quickly this year. And that's going to leave NATO in chaos because now they're not going to need to buy all those weapons from the United States that Trump was hoping to sell them.

But even with that It is already— I got a word that the US is already pushing for the sale of weapons now, not to that front, but rather to Taiwan. They pushing on the other direction. So it's kind of just weird how Washington kind of doesn't take step back and assess the strategic impact of whatever decisions they embarked on.

Yeah, it was— I heard Jeffrey Sachs yesterday describing, and he had He had seen the paperwork, you know, the receipts, the paperwork of this, that it was under Obama that a decision was taken to decide we're going to start portraying China as an enemy because it has to do with one thing: we can't allow China to outstrip us economically, even though the reality is that's exactly what's happening.

Well, that's very, very interesting. One last thing, Larry, before I let you go, because it crossed my mind and I was following on it because I didn't read much about it here. I got the word from overseas. The US envoy, his name is Barak, to Lebanon. So I was following his meetings with, at the time, with Joseph Aoun, the president of Lebanon. And one of the points he was pressing on had to do with disarming Hezbollah. Yeah, yeah, I was like just shaking my head. There is no way Hezbollah will give up its weapons. What do you— how do you see it, Larry?

Well, in fact, uh, Hezbollah just issued a statement. So, um, Barack has been putting enormous pressure on, uh, the governor of Lebanon to disarm, uh, Hamas. And, uh, the, the response Uh, let's see, I'm looking for it here. Where'd it go? Um, the response was pretty— it was very forceful. Both Hezbollah and Amal walked out of the talks and basically said, no, we're not, we're not going to surrender our weapons, we're not going to surrender who we are, and, uh, you know, we're going to— uh, you need to be looking out for the interests of Lebanon instead of serving the interests of Israel in the United States. So they, they were very, very clear about their statement. In fact, it said— I can read this— it said, at the same time, we remain open to dialogue on the condition that Israeli aggression ends, occupied lands are liberated, detainees are released, the state is rebuilt, and the destruction caused by the brutal attacks is addressed. We are prepared to discuss a national security strategy, but not under the reign of bombs. So, you know, Barak's effort is just— it's leading to greater divisions in Lebanon, and Hezbollah and Amal are still two key players. They still wield enormous influence, and the United States, I don't think, is going to be able to prevail.

Very, very interesting. I had a chance to read some of your postings on Substack. Which, by the way, let me share the screen here, but I'm going to copy the link for you guys to have it in the chat box for you guys to subscribe to Larry's articles. They're very interesting. And it was a reason why I'm mentioning this. Also, I posted for you, for the community in the chat box. The reason I'm mentioning this, Larry, because when I read Okay, sorry, here, cancel, save. Okay, let me show this one again. The reason I'm mentioning this, because you had, you put a, when you wrote the article, I remember the 5th line, you mentioned that the role of Turkey behind closed doors in still supporting Israel with the flow of oil.

Yeah, yeah.

Which a lot of people have no idea that Turkey is playing both sides.

Yeah, it's— and they're working with Azerbaijan as well. And so, um, you know, I went through quite a list of things the countries could do to bring an end to this genocide. And, uh, you know, nobody gets off the list, even India, Russia, China. There are things they could do that they're not doing, that they're allowing this to go on.

But, you know, Turkey is a genuinely bad actor in this Well, Larry, I can't thank you enough, my friend, for being here, sharing your knowledge with the community. It's always exciting to have you here, to learn from you, and I look forward to seeing you next time. And on behalf of the entire community, we truly, truly say thank you and appreciate you sharing your knowledge with us.

Well, thanks, David, and congratulations on winning the shirt war.

Oh yeah, here we are. That was the reason why I wore it today.

Yeah, I accept my defeat graciously.

Yeah, well, it's only one time, Larry. That's it. I just want to do it for the community. Has been putting some comments, uh, commenting on your shirts. They like them. So I see. But that's Larry. So that's the beauty of it.

All right, my friend, thanks so much, Larry.

I'll see you next time. Bye-bye. Well, I hope you enjoyed listening to Larry. As always, it's very, very informative. And that was, as I said earlier, that was one of the reasons why I didn't want to address the topic of when Donald Trump issued the order regarding the two nuclear subs, because I had in mind Larry, and I reached out to him and responded immediately. So to those who commented yesterday about me bringing Dr. Ted Postol, I will do that. Uh, he was under tight schedule yesterday. That's why we didn't elaborate more. Uh, next time he's going to be here with his own presentation and slides regarding missile technology. He's a scientist, a nuclear scientist. He understands the dynamics of, uh, uh, the missile technology and so forth. We'll have him here and, uh, and, and, and we'll, uh, we'll, we'll share, uh, once again, he'll share the information with us. Uh, like I said earlier, uh, let me see this one. Congrats here. Oh, Ken, congrats for winning the shirt award. I just, you know, I was ordered to wear it, so I said, no, that's Larry's, uh, home, or that's, you know, no, no, no, no, you gotta wear it. So I said, okay, well, I'll do it one time, and, and this is it. So, so I'm, I'm glad I did. It's just for us to, like Larry said at the beginning, Life is too short to take everything so serious. Let, let's just enjoy it. So anyway, uh, once again, just to remind you, for tomorrow I will be talking about, uh, the China shrugging what Mr. Trump is saying. Donald is not aware of where the east and west is, or the north or the south. So I will be addressing the depth of that issue because it goes beyond just the threats of tariffs regarding China purchase of oil. I'm going to get into the security and geopolitical dimensions of what be— what's behind Donald Trump threats. And I look forward to seeing you tomorrow. As always, remember, geopolitics impacts your daily life in more ways than one. Till next time, bye-bye.