This is Deep State radio, coming to you direct from our super secret studio i...
subbasement of the Ministry of Snark in Washington, D.C. and from other undisclosed locations across America and around the world. Hello and welcome to Deep State Radio, I am David Roscoff, I'm your host and today we're joined by two of our best friends and most popular guests here at Deep State Radio. Roscoff, who is among other things besides being one of the leading experts on nuclear
issues in the United States, the author of a new piece, which appears in the new Republic called, "Can we lose the same war twice with Trump anything's possible?" and we're going to get to that because that's kind of the core theme here. And along pinkus, former Israeli diplomat, commentator, and also good friend of this pod.
How are you guys doing? Good. Just great, David. Thanks for having us on.
βWell, it's good to have you here, and frankly, I think everybody is like, okay, enoughβ
enough. Like what's going on with this war, you know, as the Jews would say around Passover, Diana. Like, seriously, what's going on? And Joe, you know, you wrote about this, and I thought it was, you know, a very good article
is typically, as anything you do is, and frankly, I'm going to cut to the end of it because you say, well, there are three ways things can end. The fighting will Peter out, well, I don't know forever, war, or violin escalation. Okay, come on. Like that's a cop-out.
Yeah. There are three ways this could end. And as Freud could end the plan, let's cut to the chase here. There's really only one way this can end. You know it, and I know it.
And it's choice one.
βThe fighting's going to Peter out because this is like two kids fighting on the playground.β
Well, it's just going to be, you know, at certain point, you know, they're going to have to go to class, you know, something that something, the next thing is going to happen. Tell me why I'm wrong. No, you're right. And the three choices I gave, I get listed in order of likelihood in my estimate.
And that first one is that it'll Peter up several reasons.
One, this is just Trump's MO. This is what he does. Number two, he doesn't have a strategy. This is not some master plan. This is this is acting by impulse.
When the person in the United States uses his extraordinary powers by impulse, waves of attacks happen, military missions are launched. People die. Things are blown up.
βThat's President Trump exerting his powers by a whim.β
And he's just trying to, you know, it's kind of a tonious soprano view of national security strategy. It's got to bust things up a little bit and try to get this guy to know I'm serious. And if he doesn't comply, well, then I'll escalate more. But the Iranians have seen this game before.
If bombing was going to work to force Iranian compliance, it would have worked the first
time. These are pointless attacks. There is no strategic. I can, as far as I can see, tactical objectives, it's just to spasm of violence, to satisfy Trump, to show that he's tough, and he means business, but it's all pointless.
Okay, well, let's see, that seems like a fair analysis, Alon, I've been starting to call this the Groundhog Day war, because it reminds me of the movie Groundhog Day. We sort of go through the same thing every day, Trump says he's got a attack, he attacks, the Iranians don't respond in the way that he wants to. He says he's going to attack more, then he's going to take over the straight of
where moves, that he's not going to take over the straight of where moves, that he backs down from the attack. When the markets start going, gets dim, we get a little bit of a low, and then back to square what? How long can that go on?
Not for long, because, well, to begin with David, Trump could only wish to have the charm that Bill Murray had in Groundhog Day. But that's beside the point, you know, it can't go on for long, which is why I agree
with Joe's first point of the three options or fourth option of those three, and with
your definitive decisions that that will lead the option, but the wall Peter out, and here's
The thing, any escalation comes with a call, you know, people think it's a game.
Do it attack, attack, we attack, attack, attack, and let's see what happens in 48 hours.
But anything beyond that could come with a price, if there's a lot of room for misperception and miscalculation here. If the Iranians are under the impression that the U.S. is going to up the ante, and attack more valuable so-called counter-value target, they could shoot at an American ship, and you could have 12 American sailors dying, and they could bomb Saudi Arabia, and what
I'm saying here is, I don't see this cycle of repetitive repetitions rather escalation going on, you know, limited in scope and limited in duration.
βIt's just not sustainable, and I think that in the next 10 days, we'll see the, uh, theβ
mediator.
The official on on official mediator, basically three, Pakistan, Qatar, and Uleza, and
Oman. I wouldn't be surprised by the way, and this is I'm just throwing this at you without any insight knowledge if the Turks, if Erdogan convinces Trump that he too could play a role here, and then we'll have a fourth mediator. In the meantime, my last, uh, observation about this, in the meantime, Mr. Netanyahu,
uh, in considerable after the death of his, uh, soulmate, uh, Lindsey Graham, said he intends to go to the funeral and at this next week, early next week, and meet President Trump. Now, this is going to elicit, and this is going to, you know, a lot of people are going to say, whoa, this, this is Groundhog Day. He's trying to talk him into escalating again, and Trump is going to push back against
βthat, which is why it go back, circle back to point one, um, it's going to stop.β
Yeah, you know, Joe, uh, there's much to recommend your article.
I look particularly liked, uh, like the second paragraph here, we were talking about the
negotiation, and you said, the two new Jersey property managers, Trump sent to negotiate his surrender, but it is to put, I love that, you know, because it really sort of puts a fine point on it. You don't seem to have a lot of faith that the two new Jersey property managers are going to be the ones to bring this to a successful conclusion.
I don't want to put words in your mouth, but oh, no, there's not a chance that, that they can do that is, so Alon says it's, it's really the, uh, the, uh, Qatar is Amani's and Pakistanis that can bring this to New York. Joe, Joe, you try to know. Joe, you do understand that David is offended by the New Jersey, uh, referenced.
Yeah. Yeah. I do, I do, but that's, but that's where they are. People have, Jared Kushner, Steve Woodcock, have, have no experience. Don't understand Iran, don't understand the nuclear issues.
Don't understand how to negotiate, don't understand foreign policy. All they know is, you know, how to take money from these, these Arab state, monarchs and tyrants that their friends with, and that's their whole point, and they, and they have an inflated opinion of their own skills, but they, in part, got us into this mess. Not, not because Trump lost the war, what she did, not because he negotiated a surrender
document. The MOU, I think, we did a podcast where you, you aptly titled it, David. This is a fig leaf for surrender.
βWell, that's what this is, a surrender document.β
But they're, they're partially to blame because of the way they phrased the document, particularly 0.5, which clearly gives Iran the authority to resumed the shipping through the straight. They have the authority to arrange that, and after the, the traffic is restored, they are charged with then talking to Oman about the future maritime authority through the straight.
United States is nowhere mentioned in there. So here comes Trump after, doing this deal, after suffering his humiliation, after everybody understands that he lost this war, and he's now trying to lash out, and he tries to salvage this by doing something he does domestically, assume an authority he doesn't have. He doesn't have authority to establish shipping lanes through the, through the straight.
The all the shipping lanes that Iran has reestablished go through the Iranian side of the straight, hugging the Iranian coast. He opens up shipping lanes on the Omani side. The Iranians go no, no, no, no, no. We're violating the MOU, the US persists the Iranians in their own violation of the MOU's,
the prescriptive not to use force against each other, then hit those ships.
The United States responds, the Iranians respond, et cetera, now we're in thi...
But you have to understand, Trump initiated this new conflict by the actions he took, and
then his efforts to sort of bully Iran into accepting this conflict. And as Alon said, there is no winning hand here. There is no viable military strategy that you could see. The US is incapable of opening the straights. You cannot do it, even if we triple the number of ships in the straights, all it takes
is one drone that hits one tanker that sends insurance rates through the roof that stops traffic.
βAs proof of that, on Sunday, the last time I think we have data for this, only 14 shipsβ
went through the straight, that's about a tenth of the pre-war traffic.
So Trump can claim the straight is open.
He can make all kinds of pronouncements of what kind of payments countries are going to have to pay him in the future, but it's fantasy. It's not nonsense. It's absurdly false, obviously, and clearly false what he's asserting. He's trying to bend reality, trying to convince everybody that actually won this war that
he's winning this war that he's in charge none of that is true. Hey, it's David, and I hate to interrupt the podcast, but I want to tell you some exciting news. We are now on Sub-Stack.
βThrough Sub-Stack, we are going to be able to provide you with even more benefits, includingβ
live-streamed episodes, access to new content, ways to save money, and getting content from us better quality content from us. It's a revolution. It's terrific. But it's even better than that, because to celebrate, we're going to offer a special
offer to new subscribers. So now through July 15th, new members to the DSR network, or to my need to know Sub-Stack, which gives you a lot of written content as well as some exclusive video content, will receive one year membership to the other for free, in other words, they cost the same. So you will essentially get two for one, that's one year of DSR, or need to know, absolutely
free, just to take advantage of this deal, and support us, which we appreciate. Go to DSRNetwork.sub-Stack.com, or David Rothkuff, that's me, dot sub-stack.com, and sign on for membership, and you'll get two for one. Anyway, thank you for your support. We are 100% sure you're going to think this is a terrific development, and that's
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I was reading in the social media verse along, and there was a story that said that the Gulf allies, who are the ones most affected by all of this, are now getting together and
βsaying to Trump, you've got one problem here, BB Netanyahu, he is the problem, you have toβ
move past BB Netanyahu, and you know, there is some truth to that. It's also, by the way, as we've discussed many times, consistent with growing US public opinion. And so, you know, BB may want to go from this funeral to, you know, the White House. I think Trump wished he would just fall into the open hole on the ground, because he is being a, he's a problem here for this administration.
Is there any awareness of that problem where you are? Yeah, there isn't awareness, but just to pick up on what Joe said, you know, to keep it all in context, we're talking about the straight of her moves.
The straight that was open on the 28th of February, I mean, we've posted it a million times.
A straight that is that it's who's closure or shutting down is an outcome of the war, not a cause of the war. A straight that in Netanyahu's, you know, a feel good presentation to Trump in on February, 11th in the White House situation room was not even mentioned. And it was all about toppling the regime, Kurdish invasion, popular uprising, destroying
nuclear infrastructure and, and invisterating Iran's ballistic missile production and launching capabilities. The straight of her moves was not mentioned.
Now we're talking about will he open?
Will he not open?
Now, to mention, to this is the same Trump, who said, I don't care about the straight
of her move. America doesn't need this straight of move, by the way, theoretically, the one instance in which out of his ignorance came up to America really doesn't care about the straight of the move. It's going back to your question, David, that's your mark.
It is about the Arab Gulf phase.
βAnd I think that's one, it perhaps looks like long-term now, but that's one of the manyβ
debocals and failures that's worth an American point of view, but also from a Israeli point of view. So America and Israel are now seen or perceived as agents of energy and chaos. Ask the average and erotic authority of Saudi, who is causing more instability, who's responsible
for destroying the business model that you've tried to create in the Emirates and Bahrain
and Qatar and even in Saudi Arabia, is it Iran or conversely, is it the US and Israel? And I don't even want to hear the answer because I'm not going to like the answer, but it's true. So yeah, Nathaniel is the problem, not. He has three months before any election, the election is set for the 27th of October.
So that's just like 40 days, 45, I'm sorry, 100 days from now. Trump has to contend with that for 100 days. I doubt that given the public opinion shift, which is dramatic as you described it, David, I doubt that Trump will fall into Nathaniel's trap again.
βNathaniel is already leaked out that he's coming to Trump and he plans to go to Trumpβ
to present to him updated, alarning, urgent, intelligent information about how Iran is restoring
its missile production capability and it's two weeks away from breaking out into like
production of a nuclear, this runs contrary to everything that both these gentlemen said in June of 2025 and again, in March of 2020. It's just what Joe described earlier, it's bending reality, it's creating a parallel universe. I understand why Trump wants to show this as a big victory. No one's buying me, the same applies to Nathaniel, no one is buying it.
In fact, from a geopolitical point of view, Trump is not going to be judged on Iran for war ends today. It's going to be just another of his many failures. He's not going to be his presidency will not in the end be evaluated by this colossal failure in Iran.
Nathaniel, one the other hand, is an downing a major problem figure because Iran of July 16, 2000 and 26, he's by far stronger and in both more and bold than Iran of February 28. Well, you know, it's worse than that.
βLet's be honest, I was going to get into this in a big way here, but we've got it for aβ
bit. The reality, Joe, is the old US relationship with Israel. Dad. Yeah. It's Dad.
I mean, the Democratic Party, it's Dad. The Democratic Party has changed with a lot about this the other day, Rome, a manual is centrist Democrat went to Tel Aviv on the 8th of July gave a speech in which he said, this is on net. You know, this is a problem.
It's not going back. There will be no unconditional aid and so forth. Emanials position is the most generous towards Israel. There are a lot of Democrats that, and I'm not talking about sort of freak show left-wing Democrats.
There are a lot of Democrats and right-wing Republicans who are like Israel's a rich country doesn't need us for anything else is only getting us into trouble. It's directly linked to all of these forever wars. We should be done with them. We can be their friends if they want to buy something from us, we'll sell it to them, but
no more than that. Am I overstating where we are in this, Joe? Oh, not at all. Not at all. You can see the indicators.
Look at Rome, Conna's visit to the West Bank, where you go to the West Bank, and unlike previous congressional visits to the Archivite territories, he does not go to Israel for the perfunctory dog and pony show put on by the Israelis. He just goes to the West Bank, just here's the Palestinian point of view. He's previously visited Israel a lot, so the traditional sort of mandatory visit to Israel
by a prospective presidential candidates in the Democratic Party, that's over. You go do that, and that's the kiss of death. You can see your candidacy. Look at, look at House leader Jeffries, the statement he put out just two days ago on the Thomas Comics from Thomas Massey's amendment to cut off all aid to Israel, which is extreme,
Because it includes humanitarian and economic aid as well.
And he was hoping to sort of split the Democrats on that.
βWell, he put out one saying one, they're not going to whip that.β
So this is Jeffrey saying he just not going to take it in position. People with freedom brought their conscious away from Democrats are saying they're going to vote yes on on that, cut off all aid. And then he then starts detailing his position, which is dramatically different from position he had just a month ago, and that is we have to end U.S. military aid for Israel.
So the leader of the Democrats in the House, a man who's been a loyal recipient of APAC funds, since he entered politics, is switching his position.
Finally, you see across the political landscape for the Democrats, people rejecting APAC funds,
running against people who are getting APAC funds. APAC funded candidates losing in elections. No, the tide has definitely turned. I don't see anything that's going to turn it back, even if Israel elects a new leader.
βThere's a fundamental break in the Democratic Party reflecting the fundamental shift inβ
American public opinion. The Democrats are in tune with their America's ad on Israel, and they're saying enough is enough. You know, whether you call it genocide, ethnic cleansing, excessive violence, whatever Americans don't want any part of paying for that want-interstruction that Israel's been executing
for years in the occupied territories, and in Israeli proper.
Yeah, and along, you've seen all the polls, and I wrote an article for hearts that I sent you the other day, which I said, and you even read it. And there were all these polls that I put in all the polls in it. But one of the polls that I didn't really get into was the ranking of world leaders, where people feel about world leaders, Trump comes in after Putin and Xi Jinping.
But the only one who finishes after Trump is Netanyahu. Netanyahu is the most despised leader in the world. There was, there is some debate, will Trump even endorse Netanyahu if he runs again for office, because he is seen as so toxic, probably will in the end, because that's just the way I mean today, endorsed Michelin Del, to be the governor of Minnesota, so I love
Michelin Del. I mean, you know, Mike. No, well, I hear it a little philosophy is based on Michelin Del. Well, and as well it should be, when he's a great American, but the point is, I see a
problem and the problem is the people of Israel may be getting the message and they may
close the book on a quarter century of baby dominating Israeli politics, but whoever comes next doesn't look like they're going to change the policies and all of a sudden the people of Israel are going to realize it's not baby. It's reject, no, no, it's rejection of two state solution. It's bad treatment of the Palestinians, it's, you know, these policies which his opponents
are saying, no, no, I'll continue that, or the vilification of Iran. People, you know, BBs, Iran thing backfire.
βHe was like Iran's the, the boogie man for years and years and years, you have to go afterβ
Iran. Now, the U.S. has discovered you can't actually win a war against Iran. Stay the fuck away from it, you know, and so, you know, this whole panoply of policies he's embraced, I don't see a candidate running against him who doesn't also embrace them, which says to me, you know, Israel's heading for the cold storage for a long time,
but you tell me, I'm wrong. Well, no, no, you're not, you're not wrong. You're not wrong at all. You talk you're right, but, but you can't, you know, there were, there were other prime ministers before on a tenial, and they didn't do much to advance the two-state salute,
but they at least gave it a try for the semblance of a political practice. And they did not cause this riff and this structural damage with the U.S. This is all, this is all on a tenial. This is him many years ago, betting that evangelical Christians can replace American views and the Republicans can replace Democrats as Israel's ally.
That too, by the way, is backpiring, if you look at Chibli Tilhami's polls with the University of Maryland/The Brookings Institute, Susan, you see that there's even a, an erosion of support amongst younger evangelical, but back to the, to the other candidate, look. This relationship, and, you know, we have had this discussion many kind. The U.S. Israel alliance is by nature and by definition, an unnatural alliance that has its
sources in the Cold War and the reasons and the rationale for its existence to a large
Degree does no longer exist.
There's no Soviet Union, there's American fatigue with other wars in the Middle East.
βThere is energy independent in the U.S. since roughly 2015, 2016, and there is a rebalancingβ
what needs to be called the pivot, the rebalancing in the age of the specific forward time. This goes through the, the Obama administration, Trump number one Biden and then Trump number two. All that while Israel did not redefine a repackage its value. So now to take everything you've said with, with I agree, you now is down to one thing that is lethal in terms of,
of how it's really, of view the U.S. and the A pack and then the lobby and all that, and that is that Israel is, is in the eyes of many Americans moving from being an asset, but at least so for Dane Desert to a liability, yeah, that is toxic. That is what Joe was talking about, um, A pack money in democratic primaries that has become toxic, that Israel has become a way to achieve, and if you look at the, you, you look to your right and you're looking
for any kind of consolation there, where we're going to look, tougher Carlson, uh, Marjorie Taylor Greene, uh, we even, you, what, what, what, what? Linger Grant, okay, the last Neo conservative sort of, Neo conservative, who who liked Israel for cold war reasons rather than evangelical motivation, he's no longer with it. So, so Netanyahu's, uh, successor, successor, whomever that will be, is almost by definition a status quote by minute. Historically
in 20 years, we may be looking back and saying he was an interregnant prime minister before the big bang in Israeli public, maybe maybe not, I don't know, but I'm saying it, do not look for a major policy. You will see a difference in music, a difference in tone, um, a, a, a, uh, much significantly lower level of toxicity in the relationship. You will not see a, um, a middle finger way that America, every Monday and Thursday like Netanyahu did, but you're not going
to see a shift in policy that causes what David, what you correctly said is the occupation, the 22 state solution, the, uh, state and religion related it, the settlements, the, the, the Jewish, uh, Taylor and some of the, and some instances in the settlement, you're not going, I'm
βsorry to say you're not going to see a major change there. Yeah, though, I think that's absolutelyβ
right, and you know, one of the things that the big defenders of Israel in the United States
are always saying is, well, do you think Israel has a right to exist? So the right answer that
of course is that Israel exists, uh, but I think the growing answer to that in the United States, which a lot of people in Israel do not quite get is, I don't care. That's the, uh, and, you know, it's like, yeah, you did, but you, you know, you, you, you wasted the opportunity, uh, okay, there's one other issue I want to talk about before we go. Uh, Joe, you may recall that there was some talk of nuclear weapons at the beginning of all of this, and I know it was a long time ago,
and a lot of people have forgotten. Um, and trial with the little love with her moves. Yeah, but right, the, you know, Trump talked about, doesn't talk about, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This can go on for months and months and months. Yeah, but say you're the Iranians. What are, what are you doing now about your nuclear weapons program? Uh, well, this is just an open wound. Okay, three things, first, just like in the Iraq war, the nuclear weapons threat was used as an excuse to launch a war
that American leaders wanted to do for other reasons. So this was the justification. It was never
true that Iran was two weeks away from building a nuclear weapon. That was no truth to that, whatsoever. There were at least a year away by everybody's, by everybody's estimate. Uh, number number two, the Iranian nuclear program has been severely damaged. You can't have that kind of bombing go on around sensitive scientific equipment like centrifuges and not expected to be damaged,
βbut it has not been destroyed. It was never obliterated. Not last summer. Remember, it was just aβ
year ago in July that that Israel and the U.S. obliterated Trump claimed, Iran's nuclear program. No, that's not true damage, but they still have scores, hundreds of centrifuges, likely they still have stockpiles of American uranium. They could use as a feedstock. It looks like their plan is
Just slowly be built that capability.
depends. Um, so that's, that's the state of it. Number three, nuclear weapons are much less valuable to Iran now than they were then. Before this war, nuclear weapons were seen as the deterrent to a U.S. Israeli attack. That they would acquire a nuclear weapon and then the U.S. and Israel wouldn't attack them. You know, in this all kinds of historic examples of countries that the U.S. and Israel had attacked, they didn't have nuclear
weapons and the ones that did have, they didn't attack. So Iran threw the logical,
drew the logical conclusion. But this war has now given Iran too much more powerful geopolitical
weapons and that has controlled the straight and therefore an influence over the global economy. And the demonstrated ability of their missile and drone forces to cripple the economies of their Arab neighbors. Those are much more useful weapons to them than nuclear weapons. In fact, in Iranian official said, just this week that control of the straight is worth 12 nuclear weapons. And he's, he's right. This, this, these, they don't occur any of the risks or prohibitions that
they would encounter if they had got it when I hadn't developed a nuclear weapon. They have these two tools. They, they, I would say the nuclear weapons have a much less priority effect. You, you don't
hear the hard liners in Iran championing this anymore. This used to be a big push. Let's go.
Let's develop the nuclear. If it's there, it's very, it's very, it's very quiet. It's really control the straights and building up the missile and drone forces that are the key instruments of power and the focus of the current Iranian government. So if this war did anything to reduce the, the nuclear threat, you could argue that. But in the process it made Iran actually much stronger by giving it these new capabilities that it simply didn't, hadn't, didn't hadn't demonstrated
actuality that it had, even if they were theoretical before the war.
βYeah, I, the heck could go on and out about this. I think it's super important and we'll haveβ
you guys back again and again. But I think the point you're making here, Joe, goes to a bigger
point. I wrote an article about it a couple of weeks ago. You were very kind to share on the super power myth. I think yes, that if you look at the intersection between what has happened with this war and what has happened with the Ukraine war, we've learned that a lot of the big underpinnings of strategic thinking of the past 60, 70, 80 years are just wrong. Being a superpower does not give you the ability to impose your will anywhere in the world, spending hundreds of billions or
trillions of dollars does not give you that ability. And nuclear weapons do not give you the power you thought you once had. And this is especially, you know, clear in the case of Ukraine, where they've become possibly the world leaders in drone technology and are striking deep into the heart of Russia doing things that we were sure we're going to lead to the use of a tactical nuclear weapon and and and and creating a winning a lot of ground and Russia's big deterrence
βaren't working. And the same is true. I think in the case of Iran and I'm just repeating what Joeβ
has said here. But a particular, I mean, the missiles, yes, but particularly the drone capability, where you've got the ability to manufacture for a few thousand dollars a drone and you can manufacture not hundreds or thousands of drones but tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of drones and distribute them all across your country. And frankly, as the Ukrainians have shown, anywhere you want the world, you put them in the back of a truck and you drive the truck to where
you want. This gives you enormous power. And it is not, you know, as what used to be called asymmetrical power. This is a different kind of power. And you know, I just think that there are lessons from these wars. We get caught up in where's the war to that. But the bigger lesson, what do we learn from Ukraine? What if we learn from Iran is that we've got to go back to the drawing board on our understanding of power and strategy. I'll give each of you a minute to respond
to that and I will go. Just real quick on that, I'm meaning to write about your super power
βarticle because you open up a very, very important discussion. I promise I will. But just on theβ
nuclear issue, this war has demonstrated just what you said that nuclear weapons have been shown to be less useful, either as weapons of coercion, to get countries to do what you want, or as weapons of protection than they used to be. And on the drone capability in particular, it goes even beyond the nuclear Iran's neighbors have spent decades and spent tens of billions of dollars
On very advanced jet fighters and air systems.
Vietnam error weapons. But these drones. For a fraction of the price of what the UAE or Saudi Arabia
βhas spent, they have a better weapon. They have superiority over them. They can inflict damageβ
that Saudi Arabia and the UAE, for example, simply cannot on Iran. It's a whole new world out there and this Iran war has been just like a lightning bolt illuminating the landscape. Totally great. 60 seconds. Come on.
Well, first of all, it's F5 star fighter. The F4, the phantom is the F4 Joe. Sorry, not the F5,
the F4, you right. Thank you. No, no, no, no. It goes to, it goes to strength in your point that the F5 is even an earlier jet than the Phantom F4. But they also have some Russian jets. That's not the point. My point is you're absolutely right about this super power thing. The only, the depressing thing about this. It's all going to have to wait until the next president in 2020. Because I just cannot see this administration, this president, this secretary
of defense, this secretary of state, rejoin or redefining or repackaging or redirecting a global
American foreign policy. I just can't see that. You can't because there's a big, there was a
big announcement today at the Pentagon. Yeah. No, no, not about Georgia. Did you see the big announcement today, Joe? You mean the manly announcement? The manly announcement, the bandly announcement, Pete Sight, hexeth announced. This is so bizarre. We're going to measure testosterone levels in the military and give shots to people who did not have enough testosterone. Freaking weird. I mean, this is really close to General Jack D. Ripper talking about pressure,
βbut only fluids. I mean, this is really Dr. Strange like territory. I think this is much closerβ
to a gomer pile than it is to imagine, you know, we're laughing. There are people sitting right now in Moscow, in Pyongyang, in Tehran, and looking at this guy, Pete Hexeth, and they're saying, this is what we were feared all those years here. No, no, really, this must be AI. No, this must be a joke. No, no, no, this is a secretary of the fact that he's a such a fucking idiot, but you know, there are two points and one actually is absolutely what is this military that he wants
to control and make more manly. Hasn't won a war since World War II, okay? So, you know, that would be fair. Grenada. Okay. Well, I knew you would bring that up and and you're absolutely right.
βOkay. Other than Grenada, hasn't one of the worst in World War II, but I think there is anotherβ
point here, which Pete Hexeth doesn't get and which actually illustrates what we're talking about. You don't need testosterone to fly drone. You don't. You don't need testosterone to fight a cyber war. You don't need testosterone to, you know, command in outer space. And in fact, since some of us believe that testosterone is the world's most powerful brain solvent, it's it's it may not be helpful. And, you know, he's he is, you know, he is trying to prepare
the United States military for the fucking Peloponnesian wars. And, and, and, you know, we're not there anymore. I don't care. I bet he goes home and watches Gerard Butler shirtless night after night. But John Rambo John Rambo. Yeah. Yeah. I bet no. I bet 300. The 300 Spartans. Exactly. Which well, well, maybe you watch a night after night, Joe. I don't know. But in any event,
it's just a month of never. Yeah. Exactly. It, it just illustrates to be how incredibly
out of touch this group is and why a lawns point that they're not going to be the ones to turn the paid strategically is true. Anyway, maybe we're at the end of that. Yeah, who may we're getting to the end of Trump and ag Seth, who knows, we can hope. But what I hope for, and I know we can get to is that we can continue our conversation with both of you guys. And I look forward to it.
For now, thank you, Joe, from your undisclosed location.
And we'll be back with more each and every day. Here at the DSR network on Substack, on YouTube, on Instagram, on TikTok, and where you get your podcast normally. We're everywhere. So find us somewhere and subscribe. Until then, bye-bye.


