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June 19, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
20:58
LtCOL Tony Shaffer : Ukraine War Update.
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Thursday, June 19th, 2025.
Colonel Tony Schaefer returns to our cameras and microphones.
Colonel, it's a pleasure.
Welcome back.
Thank you for taking the time to chat with us.
While the eyes of the world, the media and the public and diplomats and military people like you have been understandably focused on Israel and Iran, I would like you to help us catch up with what's happening.
But I don't think, Judge, you could point to one event and say this was the one they did to retaliate.
I think it's been a continuation and expansion of their current offensive effort against the Ukraine.
And so it's more about they're already winning.
Instead of going and refocusing their assets on other things to create a big event, They just continue to do the study work of wearing down and demilitarizing the Ukrainians, which I think is much more effective than seeking a specific event and doing a revenge attack.
Is there pressure on President Putin, whether from his right wing or the circle around him or the military or the intelligence community, to get this over with?
So there is, but there...
Judge, the Russian pace has been effective.
It's been slow.
It's been methodical.
And I think the argument is, well, why would I change the pace, that is Putin, from doing it the way I've been doing it if we're going to achieve victory in the end?
And I think that's the issue at this point.
Putin, like Trump, has people within his own country who are critical of the way he does business, some of them being close to him.
And I think at this point, both men are faced with dilemmas regarding how do we continue to meet military objectives without creating a larger global conflict.
So that's why I think both people, this may get you, I don't want to get you in trouble, but by comparing Putin to Trump, but in this area,
So that's what they're both doing in their different ways, obviously.
But for Ukraine, it's all about trying to basically do everything to kind of get to the Dnepr.
And get those areas within the current conflict area settled before I think they're going to go for a ceasefire, because I don't think the Ukrainians could continue to hold out much, much longer.
You and our other military guys who've spent careers in the military have been telling us for a long time, it's going to be over soon.
It's going to be over soon.
They can't last much longer.
How much longer can they last?
By they, we mean the Ukrainian military and the Ukrainian government.
You have an issue with the illegitimate presidency of Vladimir Zelensky.
I think, well, we've always believed that people would act rationally on the Ukrainian side, which I guess was our error, because they don't act rationally.
They continue to...
So I think that's the issue that many of us have faced.
With that said, two things are no longer present, which is our funding.
U.S. funding is running out.
It's not going to be renewed.
And the military weapons in the pipeline, that's running out too.
Pete Higsteth, our friend Pete has said, we're not sending a bunch of material that they asked for, especially drones and basically counter-counter.
Counter missile and counter drone drones, which we need.
So with that said, if that stuff stops showing up, you just can't fight.
And the Europeans have kept offering stuff and they've offered to fund stuff, but they can't.
All the nations in Europe owe each other billions of dollars, so I don't know how they're going to come up with money that they don't have to pay to a country that will not win.
And obtain weapons which are not available.
I don't know how it's possible.
So I really do believe we're seeing July, August as the latest, the Ukrainians continue to hold out.
How about President Zelensky in office?
I mean, is he still pretty much a puppet of the hard right, Banderas animated nationalists?
Is he just going to go away?
I mean, what's going to become of that government?
Can he survive the demise of his own military?
I mean, literally, as a human being, can he live the demise of his own military?
Well, he believes so, and I think that's what he's trying to do right now, is continue to make very brave statements without any hope of backing it up with what he's going to be able to obtain.
So I think it's all aspirational for Zelensky.
And Judge, beyond that, He's, I think, already invested in his own future.
He could walk away today and be a very rich man and live out his days in comfort, at least until someone tries to assassinate him.
But I think that's what he's trying to prevent.
He's trying to basically show that he's on the right-wing side until the very end.
And in the very end, I think he's going to book out and leave to fly off and resign.
I think that.
And I think he'll wind up here in the United States in some form as some sort of a refugee.
Has the United States dialed back the volume of equipment?
I know at some point the legislation that was last passed under the Biden administration, all of which is subject to the discretion of now President Trump.
I think we're comfortable in saying that the president is not going to go to Congress to ask for more.
But in the interim, has the United States government, whether it's to defer this to Israel or because they know that Ukraine is losing, has the Defense Department dialed back what has been the flow of military equipment to Ukraine?
And intelligence, both.
Yes, absolutely.
I think at this point, The guidance, as I understand it, is to provide the Ukrainians defensive support, not offensive support.
Anything that would give them the ability to strike Russia regarding intelligence or specific military technology has been limited.
I know they were able to help, the United States was able to help broker, believe it or not, the Israelis to give up an older Patriot missile battery from the first Gulf War.
It was one of the early models.
So things like that, which are technically defensive in nature, I think you're going to continue to see.
Otherwise, a lot of the support for offensive capabilities is going to end.
I think the F-16 support is going to end.
Things like that are just going away.
What has become of the 20 CIA bases that were built during the first?
Maybe you don't want to answer that.
Only tell me what you can, of course.
That were built during the first Trump administration.
Are there still 20 of them across Ukraine?
Are they still operative?
The CIA is a bit of a different animal, as we know.
And I think that even with its current leadership, there's resistance to certain guidance, and they will drag their feet and justify their bad behavior.
By saying they're doing things to help defend the Ukrainians.
I think that drone attack did not sit well with President Trump.
I think the administration figure CIA was still up to helping them at the time that happened.
So I think CIA has been running its own game.
But again, I think CIA with Radcliffe is being reined in slowly.
So I don't know if those bases still exist.
I'd say about half of them still do, probably.
And I think it's just a matter of time, especially if Ukraine collapses before they're all shut down.
And they should be shut down.
There's no reason for them to be there.
What's your take on the drone attacks?
It's obvious CIA, MI6, and perhaps it's God who are involved.
But who in the CIA knew?
Did Ratcliffe know and not tell Trump?
Did he not tell him intentionally so that Trump would have plausible deniability?
Did Tulsi Gabbard, before Trump said famously or infamously, I don't care what she says, did she know about it and not tell him?
How far up the food chain?
Did the knowledge of the CIA's investment of manpower and American dollars in that drone attack go?
So this is one of those things that Mike Flynn and I were trying to warn the president about first term, is that these people, especially CIA, are going to do and say things in such a way that they will kind of tell you something's going on, but not tell you.
And when you're at that level, you get all these code names read to you.
You get these read-on slips.
And, Judge, they can bury things in the detail pretty easy.
And it's one of those things that unless you're paying attention and you have someone kind of doing a deep dive to everything they say, something could get past you.
I'll bet, we'll know at some point, I'll bet they briefed him.
On a concept that had been approved by the Biden administration, not actually talking about it was implemented.
It was already being formulated for execution, and the contemplation of the execution was probably also ignored by the staff.
They just didn't want to say it.
So they're going to come back and say, well, we told you about it on this briefing on this date back six months ago.
That's the game they play.
Did Radcliffe know?
Again, I think he knew, but not how far along it was.
So that's how they do these things.
Okay.
I don't want to veer into Israel because I want to be able to take advantage of your knowledge of intel and military on Ukraine.
However, when the president said...
Under the law, which you and I both understand, she and she alone is the principal person to inform him of American intel.
Is he getting intel from some other source?
Let me let me answer this question in two parts.
First, my friend, Johnny Lehman, the former Secretary of the Navy?
Yeah.
We both know him.
Okay, go ahead.
You know, John, you can ask him this question then, too.
So, John, during a meeting on Able Danger, which we talk about again at some point since Kurt, our friend Kurt Walden has been stirring that up, rightly so.
John Lehman told me that when he was Secretary of the Navy, they always had other intelligence sources to include some of their own, Navy, and the New York Times and other outlets.
And John said to me, we never trusted what the intelligence community was telling us.
We always believed there were other sources which were equally or better informed.
Just saying.
Just saying.
Not here to be shot at for what he says, but he said the other cabinet members, other Reagan cabinet members, had a similar quarterback.
Should she resign because he publicly said, I don't care what she says?
Well, no, let me hit the second part of this.
Okay.
My second part is Jim Woolsey.
You know Jim.
So, when Jim was director, I was running an operation completely off the books.
Well, it was kind of, I mean, you know what, it's black operations.
It was run legally, just saying for the audience, we did it legally.
We determined through this operation when I was chief of Army's clandestine program, human intelligence program, that the North Koreans in 92, Judge, had already obtained, created five working nuclear weapons.
If you go back and look at history, the Clinton administration didn't admit until the late 90s that we had knowledge.
The policy was to not admit or acknowledge.
What we knew about the North Korean nuclear program.
So, Jim had to lie.
The Army had to lie because it was an Army operation.
We were forced to not say what we knew.
And I said this on the network the other night, Judge.
I have no problem with Tulsi saying her own opinion or having a point of view which takes a certain stance.
We can't always acknowledge everything we know.
And that's my position on what she said.
Yeah, but this is not her own opinion.
What she was saying was the uniform opinion of the intelligence community.
All right, I get it.
That uniform opinion can be wrong.
Okay, got it, got it, got it.
Back to Ukraine.
We are hearing that China is entering into agreements.
To make major investments in the Donbas.
Are you hearing that?
Do you know about it?
What does that tell you about the future of the eastern part of Ukraine?
Will the world soon recognize it as part of Russia?
So, I do believe that Russia is going to walk away with what it has, and maybe a little bit more because they're still on the offensive.
China has its own internal problems right now.
China can do a lot to...
But I'm not sure Xi is going to last the rest of the year either.
The rate he's going because of the People's Liberation Army not being happy with him.
The internal consumer price index being very shaky by the Chinese people.
We'll see.
I think if Russia wins, China's going to come in with them.
But I don't know if China's going to be that strong a partner in the end because of their own internalization.
Is there still a line or a DMZ between the Russian troops and the Ukrainian troops?
Or is there no front anymore?
Can the Russians just go wherever they want?
The Ukrainians have been successful in laying down essentially defensive lines.
Built-up areas, cities especially, which are slowing down the Russians.
With that said, once they break through one barrier, they kind of go for a good amount of terrain, 10, 20 kilometers, to hit the next barrier.
Ukrainians have been very good about being defensive and building these things up.
So the answer is, yeah, there's barriers.
But once they break through, they can run a little bit, and then they get to the next barrier.
But Ukrainians have been successful in keeping those barriers up and slowing them down.
Let me get back to the flow of military equipment.
Has it been slowed down because Trump and his advisors, including our friend who's now the Secretary of Defense, believe this is a losing venture or because they want more gear to go to Israel?
Or both?
I think it's a losing venture.
They were declinating this stuff before.
The Israeli fight with Iran started.
And I think if they could get away with a judge, they just would leave Ukraine altogether.
You've got Lindsey Graham and the other folks who want us to fight every nation on the planet.
You have Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal.
Talk about an odd couple.
But they are fiercely, along with Ted Cruz, I was kind of surprised by Ted Cruz coming across so strong on this.
Ted used to be kind of, I think, more of a Walter Jones, Ron Paul guy in some ways.
But I guess he's changed.
I think it's unwise.
I think the larger issue, Judge, needs to be what President Putin and President Trump are focusing on, on relationships as we speak.
There's a number of meetings still going on between Russia and the United States to reestablish effective diplomacy.
I think that diplomacy will then result in certain military agreements, which I think are necessary.
I fought the Cold War.
We fought it to beat Russia.
I think it's time we understand the Cold War is over and there's larger issues we need to work together on relating to global security, especially nuclear weapons, that go beyond what's going on in Ukraine.
Will the war in Ukraine still be going on by Christmas time?
I hope not.
I hope you and I are having a conversation about...
Again, if we're the primary funder and provider of weapons and things in the pipeline continue to trickle through, some things are decremented because of other things that we're doing with the Israelis, they have to stop.
The Russians aren't stopping.
The Ukrainians will not be functionally able to continue to do what they're doing without our dollars, without our aid.
I have to believe by this time in August, you know, the 19th, 20th of August, it's going to be done for the Ukrainians.
Tony Schaefer, thank you very much, my dear man.
Much appreciated.
Thank you, sir.
We'll look forward to chatting with you.
Thanks for accommodating my schedule.
I look forward to chatting with you again soon.
All the best.
Thank you.
And coming up later today at 11 o 'clock this morning, back to Israel and Iran, Colonel Douglas McGregor.
At 1 o 'clock this afternoon, Professor Glenn Deason.
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