April 12, 2026 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
29:10
Alastair Crooke : Iran Will Not Be Bullied
Alastair Crooke joins Judge Andrew Napolitano to analyze the Strait of Hormuz, arguing that an impending US blockade creates a paradoxical state of being both open and closed. Crooke details how Iranian defenses have forced the US Navy 1,000 kilometers back while warning that boarding foreign vessels would trigger a trade war over rare earths. He exposes recent Islamabad talks as mere presentations of Israeli demands for zero enrichment, which Iran rightly rejected despite 93% of Israelis supporting war. With air power failing to destroy deep underground sites and Netanyahu's trial paused, Crooke concludes the US is trapped in a quagmire driven by Israeli maximalism rather than viable diplomacy. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Escalation Risks and Iranian Vessels00:14:51
Undeclared wars are commonplace.
Tragically, our government engages in preemptive war, otherwise known as aggression, with no complaints from the American people.
Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government.
To develop a truly free society, the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected.
What if sometimes, to love your country, you had to alter or abolish the government?
What if Jefferson was right?
What if that government is best which governs least?
What if it is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong?
What if it is better to perish fighting for freedom than to live as a slave?
What if freedom's greatest hour of danger is now?
Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Monday, April 13th, 2026.
Alistair Crook joins us now.
Alistair, a pleasure, my dear friend.
Thank you for taking the time to chat with us.
Is the Strait of Hormuz open or closed as we speak?
AM Eastern Time in the United States, Monday morning, April 13th.
Well, to take a line from President Trump, It's both.
It's both open and it's both closed at the same time.
Just to expand a bit, what I mean by that is the Iranians still have it open as far as crafts that comply with their regulations, i.e., pay the fee and are paying for their cargo in Huan and are traveling along the approved route, they can still leave.
The question is, of course, the Americans have now instituted, well, they're about to, it's in one hour's time, the blockade on the other side of Hormuz, on the exit from Hormuz.
And we don't know quite how that is going to work.
And so I would say the answer to your question is probably for the time being, it is closed because I can't imagine many masters of ships.
Owners of ships are going to cope with that sort of uncertainty.
For example, what happens if a Chinese vessel, which has been some of the most frequent in transit across Hormuz, what happens if a Chinese vessel passes through?
The Iranians okay it, passes through the transit, and then what happens with American blockade?
Are they going to board a Chinese flagged?
Chinese owned vessel?
Are they going to arrive by helicopter and abseil down onto the deck with guns and take it over?
I mean, this is going to, this will have, I think, intense ramifications with relationships with China if that happens.
It would be an act of war, let's be clear about it.
If a Chinese vessel was assaulted this way, it would be an act of war because it would be in the open seas and they would be taking it.
What would they do then if it turned out the Chinese says, yes, we paid the fee, it's all done, and we're on our way to China with this cargo?
What would the American Navy do then?
Seize the ship, force it to go into some harbor nearby and to disembark its cargo?
You can imagine this is the beginning of a trade war with China.
How will China respond?
Will it start saying, well, oh, rare earths, have we been.
beneficial to you in this respect for now, maybe things are going to get a little bit tougher.
So it widens the whole thing much more.
The other ships that pass through mostly have been coming from Asia, Japanese, but particularly Pakistani and Indian ships.
Are they going to suffer the same treatment that possibly a Chinese ship passing through would suffer?
For an Iranian vessel, they will probably be seized.
They are already being seized or have been seized.
So I think effectively it's closed for some time now, for a period, because until any of this becomes clear, I don't imagine many vessels will be willing to risk going through the straits and then meeting whatever happens.
And also because we don't know quite yet how the Iranians are going to react.
To American, if you like, implementation, however they implement it.
The Iranians have many small, high speed patrol boats which carry anti ship missiles and they also have torpedoes.
And what happened to the two destroyers who thought that they could deceptively slip through Hormuz?
While the negotiations were in full flux in Islamabad, two destroyers were sent, and in premature announcements, it was said that they'd sail through Hormuz.
Of course, what had happened was that they got locked on by cruise missiles by Iran outside of Hormuz, that they'd come out of Fujera port, and they got locked on by cruise missiles and were warned by patrol boats who circled them, you know, turn around and go back.
And they did.
So, we don't quite know what is going to happen then with other vessels.
And we don't know quite how Iran is going to treat vessels that are interfering with ships, vessels using Hormuz, whether they will attack the naval vessels.
They are quite vulnerable, very vulnerable.
Aircraft carrier and the fleet has sailed to a thousand kilometers away from the Persian coast because of the threat of fast patrol boats, of drones, of missiles attacking them.
We saw one of the carriers is now off in some distant land for repairs after having been attacked.
So, this is possible.
So, my answer is it's both.
Open.
That's it.
Closed.
And I think it's likely to stay closed.
And of course, this will inflict considerable pain on the oil markets, maybe the stock markets in the US.
But it may not end there.
Because as the US decides to try and tighten control over Iranian.
Supply lines, if you like, their ability to export or others export their oil overseas, we may well find that the next element in all this will be the extension of this, if you like, blockade or the counter blockade to the Red Sea and Bab al Mandeb.
And the Yemenis may well decide to close then the Suez Canal and the Red Sea.
Oh, good Lord.
And so then the pressure will reverse and the pressure will be much more towards the West and towards the United States because the Red Sea is not so important really in terms of oil and gas travel, but of course essential components to our supply lines pass through the Red Sea.
So that is quite possible escalation.
I don't know if the decision has been taken, but it's certainly being mooted.
At the moment.
Last Monday, when you and I spoke last, we were commenting on the president's very vulgar Easter Sunday posting in which he demanded that the Strait of Hormuz be open.
Now, of course, by his own hand and his own will, he is doing his best to close it.
Does he seem to understand what he's doing, either militarily or economically?
I don't think he does in any way.
It doesn't matter.
I mean, how can I say that?
I think it doesn't matter in how much he understands because he's not in control of the situation.
I think this was the real point.
This was what has emerged from these negotiations in Islamabad.
It was, first of all, an attempt by Iran, a trial to see.
Whether the United States has agency, has the ability to do a deal.
And the answer came from Vance, and it was towards the end of the talks.
And Vance had been talking throughout.
I think he had something like, he himself said, he had had something like 11 telephone conversations with Trump during the negotiations and one with the Israelis.
And when it came out, what were the conditions that had not been met?
It was completely and utterly the Israeli agenda.
I mean, it wasn't in any way a negotiating agenda.
It was zero enrichment, all the facilities of enrichment, all the facilities, the infrastructure to be destroyed.
It was all about all of the other wish list, if you like, of Israel, that the 340 kilos of enriched handed over.
and there would be no more enrichment in Iran.
I mean, all these things would be, I mean, are, of course, the wish list from Tel Aviv completely.
And then it suddenly came to a stop.
What I hear from the discussions were actually that they were quite, the worst in the technical talks, they were quite civilized and they made some progress.
But then towards the end, it became quite clear who was in charge.
So my answer is, will this change?
It will only change if there was a radical change in the position, not of the United States or Mr. Trump, but a radical change in the position of Israel.
Wow.
So it sounds as though the Vance-led and Israeli-monitored, the Witkoff and Kushner negotiations, were a farce.
It almost sounds as though Vance was speaking to Ben Gavir or Smotrich on the phone.
And it sounds as though Trump cannot control Netanyahu.
Rather, it's the other way around.
Do all of those conclusions bear some accuracy in your view?
Oh, that's exactly it.
I mean, this was not a negotiation.
This was the presentation by Vance at the end of the process of the demands of Israel.
That's what he put down, the position of Israel, and Iran refused it.
So that's why I'm saying, now, of course, people will start to say, well, perhaps there can be more negotiations.
And of course, Iran will say, diplomacy is possible.
I mean, they are very sophisticated in this way, and they know they need to take the world with them, and they need to take China and Russia with them and show that they are flexible.
But if you just study the points that were issued by the US embassy in Islamabad as the American demands on Iran, they were demands for Iranian capitulation.
That's not going to happen.
So, even if there is another round of negotiations in this period, unless there's a dramatic shift in the Israeli position, and all that we see looking through the Israeli press this morning, the Hebrew press, is the opposite.
It is the opposite that Israel, first of all, I mean, there's a sort of a strange dichotomy in Israel.
The polls show 93% of Jewish Israelis support more war.
On Iran and the destruction of Iran, 93%.
And at the same time, the military side and many of the Israelis who are looking at it strategically say this has been a disaster.
Strategic Disaster and Underground Sites00:03:03
We've achieved nothing.
Netanyahu has failed in Iran to get any achievements.
And look at what's happening in Lebanon, where Israel is suffering terribly.
And the chief of defense staff went to the cabinet and said, You know, the army is imploding.
It's breaking up.
It's gone.
It's bust.
And he said, I'm putting up 10 red lights to you.
We can't go on.
In Lebanon, we're taking heavy losses.
We are being defeated in Lebanon.
And he says, You know, in Gaza, we have not succeeded.
And in Iran, there is no success.
But 93% of Israelis still have the, what can I call it, the sort of Panglossian hope to see a thoroughly defeated Iran, a Iran that is on its knees, that is no longer capable of functioning as a state at all.
And therefore, the message going out now, this morning, from Israel is quite simply this you have to escalate.
We have now, you have to attack their oil, their electricity, their civilian infrastructure.
We have to, well, in Trump's words, send them back to the Stone Age.
And that's what you have to do now.
We have to escalate.
And they even said, I mean, there's talk, they haven't raised it publicly yet, but they are considering explaining to Trump that even zero enrichment, the handing over of all the enriched uranium, That Iran has 340, 60 percent.
Even if that is done, it's not enough.
Why?
Because they say, you know, the knowledge would still be there.
They'd still know how to do it.
And they would still be able to start again from scratch.
So what it's also going to mean is we have to investigate all of their underground sites.
And they've got to be monitored.
And we have to go into all of the underground sites that Iran has.
Only then can we say that we've removed the danger of Iran becoming a nuclear power.
So that's, I mean, more than a sort of maximalist position.
It's an extraordinary position calling for the complete, really, the complete, you know, capitulation and then destruction of the state.
So Trump has truly created a quagmire from which he has no escape, really.
He would have to leave Netanyahu on his own.
Are the Iranians still attacking?
Bombing Effects and State Capitulation00:10:53
Sites in Israel, or are they unlike the Israelis honoring the ceasefire?
At the moment, they are not attacking any sites unless they be attacked.
The exception to this, which is much resented, is Lebanon, where even now there are massive attacks taking place.
Many Lebanese have been killed in towns and villages, not this time in Beirut, but in the south.
And there are major conflicts taking place in Bin Jibale, which were featured very much in when I was there in 2006, and Kiam, which stands up on a hill and has always been a source of problem to Israel.
And they're trying to suppress these two cities, the fighting is intense, and Israel is losing a lot of fighters in this conflict.
Hezbollah will be losing.
Some of its people too, but it's not going smoothly for Israel at all.
They've just lost earlier in the few days, they lost many tanks, nearly 100 Merkova main battle tanks have been destroyed, many with their crews in them.
Some crew managed to escape, but it's been a disaster, and Hezbollah keeps firing from the north, north of the Litani River, which is about a third of the way up Lebanon, if you like.
Heading to the north, and it's firing missiles into Israel, into the north, and even into Tel Aviv.
So the war is in full spate, despite it being supposed to be part of the ceasefire.
The Israelis just broke that undertaking, as you know.
You have personally, earlier in your career, participated in many delicate negotiations.
In the Middle East.
This negotiation went on for 21 consecutive hours, during the course of which, as you just said, the chief negotiator, obviously not trusted by the president, was forced to call the president 11 times while he was being monitored by the president's business partner, an arch Zionist, and the president's son in law, an arch Zionist.
This is crazy.
Is this any way to run a serious negotiation?
No, of course not.
I mean, there is nothing.
If you simply, I mean, you recall that the Iranians put forward some preconditions, some ideas on which Trump said were a reasonable position to negotiate, a reasonable, if you like, negotiation start that would have been agreed beforehand.
Those were completely thrown out of the window.
There were some discussions between the technical groups, but they mattered nothing.
Because the main issues on all of these issues, missiles or nuclear, were 100% following the Israeli agenda.
And so there was no negotiation.
It was not a negotiation at the end.
It just became a dictation.
You know, this is our position.
You accept it or you don't.
And Iran said, no, we don't accept it.
And then they went home.
That's how it ended.
It was not a negotiation at all.
And as I say, I don't think it can be because ultimately the negotiator is Israel and not Washington in this process.
And they sit there and they phone instructions through to the American negotiating team, which are then implemented.
You can't take this forward.
As I say, you know, some people, I'm sure the Europeans will say, oh, let's have another try at negotiations.
But I think both the Iranians and the Americans can see that unless something substantial changes, what's the point of further negotiations if the key issues are presented to us as a take it or leave it case?
Adding to the absurdity of all of this was the fact that the Israeli prime minister was seated in the defendant's box in a criminal courtroom yesterday.
As his bribery trial resumed, the court taking the position that, well, if there's a ceasefire, then you can come back to court and we can resume your trial.
I'm not sure the situation today is.
I understand it that his lawyers have said there's no question of him appearing again in court for the time of this conflict because it's too dangerous and therefore he will not appear again.
The court case is now put aside because he cannot, he will not attend.
So that's put on the back burner for.
What do you think happens after another week, at the end of the second week of the so called ceasefire?
Are the Americans going to be back to attempting to level Tehran?
I think that what we're going to see, first of all, is there's a disparity here.
Is that I think the decline in Trump's popularity that is going to emerge as people look at the new oil prices and the problems of shortages taking place and even food shortages.
I mean, it can be really severe if this goes on for very much longer, severe loss.
And if Baba Al Mandab comes into the equation, too.
We're talking about something that could really have a significant effect on the world economy, ours and also the Asian economy.
And I think the ability of Trump to sustain this is far shorter than the ability of Iran to maintain its resilience and to maintain its position, retain its position.
Now, all the United States can do, or Trump can do in this position, is to threaten some sort of further military action.
He can threaten that he will bomb more.
But they long ago, I mean, I think I mentioned, but when I was in 2006 during the war between Hezbollah and Israel, the Israelis planned for a short war, just like Trump, short war.
So they had a target bank that had expired.
After less than a week.
And then they didn't have any further targets.
You know, they'd used whatever it was, 2,000 targets, all had been bombed.
The effect of the bombing, that's a different issue, but they'd used up their target batch.
So after that, they just started attacking civilian structures, civilian buildings, attacking the people.
That's what's going on in Iran.
I read time and time in the sort of mainstream press and say, oh, the superb professionally.
You know, the Air Force of the United States and Iran, one has to admire their professionalism.
And I mean, for goodness sake, what do you mean it's a milk run?
They just go and, you know, push a button and return home for lunch.
But apart from that, I mean, the question is, has it been effective?
And the answer is no.
This has been a classic, if you like, exposure of the failure of air power, that the idea that air power alone is sufficient to bring down a state.
And achieve your objectives.
And one of the reasons is because all of the Iranian military infrastructure is deep underground and they have not got it.
They have not attacked it.
They've not been able to.
In some cases, it's 800 meters under a granite mountain.
And the Americans and the Israelis have bombed it and bombed it.
And the mountain is getting gradually blacker with the smoke.
But underneath the thing, half an hour later, The missiles come out and it's all automatically arranged.
So it hasn't been effective.
The air power has not been effective.
So, what can he do except to go back and to bomb more residential buildings in Beirut, bomb more residential buildings in Tehran, and kill more people?
But even there, it's Quite striking.
And people will deny it or say it's wrong.
But what I believe is that actually the Iranians have suffered fewer casualties in this month of war than during the 12 day war because they did one thing from the beginning they emptied out all of the buildings.
They just had all of the public buildings, the universities, everything was emptied out.
So much of the bombing has been on empty buildings.
Of course, there are civilian casualties.
The Iranians, I think, say sort of 2,000 to 3,000 deaths from the bombing.
Maybe it's more.
I don't know.
But it's not the sort of catastrophe that is being.
Wow.
Alistair, thank you very much, my dear friend.
Sorry that Netanyahu jumped in on us.
Yeah, I wondered how.
He's obviously not happy with what we're saying.
Didn't like it.
Right.
Much more to come to his displeasure.
Thank you very much, Alistair.
All the best.
We'll see you next week.
Thank you indeed.
Thank you.
Sure.
Bye for now.
Morning and Afternoon Guest Lineup00:00:18
Bye bye.
Coming up today, a full day for you at 9 o'clock this morning, Larry Johnson.
At 10 this morning, Ray McGovern.
At 11 this morning, Scott Ritter at 1 this afternoon.