Transcription
Welcome back, everybody, to Neutrality Studies. My name is Pascal Lot. I'm an associate professor at Kyoto University. And today, it is my pleasure to be joined again by my friend and colleague, Professor Steven Starr, a former director of the University of Missouri's clinical laboratory science program and a senior scientist at the Physicians for Social Responsibility. Uh, Stephen, welcome back.
>> Well, thank you. It's a pleasure to be here with you. Well, I wish it was for happier circumstances, but unfortunately, we are gathering in order to talk about the Iran war and how horrible everything has become, and you know, the, the, the >> just the chances of escalation, right? And and what could escalate on the weapons level, because you've been doing research about this for a while. Uh, just very quickly, can you give us your, your, your background and what you have in store for us?
>> Well, I've, I've taught a class on nuclear weapons at the university for 10 years. I've written a book on nuclear electromagnetic pulse, and I worked as an expert witness for Switzerland and New Zealand at the United Nations on nuclear weapons effects. Um, I've been, you know, like anyone else, I've been very concerned about what's going on in the Middle East. I'm horrified by the fact that we've attacked Iran again. I just think this is a, it's a, a tragedy. Um, but I really think that Trump, uh, is delusional. I think that they've grossly underestimated Iran's capabilities. Um, they have looked at what happened, even the 12-day war in 2025, what, what happened with the, the missiles that Iran launched at Israel then. Um, I can, I got a video clip of that. But, you know, basically, I'm, I'm very concerned that this war is going to spin out of control pretty quickly. I, I can summarize, I'll, I'll summarize my thoughts at the beginning and then I'll return to them at the end of my presentation.
>> Then let's, let's move to your presentation. Actually, we've prepared it over here. Um, we can see your screen, so, um, >> please go ahead.
>> Well, you know, as everyone watching knows that the war erupted, the US attacked, and we killed Ayatollah. And I didn't even realize until the other day that he's not just a political leader in Iran. I mean, he's the second holiest religious figure in the Shia religion. And it's like, uh, if someone killed the Archbishop of Canterbury in Christianity or something like that, it's not a, that's a big deal to, particularly to highly religious people. So that in itself is, it's not just a regime change as they want to call it. Um, so Iran has retaliated quickly, and this time they were prepared for this. Um, and the image there, I think you showed that in your presentation the other day that you did.
>> Yeah, because I got it yesterday from you via email. So, thank you for that. It's, it's, uh, yeah. Can you tell us what it is?
>> Well, it's a US base in Iraqi, Iraq. It was an ammunition dump that was hit and exploded. I'm sure there's a lot of casualties. You know, they say in war, truth is the first casualty. So, we're not going to really get any sort of accurate numbers for American casualties, probably for some time.
>> Just, I think, I think at the moment, it stands at the official tally as of this morning on, on my March 3rd, your, your evening of March 2nd, is, uh, six dead service members.
>> Yeah. Right.
>> Well, I think you might need to add a couple zeros to that. But, you know, it wasn't just this one base. Um, they also hit, uh, the headquarters of the Fifth Fleet. Uh, they destroyed, Iran destroyed some very large radar complexes. I mean, there are 27 US bases that were hit that I was able to find out. That's a lot. I mean, there's, US has more bases than that, but these were all large bases. So, that's the first one of the things that's happened. Um, let's see. How do I get this to? There we go. There we go.
>> Um, so my summary is, I, I really think we've, we may be headed towards the equivalent of an Armageddon with this. It's almost, it has a biblical implication for, um, Iran has more than 3,000 ballistic missiles, probably 5,000, 6,000, and has thousands of cruise missiles and a huge number of drones. And the US and Israel will likely run out of air defense munitions in a matter of a few weeks. We weren't at all prepared for this. The US has been depleting its, uh, reserves for some time in Ukraine and then giving to Israel. But more than that, you know, we lack the industrial base to produce a lot of these things. They're, they're made by hand. U, so it's, it's almost, it's kind of unbelievable. Larry Johnson has discussed a lot of this in great detail, but you can go to his website and find out more. Um, Iran has placed most of its missiles in underground missile cities, and these are really elaborate complexes. They're deep underground. And Iran is like a country made of granite.
>> You, and you, you can't use a Tomahawk missile to take out one of these things. That just bounces off of it.
>> Um, and there, you know, Iran is an enormous country. It's, it's about, about the size of Western Europe. I don't think people realize that. Maybe four times larger than Iraq. So trying to hunt up and find all of these missile cities. I mean, I, I'm sure they've been using radar and satellites to try to figure out where they are, but trying to hit all of these in a, in a short period of time is just impossible. And Iran can decimate Israeli cities with these forces. There's only three large cities in Israel that have 50% of the population. And I do not think that Israel will accept the destruction of its cities. Uh, you know, if they, you have thousands of ballistic missiles coming in and just hammering their cities, that's, I think that Israel, I mean, they, I'm sorry, but I believe they've been committing genocide for some time with the help of the United States, something I've been deeply ashamed of, actually. Um, so I don't see why they would have any qualms about using nuclear weapons, particularly if their cities are, are being destroyed, which we'll find out soon.
>> Yeah. I just, I just want to point out at this point, at this stage, you know, we, we are seeing, I think for the first time, a, a coalition war of two nuclear weapon states against a non-nuclear weapon state, right? Uh, >> uh, this is, this is, this is very, very extreme. So, um, the, the ability of the Israelis to strike, uh, Iran with nuclear weapons is there at any point in time. And since it's an indigenous program, they could do it without US approval.
>> Exactly. And they have a large nuclear arsenal. I'll discuss that in a few minutes.
>> Um, I, I mentioned air defense systems. I thought people may not know, but these are the three systems that the US relies on. Terminal High Altitude Aerial Defense system, and we really have many of those. We have eight batteries in total. Uh, we have 50 to 60 Patriot batteries of Patriot missiles, and about 12 of those are in theater in the Middle East right now, and the ships use the SM3, uh, interceptors. So, I, I found a website that estimated how many missiles that they had going into it. I figured we had 5 to 600 THAAD interceptors, somewhere between 1,000 and 1,500 Patriot missiles, and, uh, maybe 400 of the SM3s. So that's not a whole lot because, um, you know, you typically will, you will fire two interceptors for every missile or drone that's coming in. Uh, this was a headline from, uh, was it the Wall Street Journal today? "US races to accomplish or mission before munitions run out." We've fired 1,200 interceptor missiles in the last two days. We may have fired up to half of the ones that they have in theater already. Um, and as I mentioned, we can't make enough missiles. We right now, even with the, with the Ukraine war and they, we're going to increase production, the US can make 400 THAAD missile interceptors and 750 Patriot interceptors per year. Yeah, I mean, that, if you think about that, and Iran might send thousands of missiles coming, um, we, we can, we can use those, those up in a few days.
>> Um, >> well, for example, uh, in 2025, the US fired a quarter of all its THAAD missiles in a few days fighting Iran.
>> That's the 12-day war, right? In 12 days, the US fired 25% of its THAAD missiles.
>> Right? So that's just shows you how thin we are. So what happens when the missiles run out? Um, another big thing, you know, Iran is closest Strait of Hormuz. That's 20% of the world's oil and liquid natural gas there that used to flow through there, if not now. Um, and attacks have begun already on Iran. Iran's Iranian oil pipeline has been hit, and Iran has started to respond by targeting infrastructure. Um, you know, Saudi Arabia, I believe, officially declared war on Iran, which I, I kind of shuddered when I heard that because I thought, man, uh, and there's going to be this, if this is going to accelerate, we're going to have, we're going to lose a huge amount of infrastructure over there. This shows some of the possible targets that Iran could hit, uh, in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, all of these facilities or range of, uh, Iranian missiles.
>> Yeah. And, and I, I think very importantly, of short-range missiles, right? The ones that they have even more of.
>> Right. They've got lots of missiles, and you can see the diagram in the lower corner that shows some of the missiles, and I'll go into that. Um, hey, very brief intermission because I was recently banned from YouTube. And although I'm back, this can happen anytime again. So, please consider subscribing not only here, but to my mailing list on Substack. That's pascalota.substack.com. The link's going to be in the description below. And now, back to the video. You know, in four years ago, a US general was on, went on record saying that Iran possessed over 3,000 ballistic missiles. And I'm sure that I, I've heard Larry Johnson estimate that they have five to 10,000. I think 10,000 is probably high, but I wouldn't be surprised five or six thousand. And that doesn't include thousands of cruise missiles. So, that's an enormous arsenal. This is not, uh,
>> And, and may I just ask, do you know about the, the production capacity? You know, can they make new ones of those even while, even now, like while they're under attack?
>> They have, uh, production facilities underground, probably in these same missile cities or something similar to it. I saw just maybe a couple weeks ago, they offloaded a, a bunch of tons of, uh, uh, missile fuel perchlorate, you know, as explosives. I'm sure they were taking them, you know, in anticipation of manufacturing munitions. So they, they've been preparing for this for a long time. But you can look at these photos. These are not just little tunnels. These, these go for miles. Um, this is a satellite photo of the, uh, one of the missile cities. And the missiles, uh, are mounted on mobile launchers within the city. So they can pull those out, and those, you know, it's hard to hit a mobile launcher, too. They can drive them around. They don't have to stay in one spot. Um, this is a, a picture of some of the mobile launchers coming out of the tunnel. You can see the size of that tunnel. It's not, uh, it's formidable.
>> Yeah. But you could try to destroy these entry points, right? And then, and then lock people in. That would >> Well, that's true. That's true.
>> And I'm sure that was, uh, a lot of that's trying to happen right now.
>> And we, we're going to be in the fog of war. We really, um, won't know. But I wanted to make the point again, this is, Iran superimposed over Europe. So imagine trying to find all of these missile cities in a country that size, you know, particularly for being shot at. Now, Iran also has hypersonic missiles that travel 9,000 to 11,000 miles per hour, and we have no ability to intercept those. But, you know, just, we've seen that demonstrated in, in Ukraine. The Patriot missiles can't, they haven't been able to shoot down the Russian hypersonic missiles. And people that may not know what a hypersonic means, uh, it's anything that goes faster than five times the speed of sound or Mach 5. But, um, these are like Mach 9 or Mach 13, 15. That's fast. And, you know, ballistic missiles can travel that fast, but they're not maneuverable. Whereas a hypersonic missile is actually maneuverable, which makes it, you know, our ballistic missile defense is designed to intercept missiles on a ballistic trajectory, which is the parabola. You know, it's a predictable path. If you have a maneuverable missile, and you're out of luck.
>> Um, this was, um, so that shows you how fast they can go. And, u, and this is a video that was taken when Iran launched 180 missiles at Israel in October 2024. And we, our media here told us they intercepted them all. But that's a lie. You can see that when they strike the ground, those are warheads hitting. Some of the explosions up in the air are being intercepted.
>> Right. So, this was, yeah, this was the response to, I think, the killing of, uh, this was one of the attacks on the Iranian consulate in Damascus. Yeah.
>> And, you know, they didn't learn from this. I mean,
>> And this, this was Iran showing the Israelis and the Americans what they can do, that they are not kidding, that they have the ability to strike them. Yeah.
>> Right. So again, you know, you can see Israel, a little up on the Mediterranean Sea, a little brown area, and then Iran over to the right. And it's a long way from Israel. And it's, uh, to highlight the population there's, you know, Israel is, uh, about around 79 times larger than Israel and it's got 10 times the population. And 50% of the Israelis live in the three cities, Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem. And what that means is that those are very, uh, that's a small number of targets for a lot of missiles.
>> Right.
>> Now, Dr. The Postal did a really good presentation recently, and I took the liberty of using some of his images here. This one shows a simulated missile impact in Tel Aviv with 500 missiles, each carrying a one-ton warhead with an accuracy of plus or minus 1,000 meters circular air probability. That's CAP. Um, it's quite a, you know, that's a lot right there. This is a, a high-resolution image that shows where the targeting would be. Um, if you were there. This is a image from Gaza, but you can see the same type of damage, the direct hit in the background and one in the foreground. Damage, uh, from a detonation at 30 to 40 meters. Well, um, if you're going to be in Tel Aviv, you may be seeing a lot of this. I, I, this is something that really bothers me. Israel, uh, destroyed the Al-Aqsa University where in Gaza, where 25,000 students once studied. And if this is what it would look like if you're observing from a distance, this is something that's, you know, I, I mean, I taught in college, and it's learning, and this is just one more atrocity besides hitting hospitals and schools.
>> One more, one more war crime designed to, to make it impossible for, for Gazans to ever study again, to kind of, to rebuild. But you're, you're, you're using this as an example of what a couple of missiles can do, right? To a.
>> Uh, so this is a, another image by Dr. Postal, only this time the, the missiles have, they're better accuracy. They're plus or minus 500 yards, and you can see how much more concentrated they would be. Uh, this is, uh, Israel last night. This is what I think several hundred missiles were fired. There they go. There they go. And they, they always, they, they launch them together.
>> Oh yeah. They overwhelm the air defenses.
>> Yeah. And you just said, like, if we assume about, about the capacity, even of just two and a half to 3,000 of the, of these long-range ballistic missiles, they can, they can, they can mount such salvos like they can mount at least 20 or 30 such salvos before they run out. I mean, if you imagine that was probably, you know, 100, 150 warheads coming in, you multiply that times 20. Uh, you know, I think that Israeli cities would wind up resembling Gaza if this happens. You know, Gaza covers 140 square miles or 363 kilometers, and Tel Aviv's 20 square miles or 51 square kilometers. So, at any rate, I thought I'd show one more. You know, these videos were, were removed from the internet. They're trying to censor this so people don't see what's going on. But this is again, Israel last night. And this is a foretaste of what's going to be happening. I mean, it may be happening right now as we speak. And I pity the people everywhere that are going to be killed by this. You know, it's just a war. Such an atrocity. But
>> This is absolutely horrible. It's absolutely this. It's absolutely terrible. But at this point, Iran has no other option than to, than to, than to launch this. I mean, as long as you're being shot at,
>> You will shoot back, right? That's the, it's a relatively simple logic.
>> Iran. Yeah. I mean, it's war.
>> So, I think it's important to address the question of Israeli nuclear weapons. You know, under US law, the Symington Act, it's foreign aid is prohibited to nations possessing nuclear weapons that are not within the non-NPT, the Non-Proliferation Treaty. And Israel isn't a member of the NPT, but Iran is.
>> Uh, and, and the Pentagon finally admitted recently that Israel has nuclear weapons. So, it's, but the law doesn't seem to matter in the United States anymore. The Constitution, nothing does, you know.
>> Yes, Stephen. I mean, under the Constitution, the, the president doesn't have the power to declare war. It must be Congress. I mean, the Constitution is, is really a worthless piece of paper by now. I mean, if it is,
>> I mean, if, if the president can usurp the power to make war, what can he not? And if, if all, if all the, the Congress does is just sit there and take it, then, well, you've been reduced to a rubber stamp, uh, council. You know, ironically, uh, ever since we've had launch-ready nuclear weapons, in a sense, the president's been able to launch a nuclear attack anytime he's wanted to, right?
>> For the last 20 or 30 years. I remember Dick Cheney made a joke about that.
>> But it's really out in the open with this. And the other question I wanted, you know, Israel, it's sort of a, they, they like to downplay how many weapons they have. And I think, uh, it's sort of a scope. I, I really admire, uh, some of the guys that publish information about nuclear weapons, but one that's respected in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has said for years that they have 90 nuclear warheads. Well, that's not true. Uh, you know, even I found an article by the, published by the Defense Department in the 1990s in the US that said that Israel had between 90 and 300 nuclear warheads, you know, 25, 30 years ago. Um, Israel also has, uh, a second strike capability, they would call it. They have German diesel subs. They have five of them. And the two most recent are the most modern. They have very long range. Uh, they carry 16 cruise missiles that are armed with 200 kiloton warheads, similar to Tomahawk cruise missiles. And, you know, this is a very, very deadly weapon. So,
>> Can, can they carry a nuclear warhead?
>> Oh yeah, they do. I mean, they're armed with their nuclear warheads, each one of those cruise missiles. So there's 16 nuclear warheads on board each one of those subs, and they can, you know, they can go a thousand miles. So, uh, what's the outcome? I, I think the desired US and Israeli outcome of this war is this regime change. We don't make any secret about it. They would like to see Iran broken into pieces, fragmented. You know, the elimination of all the offensive capabilities, Iran, the missiles destroyed, and, you know, the US is going to suffer some losses, but would be seen as winning along with Israel. So, that's, that's what's being trumpeted here. But, um, maybe that's not what's going to happen. I don't think so. I think, I think US and Israel won't be able to, to defend against the Iranian missile attacks or destroy the Iranian missile cities. We're going to run out of the defensive missiles for our interceptors in pretty short order. You know, some of the ships are having to travel a couple days just to go back. They have their, the, uh, they have upright tubes where they load, load the missiles in the SM3s, and they, they have to do that in port. Um, and I think under these circumstances, the United States is going to suffer major losses. We have already seen the bases that are being hit and are being evacuated. Um, you know, US aircraft have been downed. They've claimed the F-15s were from friendly fire, but I don't know. I think that, who knows.
>> Um, >> F-15 downed by friendly fire. I mean, somebody accidentally fired at your own, uh, uh, aircraft. I mean, that's, that's, that's a tough one to swallow.
>> It, it's possible. I, I'm not going to say it's not true, but, you know, that's what you want to say. You don't want to admit that Iran might have an active air defense that could interfere with us. Um, but the point, you know, my main point here is, as you could see, is Israeli cities are likely to be devastated by Iranian missiles. And if that happens, I think they'll retaliate with this nuclear arsenal. They have. They call it the Samson Option. It goes back for some years with the Philistines and the Samson pulls down the temple, you know.
>> So, um, I don't know. I'm sorry that's not a very optimistic forecast, but, you know, I've been trying to convince people that nuclear weapons are a bad idea for about 30 years. And we're, if we're stupid enough to stumble into a nuclear war, we could risk most of the life on Earth with, then we go from a few nuclear warheads to thousands of them in the US and Russian arsenals. So, so I'll, uh, stop sharing.
>> Thank you. Thank you. And if you open up again, your, your browser, you will see me as well. And thank you for this. I mean, it's, it's, it's the realities of this are are extremely scary. The, um, does Iran have any kind of missiles that could reach continental United States?
>> No, I don't think so.
>> Okay.
>> Uh, they, you know, they, they've tried to be very conservative, really. You know, ironically, the Ayatollah who they just, the US just killed, has been, had his fatwa against making nuclear weapons for decades, you know.
>> Yeah.
>> But, uh, they, they don't want to present a threat to the US, but they, their neighbor Israel, as I mentioned, has a nuclear arsenal, isn't a member of the NPT as they are. And, um, you know, Larry Johnson cites statistics show that Iran is not a leading, uh, sponsor of terrorism as often claimed here. You know, it's more likely Israel. So,
>> Which one of the two just, just inflicted a genocide on part of the, of the, people in the, in the Middle East and West Asia? I mean, which one of the two? To me, I'm sorry to say this, but Israel is the North Korea that the West likes. It's our friendly North Korea. It's the one with the nukes that has nukes against all international law. It's the one that has been threatening terror and then terrorizing the, the people that, that live around it while screaming that it's being, uh, that it is being mistreated. But for some reason, that works. Although today in the New York Times, there was a, there, there is a very amazing article that basically says, uh, that leads with how Netanyahu, Mr. Netanyahu convinced Donald Trump to go to war. That surprised me quite a bit.
>> Dean Files.
>> That one.
>> I mean, I, at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if somebody told Donald Trump, you either attack or you die. I wouldn't be surprised if he got like physically threatened into doing this, or well, uh, Epstein, Epstein files bribed, because it is, it is so clearly not in the interest of the, of the United States as a country, nor of Donald Trump as a person, nor of, uh, the MAGA base. I mean, this is the end of MAGA. It's like he cannot recover from this. Well, you know, his primary campaign promise was no more foreign wars.
>> Yes.
>> This is a complete violation of that. It's just, it's so sad, really. Uh, I think he actually had the opportunity to, he could have gotten out of Ukraine, stopped backing Israel, and he would have had enormous public support here for that. People have been trying to vote against endless war here for a long time. But as they say, no matter who you vote for, you get John McCain for president.
>> Yeah. I mean, we are now seeing, we've seen a post by Kamala Harris on Instagram saying that she opposes the Iran war and, and she, she would never do this. It's like, come on. You were the, you were the Vice President of the United States while you, while you implemented this proxy war with Ukraine and did nothing and sat on your hands. It's like, who are you fooling? The system. It's the system that produces this. It doesn't matter who's the captain. The, the steering wheel is not connected to anything.
>> Right?
>> Democracy theme park where all the handles and levers aren't connected to anything.
>> Yeah. But I mean, this is not to say that nobody has power or something. It's just that, uh, uh, the, the, the, the way the entire political system in the United States runs is like way more than like just the president. I mean, the president is just one of the, uh, dependencies within a long, long, uh, uh, machinery, right? So the question then is, like, what are the, what are the actual, uh, factors that then now would, uh, impact decision-making on the implementation of the war? Because as you just, as you just laid out, uh, this, what we are seeing at the moment, the missile, the missile exchange, right? And the blowing up of, of strategic targets, is just one. It's actually, at, at the moment, at a low level of all audience, right?
>> Yeah. Mhm.
>> Um, so the, the, the point you were making with one of your slides is that Iran doesn't need nuclear, uh, nuclear capabilities in order to completely devastate, uh, one of the, the three main cities of Israel and make them basically turn them into Gaza, right?
>> That's right. And that would say that it's possible that they,
>> Theodore Postal also did a presentation with, I think it was Nemo a while back, and said that he thought that they may have used some of that 60% enriched uranium to, uh, to, you know, made them into pits and maybe made nuclear weapons, but nobody knows for sure. But even if they did, they'd have a handful of them compared to what Israel has. So,
>> Yeah, I think that, that presentation by Ted Postal with, was with Glenn Dies, and his point was these nuclear, these nuclear weapons are by now so easy to make. I mean, it's an 80-year-old technology, soon to be 100.
>> And, uh, you don't need to test those. You don't, this is not a very elaborate thing. You can, you, you know how.
>> Oh, that's exactly right. We know how to put them together, and any rational kind of military actor would have to assume that that Iran now possesses these nuclear capabilities, right?
>> Well, if you can make a hypersonic missile, I mean, the US hasn't even successfully tested a prototype, and Iran's firing them.
>> So, they, they have super advanced technical capabilities. I mean, I, they call it a virtual nuclear weapon state when a country has manufactured all the components for a weapon, but they haven't assembled them. Japan would be one of the countries like that, for example.
>> Yeah.
>> But, um, as far as I know, at least, uh, I think it was Vice President Biden said that in an interview in 1996.
>> No, no, no. Over here in Japan, it's well understood. It's one of the open secrets that Japan is six months away from a, from a nuclear, from a, a deployable nuclear, uh, uh, warhead because they have the missile capabilities. They have the, the, uh, nuclear energy, uh, uh, production sites.
>> Plutonium.
>> Yeah.
>> But, yeah, so, I mean, and they have the knowledge to do it. So if, if the decision was made, they would have it very quickly. So it's, it's a threshold state. Uh, now the, the question is, is Iran over the threshold? Yes or not? But the, the argument that the Postal made, actually, is that any rational military actor, like meaning also that, right,
>> Including Israel and the United States, would need to plan on the assumption that if they shoot nukes, a nuke will come back.
>> Exactly right. If,
>> You're not sure, right?
>> Right. And I, you know, I just hope nobody shoots nukes. But as you pointed out, u, Iran doesn't have to, to devastate those cities. And, you know, even the World Court, um, has ruled, I guess, that if a country faces an existential threat, they might have the right to use nuclear weapons, which I thought was a terrible decision. Yeah. But, uh, uh, but I think that that might be the thinking there, if they, they think their cities are about ready to be wrecked.
>> Yeah. What this, what this unfortunately means is that the logic then dictates the, um, you know, that if, if Israel or the US think about using nukes, they wouldn't think about using one to strike once. They would, they would think of massive nuclear, uh, uh, nuclear firing in order to, to prevent the, the second strike capabilities of Iran, right?
>> Probably. So, you know, those missile cities, you know, the tactical nuclear weapons are sort of an amorphous term, but, you know, a, a weapon the size of the, the bomb that detonated at Hiroshima and Nagasaki still got the equivalent of 10 or 15,000 tons of TNT explosive equivalent in it. And it, it would release a lot of radioactivity, too, because those would be surface bursts that would be hitting the missile cities. U, it would be, it would be a big mess. There'd be a lot of fallout. I wouldn't think Russia would appreciate having a nuclear war on its border right now.
>> Um, I know we cannot know this, but we should try to, to find out if there has been any kind of, um, behind the scenes kind of communication about what that would mean. I mean, um, you know, whether, whether Russia, the thing is, if you launch these things, right, the Russians might not be, uh, perfectly able to predict where, where they are going, right? And it might put their nuclear, uh, uh, arsenal on alert or even trigger something over there. When, if these things come from, from Israel, I don't believe so. But if they came from continental United States, that would be a, uh,
>> Well, I don't think, I don't think we would launch, uh, you know, we'd have to have an intercontinental weapon from the US. They, they would use submarines. You know, the, some of the submarines carry, um, what they call low-yield warheads. Now, they, they've made it, and which, and the Russians protested against because they said, "Well, how do we know what size warhead you have on there?" But if, if they decide to fire, um, it would be from probably from a submarine. And, but again, your point is well taken because if Russia sees a US, uh, Ohio class sub firing a, a nuclear capable missile, they, they're going to, you know, they, they're going to go to like a Defcon 2. I mean, that wouldn't be a minor, uh, incident. And what about last year, like in, um, during the 12-day war, there was this news, and I, I, I believe it's probably, it's probably true that Pakistan actually said that it would consider a nuclear strike on Iran as a nuclear strike against itself and retaliate. Is that, did you, did you follow up on that on that?
>> Well, I've heard of that. Um, I've heard that too. And, you know, it's hard to, it's hard to know with a lot of this because at some point, it's kind of hearsay, but I've heard people like, uh, Larry Johnson and Colonel Wilkerson and, uh, talk about Pakistan transferring nuclear weapons to Turkey or somebody that, you know, in the event there's an attack either on Iran or Turkey with nuclear weapons. So, yeah, that's, it's, it's a wild card. You know, you open that Pandora's box with a nuclear weapon, you don't know. It's just a whole new world at that point.
>> It is a whole new world. And, and, you know, the, the logic is, of course, that no state will, uh, risk its capital for the capital of another one. No nuclear state will risk its capital for the capital of a non-nuclear state. So, um, you know, nuclear umbrellas in this sense are, at least that's the argument, are a bit of a fiction because if, if push comes to shove, if the button to the button, you need to push is not, is not at home, is not with you, then the other one won't push it, right? Which is actually the logic why Israel wanted its own domestic program and everything, and why, why the US is so keen, and Israel are so keen on preventing Iran from having that, which is, on the other hand, though, complete a fallacy because Iran always said, we don't want this, and we don't have it, and just, just leave us alone. And, and the JCPOA, I mean, they were in the JCPOA, and the JCPOA was working and verified by the IAEA, the International Atomic Agency, that they actually indeed really did not produce anymore these, these, uh, uh, fissile grade, uh, um, the, this missile, uh, weapons grade fissile material. It was all working. So Iran sent every possible, not just signal, but agreement,
>> That they don't want the weapon, right? They just, they just need an indigenous program for, for medical and whatever other purposes. And they were ready to have all of that under supervision. So it was torn up. It is utterly clear that that it was this was used as a talking point to justify the unjustifiable in such a thin way that it's even thinner than with Iraq.
>> Well, the US actions are so reprehensible. I mean, this is the second time that we've been conducting negotiations and using them, >> as a ruse, uh, before we attack. And I, I think there's going to be huge ramifications. You know, a lot of countries are going to start looking at getting nuclear weapons now as a result of this. And I would not be surprised if the Russians decide that, you know, the hell with the US, you know, if they say, "Why would we want Whit to come over and talk again?" I mean, who's, they have a word in Russia, non-agreement capable. Uh, and I think that fits pretty well.
>> It's, uh, the New York Times article today even had that, had that in there saying like, yeah, the, the reason behind the, the, the negotiations was in order to buy time for the United States to build up its, its military, which is, which it clearly was. I mean, it wasn't ready in December. You need to get these, the fleet ready. And we could see how little by little they were building it up, which is why some of the analysts on my channel, Rhina Rup, said in back in December, you know, they, at the moment, it's, it's, it's a, it's a weak fleet. It's a weak fleet. Even though the first carrier, uh, group had already arrived, but it's, it's not enough. Uh, but by, by February, it was enough.
>> Well, it's, it's tough because a lot of people really want peace. You know, even people like Ray McGovern, who I admire. I mean, I've heard him arguing with Larry Johnson about, you know, don't say there's going to be an attack this weekend. Well, nobody wanted it, you know, but, uh, the Russians, um, Putin trusted that the Minsk agreements are illegitimate and they were used as a ruse. We, the West has a habit of using negotiations as a means to only as a means to get gain a military advantage, and we're in trouble because of that. Yes. Yes, we are. Because who, I mean, nobody should trust the West. Nobody should trust anything, any word that comes out of a diplomat's mouth in the West. It, because it might, if you do, it might be your death sentence. And I believe that is now pretty well understood. The, the fact that there were all of these drones going toward where Vladimir Putin is, was,
>> I mean, his, his residence, right? It's like saying like, "Oh, no. I'm very concerned about this. Very bad. Uh, not good." And implementing a war through Ukraine, right? Um, they go and, and now they manage to to kill the leader of the, well, let's say the third largest, um, adversary nation, right? That they, that they, they decided is the adversary nation. So you have two more powerful ones on top that are still alive. But I mean, by now, it's clear what, what's in store for both, like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, if they do not have enough, enough military capabilities. I mean, that's the logical outcome. That's not what I want.
>> No.
>> The case to be. But that's what sad. The United States now proved.
>> The Russian nationalists and people like Alexander Dugin are, they're very worried at this point. You know, they're writing that saying, look, we, you know, we, it's time to stop negotiating. Uh, I guess, I, I think Putin truly wanted peace. I think he, you know, a lot of people here would probably, oh, you know, I'm a Putin synthesizer, but I, I'm not. You know, I'm, I, I actually don't trust any nation, any government. But, um, you know, they, the Russians could have leveled Ukraine in short order if they wanted to, but they've had this war going on for four years. You can get into all this 5D chess about, well, was this designed to deplete NATO's arsenals and all that, but I think a lot of it was just that they were brother Slavs, and, you know, Ukraine's part been historically part of Russia, Rus', uh, Kiev, and they don't want, they didn't want to go in there and kill everybody. But we're at the point now where I think that Zelensky may be have a short lifespan if something's got, I think Putin might even be at risk if, um, if he doesn't take stronger action because he's going to wind up having people coming after him. I don't mean to change the subject from Iran, but I, I,
>> No, no, but we need, we need to think about this together because this is now influencing each other. I mean, this is a, this is a new war, and it influences how everybody will see and perceive the, um, you know, the, the turns, right? In game theory, you think if you, if you think of a game, in game theory, only within one single game, well, then that the calculation is completely different from when you look at it in repeated games and what, what the actors actually learn from, from each of this. And this is another one. The, the fascinating thing here is that the Ukraine war is, is highly, in a, in a way, you know, from the NATO US perspective, highly successful because you're able to implement a strategic strike against a, the adversary nation through a third nation that then does your bidding and takes all the hits while you sit back, sip coffee, and, and enjoy your warm, uh, living room. Right. But, but now this is, this is, this is kind of the opposite situation where Israel is able to use the United States as its implementation partner of a war that it wants, and it is good for its strategic rationale, and has, in my view, like, there's no upside. There's just no upside. JCPOA style,
>> Uh, end, like, like negotiated end to the, to the crisis would have served the United States so many times better, and Donald Trump so much more than this one. So it's, it's, it's really bizarre.
>> Well, I see Israel as just being completely out of control. I mean, they've attacked about every neighbor they have. And what's happened to the Palestinians is just a terrible stain on American history as well. And I, I think that things are escalating out of control right now. We'll see in a few days what happens with, uh, the Iranians. We, we really don't have a way to know ourselves what's going on. We're going to get official pronouncements from the governments and,
>> But, uh, you know, those cell phone videos, I think are pretty revealing when you, people in the street, when you, if there's videos coming out of Israel of the whole sky coming down, that's, that's going to be a bad sign.
>> Yeah, but it only, you can only imagine what the sky over Iran must look like at the moment.
>> Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, I mean, I'm not trying to,
>> No, the, no, no, it's just that this, this is a horrible situation, and it's a horrible situation for the people now under this fire on both sides.
>> Um, which is not to do both sides ism, not at all. It's just to, to emphasize that the, the firing of these weapons must stop as soon as possible, also because the escalation risk here is much, much higher than with the ground war that we have seen in, uh, in Ukraine, because so many more things are flying through the air, and so many more countries are involved. The, in my, in my video yesterday, I made the point that the strategy of Iran now must be to devastate the US allies in the region, right? In order to, to coerce them out of their alliance, in order to make the point that if you host US bases, you're not safer. You're much, much more likely to, you're much more targeted. Right? That's the, that's the entire, that must be the strategy here. Um, do, do you have any thoughts on that one?
>> Well, I think, you know, I had that diagram of all the oil refineries and around the Middle East, and we've just, you know, just had the straits closed for a day or two. So we haven't seen anything yet in terms of the ramifications. But, uh, if they remain closed for a few weeks or longer, and they hit all these, uh, oil refineries, that's going to be a major economic impact on the world. And Trump's, you know, he's going to, he's going to lose this midterm election for sure. I think, unless they postpone it or something, because Americans are not going to be happy about any of this, as far as I can tell. Most of the people I know didn't want a war. I think the public opinion polls show that 70% of Americans were against this attack. And, you know, the opinions finally changing in the United States where, um, more people are sympathetic to the Palestinians than the Israelis. It was, the older generation that, you know, we were schooled on Exodus and all the things, you know, always saw Israelis as the victims, and they were brave. And but eventually, when you learn about the real history, particularly what we've seen with this incredible devastation, I just, it made me sick to see the US airlifting munitions over to Israel every day for a year or two so they can bomb the hell out of Gaza. And, you know, realistically, there's probably a couple hundred thousand Palestinians that are buried in the rubble there. They stop, you know, they, they put out at casualty death estimates of 50 or 70,000, but those are grossly, those are just the officially confirmed deaths with people having death certificates. It doesn't include the people buried under the rubble. It doesn't, the, the missing.
>> So that's, that's the background there. You know, we're so complicit with that, the United States. We're going into this war with Iran with that, all that blood on our hands, and it's terrible. You know, there, Trump wants to build a resort there. I guess he wants to pave over the, have a couple hundred thousand dead Palestinians where he can build his hotels on top of or something. But I just, that's to me, we're entering into sort of a serial.
It's a realistic world with this kind of, with the FCNE files in the background and all the, the decadence and, uh, it, it, it really can't get much worse. Also, in terms of the, you know, the, the, just, just the, the grotesque reality that this is now being done by the president of the, officially like, UN Security Council sanctioned Board of Peace. The chair of the Board of Peace is now implementing an all-out strategic war and declared literally war on Iran.
Um, so make the mockery of everything, including the language, you know, by the Epstein people, right? By the Epstein. Like, it's, it, it just, it's, it's hard to trump this, even further than it, than it, than than it already is. It's, um, I mean, this would be, this would be hard to predict even for, uh, uh, Orwell and so on.
Um, so which, yeah, which really, which begs the question to me, it's like, um, is there anything that can constrain this, um, this situation still? Like, let's say if a miracle happens and the United, the Europeans suddenly wake up and say from their, from their 100 years slumber and go like, what, wait a moment, wait a moment, this, this, this is potentially going to, to eradicate us. I mean, if, if this oil from the Middle East seizes, and I've read that analysis yesterday, and the, the economy is wrecked for kind of, you know, this, this trade is, is impeded for months. The United States might actually need to restrain its exports to the Europeans because it needs it to stabilize prices at home in order for Donald Trump to have even a shot at the midterms, right? And if then, and that would mean no more, no more oil from Russia, no more oil from the United States, no more, uh, no more, uh, uh, hydrocarbons from, from, uh, West Asia, the Middle East. Well, Europe, uh, is going to be, that's going to be tough.
Well, I think a lot of people have been hoping for a while that the, the West would collapse economically, you know, that the banking system which seems to be on the verge of collapse with quadrillions of dollars of derivatives floating around and, um, you know, the US is creating over a trillion dollars in debt every 120 days right now. Uh, and, and that's just, they, they attenuate that by typing zeros onto a, a computer to make deposits and that's an unsustainable situation, I think. So, I don't know. Ideally, if we could have some kind of collapse like that and avoid a world war, but sometimes a collapse can trigger a war. So, it's, it's hard to call what's going to happen.
A financial collapse will not come from the, from, from government debt. That's a ruse. You know, government. Government can produce as much money as it, as it wants as long as it's indebted in its own, uh, the currency, only if you're indebted in foreign currency. And the United States being the reserve currency of the world, basically cannot, unless Congress makes a weird law about it. Uh, but, but in theory, this, this, the question is the real economy. Will the real economy be impacted in a way that stuff cannot be produced anymore? Will this, will you have no access to the oil? Will you not have access to the production capacities, to the rare earths once that starts?
Um, it's a real constraint.
Well, that's true. I mean, we, we exported our industrial base here decades ago. And the, the lack of the ability to make munitions and missiles, it's just one reflection of that. Although our defense procurement procedures are so corrupt that that's a big part of it, too. You know, it's, it's, uh, the weapons are made for profit as much as defense.
I mean, that's, that's a shimmer of hope actually, because I had this talk with Greg Melo the other day who said like, look, they cannot stuff at the moment, which is, which is great. I mean, capitalism basically constraining the war-making capacity of, of the state. I mean, that's good news.
Um, but, but the question is how far can it go? And the, the stockpiles unfortunately are still pretty large, especially of these goddamn nuclear weapons.
Yeah, they are. Well, we, we got up to 86 or maybe 80,000 nuclear weapons or 70,000 at least in 1986. And then, you know, we had came to our senses and had the arms reduction treaties and got down to, we're a little over, it's like 12,000 weapons now. But that's still so many weapons that,
Yeah. I mean, you just showed us in your presentation what Iran can potentially do with 6,000 conventional weapons. The US has twice of that with nukes on top of it. Um, and not all of them are name missiles, but, but, you know, bomber deployable and stuff like that. But Stephen, do we have any kind of good news to end the program with?
Well, they haven't shot a nuclear weapon off yet. I, I hope that, uh, somebody will come to their senses. I think Trump's probably scared right now. I mean, I think he's backed himself into a corner, but, you know, the odds are that he's going to be more than likely to make a bad decision than a good one. He now, they're gonna, but they maybe they'll just declare a victory and leave. They did that with the Houthis. So, it's not out of the question. But Israel is where push is going to come to shove, because I think Iran is intent on wreaking havoc. You know that, I think Israeli cities are going to be hit, and that's where, well, hopefully it won't escalate further than that, but I think it might.
Yeah. But that, that's not the point where this communication, the missile communication game starts, right? With, um, depending on what the Israelis hit in, in Iran. The Iran, the Iranians will will do, uh, uh, some, some sort of damage like that. And if the Israelis then say like, well, then we're going to hit you harder because you won't dare to, to hit us completely because, you know, we will nuke you. Well, then you play this chicken game, right?
And, and, you know, maybe there, maybe there talks going on now that we don't know about, you know, but, uh, I, if I were the Iranians, I, I'd have a hard time talking to the Americans right now. I think they, I think I heard that Trump even proposed a ceasefire or something like that and they said to forget it. Maybe that was bad news, but they're mad. I think they want revenge right now. And the, the calculation in Iran must be that if this impunity continues, then the rain of fire on them will continue, right? So they need to, to establish the principle that, uh, actions on one side have consequences on that side as well, and they, that, that must be their calculation. Um, but how to do that without triggering a nuclear war is, um, and the other side will use exactly that threat in order to maintain the impunity, right?
Um, right. It will be really interesting to find out if Netanyahu is actually still in Israel or if he, if he fled the country. Um, there's, there's rumors to that, to that extent, but right there.
Yeah.
All right, Stephen. Um, very unhappy topic, but I'm very glad that, that you showed us this and that you also gave us a sense of, of, of the kinetic, uh, uh, uh, uh, things that are going on, even if we can know exactly what it is. I mean, we know now with the bounds and, and terms within which we need to think. People who want to read from you or sign up for your mailing list or, or, or what it is, where should they go?
Well, I have a website called nuclearfamine.org.org and there's a lot of information on that. Um, I guess I need to get a mailing list or whatever. I'm, I'm sort of a retired professor and I'm just trying to keep up with the world at this point and, uh, I, I'm not generating a lot of profit, but that's okay.
You're gener, you're generating a lot of, of, of interested listeners, including me. So, um, thank you very much, Stephen Star, and see you again next time.
Thank you.