Transcription
Well, everyone, we're very honored to welcome back into the studio, Professor Jeffrey Saxs. Professor, thank you for joining us at a very important time as we're looking at a new military buildup from the United States. Um, you know, we're looking at Iran and potentially a next war. And professor, I just want to say first of all, welcome back to the channel.
>> Thank you. Good to be back with you. I I wish it weren't on the eve of another war, but it looks like it is.
>> Yes. So before we get started, before uh I ask you my first question, I do want everyone to know that Professor Saxs has officially launched his own YouTube channel. It is Jeffrey D. Saxs official. We're going to drop the links down below. So please make sure that you go ahead and subscribe to Professor Sachs new YouTube channel.
But professor, we've seen the United States military start to build up in the Middle East and really the largest amount of ships and uh battle, you know, operations really since the Iraq war. Uh is the the world kind of feels like it's on edge again. Is this a real inflection point or are we looking at just political theater?
>> Well, I think there's a a very good chance that the United States will launch an attack on Iran. It's been widely advertised, repeatedly threatened. It follows an attack last summer. It's what Israel wants the United States to do and generally what Israel wants the United States does. Uh is this an American interest? Absolutely not. Uh is this really an Israeli interest? Well, they think so, but it's not. Uh this is an attack if it comes that absolutely should not happen. Uh does not in any way need to happen. Uh everything that is being said about Iran by Trump and his minions is a lie. Uh he keeps saying we demand that they not have nuclear weapons. But Trump is the one that ripped up the agreement that said that Iran will not have nuclear weapons and will be monitored by the UN International Atomic Energy Agency. Trump, as usual, made a mess. He lies about it and now it seems like he's going to take the United States to war, which could be devastating.
>> Yeah, absolutely. Uh, professor, I think what's really unusual here is if we go back to last summer, we saw the United States did in fact launch a military attack against Iran. We had a very precise military operation. Some fighter jets came in, they bombed the nuclear facility. Now, over the past 12 months, we've heard multiple times Donald Trump repeating that that the United States has obliterated Iran's nuclear capability that we it was such an amazing accomplishment from the US military. I mean, this is a a talking point repeated over and over again from the Trump administration. Why Why are we doing this again if we've already destroyed their nuclear capabilities? Is this just another lie from Donald Trump? Has he just been exposed? Or did last summer's campaign really not do anything?
>> He lies nonstop. There's nothing that comes out of his rambling mouth that makes sense. And when he said last summer, "We've destroyed this in the greatest mission in the history of the world." Or maybe it's the universe, uh, this was absurd, tragic. Where do we start? Well, first of all, Iran does not want a nuclear weapon. And if we negotiated, if we honestly negotiated rather than repeatedly trying to destroy Iran, overthrow its government, bomb Iran, and actually if we followed through on negotiations that were completed 10 years ago, okay, there wouldn't even be an issue. But there is an issue because the United States doesn't want to negotiate. What it does is what Israel wants it to do, which is to overthrow the Iranian government. Well, not so simple. Uh Iran is a country of more than 90 million people. And the idea that the United States says you're gone and they're gone is completely delusional of a delusional Israeli government and a delusional US that is somehow enthralled to the Israeli government. When they bombed last summer, what could it do? What did it really do? Uh, it may have damaged a site or two, but Iran has enriched nuclear material. Not a bomb, but it has enriched uranium. Why, by the way? Well, it was abiding by strict limits until Donald Trump ripped up the agreement in 2018. Then it started to inch up a little bit above those agreements to say, "Aren't you going to come back and actually honor what you promised?" And then Israel absolutely recklessly attacked Iran at its Natan's uh nuclear site. And so Iran ratcheted up its enrichment. And then we because we're just non-stop propaganda say, "Oh, you see what the Iranians are doing, not what Israel is doing, attacking, assassinating Iranians, threatening, not what the United States is doing, ripping up agreements that have already been negotiated." No. If Iran does anything in response to say you shouldn't do that, oh, you see how evil they are. It's a game. It's a propaganda game. Because the real idea here is that Israel wants military hegemony over the Middle East. The roughly 10 million people in Israel want or their government leaders who are nasty people want military hegemony over hundreds of millions of people in the Middle East. And they expect the United States to deliver that. and our Congress is completely sold out to this. So when Trump mentions Iran in the State of the Union, the Congress on both sides, the Republicans and the Democrats stand up and cheer because they want to make sure those campaign contributions come in. And so this is what's going on. No, he did not destroy a capacity that Iran doesn't want, but bombing it for a few days didn't destroy it at all. When they did that, it was a cheat because, by the way, if one recalls, we were in negotiations last summer about the same issue. And we were supposed to go to the sixth round of negotiations, which the US negotiators had characterized as positive. And this was supposed to take place in Oman. I think it was June 15, uh, 2025, if I remember the date correctly. And on June 12th, just before the next round of negotiations, Israel goes bomb to bomb them and the United States says, "That's great. We'll come in and we'll join you in the bombing." I can't use the words I'd like to use on your show. This is so dangerous, reckless, and incoherent. It's just hard to know where to start on this. This is our lives. Is this the planet on the line? And this is absolutely it's not even juvenile. Doesn't even put the right words on it. It's just dangerous and reckless lies. But you know, when you're enthralled to an Israeli government that's just murdered 80,000 people, you can kind of understand there aren't real limits.
>> Yeah, that's well said, professor. Um, you know, as we're seeing this, I I think very much we're seeing a very similar playbook to the 2003 Iraq war. You know, we we heard back then weapons of mass destruction and this is why we need to go into Iraq. Obviously, now we're hearing that, you know, they're one week away from developing a nuclear bomb, which I think you've laid out very clearly that that is not their intention. So, who really benefits from this escalation? You know, we see consistent escalation every year and, you know, rising tensions between the US and Iran. Is it just is Israel just the primary beneficiary? Is that really the root of the problem here?
>> Israel isn't the beneficiary, but Israel is the root cause of it. This is Netanyahu. This is a lobby. Uh and it works. And if you go back to the Iraq war, it's extremely interesting. The Iraq war was not a war on wrong pretenses of weapons of mass destruction. It was a war on false pretenses, knowingly false. And the campaign about weapons of mass destruction was a PR job. It wasn't a mistake. It wasn't faulty intelligence. It was PR. And it was actually focus grouped. In the fall of 2002, the Pentagon did a PR exercise. And who was that? That was a guy named Doug Feith. uh one of these uh extreme Zionist neocons and he was the link to BB Netanyahu. And one of the very interesting uh books that came out of this criminal war uh is a fantastic book by a real gentleman named Dennis Fritz. Dennis Fritz was a senior Air Force uh official who uh in 2002 was told to deploy to Iraq. He said, "Iraq? Why should we be deploying to Iraq?" And uh nobody could explain to him why they were deploying to Iraq. So Fritz said, "Look, I'm not leading my troops into something when I can't even explain to them why their lives are on the line." So he resigned. resigned his commission. Then Feith, real despic, I don't know him personally, but despicable in the role that he's played, wanted to write a book afterwards. So, he wanted uh papers from the Pentagon declassified. So, they needed a senior person who was knowledgeable about declassification to come in and read the background documents and declassify them. And that turned out to be what Dennis Fritz did. So Fritz went back to the Pentagon in 2000 in I think 19 let me get it right in 2005 I think it is and started reading the papers and Fritz as he describes in this book called Deadly Betrayal says holy this this is this is not this is a PR war. This is a inside job of Israel. We're fighting for Israel and faith is the connection. And he asked me to declassify these papers. I'm reading all of this. I'm seeing all of this. This is a war that was they had to figure out how to sell a phony war to the American people. So when you raise that point, it's a great analogy.
>> Right? The these are not wars fought because we don't know what Iran is doing. These are wars where they're searching for some explanation that can say to Trump's base, "Why am I doing the opposite of what I promised you? Why am I doing a war that has nothing to do with America's interest? That has nothing to do with make America great again. That is purely for Israel. Why am I doing this?" So, they're searching for some answer. And then Trump says, "Oh, they're developing ballistic missiles to attack the United States." Again, there are words I'd like to use on your show that are utterly deserved by such comments. Even our mainstream lamestream media, which basically never reports anything truthful because they follow the government propaganda, is saying in the last couple days, "No, this is not true." So, the lies are just pouring out right now. This is terrible. And I don't know whether there'll be a war, but there very well could be one by the time, you know, we're finished talking or by tomorrow morning when we wake up or whatever.
>> I I I can feel the genuine concern in your voice and um you know, and I I I feel your sentiments exactly. I mean, we're both US citizens. It's just very concerning on on where the direction of our country is going. Professor, I I I have another follow-up to that. If we go back to the campaign trail from Donald Trump, he largely campaigned himself as an anti-war president, a a president of peace. He's been touting to telling everyone that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. He solved eight war eight wars last year, although that's not true as well. But I mean, do you think that this could potentially be a devastation for his presidency? I mean, would would is it not right wrong that most Republicans are very much against this, at least the fan base of Republicans? Is this would this be the end of MAGA if if he were to go to this to this length and actually start a war?
>> His presidency is failing step by step though gradually. His approval rating is now about 37% disapproval about 60%. And u people are wising up, you know, this guy told us uh I'm going to charge those other countries uh with with my tariffs. And people are understanding, hey, you didn't charge the other countries. You charged me. And I paid on average a,000 bucks every household in this country. That's the average per household. Not every household. The average per household. And they're wising up. you taxed me so you could give the biggest tax giveaways to your billionaire friends. So, they're starting to understand this and we've got thousands of lawsuits right now. I want my money back. And Bessent, who's not not a nice guy, not a decent guy, can't see any decency. He says, "Oh, don't expect they're going to see their money back. They just stole it." So, how can this be a successful presidency? People don't like ICE shooting people in the streets. Uh, yesterday, a student at Columbia University was arrested out of their dorm uh and then was released late in the day because the everything about the arrest was illegal. They lied about everything. Uh, they said they were coming in to find a missing person, plain clothes, lying, everything. People don't like this. We don't want to live in a police state. We don't want to hear lies from our president every day. We don't want to pay taxes because this guy maybe he believes it. Who knows? But he thinks they're taxing others. We're the ones paying. We don't like that. And he has no right to do it. And the Supreme Court said, "No, you cannot impose taxes on the American people, one person. That's not how our constitutional system works." that belongs to the Congress. So now it's just been since the beginning of the year completely unhinged. Okay, let's arrest this president. We'll run this country. He just said uh that I was reading a wire the moment before we got on that maybe we'll just take over Cuba and bomb Iran in the same time. I don't know if something has really come completely unhinged. What it is, but something's not right. Really not right.
>> Yeah, it definitely seems that way. And it seems that as Trump as we get near closer to the midterm elections, it just seems he's a little bit more of a loose cannon. Uh you have no idea what direction he's going to go. And like you said, it could be we wake up tomorrow and there's a big conflict or we've launched another war or an invasion. Um but let's let's focus a little bit on Iran right here. Do they have uh some type of military capability to really hold back um you know, against the United States military? Are we kind of underestimating their power and the retaliation that they could launch potentially in a in a in a full conflict with the United States?
>> Almost surely if there's a bombing for a few days or a week or two, it will accomplish nothing other than killing people and generating a a response that could get out of control. The idea that it would lead to regime change and an American imposed or Israeli imposed government is complete fantasy. Uh if Trump tried to put boots on the ground, well, there are not the boots and the soldiers there. Thank God for him to try something like that. That really would be the end of his presidency immediately.
>> So aerial bombing, it's not going to do much except possibly get completely out of control. And Iran is not going to be defeated in a few days of bombing. Maybe people will die, maybe there will be suffering, but it's not going to be defeated. It's a country of 90 million people. It's got ballistic missiles. It's got hypersonic missiles. Uh it's got the ability to close the straight of Hormuz, which uh is the waterway, the narrow passage in the Persian Gulf uh through which about 20% of the world's oil flows by the standard accounting. So no uh there is no strategy here. Uh and generally the military gets these things wrong. Uh we end up in massive debacles, pushovers like Vietnam end up 10 years and there no pushover at all. we end up le leaving or Afghanistan or Iraq. It's miscalculation from beginning to end. And this seems like another miscalculation uh that's underway right now.
>> Yeah. Let's talk about Iran and you know their alliances and their potential allies here. Would we really look at Iran as fully in the bricks, you know, China Russia camp and or is that an overstatement there? What are your thoughts on
>> Well, they are in the bricks. The bricks means uh the grouping that includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, United Arab Emirates, Iran and Indonesia, and by some count Saudi Arabia. Not so clear. Uh but 10 or 11 countries. Uh by the way nearly half of the world population just to mention um and absolutely Iran is in the bricks and Iran is backed by uh China and Russia and both Chinese and Russian leaders have been telling the United States don't do this. It's not good for you. This will not play well. This will not go down well. So absolutely Iran would be supported militarily. I don't think Russia and China are going to join a war, but I think that they're going to give support to Iran. And um the military power that the United States has apparently is good for a couple of weeks or a few weeks of bombing. It's not good for a long war. Uh it's not the kind of massing of troops for a long war. Uh it what we read again I'm not in the room and I'm not a military expert but we read that uh the joint chiefs of staff have advised Trump that his aims cannot be achieved by this attack. But you know when you balance the American people are completely against it. The top brass of the military is against it. Uh Trump's base is against it. The uh political adviserss to Trump uh are against it, but BB is for it. So the way the American political system works is probably a slam dunk for war.
>> Yeah, we we definitely see the tremendous influence from Israel as you pointed out. Obviously Netanyahu is very adamant on controlling that region. We also we also heard Huckabe who is the US ambassador to Israel actually say something quite extraordinary last week saying that he would not mind if Israel controls the entire region of the Middle East. Uh which obviously prompted a response from Saudi Arabia that said absolutely not. You know there's obviously many independent and sovereign nations that compose the Middle East. I mean, is this I mean, this is just you probably can't find a more pro-Israel um you know, politician than than Huckabe, who's over there currently serving as our US ambassador. Um it is remarkable just the propaganda that's coming out right now. Hakabe is a um a representative of so-called Christian Zionists, which means a a a strain of evangelical Protestants who read a verse in Genesis chapter 15 uh where it says that God promised uh the land from the river of Egypt to the river, the great river of the Euphrates to Abraham's seed. Now uh where to start?
>> First, he doesn't understand anything about the Bible. I'm sorry to say because uh if you just stick on pure theological grounds of the Old Testament it says throughout the entire Old Testament, you screw up, you lose that. This is a covenant. This isn't a deed. This is a covenant. And how many prophets tell the uh the kings of Israel, you are losing the land. you're going into exile. This is, by the way, the opposite of what's called rabbitic Judaism, the Jewish tradition for 2,000 years, which told Jews, you stay where you are and just behave. This is the Messiah could bring you back to the Holy Land, but not some militant nationalist. So, it's completely against what Judaism taught for 2,000 years. Then you listen to real theologians. It's completely against the New Testament because the New Testament uh Jesus is the successor of that covenant according to the New Testament. And in the New Testament, Jesus says that the promise of salvation is those who believe in me. It's not given to one particular group. And this is very clear and it's clear in the letters of Paul. It's clear in in Roman 11 and Galatians. It's it's everything theologically is wrong with what Huckabe said. It's kind of a kindergarten mistake. But then there's actually the world too that we learned over the course of centuries going to war over someone's uh reading of a line in the scriptures not a great idea. Uh it was a bloodshed in Europe for hundreds of years and they finally said okay we're not going to fight on biblical passages. Huckabe is a throwback centuries ago. He's a He should have been dismissed the moment such ignorance came out of his mouth. But the truth is that that's a lot of Trump's voter base. And so this is the weird part. Our government is in the hands of the Zionist lobby. And it means one war after another. And it's absolutely not in America's interest. That's it.
>> Yeah, that's a very interesting uh segment there, professor, because I I haven't heard the theological um actual just the the logic behind that. And it's you're spot on. I mean, that from the Old Testament to the New Testament. You did a great job breaking that down. Thank you for doing that. Um I'd like to ask a little bit more broad question. Uh what is the biggest misconception that most Americans have about Iran? What should what should more Americans know about this country so that they better understand the situation?
>> Well, I'd say a couple of things. First, uh it is a civilization that's 5,000 years old. So, it's a very proud, very wonderful civilization that has made huge contributions in world history. Of course, it was called Persia in its old kingdoms. One of the Persian kings, Cyrus, is viewed in the Old Testament basically is even used the word Messiah of the Jewish people because it's Cyrus who returns the exiled people that were exiled by the Babylonians back to Jerusalem to reestablish the temple in Jerusalem. So, he's hailed for this. Now, uh this is the first point. This is not it's it's not a little pushover uh island that's going to drop into America's hands. And uh it it is a a great nation with a a history uh tens of times longer than the United States history. So this is a first point. Second, Iran has been trying to negotiate with the United States for at least 15 years. I know it. I speak to the Iranians. I speak to the Americans. I hear all of this because I work at the UN and I talk at length and have for 15 years. They're trying to negotiate. They negotiated an agreement that would have absolutely done what Trump claims he wants to do, which is to make sure that Iran doesn't have nuclear weapons. They negotiated that. It's called the joint comprehensive plan of action. It was negotiated in the summer of 2015. There were six parties to those negotiations, including Iran, I'm sorry, plus Iran. The six were the five permanent members of the security council. So the United States, Britain, France, uh, Russia and China, plus Germany make six, and Iran on the other side. And it put the UN, International Atomic Energy Agency right there to make sure that there was no breakout to nuclear weapons. Of course, I have to always add, the Iranians said, "We don't want them." But the the inspectors will be there. Trump being Trump, illogical, stupid, sorry, getting it wrong every time and listening to BB who's not stupid, just nasty, nasty, and dangerous, ripped up the agreement in 2018. So people should understand after that the Iranians said we want to return to negotiating.
>> The US and Israel want to overthrow the government. That's different. That's not about the nuclear issues. That's about Israel's hegemony in the Middle East. Who cares for that? Why doesn't Israel live within its own borders and stop making a mess for all the rest of us? That's what it should do. And that's what this whole issue is. Israel should live within its own borders. There should be a state of Palestine next door living within its borders. And Israel should not be trying to overthrow the government of Iran. It's then there could be peace in the region.
>> Yeah. And by the way, when Rubio said a couple of weeks ago, "No, no, no. We need to negotiate the big picture," the Iranian foreign minister Raji gave a speech on the big picture. He did that in Doha and it was a absolutely uh uh coherent and interesting and intelligent speech. It was grounds for real negotiation. It wasn't even reported in our media.
>> Wow.
>> It's incredible. Not even reported. They want peace. They want to negotiate. They don't want nuclear weapons. But we can't take yes for an answer. This gang. And the reason is that Israel is not interested in negotiations. Israel's interested in hegemony in the region, in dominance, in overthrowing the Iranian government.
>> Uh, professor, thank you so much uh for all of these amazing insights. I I do have one final question. Um, and it would be, you know, I know that you've spoken at the UN for many years. You you travel around the world speaking to governments and organizations. You do an incredible job. If you were advising the White House today, what would your plan of action be for the next 90 days in order to achieve this peace that we need?
>> First, I would tell them to stand down because they could achieve exactly the agreement with Iran that they want. Second, I would say end the wars in the Middle East by stop stopping the US veto on a state of Palestine. The US is the only barrier to peace right now in the Middle East. Strange to say that, of course, Israel's against a state of Palestine, but they can't stop it. The only one that can stop it is the United States, and the US used its veto in the UN Security Council to stop it. I would say stop that veto. Third, I would say, for God's sake, Mr. President, don't put on a new round of tariffs. You've made enough of a mess.
>> Give back the 140 billion that you took from us through your abuse of power, but don't put on another tariff on phony grounds. This section 122 that they're using right now is illegal the same way.
>> Right?
>> So, don't even dig deeper. And finally, I would say don't tamper with the election in November. Not with the election machines. Don't even think about it. Don't even think about federalizing this election. These elections will be run the way America runs them at by the state level everywhere without you intervening. These are the most important points for America.
Professor Saxs, uh, what a fantastic interview today. I just want to thank you so much for your time and once again I'm going to bring up your YouTube channel for everybody. Again, we're going to drop the links down to Professor Saxs official YouTube channel. Professor, congratulations.
>> Thank you. If I could just mention,
>> Please. There there were so many AI fakes of me and giving speeches I never gave. That's why we made this. It's free. It's not promo material. Please subscribe. I'd be grateful.
>> Absolutely. No, we're going to put those links down. And professor, I want to just thank you for being a real American patriot because I really, really value your insights and I learn always so much from you with our conversations and I hope that we can continue to get this video out.
>> Absolutely. And get more people educated about what's happening. So, thank you again, Professor Sax.
>> Great. Great to be with you today. Thanks a lot.
>> Thank you so much.
>> Everyone, I want to thank you for making it to this point of the video and watching today's very important interview with Professor Jeffrey Saxs. The biggest thing that I took away from today's interview was just how passionate Professor Saxs was about telling the truth about the US government and the situation in the Middle East. We have been lied to for so many years. We know that mainstream media will never tell you the truth. And this is why citizen journalism and independent YouTube channels like the one you're watching is so important for the future of our world. We cannot rely on our US government. We cannot rely on US media. We have to rely on passionate US citizens that are not afraid to speak the truth and that are going to come here on YouTube to give you the knowledge you need to better understand the world moving forward. Everyone, I want to thank you for your incredible support. Make sure that you subscribe to Professor Zach's new channel to give him the support that he needs. And as always, I want to thank you all for everything you do on this YouTube channel. We're going to continue to keep working hard telling the stories that you want to hear, but most importantly trying to make the world a better place. My name is Cyrus Jansen. Once again, thank you and I look forward to seeing you all in our next video.