Transcription
Welcome back to Real Talk with Cyrus Jansen, and today we have a special guest in the studio, Colonel Douglas McGregor. You know, I wanted to get you back on the show because we are looking at a very big escalation, you know, potentially here in the United States and Iran war. And, you know, it seems that Donald Trump seems to be going further and further down this escalation trap. We're over five months in. There doesn't seem to be really anything accomplished by the United States military. Uh, very little strategic goals accomplished, and really just a lot of chaos and a lot of uncertainty. Uh, we're approaching the beginning of August. What is your take right now on the Iran war?
Well, if we could just for a second step back a little bit, uh, because I'd like to view what's happening with Iran and what's happening in the Middle East against a broader or wider strategic backdrop. I think it seems to me that the conflicts with Russia and Ukraine, Iran and the Middle East, and ultimately what I would call a cold conflict or cold war with China have reached a turning point. And there are a lot of people that are watching all of this. They're saying, "All right, we have two hot wars, one cold war. Uh, and are they now merging into a larger, more dangerous war?" And I think we have to go back and focus on the original missions of the three conflicts and then look at where we are today.
When you talk about Ukraine, I mean, that mission, really, mission focus hasn't changed. It, I would say, just hasn't worked. Uh, you know, this is to exhaust the Russian military and economic power in Ukraine, using US and allied technical and financial support to the point where the Russians, uh, simply fall apart. Their society collapses. Their government falls, and Ukraine emerges triumphant. Well, that's not going to happen. So, that, that's obviously a dead end. And I don't know what it means right now for the future because it's unclear to me whatever this recent meeting meant.
And when you go to, uh, the Middle East there, the mission has, has not really changed dramatically. It's evolved. You know, ultimately, we went in there to support Israel in its ruthless war of destruction against Israel's enemies. And who are its enemies? Well, it's got lots of enemies, and they're multiplying, Cyrus. They get, they're more and more picking up on this. But as a minimum, we're talking about Hamas, Hezbollah, uh, the Iraqi Popular Mobilization Front, and Iran, plus, I would argue, hundreds of millions of Muslims who now utterly hate and despise not only Israel but also the United States. And the whole idea has been to make everyone submit to Israel's demands, to submit to the Greater Israel project, to worship at the altar of Israel. You know, what was interesting is the more recent discussion we had with Saudi Arabia, uh, about working together and developing some sort of nuclear arrangement. Suddenly, it all ended abruptly because part of the demand that we insist on, uh, was that we go back to the Abraham Accords, which are about as popular as the plague, uh, in the Middle East. So, that, that's off the table. We don't seem to have any real understanding or appreciation for what's happened. We tend to view everybody as somebody that can be bribed, frankly, that has no values, that has no roots, that does, that believes in nothing. Well, that's not working out very well. And I think, frankly, that's where we are.
We don't have to talk about China right away, but, you know, I think we should touch on it because it's part of a cold war, and I think the Chinese leadership knows it, and the Chinese are winning it. We're losing it. So, I would argue that all three wars have turned into losses for the United States. And, you know, to be frank, Trump inherited at least one of those. That's the Ukraine war. I think he unnecessarily created the cold war with China. He could have gone in a very different direction. Big mistake. And then, of course, he's jumped in with both feet into this morass created by Israel in the Middle East. And that is not going well by any stretch of the imagination. So when you say the Iran war, we really now, we need to refer to much something much larger that's really regional, and everything is spilling over, as we saw very recently with the attacks that we and the Saudis made on the, uh, Popular Mobilization Front in Iraq. Of course, America, most Americans don't know that the Iraqi parliament, the Iraqi government have tried to throw us out of Iraq repeatedly for the last several years. So that's part of the war. Uh, Hamas still thrives, is still there. The Israelis are still murdering people, although not at the same rate, but pretty consistently with each passing day in Gaza. They've now tried to gazify Lebanon.
Syria is part of the problem. We're not quite sure where things are going there because I don't think Mr. Erdogan, who ultimately controls that place, has decided just how far he wants to go. We're trying to bribe Erdogan with F-35s and all sorts of other deals to keep him on side, but Erdogan's population and the Turks, in particular, as a group, right now, utterly hate and despise Israel, and they don't have much use for us. Uh, the Caucasus is a flame. You know, we're not sure what's happening there with Azerbaijan, which was a platform for the Israelis previously when they attacked Iran and is sympathetic to the, uh, Israeli state. We think that Erdogan has told them to back off somewhat. So maybe they have, because they ultimately submit to the demands from Ankara. They see Ankara as the older or elder brother. The Russians are in the in the Caucasus trying to keep things together. Then we go further south. We look inside Iran, and we're trying to support everyone and anyone who has anything that they don't like about Iran on their minds, with Kurds, Balochis, you know. I'm sure, in fact, I know that we have been trying to entice, believe it or not, the Afghans into some another attacking or at least allowing us to attack Iran. I mean, it, it's a snowballing disaster. No one seems to be in charge. There never was a strategy.
All you have to do is listen to Donald Trump. What's he say? Well, I think, uh, you know, three or four days of bombing, and this government will fall. The population is opposed to the country, 80% will rise up, blah, blah, blah. That, you know, okay, that didn't work out terribly well. So we killed everybody that we were talking to. That hasn't worked out very well because the people that succeeded them are tougher, better, smarter, frankly, and more effective in most ways, and the population is now more determined and more behind this government than ever. So now, well, we're going to destroy Iran. We're the end of civilization in a night. I can do that, and I will, and so forth. So, what are we doing? It's what I saw during the Kosovo Air campaign. Find something to bomb. Find targets. You're, you're playing sort of a pop-up game all over the country, trying to track all these launchers and missile sites and storage sites and so forth, let alone this sort of elusive plutonium. Uh, it doesn't seem to be going very well. It hasn't been very effective. They emerged from the last round, that is the Iranians, with at least 70% of their missile arsenal intact and capabilities. I imagine at this point that's well up to 85%.
And they have the benefit of both Chinese and Russian support. Neither Moscow nor Beijing are interested in seeing the country destroyed. By the way, even though the Sunni Turks don't particularly care for Shiites, they're not interested in seeing Iran be destroyed either.
Uh, so you see this coalition of both Islamic states and extraterritorial powers who are all determined that whatever happens, Iran is going to survive. Iran has proven that it can survive. It has survived. Now it's moving on to the next step, which is drive us out of the region. Get us out 100%. How do you do that? Well, you destroy all the bases. And that has the pleasing aspect that demonstrates the extent to which we are incapable of defending our own bases, let alone any of our partners.
So when you take it all together, I think the wars have all become rear guard actions. We're not going to reverse what's happened in Ukraine. We can't reverse what's happened with Iran. There is no magic bullet that's going to turn defeat into victory. It's not going to happen. Since there was no strategy, and the strategic minds that gave us this mess are still in charge, I think there's great confusion in the White House. Uh, I wish that I had been able to hear what went on in these meetings, but I don't see anything coming out of them of any real significance, other than that now suddenly Trump, who was ready to throw Zelensky out of the Oval Office not long ago, is now treating him like his long-lost son.
Eventually stupid, but, you know, so be it. It's almost as though he, he doesn't understand everything's a losing proposition. But the truth is, in military terms, he's fighting a rear guard action.
And why? Well, this entire thing that we used to refer to as the, uh, what was it? The rule-based, uh, rules-based liberal world order, which was always more imaginary than real because we made the rules. Uh, it is essentially a liberal hegemonic order captained by the United States, in which everyone, because we were the leading economic and military power, was quite willing to do what we said because they didn't want us to do anything to them that was bad, and also because they wanted to secure access to our markets, and they were comfortable having our forces as protection against communism and Soviet expansion. Well, that's gone. Our wealth is no longer what it was. In fact, we've been bankrupting ourselves pointlessly all over the world. Our currency is in serious trouble. Uh, our bond yields are rising. People are dumping our treasuries. Nobody wants to play the petrodollar game anymore, sort of recycling money back through New York City. Uh, our currency is in big trouble. So the real question is, what are we doing? Well, we're fighting a rear guard action. We're trying now to limit damage.
Colonel, that's a fantastic overview, and I, and I like that what you had said as far as if we're talking about the Iran war, it's much more of a regional war now because the spillover effect is very large. Obviously, we've seen United States bases all over the region being struck, US servicemen being killed. Um, I mean, it's, it's really turning to this point of, uh, uh, you know, where Donald Trump cannot control it anymore. And what my fear here is, is that Donald Trump is going to make a desperate move and probably try to escalate. I don't see him actually retreating. But do you see a scenario where, you know, the United States actually, uh, you know, puts boots on the ground, you know, launches some type of ground invasion or uses other groups in the region to launch a proxy war, similar to how we did in Ukraine? Um, what are the thoughts? What are your thoughts on a potential escalation and a ground invasion from the United States at this point?
Well, I wrote something that's on my Substack, and you're certainly free to go download that and post it on your site, and it says "Trump's War to the Last Missile." And my point was to go through that and explain two things. First of all, the use of ground forces in the Gulf, whether you seize Car Island or Abu Musa or any number of different islands, or you seize the port of Javahar. These things do nothing for you. They change nothing. And you are at the mercy of all of these top attack weapon systems. In other words, when I say top attack, I mean top attack. Something comes in above you at very high speed, or in the air from your flank, and you can't stop it. And that's what we've already figured out. We can't stop the attacks on our bases. Now, why would you want to put, say, five or 10,000 light infantrymen, regardless of how well equipped or well trained they are and well led, into any of these places? I mean, you put them in there, they'll go do what you tell them to do, and then what? They've got to protect themselves. And how do they protect themselves against this top attack system, this ISR strike system, as I call it? Well, you can't. They're under persistent surveillance. If they move, if they talk, if they walk anywhere, they're going to be identified. They're going to be targeted. What happens when they have wounded? How do you get them out? Uh, the only island, quite frankly, that has a real fresh spring water source is Car Island. All the others are rock. So, how do you supply the water? Well, then we'll go ashore in Basra. Okay. A city of 250,000 people. I don't know how many are there right now. And you have the Bushehr nuclear reactor. What do you want to do? Capture the reactor. Uh, okay. You capture the reactor and anybody around it. And what's that do for you? Well, it's a bargaining chip.
What if somebody hits it with something? Then you've irradiated all of your troops. An accident there is fatal. The Iranians can withdraw. They can evacuate. What do we do? And you start destroying all these desalination plants and oil infrastructure. Iran strikes back at everything left in the Gulf. And, you know, we've been saying for weeks, I think I was on your show before, and I said, "Well, if we stop now," and that was weeks ago, "we can probably recover from the position we're in in the Gulf, that is the global energy structure or system. We can recover in two to three years."
And that depends upon ending any conflict. Because as long as there's a conflict of any kind, no one with money to invest, no one with money to lend will go in there to finance reconstruction, right? So nothing will change. I hear people saying, well, they're building pipelines to around things. That's not true. Nothing is being built over there right now. And why would it? Why would you invest heavily in something that could be destroyed tomorrow? So, you know, the question is, if you go back hard now on the assumption that, well, this time we can get the right target set. This time we can really hurt them. This time they'll capitulate. All of which I think is delusional. If you go back in now, it'll be a decade or more before anything recovers down there. Which means that you've, you've not only lost control of the Strait of Hormuz, which is something that is not only embarrassing, obviously, but it's something we can't reverse, and we have plenty of experience with that. I think I was on your show and I talked about the Dardanelles, and what happened to the British and the Turks. And the Turks held the Dardanelles, and the British couldn't dislodge them. They started out with 50,000 troops when they landed the British, and nine months later they had 500,000. They couldn't, couldn't do anything. They had to get them out, and they walked away. And they never tried again. And when the war ended, even though the Turks had been on the losing side, everybody made the decision to turn the Dardanelles over to the Turks on condition that we all abided by this thing called the Montreux Convention. And by the way, the Turks charge fees for movement through and, and so forth, because they've got to maintain it. It's not cost-free. You don't just sit there and all the channels remain open and nothing silts up and so forth. That's worked. Now we're upset that thanks to our attack, we can't control the strait. We're not going to get control of the strait. It, it, it would take a 100,000 troops, and you probably lose a large number of them, and it wouldn't last. I mean, this was what they found out in the Dardanelles. So why not go back to the JCPOA? Well, that's because the JCPOA was a statement of fact. It, it provided for things we didn't like, but we lost the war. It was the intelligent thing to do when he signed it. And he understood that because he said, "I've got to get the global energy complex up and running. Got to open this strait. That's more important." Yes, Mr. President, it's more important than you and anything else happening today on this planet for billions of people on this planet. What's he done? He's backed away. He's doubled down, made more damage, and I think he's predisposed right now to opt once again for force. He seems to like force. This is a personality that thinks, well, if you don't listen to me, I've got to hammer you into the dirt. And, you know, we've been through Roy Cohn's rules, right? These are the things that have defined Trump. But I don't see it working, and I see it being disastrous. And in the meantime, China has grown stronger and and will continue to grow stronger. Not because we've started wars, but because they've stayed out of them.
And that's the lesson. And that's something we Americans used to understand very well, and we seem to have forgotten it. That is the one thing about China is that over the last, you know, 40 years, it's risen very peacefully. It does not involve itself in very many wars, and certainly spends a lot of its time, its resources, its, its energy on itself, and and that's why we've seen a dramatic rise of China over the last 40 years.
Um, Colonel, I'd like to talk about Netanyahu and his visit to the United States. Uh, he's just flown into Washington, you know, red carpet treatment, of course, you know, with Donald Trump, probably coming to see, you know, the funeral for Lindsey Graham, who obviously was a very big fan of Netanyahu and the Israeli regime. But I'd like to get your thoughts on, you know, this potential meeting and and what, you know, what do you think is going on behind the scenes with Netanyahu and Trump? What do you think that they're talking about? I mean, I can't, I can't imagine that both of them are happy at this point, five months into the war. Nothing has really gone either one of them their way. 92% of Israelis actually believe that the United States have lost the war, according to Israeli sources. So what do you think that this, uh, strategic meeting is going to accomplish or what do you think that they're going to be discussing right now?
It's all pure speculation, but we can start from certain what I would call ironclad assumptions. Uh, Zelensky and Netanyahu, part of the same cabal, backed by most of the same Zionist billionaires who hate Russia, hate Iran, and would like to see both destroyed. You know, so both of them have the same interest, and that is to keep the war going. Whatever you do, Mr. Trump, don't stop. Keep bombing. Keep sending us money. Keep sending us equipment and supplies. Help us to fund more mercenary forces. This is Ukraine, you know, and we will win. Just give us some more time, and we'll pull this out and win. Of course, 50% of everything you give these people ends up in bank accounts in Cyprus and God knows where else because these people are terrible crooks and criminals. But sadly, it looks like President Trump was advised by his handlers, uh, who own him and others, to go along with this. So I, I suppose we'll come out with some sort of plan to send X numbers of millions of dollars and more equipment. It's not going to make any difference. Ukraine's losing this war. The whole posture of Russian forces is changing, and Russia is moving now aggressively west, and Odessa is useless to the Ukrainians as support now. It should have been shut down a long time ago, and now Ukraine is a landlocked entity of no particular value to anybody. Their Russians are moving into Kharkiv. So I, I think that over the next month or two, Ukraine is quite liable to collapse on its own at this stage. I don't think MI6 or the CIA and hundreds of millions of dollars and any more, you know, equipment can save them. I think they've had it. They're also running out of manpower. And even in the western part of Ukraine, which is the most anti-Russian, anti-communist historically, and I know those people, I grew up with some of them, and I love them personally, but they've now turned on the government. They don't want their their families murdered on the battlefield by the Ukrainian leadership that simply treats them as cannon fodder. So, I think unfortunately, Zelensky will will leave with a pat on the head, some promises. Uh, no doubt, you know, Congress will deliver because they profit from the weapons and so forth that are sent over there. Then we come to Mr. Netanyahu, and of course, Mr. Mr. Zelensky will do anything, anything he can to ingratiate himself to us, including, "I'll join the war against Iran." Okay, thanks. Uh, and now then you turn to Mr. Netanyahu. Mr. Netanyahu has lost the war. Israel is in a very real danger of going out of existence. All over the region, all of the elites privately are saying the same thing, from the Indian border all the way to Morocco in the Islamic world. Sykes-Picot is dead. It will not be restored. In other words, when this ends, this war, the map is not going to look as it did before. I don't think President Trump really understands that. And I think that Mr. Netanyahu is living in this fantasy world of the Greater Israel Project, which means that we are going to fight in perpetuity against everyone in the region, anyone in the region that refuses to submit to Israel. We're not. Those days are over. He may actually be removed from office. I'm talking about Trump. I'm also talking about Netanyahu. Of course, removing Netanyahu doesn't change thinking in Israel. They continue to believe with heart and soul in what I would call Jewish supremacy and Israeli hegemony, which is heavily backed in New York City and the financial markets around the world. That's not going to work because they've got everybody against them. Now, the only one who hasn't joined the fight directly is of course Mr. Erdogan.
But I think that's coming. Uh, because behind all of this, you also have the development of BRICS, and BRICS is ultimately going to include the Turks as well as the Iranians and everybody else in the Middle East who wants to recover from this stupid war, because if you don't join BRICS, you're not going to be able to do much trade. They already started to trade in yuan, and yuan is effectively going to be backed by gold. Where does that leave us? We're out.
So, as I said, it's a rear guard proposition, and Trump will have to do what he thinks he can do for the Israelis as well as for Zelensky, while he tries in his own dumb way with tariffs and sanctions and other things to hurt everybody, including China. It's all going to fail. Has no chance of success. And the smart thing to do is the opposite of what he's doing, obviously. But there is no strategic thinking. None whatsoever. You know, if you, you know, the best, the best illustration of the sort of strategy that we should pursue was pursued by Great Britain from 1795 to 1815. And they would periodically be in conflict with revolutionary France and Napoleonic France. And then they would make peace because they could go no further, or they'd been into a setback. They couldn't buy their way out, or they couldn't fight their way out. There was no shame in that. You just stopped. You cut a deal. You got off. You waited and you built alternative structures yourself, in their case with allies and partners and so forth. But that takes patience. It takes understanding. It takes continuity of thinking in government. We don't have any of that.
Uh, Colonel, how do you think that this plays out for Donald Trump as we're, you know, less than 100 days to the midterm elections? You know, this is the big thing coming up obviously in the United States. We could see potentially the Democrats gaining power of the House and the Senate and ultimately, you know, having a tool to really stop Donald Trump altogether. Uh, do you see that this, that so far this Iran war would has been such a disaster for Donald Trump, that that is most likely the outcome that he could potentially lose his power and the midterms could swing to the Democratic side? What is your thoughts on the midterms?
I, I, I don't think the midterms matter very much because both parties are disasters.
I think if you focus on Donald Trump, the question is, will he be removed before the end of the year, or will he last into 2027? That depends mostly on the economy.
Now, I've looked for people that are upset over the war, and there, there are some out there in the United States, some people who are. A lot of people in the United States don't understand this. I mean, ignorance is widespread. "Oh, let's bomb those ragheads. You know, I don't care how many Muslims die." I mean, I hear this kind of thing all the time.
And it's dumb. But this is the product of brainwashing that's gone on for decades. You can't just turn it off and get people to understand, well, that's not the case. It hurts Russia because people insist, "Oh, well, we know the Russians. We dealt with them in the Cold War. They're evil." Well, wait a minute. You know, this is not the Soviet. Oh, go away. They're the same. So you got a problem with that in the American population. A problem, I would say, of an acute lack of understanding, and less politely, ignorance. But there are more Americans than ever that are feeling the rise in inflation, the rise in prices. Uh, the economy, contrary to what President Trump keeps insisting, is not good. It's not robust. This is one of the reasons that people voted for him initially. Remember, he would focus here at home. He used to talk about the debt and the danger to the economy. He used to talk about finding a way to grow out. Well, growing out is now an impossibility. The best that you can hope for is a default, and that default can be managed. It's going to be painful. Uh, because this entire nation subsists on cheap energy and cheap credit. If you don't have cheap energy, you don't have cheap credit. You don't have cheap credit. Well, you end up paying outrageous percentages for money that you borrow to buy a house, build a building, conduct a business. So, we've been very fortunate. All of this is tied up with the stupidity of his actions in the Middle East, as well as China, as well as Europe and Ukraine. So, if he continues to self-immolate, which is really what he's doing, and at this stage, I think there's a good bet he will, uh, he'll double down again. He'll do as Mr. Netanyahu asks. And I'm sure that he probably thinks, well, I have enough support from the Zionist billionaires that are backing all of these things and pushing all these things that I can fight off any attempt to remove me. That may or may not be true if things get much worse. And I think they're going to get a lot worse. I think you're going to see $150 a barrel and higher. I think if you talk to Jeff Currie, he'll make the same kinds of arguments. Or Ray Dalio, or Luke Gromen, you know, or, uh, you know, Gundlach, Jeffrey Gundlach. All of these people are very smart. They've been in business for years. Rogers is another one. They'll all basically say, "Look, you know, we're, we're just one foot left on the cliff. We're already tipping over into the abyss." So, if I'm right, and they're right, and that's the case, no, he, he's going to have a tough time remaining in office. And it's, it's either now or later he'll be gone.
Yeah. I mean, I think you've hit on the most important thing for all Americans that, I mean, is the primary thing is certainly the economy. I mean, when we look at gas is still, you know, uh, at all-time highs. I mean, it just continues to get worse. I was in California, diesel was almost $8 a gallon. I mean, how does the United States economy function when those, when the gas is so high and the price is so high? Um, and then now we're looking at Iran, you know, actually shutting down, uh, the other side of Saudi Arabia where where they're exporting, right? I think it's Hezbollah, rather, Hezbollah has shut down that other avenue to export oil. So, I think we're going to see a lot of economic pain here coming up in the fall. And, and I, I mean, do you think that Donald Trump ultimately will have to cut a deal similar to how he, you know, originally he signed the JCPOA and basically said, "Look, we had to sign it or else the global economy would collapse." We know that the United States strategic oil reserve is at, is very low. Actually, it was China that really saved the global economy because China stopped importing as many barrels of oil, and they allowed those barrels of oil to go to other nations around the world because China has the largest strategic oil reserve in the world, over 1.4 billion barrels. They could survive well over a year if needed. You know, because of China's vast reserves. So again, the world needs to thank China for once again saving the economy. But ultimately, Trump has shown his cards. He has to make a deal or he has to make a move or or witness a global economic collapse. Is that ultimately going to be the story here, Colonel, that Donald Trump's gonna have to eventually give up?
Well, two things. First of all, most Americans do not understand what you've just said about China.
They are being told, "Oh, China wants to destroy us. China wants to replace us." Chinese don't want to replace us. They want nothing to do with the reserve currency. I mean, it's, it's bizarre when you listen to people. "Oh, they hate us. We're at war with China." No, you don't. You're not necessarily at war with China. You're competing with China, and you're doing a shitty job of competing with China, but you're competing. You're not at war. "Oh, yes, we are." Okay, fine. Uh, you have the same problem with Russia. I think that, uh, the other issue is that Donald Trump can't sign much of anything because at this point, the best deal he received was the one that he's thrown away. The JCPOA. That JCPOA, as humiliating as he seemed to think it was, was a great opportunity to get out of this nonsense. But he's, you know, the puppet of the Jewish lobby. He's, uh, essentially consigned his soul to them. He's mortgaged his life and his presidency to the Israel lobby. That's it. They're not going to accept that. So, when this ends, and it will, everything ends at some point, and it could end catastrophically, by the way, including the use of nuclear weapons, uh, because the Israelis could foolishly initiate that. But I, I hope not. But when this ends, we'll just leave.
And that's what we always do. And again, I say this to people, and they look at me with blank faces. I said, "Remember, we are primarily an aerospace and naval power. Our army was really pitifully small and not terribly capable. Uh, it's, it's gone from where it was in 1991 down to almost nothing. Needs to be radically reorganized, reoriented. Has things it's got to do, but we're primarily air and naval, and that's what you're seeing in operation right now. And air and naval power has limits. Those limits are identified. We can't change those." So, I think what he does is he says, "I've done all I can. We've destroyed all of them. It'll be years before they recover. So, we're leaving." He'll say something like that, and he'll go away at some point. The problem is the fee, the defeat, the strategic setbacks, what I talked about at the beginning, the destruction of this hegemonic order is going to follow him back to Washington, and he'll pay a heavy price for it. His best shot is over, and it's over for another reason. I'm sure you're aware of this, Cyrus. Nobody believes him.
Yeah. I think his credibility is almost completely gone at this point. I totally agree with you. I mean, I, I said to a friend of mine, "Would you buy a used car from Donald Trump?" He started to laugh. He said, "Hell no." I said, "Of course not."
He, he'd bring this 1957 Ford, freshly painted up, to you and say, "This is the greatest car in the world. You know, and there's nothing better." And by, you know, he's simply interested in parting you from your money. That's what he's learned to do very well. Well, that doesn't prepare you to be president of the United States. And then if you add in the egomania, narcissism, the acute lack of understanding, the failure to study anything, when you're talking to somebody who says the president likes to watch things on video. One of my sons was telling me about a cold larping. Is that familiar to you?
I haven't heard of it. No.
Well, it's about becoming an avatar. You play in one of these games, and then you step into the avatar, and you, you run around. And, uh, they said, "Well, you dad, you don't understand. The president larping too much. He's larping. He doesn't understand what he's doing."
I think he's lost the mental capacity to serve this country, certainly in the highest position in the world. I mean, it is a very important position, and it's very difficult to see the United States doing anything of what you've just predicted, just eventually having to pull out. And that's what we always do. That's what we always do. We look at Afghanistan, you know, 20 years, $2 trillion to replace the Taliban with the Taliban, and strategically accomplish nothing in the region other than, uh, maybe enriching a lot of our politicians who are owning the military-industrial stocks, you know, and that does seem to be a big play. We know the Jewish lobby. It's a frustrating thing, Colonel, but I'm really glad that we can get people like yourself on the show to help more Americans and more people around the world, you know, learn the truth. Colonel, I'll give you the last word. Tell us more about your Substack and where we can find more of your work so that we can continue to support you.
Well, there are a couple of things that people can do. One is to go obviously to the Warrior Diplomacy. It's McGregor Warrior Diplomacy Substack. And now there's also a McGregor Warrior Diplomacy YouTube channel. And I think you, you know, a lot of things are posted that have been done recently, as well as in the past. And I think people will find it interesting. We posted some things that I wrote a long time ago, and people are reading. You say, "Well, this is exactly right." Well, they're 10 years old in some cases, and they're finding out that, you know, the problems we're dealing with didn't just happen. And in fairness to Donald Trump, by the way, and Joe Biden, when you look at the problems we have with missiles and munitions, they go back to the George W. Bush time. Decisions were made then to reallocate funds, and the air and naval services went with considerably fewer resources into the future. But they also had leaders, senior leaders who wanted to push themselves, advance themselves. They were ambitious, and they didn't manage very well. So the combination of poor senior military leadership along with the reallocation of funds to fight, remember the global war on terror, and these funds went into primarily light infantry and the Marines and the army. Uh, that's money lost on a cause that was lost, that never made any sense, and under a series of senior military leaders that weren't very impressive. So the problems we have now began 30 years ago.
Well, Colonel, I want to say thank you so much for your time today, and we're going to drop the links to your Substack and also your new YouTube channel down in the description below so that everybody can follow along. Everybody, thank you for making it to this point in the video, and we look forward to seeing you all in our next episode.