Iran Deception: America's Real Goals | Prof. David Gibbs
Neutrality Studies
111,205 views Mar 15, 2026 Interviews
From regime change to permanent conflict, the war on Iran is not an exception and not an accident. The dark forces of violence in Washington once again won out, but the victory of the warmongers might not be what it seems. While militarism, neoconservative strategy, evangelical fundamentalism, and, most of all, an unwavering alignment with Israel have pushed the United States from one confrontation to the next, the war-making capacity of the US is waning, and the signal this sends to us "allies" across the globe is not what Washington would like it to be. My guest today is again, Dr. David Gibbs from the University of Arizona.
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Transcript
0:00Welcome back everybody to Neutrality Studies. I am joined today again by Dr.
0:055 secondsDavid Gibbs, a professor at the University of Arizona. David, welcome back. Thank you for having me, Basco.
0:1313 secondsThank you for coming back online. And we want to talk about Iran, of course. And you are a historian. uh you've got very
0:2121 secondsgood and interesting perspectives on also the long-term development during the cold war of the United States
0:2828 secondsoperations uh abroad. How do you see these latest Iran war tying in with with
0:3535 secondsthe long-term policy of the United States? Well, since I'm an American citizen,
0:4040 secondsI'll give you essentially an American perspective on this war. And as I would see it, the United States has with the
0:4747 secondsend of the Cold War been basically looking for new enemies. At the end of the Cold War, it it's so remarkable that the United States had no enemies. I
0:5656 secondsremember in 1990, Colin Powell, who was then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, gave an interview with Stars and Stripes, the official military
1:041 minute, 4 secondsnewspaper, and I I remember the quote exactly. He said, "Think hard about it.
1:081 minute, 8 secondsI'm running out of demons. I'm running out of villains." Um, as if that's a bad thing. And obviously if you're a military man I guess that is a bad thing
1:161 minute, 16 secondsbecause you're trained your whole career is based on the idea of enemies. And if you're running out of enemies I I guess that's viewed as a negative. Now the
1:241 minute, 24 secondsnormal person without self-interest might see that as a good thing since after all who would really want war and the answer is their whole vested
1:331 minute, 33 secondsinterests that wanted war that thrived in war and that profited from war. There was of course Eisenhower's military-industrial complex but it's
1:401 minute, 40 secondsbroader than that. uh including think tanks, elite academics, elite journalists, academia had had a you
1:471 minute, 47 secondsmight say a gravy train based upon the Cold War. At least the American side did. Lots of grants and uh um
1:551 minute, 55 secondsscholarships and book contracts, uh secret work for the Central Intelligence Agency, often editing, you know, pay paying you to write books and then
2:042 minutes, 4 secondsediting them for you in secret, that kind of thing. Uh lots of academics did these things. And with the end of the cold war um you know there was a lot of
2:122 minutes, 12 secondsum um joking about it. Uh there was a left-wing magazine that no longer exists called the lies of our times that I
2:192 minutes, 19 secondsthink in the early '9s had a cartoon that had the headline of the future and the headline read war to be declared
2:262 minutes, 26 secondstomorrow and the sub headline read enemy to be selected soon. Um with the implication obviously that uh you know you need to have some kind of enemy but we don't really know who that enemy is.
2:372 minutes, 37 secondsAnd so they were looking for an enemy and um uh you know Iran was one of multiple enemies. Russia obviously China is another enemy. Arab terrorism defined
2:462 minutes, 46 secondsvery broadly as an enemy. Um and all of these I think didn't don't come out of nowhere. I mean obviously there's a psychological need for a boogeyman for a simple explanation for all our problems.
2:562 minutes, 56 secondsI suppose that but I don't like psychological explanations. I think there were material interests here and the material interests were um to find
3:053 minutes, 5 secondssome justification for this enormous military the United States had and it was only slightly downsized after the Cold War to find a justification for
3:143 minutes, 14 secondshundreds of overseas bases again which had no function after the if the Soviet Union was gone but it needed a function.
3:203 minutes, 20 secondsThey had to find a function. There were fleets around the world. there was, you know, the the security apparatus, the CIA and all the other agencies. And so I
3:293 minutes, 29 secondsthink looking for an enemy created a psychological construct, a concept, which was that um
3:383 minutes, 38 secondsif you look for an enemy, you'll find an enemy. And Iran clearly was an enemy. It was a convenience enemy because after all, they seized the US embassy. We
3:453 minutes, 45 secondsnever 1979 held the US embassy staff hostage. We never forgive them for that.
3:513 minutes, 51 secondsSo there's a bit of a personalization there, but I think the overall one was that um they were one of multiple
3:583 minutes, 58 secondsenemies. And this it's very easy to blame this on Trump and say Trump is an oddball. He's a madman. Whatever you
4:054 minutes, 5 secondswant to say, which is to some degree true. I mean, look what he's doing in Iran. But this is a bipartisan project.
4:124 minutes, 12 secondsAnd Trump, what Trump is doing in Iran is much more, I'd say, a broad continuity with the past than a deviation from it.
4:224 minutes, 22 secondsYes. Uh so you are putting this of course in then into the context of of US foreign policy of of how how the cold war ended.
4:324 minutes, 32 secondsum you know there's these two schools of thoughts um I I would say when it comes to Iran one is let's let's call them the
4:394 minutes, 39 secondsmirimer rights who basically try to explain it with the influence try to explain the Iran war and the entire
4:474 minutes, 47 secondsMiddle East strategy of the United States with Zionism and the the Zionist lobby and the other ones I would I would
4:554 minutes, 55 secondssay like you know commentators like Brian Brletic he just I just read his latest post he he's saying like if you really believe that the uh United States that that Israel runs the United States,
5:055 minutes, 5 secondsyou're either delusional or uh dishonest. Uh his whole argument is that uh no, this is this is the United States
5:135 minutes, 13 secondsrunning the uh running the show. It is Israel that is basically the proxy over there that is needed in order to to
5:215 minutes, 21 secondsrealize that kind of that kind of policy. Um this kind of finding an enemy, right? by creating an enemy and creating something so alien to the
5:305 minutes, 30 secondsregion that it necessarily must blow up the entire region. Um, which which of the two camps do you think has the is
5:405 minutes, 40 secondsclosest to the way that that the historical development um um like lets us guess what it is closer to meshimer's interpretation.
5:515 minutes, 51 secondsThere's no denying the influence of the Israel lobby which is enormous and extremely influential. Well, I see it in my classroom. I told my class, I'm not
5:595 minutes, 59 secondsgoing to discuss the Iran war or anything having to do with Israel Palestine because there are groups on campus on every campus in America or
6:066 minutes, 6 secondsmany of them certainly that track professors in terms of what they say on Israel Palestine and you can get into a lot of trouble uh if you say the wrong
6:156 minutes, 15 secondsthing. Um you know, you'll have to justify yourself, you'll be demonized and so on and so forth. Um, there used to be a case where I could say anything I wanted in class, but those days are
6:236 minutes, 23 secondsover. And a lot of that has to do with the Israel lobby. And so I don't think there's any point in trying to minimize the significance of it. I think that Mir
6:316 minutes, 31 secondsShimemer's book uh which he co-authored with Stefan Walt at Harvard, the Israel lobby about 20 years ago. There's no
6:386 minutes, 38 secondsdoubt they were right on that. I think it's it it is deeper than what they said. However, and I think the way I would look at it is that um Israel was
6:466 minutes, 46 secondsseen as you had the growth of the neoconservative ideology. I've spoken about it on this show before and as I
6:566 minutes, 56 secondssee it, this was a outgrowth of America's failure after Vietnam in the late 1970s. And it was an effort to reinvigorate American militarism after
7:057 minutes, 5 secondsits uh failures in Vietnam and to try and push back against what they saw as dovish tendencies in the American
7:127 minutes, 12 secondspolitical system. And they the neoconservative ideology, both its Jewish and gentile components, saw
7:197 minutes, 19 secondsIsrael as their model. And what they liked about Israel was that Israel used military force unapologetically.
7:267 minutes, 26 secondsThey used maximal military force offensively, not just defensively, but offensively. They attacked. They didn't just defend. And at least in the
7:357 minutes, 35 secondsmythology, not so much in reality, but in the mythology, they always won. They always performed brilliantly. That that didn't in practice happen in many cases,
7:427 minutes, 42 secondsbut that's how they saw it. And so you had basically a situation where um they
7:497 minutes, 49 secondsthey saw Israel as what America should be like. Oh, one more thing about the idea of Israel was to disparage negotiations, at least to downplay
7:587 minutes, 58 secondsnegotiations, use them as little as possible. Military force solves problems. Negotiating is for for the
8:048 minutes, 4 secondsweak, is for the weak. And so it seemed to the neoconservatives, to the neoconservative ideologues who grew up
8:118 minutes, 11 secondsduring this period that um Israel was pointing the way to what America should be like. And they were heavily funded by
8:198 minutes, 19 secondsthe military-industrial complex, the neoconservatives. They had a series of lobby groups and gradually over time they gained more and more influence in
8:268 minutes, 26 secondsboth parties. They started out actually in the Democratic party and then they moved to the Republican party and they moved back and forth and they're very much present. Trump has expressed a lot
8:358 minutes, 35 secondsof skepticism about neoonservatism but now he he clearly is following the neoonservative playbook and that essentially is turning America into
8:428 minutes, 42 secondsIsrael and many people have said that America needs to be more like Israel. We need kind of Israel style security and uh with a disparaging of civil liberties
8:508 minutes, 50 secondsand privacy. Uh we need to dismiss negotiations. We need to um aggressively attack not just people who threaten us
8:588 minutes, 58 secondsor people who but people might hypothetically threaten us. I think the use of hypothetical threats here to justify aggression was very much part of
9:069 minutes, 6 secondsthe Israeli playbook. Um and so I I think you had sort of the merging of almost um Israel and the United States
9:149 minutes, 14 secondsinto one. And that was the neoconservative idea and that's that's the policy now. So as I would see it,
9:209 minutes, 20 secondsit's more than the Israel lobby. It's much more as well that the Israeli idea is located in the US government. Um and that the idea of what America should be
9:299 minutes, 29 secondslike is is based upon the Israeli experience. And that's playing out right now before our eyes in Iran. Um based on the idea that Iran might hypothetically
9:379 minutes, 37 secondssomeday be a threat. Um the hypotheticals here is very interesting to me. the idea that um if somebody might hypothetically threaten you, you
9:469 minutes, 46 secondsshould treat it as a certainty and attack them. Um the the opportunities are limitless. I mean, hypothetically, anything's
9:539 minutes, 53 secondspossible. Hypothetically, aliens from outer space could attack us. The Lochness monster could come out of Scotland and attack us. I don't know.
10:0010 minutesI'm being a bit flippant here, but if you wanted to hypotheticals, why not go all the way, I suppose. Um and so Iran hypothetically might do something. So,
10:0810 minutes, 8 secondsit's legitimate to attack them. This, by the way, was formalized by Richard Cheney, a prominent neoonservative,
10:1610 minutes, 16 secondsvice President Richard Cheney. He called it the 1% doctrine. And he said that if a country presents even a 1% threat that
10:2410 minutes, 24 secondsthey might go to war with us and present a security danger to us, we should treat it as a 100% threat with the idea that
10:3210 minutes, 32 secondswe should attack them. It's always safer to attack and to go to war than to seek peace, I guess, was the idea here. and
10:3910 minutes, 39 secondsany any threat of any minimal amount should be writed as a near certainty,
10:4210 minutes, 42 secondswhich makes no sense. Logically, it makes no sense. But that really is the neoonservative idea, the 1% doctrine.
10:5010 minutes, 50 secondsHey, very brief intermission because I was recently banned from YouTube. And although I'm back, this can happen anytime again. So, please consider subscribing not only here, but to my
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11:0311 minutes, 3 secondsThe link's going to be in the description below. And now, back to the video.
11:0711 minutes, 7 secondsIt's it's kind of offensive realism on steroids, right? Where you where you basically argue that no, no, no, I mean the the offensive is the important thing
11:1511 minutes, 15 secondsand you need to make sure that any kind any kind of and type of threat is immediately removed. So there cannot be a balance, right? Because balance
11:2311 minutes, 23 secondsimplies that you accept that the other one has a certain weight. No, the the neoconservative idea is complete utter total domination and nothing less is
11:3211 minutes, 32 secondsacceptable. um as a and it's it's treated as a security threat, not just as a problem, not just as something to
11:4011 minutes, 40 secondsbe negotiated. No, it is a security threat that needs to be eliminated. So like offensive realism on steroids. But
11:4611 minutes, 46 secondsthe the thing with Israel though, you know what, at the moment I'm thinking so much about is like how to understand
11:5311 minutes, 53 secondsthis as a as a political as a political project. And I'm at the point where I would argue that you cannot uh you
12:0112 minutes, 1 secondcannot analyze the political process in the United States without the political process in Israel and vice versa. These two are MA would say joined by the hip
12:0812 minutes, 8 secondsbut maybe even that they share the same bloodstream. They are Siamese twins and the and in a sense what you just said
12:1612 minutes, 16 secondsyou know makes me think of Israel as the unshackled United States. the United States without the US constitution and without the same constraints and hence a
12:2512 minutes, 25 secondsa model a model for the neocons and they're trying to import that back in and the Israelis on their part they import all the weapons all of the the
12:3312 minutes, 33 secondsproductive capacity of the United States and round and round it goes something like that I suppose the only thing I I would slightly disagree with
12:4012 minutes, 40 secondsis um it is in a sense offensive realism on steroids except that realist would insist you have to be cautious you have
12:4812 minutes, 48 secondsto weigh the possibility of risk that you might fail, might be defeated.
12:5312 minutes, 53 secondsWhereas the neoconservatives tend to throw caution to the wind and they insist that it's all a question of will, willpower, or at least they imply that.
13:0013 minutesAnd the idea is that um those who disagree with them are showing lack of spine, lack of moral certitude or some
13:0913 minutes, 9 secondsum character flaw perhaps. And that um uh if only America is only a superpower
13:1713 minutes, 17 secondsif it acts like a superpower is what they would say. And acting like a superpower means constant shows of force. The bottom line is this system
13:2413 minutes, 24 secondsthat we have set up here that basically when you create this enormous military um you have to use it periodically. You
13:3313 minutes, 33 secondshave to use it. Uh there's no way you can justify the existence of this enormous outsized military far larger than any in the world. Again, you know,
13:4113 minutes, 41 secondspeople talk about the threat from China.
13:4213 minutes, 42 secondsChina has a GDP approximately the same size as the United States, larger by the PPP standard, but their military is much
13:5013 minutes, 50 secondssmaller. Their military spending, their level of spending as a percentage of GDP is much smaller. Um, and so the United
13:5713 minutes, 57 secondsStates basically has this worldclass military like such has never been seen before. And if you have that, you have
14:0514 minutes, 5 secondsto use it periodically. And so the ideology of neoconservatism fit in very nicely with that idea with that institutional need to use the military.
14:1514 minutes, 15 secondsUm and um again we're seeing that now in Iran that um if you have this constant pressure to use the military to do
14:2214 minutes, 22 secondssomething and this ideology based upon hypothetical threats of something that might hypothetically go along and attack you. I guess that fits in and justifies
14:3214 minutes, 32 secondswhat we're doing in Iran. Uh, I guess the only problem is we could very easily and very likely will lose this war and what happens then is anybody's guess.
14:4114 minutes, 41 secondsWhen I talked yesterday to Muhammad Mandi, I mean, he made it very clear that, you know, the Iran is not waiting for the United States to offer peace.
14:4914 minutes, 49 secondsIran already rejects any type of of short-term ceasefire and the war will end at when Iran decides that it will
14:5714 minutes, 57 secondsend. So their their new their strategy seems to be to uh to absorb as much as they can and to basically in essence
15:0715 minutes, 7 secondsthey want to dispel they they want to um uh to to to chase the United States out of West Asia and demand not only a a
15:1715 minutes, 17 secondsceasefire on paper but take away the material capability of the United States to wage again war within the next years.
15:2515 minutes, 25 secondsHow how likely do you find it that this is an achievable goal? Because after all,
15:3115 minutes, 31 secondsyou're right. I mean, the United States has the most formidable military force on Earth, but even that is not infinite.
15:3915 minutes, 39 secondsI was listening to Theodore Postl, uh the weapons specialist at MIT, who's extremely informative and a very expert,
15:4615 minutes, 46 secondsand he basically said that missile defense systems basically don't work against ballistic missiles. I think they work against fighter planes which are
15:5315 minutes, 53 secondsbarely being used here at least not at least not at close range and they work against drones but ballistic missiles they just don't work and so the
16:0216 minutes, 2 secondsUnited States cannot and Israel cannot really shoot down a lot of these missiles and the missiles the interceptors are extremely expensive and
16:1016 minutes, 10 secondsfew in number um and being depleted very rapidly whereas Iran seems to have a remarkable supply of missiles and drones
16:1916 minutes, 19 secondsand if they run out of them and run out of the ability to manufacture. There's a likelihood that I would think Russia and or China would help replenish them because they have a strong interest in
16:2716 minutes, 27 secondsdoing so. And so I I there is a reasonable possibility Iran may just win this war in the sense that all they have
16:3516 minutes, 35 secondsto do as many have noted is survive um to to be standing at the end of the day.
16:4116 minutes, 41 secondsAnd um also they're engaging in I think what some have called vertical escalation. Uh they're not just attacking Israel, they're attacking
16:5016 minutes, 50 secondsalmost all of America's allies in the Middle East. Um they're attacking multiple Gulf States and they're trying to demonstrate and are demonstrating
16:5716 minutes, 57 secondsthat America not only cannot protect you, but America makes you more vulnerable to attack. That far from protecting you, the alliance with the
17:0417 minutes, 4 secondsUnited States weakens your security. And I think the Gulf States are figuring that out. And the Europeans, if they were smart, would figure that out, too.
17:1417 minutes, 14 secondsThat maybe maybe NATO is not such a good thing. uh maybe rejecting neutrality by Sweden and Finland is going to be a disaster because it makes you a target.
17:2217 minutes, 22 secondsIt puts a target on your head just as UAE just found that out as Bahrain just found that out and Iran is making this
17:2917 minutes, 29 secondsvery clear that that's what's going on here is that America will not protect you. It makes you more insecure.
17:3517 minutes, 35 secondsUm and so I I think what they really want to do as an endgame is to force America to withdraw from the Middle East. Now for America to do that would
17:4417 minutes, 44 secondsbe almost announcing the end of the American empire and he right it would be end of the Trump presidency and end of the American empire. Um it's
17:5217 minutes, 52 secondsvery hard for me to believe Trump would be willing to accept that. But what he will do if we simply start running out of missiles and start tiring oh one more
18:0018 minutesthing of course and vertical escalation is the closing of the straits of Hormuz and the possibility of causing an
18:0718 minutes, 7 secondseconomic downturn maybe a very severe economic downturn uh with devastating consequences. All of these things
18:1418 minutes, 14 secondsbasically are playing to Iran's favor and will eventually run the risk of tiring the United States. But this could be a major turning point that I wonder
18:2318 minutes, 23 secondsif Trump would want to be the president who presides over the defeat of the US Empire in the most humiliating way possible by a country we've always regarded as an inferior country,
18:3218 minutes, 32 secondsinferior in every level. We had no respect for the Iranians. And here they going to defeat us. It would be a repeat under worse circumstances that at worst
18:4018 minutes, 40 secondstiming what the Vietnamese did to us in 1975.
18:4418 minutes, 44 secondsRight. Right. and in in in a much larger scale in a sense because it would it's not just a retreat from the from the
18:5318 minutes, 53 secondscountry. It would be a complete retreat from from the region. At least that's what the Iranians are apparently aiming for. And you know, just to to underpin what what you just explained, you know,
19:0119 minutes, 1 secondthey are also making the point in another way by exactly not attacking anyone who doesn't have US military bases.
19:0919 minutes, 9 secondsNot a single not a single strike on Oman. Not one. Because no US military bases, no installation. Oman is a friend of the United States but not an ally.
19:1719 minutes, 17 secondsOman is also a friend of Iran and this is well understood. Mandi actually says yes. I mean uh if these Gulf states declared their permanent neutrality from
19:2619 minutes, 26 secondsnow on and expelled the United States or just at least said we're not going to renew any of these leases, then that would that would solve it uh safe the
19:3519 minutes, 35 secondsquestion of of uh reparations. But the um the security structure is definitely that that one that the Iranians are
19:4319 minutes, 43 secondslooking for. Now for the United States then I mean the one of the questions that's in the back of everybody's mind at the moment also if I reading all the
19:5219 minutes, 52 secondsthe newsletters that I'm subscribed to is like is there a point where the US or Israel might just use their nuclear weapons in
19:5919 minutes, 59 secondsorder to escalate to something that is so unthinkable that it that in in the neocon mindset oh okay this is the real
20:0720 minutes, 7 secondspower and this will end it once and for all.
20:1020 minutes, 10 secondsThat that is the the worry on my mind and in many people's minds and with good reason I think and that if the United States were backed into a corner and more significantly if Israel were backed
20:1920 minutes, 19 secondsinto a corner, Israel were facing defeat in this war and Netanyahu personally were facing defeat in this war. What would Israel do? Well, nuclear weapons
20:2720 minutes, 27 secondsis one possibility. Um that is it is one possibility. Israel has claimed falsely by all indications, but is claimed
20:3420 minutes, 34 secondsnevertheless is existential for them. um and they've acted at least superficially in public as if it's existential. That's
20:4220 minutes, 42 secondsthe case, they can easily justify it to themselves and to each other at least as a re cause for using nuclear weapons. Um
20:4920 minutes, 49 secondsIsrael would be the first cause of concern. Um the United States also under Trump, I I would not think it impossible the United
20:5820 minutes, 58 secondsStates would resort to nuclear weapons because they would see that as a last resort. If we can't win with conventional weapons, then maybe we need to move to nuclear weapons. Because again, acknowledging defeat in a war,
21:1021 minutes, 10 secondsthat may mean a permanent setback in a key region with global implications.
21:1521 minutes, 15 secondsThat might be considered unthinkable and intolerable, not just for Trump, but for his advisers and some of the top military personnel. And so nuclear
21:2321 minutes, 23 secondsweapons would be considered an option under those under those circumstances.
21:2821 minutes, 28 secondsUh that is an enormous risk, enormous danger here. I think and I don't know what to say about it except that um you
21:3621 minutes, 36 secondsknow we've been playing with this game with nuclear weapons that we haven't used them since Hiroshima Nagasaki therefore it's not really a serious
21:4421 minutes, 44 secondsproblem. It's remarkable how the nuclear threat was treated as a constant worry when I was a child growing up during the
21:5221 minutes, 52 secondscold war but after the cold war ended we pretended it stopped being an issue. There's almost no discussion of this.
21:5621 minutes, 56 secondsThere's no anti-war movement. There's no anti-uclear weapons movement in the west. There used to be an enormous one, but it's gone now. It's gone. And so,
22:0522 minutes, 5 secondspeople have forgotten about the risk here. And I think in that situation, the risk of using nuclear weapons is greatly increased.
22:1122 minutes, 11 secondsYeah. Instead of denuclearizing, we denuclear feared. So,
22:1622 minutes, 16 secondsexactly. We still have the nukes, but we have we don't have the necessary fear anymore about them. So, this is a most unfortunate development. Um, but the um,
22:2622 minutes, 26 secondsone of the things I was wondering and I I know you you're probably not not the person who has all of the information on that one. Probably we would need to talk
22:3322 minutes, 33 secondsto Ted Postol. Um, the the nuclear reactors that that Israel has on its territory, aren't they the hugest
22:4122 minutes, 41 secondsliability? I mean, if if Iran got struck by a uh nuclear weapon, wouldn't be the most natural thing to just shoot a
22:4822 minutes, 48 secondscouple of conventional missiles at these nuclear reactors and and wreak havoc that way. Isn't that the kind of deterrent at the moment? But I I I
22:5622 minutes, 56 secondshaven't talked about this with anyone who who actually knows how these things work. I just wonder if you have any any any thoughts on this.
23:0323 minutes, 3 secondsYeah, Israel Israel's main nuclear production facilities at Deona in the Negv desert. is both by France in
23:0923 minutes, 9 secondscooperation with France in the 50s and it um you know again you'd have to talk Ted Postol being a technical specialist
23:1723 minutes, 17 secondssomething I'm not but I off the top of my head I can't see any special reason why Iran couldn't use one of their advance more advanced missiles to target
23:2523 minutes, 25 secondsdemona they haven't done that yet and I think for very good reasons they haven't done it um they have shown restraint uh which I appreciate personally as a human
23:3423 minutes, 34 secondsbeing who values his life um But if they were struck with a nuclear weapon, of course, all bets are off and striking at
23:4223 minutes, 42 secondsDeona, uh, would of course be a realistic possibility. Um, I'm assuming,
23:4723 minutes, 47 secondsand again, this is something you'd have to ask a specialist about, but I'm assuming there'd be considerable danger of spreading radioactivity over a large
23:5523 minutes, 55 secondsarea and neighboring countries with very deadly effects.
24:0024 minutesYes. Yes. and and uh you know one thing is the Iranian leadership um and also according to Morandi you know they they
24:0724 minutes, 7 secondsusually don't really talk about Israel they usually talk about occupy Palestine they are very much aware that the land that Israel sits upon is the land of the
24:1624 minutes, 16 secondsPalestinians and they have no intention whatsoever to permanently uh uh radioactively poison the Palestine right
24:2524 minutes, 25 secondsso I mean that that's these are part of these constraints that that they they operate within. Now, coming back to the
24:3324 minutes, 33 secondsUnited States though, um what do you think or I I I did a couple of episodes about
24:4024 minutes, 40 secondsum the evangelical component and this doomsday ideology of uh of bringing about Armageddon and how do you know how
24:4824 minutes, 48 secondsthe US president now has a faith office in the White House and just last weekend they had this ceremony with him like at the desk and and and his his pastor
24:5624 minutes, 56 secondspraying to him and saying things like really dumb things, but I'm pretty sure Donald Trump loves to hear them. is like saying no to Donald Trump is saying no to God and stuff like that and Pete
25:0525 minutes, 5 secondsHexth with his tattoos and uh the Jerusalem cross and theos vult and so on like the the acknowledgement that there
25:1325 minutes, 13 secondsis a very very strong component that wants this war not in order to win and project power but in order to bring about the end days and and the second
25:2125 minutes, 21 secondscoming of of the Christ that's a completely different motivation for war from the neocons of course it goes
25:2925 minutes, 29 secondshandin glove with the neocons But it's a different motivation. How how important do you judge that that stream of US politics to be in this war?
25:3825 minutes, 38 secondsIt's very significant. I mean just a little bit of the history is that u evangelical Christianity again by evangelical what we mean is a branch of
25:4625 minutes, 46 secondsmostly Protestantism that has a very literalist interpretation of the old and especially the new testament and is sort
25:5425 minutes, 54 secondsof separate from the more mainstream Christian groups like the Presbyterians or the Methodists and as very emotional connection between individual Christians
26:0226 minutes, 2 secondsand Jesus Christ. This the modern version the US has always the US is an exceptionally religious country. stands out among all industrialized countries
26:1026 minutes, 10 secondsas exceptionally high level of religious identification.
26:1426 minutes, 14 secondsUm, and we've always had periodic upsurges of evangelical interest. One of them was in the 70s and it emerged precisely at the moment of neoconservatism.
26:2426 minutes, 24 secondsAnd um, the distinctive thing about the 1970s version of evangelical Protestantism is that it
26:3326 minutes, 33 secondsestablished the idea of Christian Zionism. That was a whole new idea that I not aware there's any significant anticedants to it before the 70s
26:4226 minutes, 42 secondsfor the evangelicals like because Christian Zionism is very old when it comes to the UK 250 years at least but for the evangelical Americans this was
26:5026 minutes, 50 secondsthis was new well the mass I mean I'm sure there was always elements of it but it's a mass phenomenon that took hold of the whole evangelical movement and became a
26:5826 minutes, 58 secondscentral feature of it that was the 70s that was very much the 70s it's somewhat ironic because these they did have a history anti-semitism.
27:0627 minutes, 6 secondsUm, but nevertheless, they they put that aside and for purely religious purposes,
27:1227 minutes, 12 secondsthey they became more intensely identified with the survival of the Jewish state uh even than many Jews. And
27:2027 minutes, 20 secondsthe Israel lobby appreciated this and they I' I've been through the papers of the one of the elements of the Israel lobby, the American Jewish Committee from this period. And people were openly
27:3027 minutes, 30 secondssaying that this is a good thing because after all it increases our political punch. Uh Jews at that time in the 70s were only about 3% of the US population.
27:3827 minutes, 38 secondsI think now they're 2%. Uh they didn't really have that much electoral many votes. Uh evangelical Christians.
27:4527 minutes, 45 secondsUh that's um uh I I think that uh was if I'm not mistaken I think about 35% of the US population by the mid70s said
27:5427 minutes, 54 secondsthey had been born again in Christ the defining feature of being an evangelical. That's a lot of people that's a lot of votes right and so the Israel lobby uh put aside
28:0228 minutes, 2 secondswhatever reservations they had and ultimately cultivated and forged a relationship with these evangelicals because it increased their political
28:1028 minutes, 10 secondspower. Um and um you know mostly you know, which is just just to interject, which is very
28:1728 minutes, 17 secondsinteresting because the Christian evangelicals uh uh Christian Zionism of course uh views Jews as uh necessary implementation tools in order to get to
28:2628 minutes, 26 secondsArmageddon. But as soon as Armageddon come, the Jews of course go to hell. But they are they're happy with that, right?
28:3128 minutes, 31 secondsThat that's just how it's supposed to be. That's the plan. Therefore, we're nice to the Jews now and we help them with with Israel and with with the with a third temple and then uh at the end they're in in hell and we're in heaven.
28:4128 minutes, 41 secondsSo that's how it's supposed to be,
28:4228 minutes, 42 secondsright? But they view them as that which cannot be something that the uh Jewish uh uh Zionists are very happy about. But
28:5028 minutes, 50 secondsif you can use it, then why not? It's clearly not.
28:5328 minutes, 53 secondsExactly. In other words, it was rail poly. This is the way politics is done. It was an alliance.
28:5828 minutes, 58 secondsAnd it was alliance of convenience, but it was an alliance all the same and a very politically potent alliance. And so I think that's a key element of the
29:0529 minutes, 5 secondsIsrael lobby is the alliance with the evangelicals, many of whom were, it should be noted, workingass, um not just whites, there's also heavy uh
29:1329 minutes, 13 secondsAfrican-American element in the evangelical movement as well. Many um um recent more recent sort of Mexican-American immigrants are involved
29:2129 minutes, 21 secondsin it. So it's huge and it's not just it's multi-racial and it um it it's working class to a significant degree. Many of these people
29:2929 minutes, 29 secondsare people who had long ago voted for the Democrats and enabled the Republicans to forge an electoral realignment based to some degree on religion. And again, Israel was a key
29:3829 minutes, 38 secondscomponent of all of this um and a key component that was very useful to the Israel lobby and to the Israeli
29:4529 minutes, 45 secondsgovernment. And there Trump, it's somewhat ironic. Now, Trump course is blasphemous. He he talks in a blasphemous way. His personal contract is blasphemous.
29:5529 minutes, 55 secondsum you know his personal life is totally dissolute but the uh evangelicals tend to overlook that and uh that he's doing
30:0330 minutes, 3 secondshe's engaging in activity that they approve of including obviously rock solid support for Israel and so I think
30:1130 minutes, 11 secondsthat basically um this kind of intense well pro-Christian attitude is another
30:1830 minutes, 18 secondsinfluence on Trump it's an electoral influence I find it very difficult to believe Trump has any real deep interest in Jesus Christ or the second coming or the end times or any of these things,
30:2730 minutes, 27 secondsbut he likes power and he likes adulation and he gets that from the evangelicals. And so I think this is another very significant influence on him.
30:3730 minutes, 37 secondsHe's also he's also at an age where you know um becoming more more faithful or or adopting certain beliefs would very
30:4630 minutes, 46 secondsmuch make sense you know in in in in terms but I have no I have no indication about that whatsoever. So let's let's rather
30:5530 minutes, 55 secondsdiscuss like where do you see this influencing the other huge war of the United States that's still going on the proxy war against Ukraine. I mean this
31:0431 minutes, 4 secondsum the last two weeks were quite interesting. I mean Ukraine has been immediately crowded out from the media
31:1231 minutes, 12 secondscompletely gone from the from the headlines of the New York Times and so on and in a sense Iran is now doing to
31:1931 minutes, 19 secondsUkraine what Ukraine did to Corona. It's just it takes up the the the oxygen the media oxygen. Do you think this will actually translate into into
31:2831 minutes, 28 secondsdevelopments on the ground or what what what are your information on on how Ukraine is going?
31:3331 minutes, 33 secondsWell, um I mean others have noted this and it's no doubt true there's no way this can work out except for the benefit of Russia uh in the sense that um the
31:4131 minutes, 41 secondsUnited States just doesn't have a lot of weapons to give to Ukraine anymore.
31:4431 minutes, 44 secondsWhether Europe pays for them or not makes no difference. So the US just doesn't have an inventory of weapons to give to Ukraine if they're expending
31:5231 minutes, 52 secondsthem all on the war in in Iran with Iran and if they're giving them all to Israel and um which they're doing. And so
31:5831 minutes, 58 secondsthere's that there's lack of focus and attention on on Ukraine which I'm sure must be very personally gling to Zalinski.
32:0632 minutes, 6 secondsAnd finally there's the issue that it's very beneficial to Russia in terms of raising the global price of oil.
32:1232 minutes, 12 secondsobviously very unbeneficial to oil importers like Europe for example which are going to suffer very heavily from this and accelerate their
32:2032 minutes, 20 secondsde-industrialization. I mean the dilemma of Europe is very remarkable. On the one hand they cut off their main supply of oil and gas which is Russia and thought
32:2832 minutes, 28 secondsthat was very clever of them and then they bought much more expensive US fossil fuels and um and remained reliant
32:3632 minutes, 36 secondsof course on supplies from the Persian Gulf. how the Persian Gulf has been cut off and of course we should not be surprised a bit if Donald Trump and his
32:4332 minutes, 43 secondsnationalism imposes export controls on US oil and gas. Uh so Europe will be left out to dry so to speak and the
32:5132 minutes, 51 secondsde-industrialization of countries like Germany will be rapidly accelerated and probably this will be a turning point for Europe including politically.
33:0033 minutesuh we should have every reason to expect parties like the a day in Germany that uh the um national in France and so on
33:0833 minutes, 8 secondsit's rise very rapidly in response to these conditions um and nevertheless Russia will be the beneficiary in the sense that they will gain much more
33:1733 minutes, 17 secondsrevenue on account of a raised global price for oil and gas that I'm sure is already happening.
33:2533 minutes, 25 secondsYeah. the, you know, the the pickle that the Europeans managed to maneuver themselves into willingly, seeingly,
33:3233 minutes, 32 secondsknowingly is, uh, is something to be studied by future historians for. Yeah, I agree.
33:3833 minutes, 38 secondsI agree. It's incredibly strange. Um but the on on the other hand like when
33:4533 minutes, 45 secondsyou look at at the caucuses and central Asia um we are already seeing how this
33:5233 minutes, 52 secondswar is unfortunately also spreading into there. Um do you have any thoughts about you know the involvement the potential
33:5933 minutes, 59 secondsinvolvement um of of Azarbjan aliith uh and the uh the the way that central Asia
34:0634 minutes, 6 secondsmight look at this? I mean, Iran is a direct neighbor to Afghanistan, right?
34:1134 minutes, 11 secondsAnd Afghanistan was fighting a war with the United States for uh 20 years. And actually, Iranians are saying, "Look,
34:1834 minutes, 18 secondswe've seen all of these US wars in our region. We've we've studied them. Uh we know how the US operates. Uh this is this is a direct this is this is now now
34:2734 minutes, 27 secondswe apply the knowledge that that we've gained through that. But how do you think the rest of the region that had that had already suffered wars with the
34:3334 minutes, 33 secondsUnited States is um is going to develop or or going to approach this?
34:4034 minutes, 40 secondsI I I'll say this. I mean, honestly, I don't have a good answer to that. What I would say is if if they're smart, what
34:4634 minutes, 46 secondsthey'll do is is establish as as close as possible essentially a neutral position on America's wars and possibly
34:5534 minutes, 55 secondsuh try and achieve some kind of at least proper motives for vende with their nearest neighbor which is Russia. Um uh just because it's their nearest neighbor
35:0335 minutes, 3 secondsand it's always wise to be on good terms with your nearest neighbor. Um, and I think that again what what what is being demonstrated very clearly in the Middle
35:1135 minutes, 11 secondsEast, everybody should have anticipated was that American bases alliance with the United States reduces your security.
35:2035 minutes, 20 secondsBy the way, one of the things I did want to comment on is I've been fascinated in a very and confused in some ways about Sweden and Finland.
35:2835 minutes, 28 secondsSweden and Finland, Finland had been neutral since 47. Sweden for centuries literally had been neutral and they did quite well with neutrality. Uh their
35:3735 minutes, 37 secondssecurity was insured. Uh they didn't uh get drawn into conflict and now they're
35:4335 minutes, 43 secondsgiving up their security for an America that is not only unreliable and but and and views Europe with contempt but is
35:5235 minutes, 52 secondsopenly a threat to their security as being demonstrated in the Gulf right now. And um one wonders um if somebody should perhaps have taken the sweds and
36:0136 minutes, 1 secondthe fins and shaken them a bit by the scruff of the neck and said, "What are you thinking, guys?" Um because it it doesn't seem to be what they're doing is
36:0936 minutes, 9 secondsrational. A lot of this is based upon hypotheticals. What if Russia does this?
36:1336 minutes, 13 secondsWhat if Russia does that? There's a book recently published by a German academic called If Russia Wins. It's a bestseller in Europe, I'm told. Um it's by this guy
36:2236 minutes, 22 secondsnamed Masala who's a professor with very close ties to the Buntes and with NATO and it's literally fiction of you know
36:3136 minutes, 31 secondsRussia goes and starts acting militarily aggressively beginning with the Baltics and it's fiction and people are treating it and reviewing it as if it were real.
36:4236 minutes, 42 secondsUm and that's happened before in the 1980s a British general did exactly the same thing. He wrote a book called The Third World War, which is a fictionalized account of Russia
36:5036 minutes, 50 secondsattacking Western Europe, and people treated it as if it were a documentary.
36:5536 minutes, 55 secondsUm, and I I think what we have here is is an extreme case of the neoconservative logic now being applied to Europe, which is treating
37:0437 minutes, 4 secondshypothetical threats as actual threats and remote threats as certainties and
37:1137 minutes, 11 secondsthen planning accordingly. And always it's safer to militarize than to demilitarize. All right? And none of
37:1837 minutes, 18 secondsthat makes any sense when you think about it. But that's the logic here being applied in Europe as well as in the United States and Israel. Of course,
37:2537 minutes, 25 secondsI I have I have two two pieces that to to to explain this. One is of course that yes, the Europeans, the Swedes and the Fins included, swallowed the pill,
37:3637 minutes, 36 secondsthe neoconservative pill that you just described. um and the and that they work in these hypotheticals and they've
37:4437 minutes, 44 secondsthey've worked themselves into a point where the hypotheticals are believed as dogma. It's basically if Russia wins then naturally the next step will be the
37:5237 minutes, 52 secondsBaltics. It's absolutely clear, you know, it's like the domino theory. It's it's it's taken for certainty that this is what's going to happen, right? And if
38:0038 minutesyou if you question that, then you're the delusional one. So that's just the fact that there's no evidence to support that is of no importance to me.
38:0638 minutes, 6 secondsIt it doesn't matter. Doma doesn't depend on on uh on evidence. Doma depends on belief. Uh uh um
38:1438 minutes, 14 secondscan I just add to that? I mean like coming out of from the United States and with a long memory because I've been around for a while. Um during the Cold
38:2238 minutes, 22 secondsWar there was some tendency of Americans to look at the Europeans as the smart ones. They were the ones who showed nuance. They were the ones who didn't
38:2938 minutes, 29 secondscar get carried away with boogeymen and uh uh you know rhetoric and so on. And the European press was much better than the American press. I remember reading
38:3738 minutes, 37 secondsLemon uh and it was much better than the New York Times. Even the British press,
38:4138 minutes, 41 secondsthe BBC was better than their American counterparts. Now they're everything in Europe. Um I said I could read I don't read German, but I read French. It's it's it's the New York Times.
38:5138 minutes, 51 secondsI know. But it makes sense, doesn't it?
38:5338 minutes, 53 secondsAfter after 30 years, 35 years of having won the Cold War and having to admit that the United States approach was actually correct in winning the war,
39:0339 minutes, 3 secondsright? that everybody in Europe started integrating right including the newspapers. So all of the European newspapers are downstream New York Times
39:1139 minutes, 11 secondsthese days. They also the New York Times in order to understand how the world needs to be framed and then they go along with that because that is objective truth to them. And so the
39:1939 minutes, 19 secondsother the other element by the way on Finland and Sweden is that the Europeans have lost the capacity to think outside the realm of deterrence.
39:2739 minutes, 27 secondsdeterrence is all they can think about. And within the framework of deterrence,
39:3139 minutes, 31 secondsyou just have no space. Your frame excludes the option of having like neutrality as a security strategy. Uh
39:3939 minutes, 39 secondsbecause it's not deterrence because you need to scare the other one into not attacking you. That's that that that's it. And in under that possibility that you could scare them
39:4739 minutes, 47 secondsinto actually attacking you seems to not have crossed their minds.
39:5139 minutes, 51 secondsNo, it does. It does. But it it it's the reason why they argue we need to uh militarize because we are too weak so we
39:5839 minutes, 58 secondswill invite attack therefore we need to militarize. So the whole idea of oh no no if we are no threat to anyone if we only have friends on both on all sides
40:0740 minutes, 7 secondsthen we're perfectly fine that is just outside of the way that they can think about u military strategy and a large
40:1540 minutes, 15 secondspart not all not all but a large part especially in the establishment have lost the ability to think in that in in those non deterrence terms. Um so what
40:2440 minutes, 24 secondswe need to study is actually to understand how they managed to install that how 35 years of that how did 35 years manage to to again crowd out the other security paradigm.
40:3640 minutes, 36 secondsUh it is interesting I mean basically that you've had a almost it's not just a political but almost an intellectual conversion of European elite and European thinking
40:4540 minutes, 45 secondsclass shall we say to being carbon copies of the United States. Another thing I guess that's rather interesting
40:5140 minutes, 51 secondsis that um you know it's it's not as if the the American um alliance um has worked out that well. Again, we're
41:0041 minutesseeing the effects of the American alliance in the Gulf. I'm just wondering if people in Sweden and Finland would say, "Gee, I I wonder if that's a look
41:0741 minutes, 7 secondsUAE and uh you know, Qatar allied with the United States and now they're getting attacked. They wouldn't have been attacked if they hadn't done that."
41:1441 minutes, 14 secondsUm we'll see. Hey, I mean, if this has any effect on on and causing them to rethink their strategy. Um, you know,
41:2041 minutes, 20 secondsanother one, of course, is the issue of guns versus butter. I mean, Europe is de-industrializing. They are making themselves actively poorer. They've been doing that all. This is going to make it
41:2841 minutes, 28 secondseven worse. And they've done it to themselves. This is to to policies that they themselves have followed. They didn't have to follow. And now they're going to raise the military budget,
41:3741 minutes, 37 secondstalking about 5% military budget from maybe 1%. Um, you know, this is going to come out of their living standards. and
41:4441 minutes, 44 secondsthey're openly saying we should happily do that. Um, you know, they might look at the United States. The United States basically is a country with enormous
41:5141 minutes, 51 secondssocial problems. It's basically all the infrastructure is broken down appropriate to a much poorer country.
41:5741 minutes, 57 secondsYou go to Europe, but it's much nicer there. Uh, the Europeans want to give all that up so they can look like the United States. It just seems like a very strange idea.
42:0542 minutes, 5 secondsIt is, but in their frame, in their mental framework, it's not the Americans that do that to them. It's not themselves that is doing it to them. It
42:1242 minutes, 12 secondsis the Russians. the Russians create that threat and because of that we are suffering right and that's the rationalization it's not threatening us if they were um
42:2142 minutes, 21 secondscivilized people we wouldn't have to do this I mean it's it's perfectly rational within their framework so it's it's very unfortunate but it will continue for
42:2942 minutes, 29 secondsrather a long time I think until I I see this at least 20 more years until a next generation comes along that will have to
42:3742 minutes, 37 secondsre to restudy what actually happened and reassess but the people who are in within in the the current assessment
42:4442 minutes, 44 secondsthey will maintain it uh till the end of until the end social if you might get a social rupture in Europe and well I mean
42:5242 minutes, 52 secondswe could very in the in the medium term very easily it's very easy to imagine an AF government in Germany for example um
43:0043 minutesyou know the right coming to power the major countries of Europe now will they function differently I don't know uh I I wouldn't vote for them I'll tell you
43:0843 minutes, 8 secondsthat but still I mean this is something that the European establishments very much fear and they brought it upon themselves.
43:1443 minutes, 14 secondsWhat what uh right-wing conservative friends in Germany told me is that the AFD on the national level is already converted to the standard way of
43:2343 minutes, 23 secondsthinking. It's the AFD on the local level that still has some of this p u not pacifist but non-militarist uh uh
43:3143 minutes, 31 secondssoul in it. But the the process the system is already doing to the AFD what they did to the Greens. they it's it's washing them on the national level into
43:3943 minutes, 39 secondsbecoming a uh a government party uh and basically getting them especially on that part online. I don't know how true
43:4743 minutes, 47 secondsthat actually is, but that's what my my sources there tell. Um because it's systematic, right? The problem is systematic. The the um
43:5643 minutes, 56 secondsand I do believe it's a way that that these last 30 years actually developed for for many of the Europeans. And look
44:0344 minutes, 3 secondsat the look at the Epstein files and what they tell us about the intermingling of these elites, right?
44:1044 minutes, 10 secondsAll of the names, British, Central,
44:1344 minutes, 13 secondsEuropean, right? Then you've got a peaceful in in in the Middle East, but that's about it. There's there's no Japanese. There's no Russ not many Russians and so on. You know, it's the it's it's this this disentanglement. So,
44:2344 minutes, 23 secondsit's one it's one blob. It's one thing and it's it's it's going to be really painful and it's going to take a long time to actually disentangle it if it disentangles at all.
44:3344 minutes, 33 secondsI don't know. One one possibility would be obviously pol and the the standard political system does not address basic social problems and they fester.
44:4244 minutes, 42 secondsPolitics will often go move to the streets and you'll get social disorder,
44:4644 minutes, 46 secondsriots, um violence. I mean, I wouldn't rule that out as a possibility in Europe or in the United States for that matter. No, no, it's true. Actually, in the end,
44:5544 minutes, 55 secondswhat the what the US planned was for Iran in January this year might very well happen at home. that real civil uh
45:0345 minutes, 3 secondsdiscontent might start haunting haunting these countries. But the the question to me I mean just to come also back again
45:1045 minutes, 10 secondsto Iran is uh whether or not that was ever meant seriously. You know this whole idea that Donald Trump touted out is like okay we going to bomb the your
45:1945 minutes, 19 secondsregime and then you Iranians you stand up and you you take over the government.
45:2445 minutes, 24 secondsWas that ever really meant as a strategy? Do you believe within the neoonservative framework they actually believe that something like this was possible? Is it really just an another
45:3245 minutes, 32 secondskind of excuse in order to to justify bombing people uh bombing people over there?
45:3945 minutes, 39 secondsWell, there's a remarkable superficiality to neoonservative thinking. Uh there always has been that basically military sort of a deification
45:4845 minutes, 48 secondsof military force and covert operations and that military force solves all problems. I think the idea of decapitation here uh was something that
45:5745 minutes, 57 secondstransfixed both the Israelis of the United States. And I think that the superficially uh immediate success of
46:0446 minutes, 4 secondsthe Venezuela kidnapping of the president and his wife, as illegal as it may be, that probably supercharged the idea of trying to do the something like that in Iran.
46:1446 minutes, 14 secondsAnd that somehow if we could remove there's a very big focus on personalization and thinking here that the problem the
46:2246 minutes, 22 secondsworld faces are bad men. There's a great man theory of history here. It's all about bad men. I don't not very many bad women but bad men with and they always
46:3146 minutes, 31 secondshave names Putin and Malloich and Kim Jong-un and Castro back in the old days Gaddafi and um so I guess the idea is
46:4046 minutes, 40 secondsthat we've so convinced ourselves that it's all about bad men the superficiality of all this seems to have sunk in you might say if we simply
46:4846 minutes, 48 secondsdecapitate the bad men kill them or kidnap them all will be well I I think there was some of that thinking going on here in addition I think there was a
46:5746 minutes, 57 secondsfallback option From the Israeli standpoint, I don't know if the Americans thought this because I don't think uh this fight penetrated, but the Israelis may very well have felt that if
47:0547 minutes, 5 secondsyou destabilize Iran such that they have social chaos, civil war, and national breakup over an extended period of time,
47:1347 minutes, 13 secondsthat's not a bad outcome. Yeah.
47:1547 minutes, 15 secondsUm because basically that means Iran would be effectively itself decapitated as a major country. Um they seem to rule
47:2347 minutes, 23 secondsout the fact that chaos itself can produce threats. they seem to lead out that detail. But nevertheless, I think that that could very well be the Israeli
47:3147 minutes, 31 secondsthinking. I think from the American standpoint, the idea that basically you eliminate the leadership, you eliminate the bad men, you kill them, and that
47:3947 minutes, 39 secondstakes care of the problem, the problem will solve itself. It's remarkable how um the same thing happened in Iraq when you invaded in 2003. The idea of we
47:4747 minutes, 47 secondsoverthrow Saddam Hussein and everything would fall into place. There was no planning. I as I recall the number of American personnel, military and
47:5547 minutes, 55 secondscivilian who even spoke Arabic was very small. Um and they really never had a real plan of what to do after they
48:0348 minutes, 3 secondsoverthrew Saddam Hussein. Um and you might might in retrospect and at the time it looked crazy, but somehow or another they had a a certitude that
48:1248 minutes, 12 secondsbasically all you need to do is use military force to overthrow the government and everything would fall into place. that that that's been the
48:2148 minutes, 21 secondsneoconservative idea for a long time and I think we've seen it play out here as well.
48:2648 minutes, 26 secondsYeah, I think you're also right about about Israel. I mean, the main strategy in my view, anything be discernable if you take the last 30 years as as
48:3448 minutes, 34 secondsreference is that uh chaos chaos in the environment actually really solves the problem. Right? If the other if the the
48:4148 minutes, 41 secondspotential adversaries are in utter disarray, then you're you're um snug over there at the Mediterranean, right?
48:4948 minutes, 49 secondsEverything everything's okay. So, and if the same can be done to Iran and mega Syria, right, that that solves the problem.
48:5648 minutes, 56 secondsLibya Libya is another I mean also the other former kind of enemies like Libya were solved in that way and they were solved. I mean,
49:0449 minutes, 4 secondsthey're not they're not on the list of concerns anymore.
49:0749 minutes, 7 secondsYes, that's right. I I think that you know the long-term perspective is that chaos can produce terrorism. It can produce obviously subnational units possibly seeking weapons of mass destruction for who knows what purpose.
49:1849 minutes, 18 secondsUm there all sorts of things that can rise out of chaos, none of which are good. But for some reason again the Israelis don't think about it in those terms. They simply they simplify the
49:2649 minutes, 26 secondsissue in terms of just destroying a country as a solution.
49:3249 minutes, 32 secondsYeah. because you know if you I mean if you look at the people who take the decisions to do that um all of them so far have fared quite well with that
49:4049 minutes, 40 secondsstrategy right none of the Israeli prime ministers and especially Benjamin Netanyahu never really suffered any kind of serious repercussion on the opposite
49:4849 minutes, 48 secondsI mean the next the next airport over there might be named after him and he might he he might be remembered as you know among Bengurion and and and and
49:5549 minutes, 55 secondsHerzog as as the people you know who really who built the the the the capacity of the state the the US president build his piece of peace of uh
50:0450 minutes, 4 secondspeace board of peace and he's thinking of himself as like you know one of the three or four greatest presidents of the of the US I mean deserving like an
50:1150 minutes, 11 secondsanother head in Mount Rushmore and and they're not far away from achieving that. So so the people responsible for
50:1850 minutes, 18 secondsthis have only had success with the strategy that that they used in the past.
50:2450 minutes, 24 secondsYou know you're right about that that obviously uh there's the phrase nothing succeeds like success but also nothing fails like failure. Um and um my guess
50:3350 minutes, 33 secondsthe odds heavily fail some form of failure here. Uh exactly what form that will take is very hard to predict but I
50:4150 minutes, 41 secondsI just don't see it likely that this is going to end in a US and Israeli success success. If it does end in USIsraeli
50:4950 minutes, 49 secondssuccess that would probably encourage more interventions, further militarism,
50:5450 minutes, 54 secondsuh further risk takingaking with who knows what consequence. I mean, Cuba, I assume, would be next, and um I don't know, um maybe a ramped up war against
51:0351 minutes, 3 secondsRussia because it' get so cocky. Uh perhaps a war with China. Um it's hard to know basically how far this would go,
51:0951 minutes, 9 secondsbut um uh hubris obviously uh is kind of a a self- fueling activity and it the
51:1751 minutes, 17 secondsmore hubris you get, the more um risks you take to enhance your hubris. And so I I I think that basically one hates to
51:2651 minutes, 26 secondssay it, but the idea of the United States doing anything that would involve that could be defined as winning
51:3351 minutes, 33 secondsuh would be a more dangerous outcome than losing. Although losing is very dangerous too because as you noted uh the US andor Israel could resort to nuclear weapons.
51:4251 minutes, 42 secondsYep. No, absolutely. And and that that is true as well. In German we've got a saying hubris comes before the fall. Oh,
51:4951 minutes, 49 secondsthank. And it works, you know, it works until it doesn't. It reminds me a little bit of the of the black swan uh uh problem. Um the and the the turkeys,
52:0052 minutesright? The turkeys right before uh Thanksgiving saying everything is fine.
52:0452 minutes, 4 secondsThe whole last year was just one steady growth of population, right? We are fine. Uh it's fine until you're not. Um,
52:1052 minutes, 10 secondsbut the if this Iran is going to be the event that actually is the the final Thanksgiving for the Turkeys is is is of
52:1852 minutes, 18 secondscourse another question. The the the issue is that it again cost a lot of people's lives. I wish there was a way to constrain it, but it's it's it's just
52:2752 minutes, 27 secondsso bloody again. Well, it's I mean the the loss of lives basically is is not just military, but again, you know,
52:3452 minutes, 34 secondsthere was the Lancet study, which I'm sure you've you've seen reference to,
52:3852 minutes, 38 secondswhich is that uh it's cumulative effects of US sanctions over 50 years. I believe the figure they gave the total death toll cumulative in all regions was 38 million from US sanctions alone.
52:4952 minutes, 49 seconds500 million people a year die of US and EU sanctions a year. Half a 500,000,
52:5652 minutes, 56 secondssorry, 500,000. half a million people every year from the sanctions. The direct and indirect effects including of course not getting medicine. Funnily
53:0453 minutes, 4 secondsenough, my interview yesterday was with one of the authors of not that study but the the overall uh research group. Um
53:1253 minutes, 12 secondsit's devastating. It's devastating. And that's that's that's just economic sanctions. That's not that doesn't for the bombs that kill the people people.
53:2253 minutes, 22 secondsAlthough, interestingly enough, that number is bigger than the number of people die from dying from the bombs.
53:2853 minutes, 28 secondsThat's right. Yeah, that's true. You know, we're getting close to uh I guess closing the interview, but I did want to basically bring up the domestic politics
53:3653 minutes, 36 secondsin the United States of the war and note something. This really has been something of a historical turning point for my country which is traditionally we
53:4453 minutes, 44 secondshave uh the familiar idea of rally around the flag and when the president goes to war initially as a great bump in his popularity that doesn't work
53:5253 minutes, 52 secondsanymore. A majority of the public at the very beginning of the war did not support the war. That's very unusual. Um
53:5953 minutes, 59 secondsand it usually support declines over time. And so uh if Trump loses this war uh it's going to be devastating for him.
54:0854 minutes, 8 secondsmany people in his entourage in the Make America Great Again entourage, but Tucker Carlson, for example, um uh
54:1654 minutes, 16 secondsMarjgerie Taylor Green, a a very conservative congresswoman, have already condemned the war in the very strongest terms possible. They said, you know, we
54:2354 minutes, 23 secondsvoted for you as president because we thought you would have wouldn't do wars like this. You wouldn't be as interventionist as the Democrats, and here you're being just as bad or worse
54:3254 minutes, 32 secondsthan they are. Uh so I I think this basically could cause something of a political explosion in the United States
54:3954 minutes, 39 secondsand it's it's also indicates it's going to be much more difficult for future presidents of either party to go to war just because if you cannot mobilize
54:4754 minutes, 47 secondspublic opinion even at the beginning of the war uh that's going to be very difficult to sustain politically and so I I think that part is is a very big
54:5554 minutes, 55 secondspositive. Um what caused Trump to change I don't know because his first term was actually much less interventionist
55:0355 minutes, 3 secondsum than than previous presidents. This is so this is a big reversal. And so why he changed suddenly in his second term
55:1055 minutes, 10 secondsthat I can't tell you. I I I keep wondering if somebody actually, you know, literally physically threatened him because the way that he that the one
55:1955 minutes, 19 secondsthing he was not he was there's a lot of bad things to say about him and his first term, but the one thing he was not was a blood was bloodthirsty. And if you
55:2755 minutes, 27 secondslook at his speech that he gave at the beginning of the war, it it it was completely bloodthirsty. It's like you either surrender or we will kill you all, everybody will die. It's like that
55:3555 minutes, 35 secondsthat that he didn't do that before. I mean, something moved him into that space, and I wouldn't be surprised if he got physically threatened um, you know,
55:4355 minutes, 43 secondswith a knife on the table or something like that.
55:4655 minutes, 46 secondsYeah. I mean, it's it's a big it's a big mystery to me what exactly happened there. And I I don't really have a I have a good answer right now. I I do
55:5355 minutes, 53 secondsnote though there is that huge huge change. I do wonder also about people like Tulsi Gabbard, uh, who's the national intelligence director who in
56:0156 minutes, 1 secondher career as a Democrat and then as a Republican was railing against the wararmongers. You know, Hillary Clinton was a wararmonger. She's part of the war
56:0856 minutes, 8 secondsmachine. That was her vocabulary. And here she is still in the administration, at least publicly in support of the war.
56:1656 minutes, 16 secondsJD Vance, not quite as viferous as as Tulsi Gabbard, but somewhat similarly, and he's publicly supporting the war.
56:2456 minutes, 24 secondsAnd so, um, again, how long this will last if things start to fall apart, as they may in the next couple of days, I don't know. But so far at least, it's
56:3256 minutes, 32 secondsvery surprising though. People who really should know better have stuck with Trump.
56:3756 minutes, 37 secondsI I mean it's it's it's a huge it's a huge mystery, right? Because like these two figures, Vance and and Gabbard, um they are obviously not happy about this.
56:4556 minutes, 45 secondsThey obviously belong to the non-neon camp. The only the only thing I see is that they strategically wait for the moment to to put the knife into the back
56:5356 minutes, 53 secondsof Donald Trump and publicly come out as opposing him. But but maybe that's just wishful thinking.
56:5956 minutes, 59 secondsI I don't know. I I can't predict what they're going to do. Uh but on the whole, um
57:0857 minutes, 8 secondsthere's going to be no good outcome to this war, that's for sure. But I I think the best outcome would be uh that Israel and the United States get get taught the
57:1657 minutes, 16 secondsa lesson in strong terms that basically interventionism is a disaster. um and other countries
57:2457 minutes, 24 secondshopefully will learn the lesson uh that align with the United States having US bases uh on their on their territory decreases their security in a very
57:3357 minutes, 33 secondsactive and direct way and hopefully that will sink into a lot of countries.
57:3857 minutes, 38 secondsIf that lesson was taken, it would be even more a reason to do uh neutrality studies to understand how to be safe without interventionism. David, that's a
57:4757 minutes, 47 secondswonderful uh uh final word. Um people who want to find your writing or your your um publications um they where should they go?
57:5657 minutes, 56 secondsUh dgbs.arizona.edu.
57:5957 minutes, 59 secondsI'll put that up um when you put up a page for this um for this uh video on YouTube. I'll I'll give you the URL.
58:0758 minutes, 7 secondsI'll put the link into the description box below. Um everybody check out David Gibbs writings. Professor the Gibs, thank you for your time today.
58:1558 minutes, 15 secondsThank you, Pasco.
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요약: 냉전 이후 적을 찾아 헤매는 미국의 군사주의
1. 적의 창출과 군사-산업 복합체의 물적 이해관계
미국은 냉전 종식 이후 조직적인 위기에 직면했다
2. 네오콘의 이데올로기와 이스라엘 모델의 수입
미국의 이란 정책을 추동하는 핵심 동력은 네오콘(신보수주의) 이데올로기다
3. 이란 전쟁의 전개와 제국 쇠퇴의 징후
현재 진행 중인 이란과의 갈등에서 미국은 과거와 달리 심각한 한계에 부딪히고 있다
4. 동맹국의 희생과 핵전쟁의 위험
미국의 군사적 모험주의는 동맹국들에게도 재앙적인 결과를 초래하고 있다
평론: 지적 관성 속에 침몰하는 제국과 그 부역자들
본 인터뷰는 미국의 대이란 정책이 전략적 합리성이 아니라, 거대 군사 기구의 존속을 위한 <적의 발굴>이라는 병리적 현상에서 기인함을 날카롭게 폭로한다. 데이비드 깁스 교수의 비판은 단순한 반전론을 넘어, 미국의 국가 정체성이 어떻게 군사주의와 타국(이스라엘)의 공세적 독트린에 잠식되었는지를 구조적으로 파헤치고 있다.
1. 허구적 위협에 기반한 <공포의 도그마>
네오콘의 <1% 독트린>은 논리가 아니라 신념의 영역이다. 증거가 없어도 가상의 시나리오(예: 러시아가 발트해를 침공할 것이라는 소설)를 다큐멘터리처럼 믿는 유럽 엘리트들의 모습은 지적 파산의 증거다
2. 동맹이라는 이름의 안보 기만
가장 뼈아픈 지점은 <미국과의 동맹이 안보를 강화한다>는 신화의 붕괴다. 이란의 공격을 받는 걸프 국가들의 사례는 미국 기지가 보호막이 아닌 표적임을 증명한다
3. 출구 없는 전쟁과 핵이라는 최후의 도박
인터뷰는 트럼프 행정부의 광기 어린 태도 변화를 지적하며, 이것이 단순한 개인의 성향이 아니라 시스템적 압박이나 위협에 의한 것일 수 있다는 가설을 제기한다
결론
<이란의 기만>은 결국 미국이 이란을 속이는 것이 아니라, 미국이라는 국가 시스템이 자국민과 동맹국을 상대로 벌이는 거대한 사기극이다. 깁스 교수의 통찰은 이 사기극의 끝이 제국의 굴욕적인 해체이거나 인류 전체의 재앙(핵전쟁)이 될 수 있음을 경고한다. 이제는 중립(Neutrality)이라는 가치가 단순히 소극적 태도가 아니라, 광기 어린 군사주의로부터 스스로를 지키기 위한 적극적이고 생존적인 전략임을 재인식해야 할 시점이다.
이 인터뷰의 핵심 개념인 <1% 독트린>이나 <네오콘의 이스라엘 모델링>에 대해 더 구체적인 분석이 필요하신가요? 혹은 유럽의 탈산업화 과정에 대해 더 자세히 알고 싶으신가요? 말씀해 주시면 바로 정리해 드리겠습니다.
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세진님이 올려주신 강의 **〈Iran Deception: America’s Real Goals | Prof. David Gibbs〉**는 미국의 이란 정책을 군사-전략, 정치경제, 이념(네오콘), 그리고 미국 국내 정치라는 네 가지 축에서 해석하는 비판적 분석입니다. 아래는 약 1,000단어 요약 + 평론입니다.
1. 요약 (Summary)
1) “이란 전쟁은 사고가 아니라 구조적 결과”
강의의 핵심 주장 중 하나는 미국-이란 갈등은 우연한 충돌이 아니라 구조적 정책의 결과라는 것입니다.
Gibbs는 냉전 종식 이후 미국이 “적 없는 초강대국”이 되었다는 문제를 지적합니다.
냉전 동안 미국 군사체제는 소련이라는 명확한 적을 중심으로 조직되었습니다. 그러나 1991년 소련 붕괴 이후 이 구조는 정당성을 잃게 되었습니다.
그 결과:
-
군산복합체
-
안보 관료조직
-
외교 정책 엘리트
이 세 집단은 새로운 적을 필요로 하는 구조에 놓였습니다.
이 과정에서 이란이 “편리한 적”으로 선택되었다는 것이 Gibbs의 설명입니다.
2) 네오콘 전략: “미국은 이스라엘처럼 행동해야 한다”
Gibbs는 미국 외교정책 변화의 핵심으로 네오콘(neoconservative) 이데올로기를 강조합니다.
네오콘의 기본 생각은 다음과 같습니다.
-
군사력은 적극적으로 사용해야 한다
-
잠재적 위협은 미리 제거해야 한다
-
협상보다 군사력 사용이 더 안전하다
이 사고방식은 이스라엘 군사 전략을 모델로 삼았다고 설명됩니다.
네오콘은 이스라엘이
-
공격적 군사력
-
선제공격
-
협상 경시
전략을 사용해 성공했다고 보고,
미국도 같은 전략을 채택해야 한다고 주장했다는 것입니다.
3) “1% doctrine” — 잠재적 위협도 공격 대상
이 사고를 대표하는 개념이 **딕 체니의 “1% doctrine”**입니다.
핵심 논리는 다음과 같습니다.
어떤 위협이 1%라도 존재한다면
그것을 100% 현실로 간주하고 대응해야 한다.
즉,
-
위협 가능성
-
가설적 위험
-
미래의 잠재 능력
이런 것들도 전쟁의 정당화 근거가 됩니다.
Gibbs는 이것을
“offensive realism on steroids”
라고 표현합니다.
즉 극단적 공격적 현실주의입니다.
4) 이스라엘 로비의 영향
강의는 이스라엘 로비의 영향도 인정합니다.
그러나 Gibbs는 이를 단일 원인으로 보지 않습니다.
그의 설명은 다음과 같습니다.
-
이스라엘 로비는 매우 강력한 영향력을 가진다
-
그러나 미국 정책은 그보다 더 큰 구조 속에서 형성된다
그 구조는 다음입니다.
-
네오콘 이데올로기
-
군산복합체
-
미국 패권 유지 전략
즉
“이스라엘 로비만으로 설명하는 것은 과도한 단순화”
라는 입장입니다.
5) 미국 군사패권의 구조적 딜레마
Gibbs가 강조하는 또 하나의 핵심은 미국 군사력의 구조적 문제입니다.
미국은 역사상 가장 강력한 군대를 보유하고 있습니다.
그러나 문제는 다음입니다.
거대한 군대를 유지하려면
그것을 사용할 이유가 필요하다.
따라서
-
위협을 과장하거나
-
가설적 적을 만들고
-
군사 개입을 반복한다
는 것입니다.
6) 이란의 실제 전략
Gibbs는 이란 전략을 비교적 현실적으로 평가합니다.
그의 분석에 따르면 이란의 전략은 단순합니다.
“생존 전략”
이란은 미국을 군사적으로 이길 수 없습니다.
따라서 전략은 다음입니다.
-
장기전 버티기
-
미국 비용 증가
-
동맹국 압박
특히 그는 미사일과 드론 전력을 강조합니다.
미국의 요격 시스템은
-
매우 비싸고
-
대량 공격에 취약합니다.
반면 이란 미사일은
-
훨씬 저렴하고
-
대량 생산이 가능합니다.
7) 전쟁의 실제 목표
Gibbs는 이란의 궁극적 목표를 다음과 같이 설명합니다.
미국을 중동에서 철수시키는 것
이를 위해 이란은
-
미국 동맹국 압박
-
경제 충격 (특히 석유)
-
장기 소모전
을 전략으로 사용한다고 봅니다.
8) 핵전쟁 위험
강의의 마지막 부분에서 그는 매우 중요한 위험을 지적합니다.
만약
-
이스라엘이 전쟁에서 패배한다고 판단하면
핵무기 사용 가능성이 존재한다는 것입니다.
이스라엘은 핵무기를 공식적으로 인정하지 않지만
실제로는 핵 보유국입니다.
이 때문에
중동 전쟁이 핵 충돌로 확대될 위험
이 존재한다고 경고합니다.
2. 평론 (Critical Commentary)
1) 강의의 장점
이 강의의 가장 큰 장점은 구조적 분석입니다.
대부분의 전쟁 해석은
-
특정 정치인
-
특정 사건
-
특정 위기
에 초점을 맞춥니다.
그러나 Gibbs는 다음을 강조합니다.
구조
-
군산복합체
-
이데올로기
-
패권 유지 전략
이 접근은 실제 국제정치 연구에서도 매우 중요한 분석 방식입니다.
2) 네오콘 분석의 설득력
네오콘 분석은 상당히 설득력이 있습니다.
특히 다음 역사적 사건과 연결됩니다.
-
2003 이라크 전쟁
-
Bush Doctrine
-
regime change 전략
Gibbs가 말하는 “위협의 과장” 전략은 실제 정책 문서에서도 확인됩니다.
3) 그러나 과소평가된 요소
강의에는 몇 가지 한계도 있습니다.
① 이란 정권 문제
강의는 이란 체제를 비교적 덜 비판적으로 봅니다.
그러나 현실적으로
-
혁명수비대(IRGC)
-
지역 무장조직 지원
같은 요소도 중동 갈등의 중요한 요인입니다.
② 중동 지역 정치
강의는 갈등을 미국 중심 구조로 설명합니다.
그러나 실제로는
-
사우디-이란 경쟁
-
터키
-
UAE
-
지역 민족 정치
도 큰 역할을 합니다.
③ 미국 내부 정치
Gibbs는 네오콘을 강조하지만
오늘날 미국 정책은
-
네오콘
-
현실주의
-
국내 정치
세 요소가 복합적으로 작동합니다.
3. 전체 평가
이 강의는 미국-이란 갈등을 이해하는 매우 중요한 비판적 시각을 제공합니다.
핵심 메시지는 다음입니다.
1️⃣ 냉전 이후 미국은 새로운 적을 필요로 했다
2️⃣ 네오콘 이데올로기가 공격적 전략을 정당화했다
3️⃣ 이란은 미국을 중동에서 몰아내는 장기전 전략을 사용한다
4️⃣ 이 갈등은 핵전쟁 위험을 포함한 매우 위험한 구조적 충돌이다
✅ 한 문장 정리
이 강의는 이란-미국 갈등을 **“이데올로기 + 군산복합체 + 패권 유지 전략”이 만들어낸 구조적 전쟁”**으로 해석한다.
세진님께 도움이 될 만한 추가 분석도 가능합니다.
1️⃣ 이 강의에서 사실 가능성이 높은 주장 vs 과장 가능성 주장
2️⃣ 미국 학계의 실제 이란 전략 평가
3️⃣ 이란 미사일 전력의 실제 수준 (군사 전문가 분석)
4️⃣ 이 전쟁이 실제로 어떻게 전개될 가능성이 높은지
원하시면 이어서 정리해 드리겠습니다.
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