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June 23, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
24:18
Scott Ritter : What We Now Know.
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Monday, June 23rd, 2025.
Scott Ritter joins us now.
Scott, again, thank you for yesterday's segment, which has reached over 755,000 people the last time I looked a little while ago.
What do we know about the Iranian strikes on the American base in Qatar?
Did it happen?
Or is this just the Western media feeding us what the CIA wants us to hear?
No, I think it happened.
The Iranian president issued a statement together with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Command.
The Supreme Leader has weighed in on this.
So Iran did retaliate.
It appears that there was a very limited scope retaliation.
They fired six missiles.
Some have read into the Iranian statements to say that this Maverick.
Including Maverick.
Maverick's read into the Iranian statements as well to believe that this is symbolic, a missile for a bomber kind of thing.
Some reports say that these were older missiles, not the newer Fatah missiles, which means that they were basically set up to fail.
And even if they hit their targets, and there's some reporting that three of these missiles did strike the air base, the Americans have been given an enormous amount of advance notice and had evacuated to bunkers and shelters.
And there were no casualties, which then the Supreme Leader has come out afterwards and said, we harmed no one, but no one will play us as a fool or something of that nature.
So this was Iran symbolically striking back at what was, in effect, a symbolic American strike against Iran.
No casualties, hitting empty facilities.
And according to the news, Donald Trump has said he will not retaliate.
So we may have the makings of a grand bargain in play.
I mean, it's a very fluid situation, very volatile situation, but it doesn't appear either the United States or Iran is going for blood, going for the throat.
They appear to be looking for an off-ramp.
And I'll just leave it to this.
The fact that the Iranian attack came after Foreign Minister Iraqi met with Russian President Putin, where clearly this was discussed and the Russians greenlit this.
I don't think the Russians would have greenlit any action that would have led to an escalation of the violence and such.
I think what we're seeing is a lot of behind the scenes action taking place, a lot of behind-the-scenes diplomacy.
But in order for diplomacy to work, the situation on the ground needs to stabilize.
And I think this tit-for-tat strike, no casualties, no blood, you know, might be part of this stabilization effort.
Do we now know with certainty that the United States bombings on Saturday evening and Sunday morning served no legitimate military purpose?
We can say that with all certainty.
Even the U.S. government has had to admit, together with the Israelis, that they have not, you know, the thing that everybody was worried about is that 60% enriched uranium and the advanced centrifuge cascades that could be used to step that up to weapons-grade uranium.
These have not been destroyed.
We don't even know where they are right now.
So in many cases, we're worse off today than we were before the military action took place, because at least when the military action took place, we knew where this material was and we had them monitored by IAEA inspectors.
Iran, I think today earlier, the parliament severed relations with the International Atomic Energy Agency.
That doesn't mean that Iran has stepped away from the MPT, but what they've said is that, as currently structured, they cannot do business with the IAEA inspectors.
So, you know, we know that we've only made the situation worse, which is another reason why I think the president may be inclined to a grand bargain, because a grand bargain that brought about a cessation of the conflict,
but brought the Iranian nuclear material under control of a new IEA inspection regime, maybe combined with a deal that caps Iranian enrichment at 3.75%, which would be a victory for Iran.
You know, I think this is the logical outcome of the military failure because we clearly couldn't get rid of this material or these centrifuges with military action.
We don't know where they are today.
And the only way we bring them under control is either to strategically defeat Iran and occupy Iran, which just isn't in the books at this juncture, or to cut a deal that brings an end to the conflict and brings Iran's nuclear program back under the monitoring of international inspectors.
So Secretary of Defense Heg Seth calling this brilliant, and President Trump saying we totally obliterated their nuclear facilities, this is hogwash.
It is, unless, you know, and I'm not giving Trump credit here, but unless his entire, you know, plan was to, you know, carry out an action against Iran, which was so demonstrably useless, but to disguise it with his rhetoric, you know, hoping for the Iranians to strike back.
Because remember, the Iranians are guilty of the same thing.
We are going to destroy the American base with fire and brimstone, rain hell down on the infidels, da-da-da, six missiles, three of which were shot down.
So both sides are guilty of extreme rhetoric in delivering very minor Strikes.
And one has to wonder if this wasn't, you know, I'm not saying it was pre-planned, but remember, Trump has done this before.
He assassinated Qasem Soleimani and then rode out an Iranian ballistic missile attack against Al-Assad Air Base in Iraq only to declare the issue resolved.
And so Trump may have initiated something in hopes that the Iranians responded similarly so that there could be an end to this conflict.
I don't know.
I can't get inside the brain of this man.
Is the United States foreign policy subordinated to the wishes of Benjamin Netanyahu?
Well, gosh, you might think that so if you listen to the spokesperson of the Department of State, Tammy Bruce, who said America is the greatest nation in the world after Israel.
That was shocking to me that she said this, an insult.
We're the greatest nation in the world after no one, if you want to make that statement.
But to deliberately for a senior State Department spokesperson to make that statement, subordinating the United States to Israel speaks volumes about where we are as a nation, as a people today.
Here she is saying that, Scott.
The pride of being able to be here and do work that facilitates making things better for people and in the greatest country on earth next to Israel.
In the greatest country on earth.
Next to Israel.
It is, it's an honor to be able to make a difference and to be able to speak in this regard with an administration that I love so much.
She said that in an interview with a reporter while she was, I don't know if the Secretary of State was there, but she was at NATO headquarters.
Yeah, it's an embarrassment to the United States of America.
And under any circumstance, she should be relieved for incompetence.
You don't subordinate the United States to any nation, let alone Israel.
You know, we would never say the United States is the greatest nation in the world, except for Great Britain.
You know, we like the British.
We have a special relationship, but we don't subordinate ourselves to them.
We don't subordinate ourselves to France, to anybody.
And yet she has come out and said this because apparently we are subordinated to Israel.
You could make the argument that every major Middle Eastern war in which we've engaged in the past 20 years has been at the instigation of Benjamin Netanyahu.
You could make that argument indeed.
I think it would hold up in court even.
I mean, Scott, the Israeli donor class we know has an ironclad grip on the Congress.
Now it apparently has an ironclad grip on the White House.
Well, I mean, it was problematic in the extreme when then-candidate Trump took $100 million from Marion Adelson.
We know the agenda that was attached to that $100 million.
You know, Marco Rubio was supposed to be vice president.
That $100 million was supposed to buy that.
Trump said, no, I'm not doing that.
But he gave Marco Rubio the Secretary of State position.
And today, I just want to remind people that when Marco Rubio stood behind the president as he announced the military action against Iran, he wasn't just the Secretary of State.
He was the National Security Advisor.
He's currently dual-hatted, which is constitutionally problematic.
And yet he is literally a de facto tool of Israel.
Marco Rubio is carrying the water for Benjamin Netanyahu.
He's the Secretary of State slash National Security Advisor.
The same can be said for Pete Hegseth.
He's also carrying the water.
He is a longtime Christian Zionist.
You know, these are things that in the old days, to express the opinions that they had, you couldn't have gotten a security clearance.
You know, Israel hasn't always had this grip on the United States.
There was a time that if you were considered to be too close to Israel, you didn't get a security clearance.
You didn't get to hold high positions.
Today, apparently, it is a prerequisite for selection to high office because Trump has surrounded himself almost exclusively with people who have taken significant Israeli money and have basically given voice to their pro-Israeli sentiments.
Here's Marco Rubio making a fool of himself yesterday.
This is about a little over a minute long.
The essence of it is, forget about the intel.
Cut number two, Chris.
Weaponization ambitions.
Are you saying there that the United States did not see intelligence that the Supreme Leader had ordered weaponization?
That's irrelevant.
I think that question being asked in the media, that's an irrelevant question.
That is the key point in U.S. intelligence assessments.
You know that's the same.
Yes, it was.
That's the political decision payment.
I know that better than you know that, and I know that that's not the case.
But you see when the order was given.
And the people who say that, it doesn't matter if the order was given.
They have everything they need to build nuclear weapons.
Why would you bury things in a mountain 300 feet under the ground?
Why do they have 60% enriched uranium?
You don't need 60% enriched uranium.
The only countries in the world that have uranium at 60% are countries that have nuclear weapons because it can just quickly make it 90. They have all the elements they have.
Why do they have a space program?
Is Iran going to go to the moon?
No.
They're trying to build an ICBS.
That's a question of intent.
And you know in the intelligence assessment that it was that Iran wanted to be a threshold statement.
I didn't even know what the intelligence assessment is.
It's a March assessment.
And that's why I was asking you if you know something more from the March.
That's also an inaccurate representation of it.
That's an accurate representation of it.
That's not how intelligence is read.
That's not how intelligence is used.
Here's what the whole world knows.
Forget about intelligence.
Forget about intelligence.
There you go.
Sorry you had to listen to all of that to get to the key part at the end.
Does Marco Rubio know what he's talking about?
Well, unfortunately, Rubio has a very valid point.
The 60% enriched uranium has no purpose other than positioning Iran as a threshold state.
Iran did this.
Or for negotiating or for negotiating purposes.
Right.
Well, I mean, when you position yourself as a threshold state, Iran says that's For negotiating purposes, but what it does is it's opened the door for people like Marco Rubio to say, Oh, you're just one step away from a nuclear weapon that we can't allow you to have, therefore, this represents an imminent threat.
This is why I've always been critical of the Iranians for doing this.
My criticism dates back to October of last year when I wrote an article to publish in Consortium News that said exactly this, that Iran's program, which has 60% enriched uranium and other aspects declared by the Iranians, makes them a threshold nuclear weapon state, and that's unacceptable.
And it leaves open the possibility of military preemptive attack, which would be justifiable, to be honest, because Iran has no legitimate reason to have 60% enriched uranium.
But the Iranians did enter into negotiations prior to this.
What we now know, thanks to Marco Rubio, is that the decision to strike Iran was made on March 7th.
It was April 14th, I believe, that the United States began negotiations with the Iranians that led to draft agreements that would have capped enrichment at 3.75%, disposed of the 60%, resolved all of the issues that Marco Rubio speaks of, but that Marco Rubio didn't care.
So he should also say, I don't care about diplomacy.
And here he is, the Secretary of State, because basically he allowed diplomacy we could use as a front to create a subterfuge that set the Iranians up for the surprise attack.
The Iranians did everything they needed to do to unravel the disaster they had made in enriching uranium 60%.
They were ready to give it all up, to sign a treaty, to cap the whole thing.
But Marco Rubio wasn't interested in the facts.
He wasn't interested in intent.
He had made a decision on the behalf of Israel that he wanted to go to war, and that was the outcome he sought.
How badly has Israel been battered by Iran since its surprise attack in the middle of June?
Well, it's very difficult to say with certainty because Israel has put a media blackout on the strike.
So what has leaked out, the bits and pieces that have leaked out show that Iran is striking targets of critical importance to Israel.
In addition to the Ashdod power generation plant, which if it's totally knocked out, is literally lights out for Israel.
They've struck military facilities now for the first time, inflicting harm on the Israeli military.
And these missiles are reaching their targets.
They are striking.
They are doing damage.
The Israelis themselves, you're starting to hear talk inside Israeli channels that this is not a sustainable conflict, that Israel will have a hard time going on for another week, which is why what came out of the news today that Israel is pressuring the United States to bring an end to this conflict by the end of the week.
And that's sort of ironic, having dragged the United States into this war.
Israel's in such a dire situation that they're pressuring the United States, please end this.
We need this to be over by the end of the week.
We can't take much more of this.
So let me get this straight.
The United States was moving forward with negotiations with Iran on the nuclear enrichment issue.
Benjamin Netanyahu disrupted those negotiations by his surprise attack on Iran.
Now he wants, then he talks the United States into a meaningless PR bombing that costs $100 million of a couple of mountains in Iran.
Now he wants the United States to get him out of the war that he started in order to disrupt the negotiations.
Do I have that right?
Yes, sir.
Except let's make it upfront.
We don't want to give the United States the facade of innocence.
It wasn't that Benjamin Netanyahu disrupted the negotiations.
Benjamin Netanyahu, working with Marco Ruby and others, used the negotiations as subterfuge to set Iran up.
So the United States was part of Benjamin Netanyahu's surprise attack.
Wow.
Russia, China, Pakistan, what are they thinking?
Well, right now, the three of them, yesterday was a very interesting day in the Security Council of the United Nations as Russia, China, and Pakistan came together to sponsor a resolution that would call for an immediate ceasefire.
Now, yesterday, in yesterday's environment, that seemed to be politically impossible to pull off, given the fact that the United States had just struck Iran and it was clear that Iran was going to have to have some sort of retaliation.
But in the current context, where the emptiness of both the American attack and Iran's response and the fact now that Trump isn't going to respond and Israel is screaming for American intervention to bring an end to this conflict, and even Iran is saying, you know, we could see the light at the end of the tunnel here.
We're in strange territory where Russia and China, together with Pakistan, may sponsor a Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire and the United States vote in favor of it.
That hasn't happened yet, but we're now in the realm of the possibility.
So whether it was by accident, on purpose, combination of both, there is a window of opportunity for diplomacy here.
I just hope that everybody's wise enough to take it.
I think the Russians and the Chinese are ready.
I think the Iranians would be willing.
It's up to the United States and Israel in what we're willing to accept in terms of a compromise on Iran's nuclear program.
And that'll make or break any potential ceasefire.
And what happens if Netanyahu comes begging for a ceasefire?
And what happens if he accepts a compromise on uranium enrichment?
And how does he justify and explain the destruction of his country's infrastructure and economy?
And what becomes of him when this ends?
Well, these are all good questions.
If I were Benjamin Netanyahu, I would spin this as a tragic but necessary victory for Israel.
I would say that there was no chance that we would ever destroy the totality of Iran's nuclear Program, that it's impossible to do so, but that the damage we have inflicted on the nuclear infrastructure has set Iran back two to four years.
And because of this, we have compelled the Iranians to surrender those aspects of their program that were most problematic to Israel and the United States.
And that this new nuclear deal, because it's backed by the weight of the United States, is a deal Israel can accept.
But it never would have happened without the decisive leadership of Benjamin Netyo.
That's the kind of BS spin that I'd put on it.
But in reality, he's probably finished in terms of his political career and his personal freedom.
There may be a compromise yet over his personal freedom, meaning that there might be a deal where he steps down, agrees to a slap on the wrist, and there won't be a full prosecution.
I think Israel is interested in just getting past this nightmare.
But he is at real legal risk.
He has several cases open against him.
And as soon as he stops being the prime minister and have the protection of the prime ministership, then he is susceptible to being arrested and in charge, put on trial.
And he knows that.
No matter what, Israel is going to wake up to the fact that this was an unnecessary war.
And when the final tally comes in about the damage done, I think there will be a real political price to be paid, not just by Benjamin Netanyahu, but everybody who pushed this war on Israel.
This was a war of choice.
Israel had not been attacked.
The United States had a diplomatic solution to the problem of Iran's nuclear program.
But Benjamin Netanyahu made a decision to take Israel to war.
Now Israel's paid a very, very steep price.
We don't know what the final price tag will be, and we don't know what the true extent of the political damage that has been done will be until this war is over and the dust settles.
But I am safe to say that I don't think this ends well for Benjamin Netihov.
Did Donald Trump risk initiating World War III by what he ordered on Saturday night?
I believe so.
I don't believe this grand bargain that we're whispering about was even on the table when Trump made that attack.
Meaning, if it was, it was in his head.
You know, it was some sort of Donald Trump trick play.
But I don't think it had been briefed to the Russians.
I don't think it had been briefed to the Chinese.
And I don't think it had been briefed to the Iranians.
And so by carrying out such a precipitous action without a guarantee of what the outcome would be, that means that rather than have the Iranians behave rationally and fire six for six and not seek to kill anybody, what if Iran had just fired a huge, massive retaliation against all of the air bases?
What if the attack against Al-Udaid started off with 50 missiles that caused the United States and Gutter to expend the totality of their ballistic missile defenses and then followed up with, say, 20 precision-guided missiles that took out not the empty hangars, but the bunkers where Americans were hiding.
And suddenly we have hundreds, maybe thousands of dead and wounded Americans.
Now the United States has to retaliate.
This is the danger of playing stupid games of this nature.
This is what Trump was willing to risk.
I agree.
This is an extraordinarily dangerous situation.
What if he was straight or moose?
What if they had attacked oil infrastructure in the region?
And now we have a diplomatic crisis, an economic collapse of the world.
So this is everything that Donald Trump put at risk with this precipitous, irresponsible action.
The fact that we may come out of this would be, I'd be thankful.
But what we're going to get is what we would have gotten through negotiations without any of this war.
And that's what's being overlooked here is even if there is a grand bargain, the bargain we're getting is one that comes with a heavy price tag.
We could have done this just through diplomacy had Donald Trump had a different Secretary of State other than Israeli first Marco Rubio.
Scott Ritter, thank you, my dear friend.
Thank you for yesterday.
Thank you for today.
Thank you for the emails.
Thank you for the sub stacks.
Thank you for all the work you do.
We may need you again this week, which will be a first, but God bless you, my friend.
All the best.
Okay, thank you very much.
Of course.
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