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Oct. 17, 2024 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
25:01
Pepe Escobar : Putin's Thoughts on Ukraine/Israel
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Thursday, October 17, 2024.
Pepe Escobar joins us now from Moscow, where it's midnight.
Pepe, welcome, my dear friend, as always.
You're so gracious to stay up late.
I don't know if you stay up late every night, but you're gracious to stay up late for us.
We have to.
Yes.
Thank you.
Thank you.
A lot to talk about Ukraine.
Iran, the Kremlin, and Tehran, the killing of Senwar and BRICS.
But let me start with Ukraine.
Is there any truth from your understanding and your sources and your observation of Russian media to the allegations that the North Koreans have sent troops to Russia?
To fight against the Ukrainians and that some of those North Korean troops have defected to the West.
No.
I mean, it would be humiliating to President Putin with the size of his population and with young men volunteering to the military for him to have to call.
On North Korea to send troops there.
What is this?
A PR stunt concocted by Keynes?
Russia doesn't need anybody.
They have more than enough.
They don't need a new mobilization.
And they have enough reserves.
If they need in the front line, they have enough reserve troops.
And if that would ever happen, it would be a mediation for the DPRK as well.
They don't do this anywhere.
Of course not.
One thing is the DPRK sending missiles to Russia.
That's one thing.
One thing is to send troops and on top of potential defectors.
Troops in North Korea, they are not potential defectors.
They are heavily screened.
This is another childish issue.
If North Korea sends missiles, will it send troops or technicians to operate those missiles?
They don't need it.
The Russians go there, they learn, and they come back.
Got it.
Russians are very good at it, you know.
Okay.
What is the status of the Ukraine incursion into Kursk?
Oh, apparently they lost over 20,000 killed in action and growing every day.
And, of course, this disappeared a little bit from the map because this is already Bricks Week here in Moscow.
So nobody's talking about Kursk.
And next week, even more.
After BRICS, these two BRICS weeks, then it's another story.
But they consider the Kursk matter as going to be, the mopping up operation is proceeding, and it's going to last another few weeks or so.
So nobody's even paying attention to it, Judge, really.
Do we know if Americans have been killed?
I cannot tell you because I haven't checked these past few days.
I have to be frank with you.
I have been consumed by BRICS since last Friday.
Give me your best gut feeling from all you know and all your sources and all of the geopolitics going on.
How much longer do you think Ukraine can hold out?
We know they're going to hold out at least until November 5th, but let's not be cynical about the U.S. election.
They're being slaughtered.
How much longer can they hold out?
They could hold out until next spring.
But the thing is, I think the question is how much further the Russians want to go.
And there's no definitive answer, obviously, from the MOD and from the Russian Security Council.
And considering what sort of Minsk-2, Minsk-3 style shenanigans the West is going to come up with in the next few months after the result of the U.S. presidential elections.
We understand that the Ukrainian losses are in excess of 600,000 dead.
What are the Russian losses?
Do we know?
It's 8 to 1, Judge, roughly.
And our good friend, Andrei Martianov, he is calculating between 7 and 8 to 1. And we don't have definitive numbers.
There were a few numbers a few weeks ago that were completely absurd, saying that Russian killing in action was over 100,000.
No, definitely not.
They are probably around...
Okay.
Transitioning to Israel, what is the current relationship or your current thinking about the relationship between Moscow and Tehran?
Extremely important because of two events that are going to take place next week and probably the week Iran is going to be a full member of the BRICS Summit next week.
So it will be at the top of the table discussing with BRICS partners and with what we call BRICS Plus or BRICS Outreach, the partners and the people who are invited for the summit, including heads of state such as Erdogan from Turkey.
And after that, there will be.
And Putin and Pazeshkin especially will sign the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, which is geoeconomic, geopolitical, and very important, military as well.
Military has been going on since last year.
All sorts of exchanges.
Depending on what sort of apocalyptic adventure we have in West Asia, post-Israeli attack against Iran and then the Iranian retribution, we could have pitted frontally the US and Israel on one side and Iran and Russia on the other side.
And then all bets are off.
Friend and colleague and regular contributor here, Dr. Gilbert Doctorow, senses, in his view, a hesitation on the part of President Putin to sign that agreement and an expectation for some restraint on the part of the Iranians as a condition of signing it.
Do you agree with Professor Doctorow?
Or is this going to be signed as agreed to?
Well, we're not having any signs that there will be any procrastination from the Russian side.
There was the possibility that the agreement could be signed during the BRICS summit, but that would dilute the importance of the agreement.
The date has not been set in stone, but what's set in stone is that they're going to sign it before the end of this year.
Most probably end of October, maximum beginning of November.
And considering that they are discussing closely the situation in West Asia at foreign ministry level, at defense ministry level, and the meetings between Putin and Pazeska.
So it will happen.
We don't know the exact date.
And it suits them both, because then this will create another layer of pan-Eurasian integration linked to BRICS, linked to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and linked to the fact that both Iran and Russia see these declinations of the forever wars as wars against them.
In the case of Ukraine, against Russia.
In the case of West Asia, against Iran.
Israel attacks Iran and Iran attacks Israel and it gets accelerated and accelerated.
And the Americans think that Israel has its back to the wall and the Americans enter the war by firing offensive missiles from jets and ships into Iran.
What will President Putin do?
Nobody knows.
Nobody knows.
Depends if the deal would have been signed by that time.
But if the deal has been signed, what will he be obliged to do in order to comply with the deal and not lose face internationally?
Of course.
Of course.
There will be substantial extra Russian help which will go beyond what we already have on the ground.
For instance, the S-400.
Missiles.
Defense missiles.
They are already in Iran.
So we can go further than that.
Could be Russian hypersonics, for instance.
Iranians, don't forget that Persian tradition, 2,500 years at least.
They're very, very proud.
And IRGC generals are saying on the record, look, we don't need, we have everything we need and we even have, Nobody knows what kind of secret weapons are these.
So the IRGC may not even request Russian help.
It all depends on how this apocalyptic dementia will evolve.
And we are all hostages of this completely demented spiral, in fact, which was provoked by the Israelis in the first place.
Back to BRICS.
Will Turkey join this week?
No.
Turkey, very important, Judge.
And this is a very complex story.
I'll try to be brief.
Today I received a report of one of my good sources in Istanbul, where I was last week, in fact, and saying that basically Erdogan will use...
Putin who and Modi?
Putin, Xi Jinping, and Modi.
He's going to meet the three top BRICS individually, bilaterally.
In itself, it's already huge.
We can interpret it as Erdogan selling Turkey to BRICS.
That's what it is.
A very important button.
These good sources in Istanbul say that he's going to use this as leverage to extract more concessions from, guess what, the Americans.
First of all, because Turkey is broke.
And the number one responsible actor for practically throwing Turkey into bankruptcy is Erdogan himself.
So he needs funds.
He needs investments.
It's not going to come from Saudi Arabia or the Emirates.
It's not enough.
So he'll try to use this saying, look, NATO, okay, I'll continue in NATO, but I'll become a full member of BRICS and SCO as well.
What do you have to offer me?
It makes sense considering the way he plays, Judge.
So it was very sobering to receive this report earlier today, in fact.
And considering the discussions that we had in Istanbul last week with Kemalists, secular Kemalists, people who are not affiliated to Erdogan's party or a sort of Islamic opposition.
No, very clear-minded Kemalist secularists.
They say, no, it's another one of his power plays.
Makes sense.
It's very interesting to see what Putin, Xi and Modi are going to tell Turkey.
What do they expect from Erdogan?
Well, he's going to have to leave NATO.
We can't be in bricks and NATO at the same time.
You're absolutely right.
The thing is, he doesn't have a strategic vision of this very complex process of Eurasia integration.
Where BRICS and SCO, Eurasia Economic Union, all these organizations are together.
And Turkey is not a member of any of them.
They are an observer at the SCO.
The only thing that Erdogan and the people around him, you know, real estate speculators, what we call the Gang of Five in Istanbul, the five major real estate conglomerates that support him, they want more trade and commerce with...
That's what it's all about, essentially.
So he's not seeing Eurasia integration as a process of trying to come up with an alternative geoeconomical and geopolitical system of international relations and financial markets as well.
He doesn't see it that way.
Especially because, and this is something, whenever they tell me, I fall on the floor.
He doesn't read anything.
He doesn't discuss it with anything.
He doesn't have intellectual debate with anybody.
He imposes what he wants.
So it's a very narrow-minded view of the world.
I want to ask you about President Xi.
What is the Chinese view, the Chinese government view, of the Israeli slaughters in Gaza and attacks on Lebanese civilians?
Condemned it sternly.
And sternly from the Chinese point of view, which they are always very diplomatic, reticent, and they measure their language.
but this has gone over the top even for them and even for the briefings by the Minister of Foreign Relations in Beijing.
So they are more or less aligned, not as forcefully as Russia in the UN Security Council, for instance.
When Nebenzia, the Russian representative at the UN, now he's unplugged now.
Just like that, if this war becomes a regional war.
So, obviously, they condemn it.
But the hard work and, let's say, the forefront of the condemnation is Russia.
And considering that the strategic partnership is so close, for instance, this week, earlier this week, they were together at the SCO Summit in Islamabad in Pakistan.
They were also discussing all that.
This was a sort of mini-SEO summit.
The big summit was in July with the heads of state.
This one was the heads of government, special representatives, etc.
They were discussing connectivity corridors.
They were discussing Trans-Mongolia, Trans-Siberia, the connectivity corridor, the China-Pakistan economic corridor.
And they were discussing, of course, West Asia as well.
I want to ask you some questions about Europe, but before we do, I'm going to play a clip from the Spanish Parliament in which a member of the Prime Minister's own party, Pedro Sánchez, had some very strong words to his face.
Chris, cut number 13. How does this differ from Nazi gas chambers?
I address you all, ladies and gentlemen, including the President.
No difference.
As a nation, we are complicit in perpetrating this genocide.
You travel globally discussing an arms embargo that your government cannot enforce.
Your government has been selling arms since after October 7th.
It has bought 1 billion euro worth of weapons.
One billion euros, ladies and gentlemen, during this year of genocide, have allowed weapons to be transported through from our ports throughout this year.
If you truly support the arms embargo, Mr. Sanchez, cease to seat and enact it immediately.
Do you think there's any chance that, A, there's a crack in the we-will-follow-Biden mantra of the European countries, and B, The European countries will do anything.
Prime Minister or President Macron is furious.
We'll play another clip in a minute of Prime Minister Starmer agreeing with one of his critics that the British government needs to do something to stop the slaughter.
Where do you think this is going in the European minds?
There's already an enormous split, including pan-European public opinion.
There's no question about that.
But the problem is, once again, Judge, they are vassals.
They are subordinated to everything that comes from Washington.
They don't have real sovereignty.
If they did, they would have been doing something about the genocide.
And they can't.
It's very, very sad for all of us who grew up with European culture and all that.
Yes, it is.
Our friend George Galloway could explain that for us.
But I want to play you what he says on the floor of Parliament and Prime Minister Starmer's agreement with him.
And you tell me if this is worth believing.
Cut number 10. Israeli Finance Minister Smotrich had said that starving 2 million people in Gaza might be justified and moral.
National Security Minister Ben-Gavir called settlers who killed a 19-year-old on the West Bank heroes.
After my visit to Israel and Palestine last February, having witnessed the damage that these extremist ministers in the Netanyahu government are doing, I called on the last government to sanction them.
The last government refused, but we now learn that the former Foreign Secretary was considering this.
So will the Prime Minister now sanction the Ministers Ben-Gavir and Smotrich?
We are looking at that because they're obviously abhorrent comments, as he rightly says, along with other.
Really concerning activity in the West Bank, but also across the region.
The humanitarian situation in Gaza is dire.
The death toll has surpassed 42,000, and access to basic services is becoming much harder.
And Israel must take all possible steps to avoid civilian casualties, to allow aid into Gaza in much greater volume.
Mr. Speaker, along with France, the UK will convene an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council to address them.
And at this urgent meeting of the UN Security Council, the US will veto whatever purports to restrain Israel.
And even if it didn't veto it, Israeli forces will shoot at UN troops.
Of course.
They are shooting at UNIFIL on an everyday basis and nothing happens.
Condemned by half of Europe and nothing happens.
Well, Starmer is very complicated.
Is he credible?
No, he's a Zionist.
This is rhetoric.
It sounds wonderful when you hear that in the British Parliament, but there's no follow-up.
Who or what can stop The slaughter by the IDF forces.
A phone call from the White House, which we know will never happen.
Really, really.
It boils down to this.
Really.
And we know it will never happen.
It's not a phone call from Lloyd Austin or from, oh my, ghastly little Blinky.
It's from the White House, and we know it's not going to happen.
Unfortunately.
And it probably won't happen No matter who wins the American presidency, because on Israel, they would each try to outdo Joe Biden.
Exactly.
Once again, unfortunately.
And the thing is, Russia and China, they see that clearly.
Iran as well.
So these three bricks, they see this clearly and they said, And this means helping the axis of resistance.
So China in the background, Russia, let's say, in the middle position, and Iran in the forefront, their strategy is to help the axis of resistance as much as they can.
They're going to have...
Mahmoud Abbas was invited, so the BRICS members, the full members and the BRICS partners, BRICS Outreach, BRICS Plus, they'll be sitting together and discussing exclusively Palestine.
We hope that something more practical would come out of it, because BRICS reputation is now...
They need a forceful BRICS declaration on the genocide in Gaza.
Because the global South, the global majority is actually expecting that from them.
My dear friend, thank you very much.
Thank you for staying up until the wee hours.
And thank you for your analysis, as always.
Pity we couldn't get into BRICS.
But next week, I'll be in Kazan.
So we have to organize.
How to do it.
Well, we'll do it.
I'm sure you have sources that'll be at the BRICS gathering, and we'll be all ears next week.
Thank you.
Thank you, Pepe.
All the best, my man.
All the best, Judge.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Coming up tomorrow at 4 o 'clock in the afternoon, the end of the day, the end of the week, the Intelligence Community Roundtable with Ray McGovern and Larry Johnson.
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