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July 13, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
23:25
Ray McGovern :
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Monday, July 14th, 2025.
Ray McGovern will be here with us in just a moment on Europe's views of Russia.
Paranoid or realistic?
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Ray, welcome here, my dear friend.
You've been traveling around Europe for the past, what, 10 days or two weeks.
Do you have a feeling of how people in general look at Russia?
Is it one of, and if you do, is it one of hope or is it one of fear?
Well, I'm in Oslo, Norway right now.
And the more progressive people who are hosting us are really in favor of doing something about things like Gaza and Israel's attempt to change the Middle East.
But they have been brainwashed on Russia.
Most of their, not these particular people, but most of their countrymen have been sold a bill of goods.
And that's the case in Germany.
It's the case pretty much throughout Europe.
And that's the main fly in the ointment.
There is no free press around here.
Everybody has to believe what people say.
And people like, I won't mention his name, but there are professors that we've met here who have been chided about speaking out if it's inconsistent with the, what do they call it, with the consensus, which has to be, of course, correct.
There is no level of free speech as we like to believe we have in the United States.
There's either a governmental effort or a societal effort to conform.
That's exactly right.
And it's extremely effective.
In Germany, in particular, it's bad here in the United States, but the Germans have perfected this.
Everybody is afraid.
They're afraid to speak their mind, including professors.
There is a very strong opposition to that, but they're very small right now.
And they tend to be conflated with the IFD, the Alternative Veh Deutschland, and that they can spare people very easily by association.
And that's what they're doing, the mainstream press.
Our longtime friend and colleague, Larry Johnson, who will be here with us in an hour and a half, is warning that Germany is on the verge of a fourth Reich.
And it's a toxic mix of the militarization of Frederick Mertz and his party and this type of conformity and fear of speaking out of which you speak.
Do you share Larry's concern?
Yeah, to which I would add, Judge, that the military-industrial complex is very, very powerful in Germany.
Brief example, 2013 or so, before 2014 when the coup in Kiev happened, Kraus Mafai, who had the order to build a common European battle tank, was dead in the water.
Why?
Well, it didn't seem to be much threat from Russia.
Oh, then there was the coup in Kiev, right?
Then there was the involvement of Crimea.
Crimea got scooped up by Russia.
And then there was the MH17, also blamed on Russia.
That, and only that, justified in quotes, the sanctions, the first real brutal sanctions, and of course, turning the people in Europe to believe, well, you can't invade another country.
It was unprovoked, a lie.
It was full scale, another lie.
And it was illegal.
Well, that's unsettled law.
And you ought to read about Article 15 in the Constitution, in the UN Charter, and I'm sure you have, Judge.
Well, you mentioned earlier Gaza.
Do people in the EU care about the genocide in Gaza and American and Israeli bellicosity toward Iran?
I was glad to hear that here in Oslo and pretty much overall in Norway, people care deeply about genocide.
They are second only to the Irish.
Ireland has come out very strongly.
The Irish have their experience with the British and with kind of genocide, starvation, forced starvation called the Great Hunger.
So these two countries are the ones leading Europe and saying, well, look, this Is a human problem.
We can't dust it off.
We can't justify genocide no matter how many Jews were killed during World War II.
Are there signs?
Switching gears now.
Are there signs that you have observed that Donald Trump will soon announce, perhaps as soon as tonight U.S. time, that he's going to pull a full Biden, for lack of a better phrase, in Ukraine?
Well, I like to subscribe to Yogi Bera's dictum that when you come to a fork in the road, take it.
Now, there is a fork in the road here, and I have my own ideas as to which one of these that Trump's going to take.
What's really interesting is that what I welcome here is this surprising opportunity to speak just a few hours before we know what Trump's going to say.
It's a challenge not unfamiliar to me.
It's given me great energy.
And, you know, I'm going to associate myself with Deputy Foreign Minister Ryapkov.
He said recently, it's so priceless that I wrote it down.
Donald Trump makes a lot of contradictory statements and actions, and that really complicates matters.
He's inconsistent in his statements, and this is not making our work any easier.
Well, the same here, okay?
Now, what I see happening tonight is the proverbial lipstick on the pig.
There's going to be new announcements that we're going to send patriots to Ukraine.
Oh, okay.
You got a lot of patriots?
No, we don't have a lot of patriots.
How many?
Maybe 10?
Well, that's actually you Europeans have a lot of patriots.
Of course, you're going to need your own patriots.
So where are the patriots?
Oh, they'll come along.
They build several each year.
Hello?
Patriots are going to make any difference in it.
Well, it's kind of a disguise for what I think Trump is easing out of here.
What else?
Well, we have the Europeans are going to pay for all this, right?
Yeah, okay.
They're going to find the Patriots and they're going to pay us for them when they find them.
It's hard to find Patriots.
And, you know, the big thing, Judge, is that at the NATO summit, there was a formal communique, and it did not say anything about Ukraine's irreversible path toward membership in NATO.
And that's exactly the words used the previous year.
So Trump has pretty much said, okay, let the Europeans take care of this.
Now he has his own domestic constituency that he has to appear.
Good on.
And Putin recognizes that.
I remind people that Putin said five years ago, look, I know that U.S. foreign policy is made on the basis of domestic politics, domestic considerations.
Now, I think that Lavrov has probably told Rubio, look, this is going to go down tonight.
We know that you sent Kellogg to Ukraine to hold their hands and give them big hugs.
We have some video on that, I think, already.
We know that the NATO general secretary is speaking to the president right now, 10 o'clock in the White House.
What's he telling them?
He's telling them, look, it's up to you guys.
We're out of here.
We're going to make this look like we're helping you.
But, you know, even if we wanted to help you, we don't have the armaments.
So you guys take care of this, and it's really over to you.
Now, that is a big change from what most people are predicting.
And I could very well be wrong.
I've been an outlier on this forever.
But let me just cite something that the chief investment person for, well, I can't bring it up now, but his name is Kirilin.
And what he said is, look, there are a lot of people trying to divert our progress toward real improvement with the United States.
And we're not going to let them do that.
And again, I would just say that the overweening desire, justify it or explain it, however you will, for Buchan and Trump to get Ukraine behind them, Trump partly because he doesn't want this to become a Trump's war.
It's Biden's war.
So I see that what Lavrov tells Rubio and Rubio dutifully goes to the press is, oh, look, I just got a new, it's a really interesting and unexpected proposal from Mr. Lavrov, and it's certainly something I'm going to take to the president.
President Trump might say something about that tonight.
But a fork of the road, well, I think the fork of the road has already been taken.
I don't think Trump is going to go back into full-scale support for Zelensky or for the Europeans who really very much desire to get us back in there.
We're out of there in terms of, in other words, that's what I feel.
And again, outlier.
I've been an outlier before, and I've been wrong before, but that's what I think Trump's going to do this afternoon.
Here's Secretary Rubio yesterday being asked about this.
The first answer is a little snarky.
I'm not going to tell you what the president will say, but then he elaborates somewhat.
Chris, cut number three.
The president says that there's going to be an announcement coming relevant or relating to Russia on Monday.
Can you tell us a little bit about what his thinking is based on your conversation last night, where things currently stand?
No.
No.
That's what Monday will be about.
So he did say that there's a new agreement between the U.S. and NATO to get new U.S. weaponry through NATO to Ukraine, and NATO is going to fully pay for that, according to the President.
Can you explain to us exactly, number one, How that's going to work and when those weapons, as part of this agreement, will actually get to Ukraine?
Well, I think what you're referring to is something that Ukraine has already offered, and so has Europe, and that is to buy weapons from the United States and then provide them to Ukraine.
At the end of the day, that some of the systems that Ukraine requires are systems that Europe doesn't make.
They would have to purchase them from the United States.
In addition to that, I would point to the fact that a number of the defensive weapons that Ukraine seeks are in, our allies in NATO have them.
So as an example, Germany, I believe, has 13 or 14 Patriot batteries.
Other countries do as well, Spain, others, and some have placed orders for that.
And so we've continued to encourage our NATO allies to provide those weapons, systems, those defensive systems that Ukraine seeks, that they should provide those weapons to Ukraine since they have them in their stocks.
And then we can enter into financial agreements with us where they can purchase the replacements.
It almost sounds like he doesn't know what he's talking about.
I mean, how dangerous is it for the United States to be giving this stuff away, whether we give it directly to Ukraine or whether Starmer buys it and gets it to Ukraine?
You know, Judge, the riskable fact here is the fact that we ain't got such weapons anymore.
Right.
And so, you know, I don't know how they'd be delivered.
You know, you get them to sign up from Spain or somewhere, and then I guess the White House has an Amazon card for free delivery.
You deliver them to Ukraine.
My God, the whole thing is ridiculous.
That's why I think this is mostly window dressing.
Reuters talks about hundreds of millions of dollars that's going to be invested now in this new aid package from the U.S. Hundreds of millions of dollars dropping the bucket.
There were hundreds of billions of dollars first off that we've invested in Ukraine.
And how are they going to get there these things?
And how long?
So, you know, it'll be a good performance tonight.
And he'll talk to his base and those who say, well, you can't leave Ukraine in the lurch.
But I think when Lindsey Graham gets home, he's going to have to have a real stiff drink.
Because when he mentions these sanctions, for example, well, they've all been written off by people like Ryapkov who say, look, we're used to sanctions.
You try to sanction 500%.
Give me a break.
Other people will also suffer from these sanctions.
So don't pull the sanctions thing on us.
We're at the end of the road here.
I think a fork in the road is the right expression.
I see Trump in cooperation with Putin and Lavrov and Rubio taking that fork and reaching out to their friends like Kellogg going to Ukraine.
He arrived in Ukraine just an hour ago.
I think maybe they should do, do we have a little, Oh, there he is with the big man.
Yeah.
Well, he gave his chief of staff a really big hug when he was dressed in sort of fatigues.
So anyway, I think he's there to say, well, this is the way it is, folks.
You know, go to the Europeans if you need some more deliveries of weapons and we'll pay for it.
We have an Amazon card.
We'll take care of the delivery.
What kind of a message does the American government send when it permits these kinds of videos, these ostentatious manifestations of affection, warmth, collegiality, and alliance between the United States and Ukraine to be spread across the media?
I mean, this was obviously done for show.
Kellogg can't claim that he didn't know he was being photographed.
Well, you know, Kellogg's a different matter, but the whole thing is for show.
And you can't just leave the Ukrainians in the lurch.
After all, we promised them 800 times that we would support them for as long as it takes.
Well, now it's as long as it takes.
We defer to the Europeans.
They talk a big game.
They can't even buy the stuff they need from us.
So it's pretty much a charade.
The only problem is when Americans look at these pictures, they're deceived into thinking, well, we're still in the fight there.
It's going to take a while before the Washington Post and the New York Times educates people as, well, actually, a couple of hundred million dollars doesn't compare what we've given them before.
And we're getting out of there.
But the Europeans are coming and help.
Well, the Europeans can't help.
The Russians will inexorably move to the West very slowly and hope that the U.S. can, in the end, work out the kind of arrangements so that it's not an unconditional surrender from Ukraine, but put a little more lipstick on this pig and say, well, we're supporting this and we have a buffer zone constructed here.
That's what the Russians want.
And I think that Trump will have to come around to that.
Otherwise, it's a real toxic defeat, which can't be disguised by photos such as the ones you just saw.
Do you subscribe to Scott Ritter's view that Ukraine is in the moral, Ukraine's military, pardon me, is in the moral equivalent of hospice?
Well, no, I think it's about a week away from hospice.
But when it becomes clear to Zelensky and the others that there ain't no more patriots coming, when the Russians completely dominate the entire airspace of Ukraine, I mean, sure, they may have drones and stuff, and those are effective to an extent, but Russia has the winning hand here.
And I just refer one more time to Obama of all people, who of course was president when Biden was vice president.
And he said right off the bat, the worst thing we can do for Ukraine would be to give them the idea that they could prevail in a contest or in a struggle or in a war with Russia.
We have to be careful of our own core interests, which have nothing to do with Ukraine, as opposed to Russia's core interests that have everything to do with Ukraine.
So we're not going to give them offensive missiles.
Now, I'll be surprised tonight if Trump says, oh, we'll give them offensive missiles.
In other words, if he just doesn't say, well, we're going to give them enough to defend themselves.
I'll be surprised at that.
But again, I've been wrong before.
The New York Times reports that Ukraine is using fishing nets to catch Russian drones.
I mean, I would think to follow the Ritter analogy, they're pretty close to hospice.
They may even be on life support.
Secretary Rubio was reluctant to spill the beans, understandably, on what President Trump is going to say tonight.
But your favorite senator from South Carolina was not reluctant.
Here he is yesterday, cut number two.
I expect in the coming days, you will see weapons flowing at a record level to help Ukraine defend themselves.
I expect in the coming days that there will be tariffs and sanctions available to President Trump he's never had before.
I expect in the coming days more support from Europe regarding their efforts to help Ukraine.
Putin made a miscalculation here.
For six months, President Trump tried to entice Putin to the table.
The attacks have gone up, not down.
One of the biggest miscalculations Putin has made is to play Trump.
And you just watch.
In the coming days and weeks, there's going to be a massive effort to get Putin to the table.
And to those who are helping him, China, buying cheap Russian oil and having no accountability, those days are about over.
Does he know what he's talking about?
He knows what he wants Trump to do.
Trump has overridden Lindsey Graham many times in the past.
You know, you pick out what you want to believe.
If people want to believe that Lindsey Graham is running this foreign policy, then we're going to have a different kind of outcome tonight.
I've since remembered Dmitryv.
He's Putin's main person for investments, and he was at the first real summit there when they met in Saudi Arabia.
He said, look, there are lots of efforts that are trying to divide a wedge between Washington and Moscow.
Quote, constructive dialogue between Russia and the United States is more effective than doomed to fail attempts at pressure.
He told that, he says, look, this dialogue will continue despite titanic efforts to disrupt it by all possible means.
Now, you could find contradictory statements by various Russians as well as Americans, but I'll go by that because I've seen over the last several months that Putin and Trump really do want to create a more cordial relationship.
Ukraine has lost interests, and, you know, the Middle East has gained interests.
And where are those patriots to look for?
They're in the Middle East right now.
So it's going to be interesting to see what happens tonight.
Again, we'll see, as Trump, the great prophet, likes to say, but we'll see what happens.
We'll see what happens.
Ray McGovern, thank you very much.
Safe travels, my dear friend.
And we'll look forward to seeing you again soon.
All the best.
Thanks.
Thank you.
And coming up later today, actually in a couple of minutes, at 10.45 this morning, Professor Jeffrey Sachs at 11.30 this morning.
Larry Johnson at 1 o'clock this afternoon.
Colonel Douglas McGregor at 2 o'clock this afternoon.
Scott Ritter at 4 o'clock this afternoon from South Korea, Ryan Dawson on the Epstein files.
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