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We need your help to build the future of independent news media and we hope to see you at Breakingpoints dot com. Joining us now is shaiall Ben Afrime. He is a geopolitical analyst and has put out a lot of interesting stuff on this new meeting between these Raelis and the Lebanese for a potential ceespire.
Chill.
Thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it.
Sure always a pleasure.
So let's go and put this up here on the screen d one. The Lebanese and Israeli diplomats held this face to face meeting here in Washington. It was the first of its kind in many, many years, but you are a very skep of some sort of a ceasefire. Could you maybe set the table for some of the history leading up to this moment and what you make of the development so far.
Yeah, well, this is the first face to face meeting since the nineteen eighties, when also violence, extreme violence in the region led to a series of meetings under American pressure and through the mediation of other Middle Eastern countries,
and that's again what happened here. The United States has put a lot of pressure on the Lebanese government and on Israel to discuss a ceasefire, but there's absolutely no chance of its succeeding because Israel has plans to its member Lebanon completely take over a security zone all the way up to the Litani River. And what the Lebanese want is just a ceasefire, just for Israel to stop firing, but Israel wants part of the country and wants Lebanon
to try to dismantle Hesbela. Now, the public opinion in Lebanon is wildly against any kind of deal with Israel because the kind of deal that Israel and the United States are looking for involves normalization of the relationship and peace. While Israel takes away part of Lebanon's land, And even if the normalization involved giving up no land, there is very few people in Lebanon who are for normalization. Seventy to eighty percent depending on Paul, are against normalization without
giving up land. With giving up land, you probably wouldn't find a single Lebanese person who would be willing to normalize. And meanwhile, Israel is demanding that Lebanon dismantle Hesbela, which there's no support for whatsoever in Lebanon, especially with this invasion. Before this invasion there probably would have been some support for it, but much less now. But even if Lebanon wanted to disinbantle Hesbella, they couldn't. Israel can't this man
Bella with its massive army, and Lebanon couldn't. Lebanon's also on the verge of becoming a failed state. Since twenty twenty two, Lebanon has been involved in an almost complete economic collapse. Their currency has almost no value, They've lost fifteen percent of their population leaving, and that's mostly liberals and moderates who might want normalization.
So the whole thing is a farce.
Yeah, we can start rolling some of this footage in D two. This is recent strikes in southern Lebanon, and child, can you help us understand to your point about support previously for dismantling Hesbela defeating Hasbela, how significant these strikes have been and basically how they may have undermined the cause of actually squelching has Belah in Lebanon.
Yeah.
Well, I wouldn't want to over sell the prospects of anything happening regarding quelching has before all this happened. But as you can see, Israel is committing all sorts of war crimes and atrocities in Lebanon, the kind of atrocities that no country could put up with silently, and that public opinion absolutely will not allow to for the government
to facilitate. You know, not only are has Israel killed all these people, a large portion of which are our children as usual, But and not only is Israel operating deep inside Libanon, but it's destroying entire villages. The first three lines of villages, and what you're seeing in that footage is the first line of villages. The first three lines of villages above Israel are slated for complete and
total destruction. Every single building is going to be destroyed, and instead of those villages, Israel is going to build a network of military bases. There's a big debate in the IDF over whether to continue to destroy the next levels and the next levels and where these bases will be. The occupation Israel's planning is permanent. Every single person in
Lebanon is very aware of that. And no matter what your feelings are about Hebela, no matter what your feelings are about the West and normalization, no one is willing to countenance this complete destruction of the Lebanese nation. And even people hate Hebela the most and hate the she unites the most, can imagine allowing this sort of thing to happen. Hesbela is the only force in Lebanon that is standing up to Israel, and that will increase their
popularity among the people. And this isn't the first time it's happened. This happened also in the previous conflict and in much greater magnitude of order in the Second Lebanon War, and also in two thousand when Israel withdrew from Lebanon.
That was also a big boon for Hesbla's popularity. Put Hesbel on the verge of controlling the entire country, and now with the Sietes being an even larger part of the population for demographic reasons because people from other sectors are leaving and because they have a higher birth rate, this will possibly once again turn Hesbel onto the leading political force in the country.
And that's due to Israeli policy.
And this is yeah, this is very important to underscore shial and one of the reasons we wanted to get into the nitty gritty is that this is vital to the success or, at least it seems of any sort of deal between the United States and Iran. A core
tenant of that was a ceasefire with Lebanon. Now as you're explaining it, because I don't think people may understand all of the details, is that these talks are between the Lebanese government and the Israelis, but it is to resolve fundamentally a Hezbolah problem which they have at least a limited amount of control over from the Lebanese government, or maybe no control at all, because the Hezbolah has
rejected this. So for some sort of tenable cease fire to occur from the Israeli side, it would effectively mean that the Lebanese government would have to agree to de facto annexation, occupation and control of half of this country.
Is that correct, That is correct, Yes, Lebanon, it would have to completely surrender the sovereignty of part of the country.
That is an Israeli demand.
They're giving Lebanon a map and they're saying in the south there's going to be three different zones, one where we completely directly control and destroy everything, another one where we have blink control, and one where Israel has the ability to operate freely. There's no government in the world that can agree to that formally, even if they agreed to it the facto, which is also unlikely. Agreeing to it formally is like you committing suicide for the government
of any sovereign nation. And you hit on another very important point, which is that even if Lebanon wanted a ceasefire, they can't have a ceasfire because the Lebanese government and the Lebanes Army are not fighting against Israel. Hesbalis, the Americans and Israelis know this perfectly well. So Lebanon can't deliver what Israel is asking for even if it wanted to, and it wouldn't want to because they want Israel to
leave its territory, as any sovereign nation would. So this is really one of the most ridiculous negotiations imaginable between a government that not only is not the one firing, but also it isn't able to stop the firing, but also it doesn't have the legitimacy to reach the deal
that the United States and Israel wanted to. So the only reason Israel agreeing to this is because it gives a cover to continue its operation in Lebanon with some American support, because Americans have been pressured into stopping this from some of their Arab allies. And that's the only reason it exists. It's it's a fig leaf, and people are talking about how staric it is and the whole thing is a joke.
Well, I was just going to say Reuter's headline coming out of yesterday, US hosts Rare Israel Lebanon talks quote progress unclear. And then as soon as we're done with that headline, we can put the BBC headline from a couple of days ago up on the screen, quote Israel steps up strikes on Lebanon and HESBLA attacks continue as
talks loom. So to your point, shy'all, that's stunning. I mean, if you're reading the tea leaves, and I'm curious for your take on what we've heard after the meetings that were hosted here in DC yesterday brokeer by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, it confirms you're just or it seems to really confirm your suspicion that this is a fig leaf, that this is a cover to continue with US TACIT
backing strikes in southern Lebanon. Is that what you're reading after coming out of the last twenty four hours hearing from israelis seeming to double down in their position after they left the meeting. I mean, that's what it seemed like to me. But I'm curious as an expert what you made of it.
Yeah, So regarding American motivations, to me, Frank, sometimes it seems like the American officials making the decisions Michael Rubio maybe doesn't fall into this category. Sometimes are too clueless about the Middle East to really understand what they're doing. Sometimes what seems like being nefarious is actually complete ineptitude on their part. From the Israeli point of view, they know exactly what they're doing. They have no intention whatsoever
of stopping or slowing down. And yes, the level of strikes that we're seeing in Lebanon greatly increased once the United States reached a deal with Iran in order to try to derail it. They wanted this war anyway, and this isn't the reason for the war in order to in order to derail it, but that's a great bonus that they can get to derail it. So a thig
leaf is even being charitable. Israel is using this war in these negotiations as a means of sabotaging the wider Iranian deal, and they are offering Lebanon basically what they are going to enforce either way, which is carving up their entire country. So yes, the whole thing is a fig leaf, and it's a joke, and I am almost surprised that Lebanon is agreeing to this.
They must be.
Under a lot of pressure from other countries, France, the United States, some of their some of their Arab partners to do this because they're fully aware of what Israel is doing. The only country that benefits from the existence of these talks, aside from the United States is Israel. They're basically lev is basically legitimizing what it's doing, even if they're not agreeing to it, just by talking to them.
That's an important point. Now, child, here's the big question. If they agree to some sort of a ceasefire, which is occupation control of half of the country, how would Iran view that? Iran And because ultimately they have to see it as a ceasefire not just of on Hezbolah, but of not de facto occupation control, is that acceptable to them? Like, is this such a long term problem that any tenable solution either would include Israeli withdrawal or the continuation of the war. How do you see that?
Well, to the Iranians, they absolutely can't agree to Israel achieving these goals officially, but unofficially for Iran this is a good thing. Unofficially for Iran, this strengthens Hesbela and the grip that they have on Lebanon at a time when they were very, very weak. You know, after the
last round of conflict. Israel had won that round. They managed to get a ceasefire that was very much on American Israeli terms, and they managed to convince a lot of people in Lebanon that, of course Israel is aggressive towards Lebanon. But Hesbela brought on Israeli aggression by getting involved in a war when Israel was at its most
vengeful point after October seventh. So it looked like a terrible strategic mistake for Hesbelon, for Lebanon what had happened, But Israel squandered that by breaking the ceasefire repeatedly and by now trying to completely destroy it appears a state of Lebanon. This is all great for Iran. You know, Iran was really on the rock before this war, but this war has paradoxically revived their fortunes in the Middle East.
Right now, between demographics and what Israel's doing, Hesbela are set to become once again the most important force in the country in a way that they haven't been since twenty twenty three. And that really allows Iran once again to rebuild its network of proxies, and with the support they now have from China and Russia, we actually could see Iran be the strongest that it's been in several years. They have other problems because Syria is now also starting to invade Lebanon.
Israel's invading Lebanon, but.
That will make Hesbeala the resistance there to all these all this imperialism against Lebanon. Either support has Bella or leave increasingly, that's all very good for Iran, so Ieran is going to want to see this through. They don't necessarily actually want to cease fire in Lebanon. De'll say that they do, but this is a process that plays into their hands.
Makes sense. Well, chyl thank you very much for your time. Really enlightening and very interesting. Thank you, Thank you so much. Always a pleasure. Good to see you. Joining us now is Lauren Conlin. She's the East Coast contributor for LA magazine. Lauren, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate your time so.
Or thank you for having me and covering this story.
Yeah, so let's talk. I mean, we've had a great amount of interest, a lot of inquiries around all of these missing scientists and some of these mysterious circumstances. Let's
put this latest one up here on the screen. We have a missing nuclear official becomes the tenth person tied to this dark pattern surrounding us secret So top line, Lauren, you've actually dug into the circumstances of these Is this a real story or is the Daily Mail or the tabloids are they making it out than it should be or should we all really be paying attention.
I mean, I think we should all be paying attention. I think this is very important that this is coming to light. So I think the people that say, oh, well, you know, it's a coincidence because this happened in twenty twenty two. This happened in twenty nineteen. No one was paying attention then. But we're paying attention now. And what
we're seeing is a pattern. And I don't want to sound cliche here, because I think what's going on beyond some of the mysterious circumstances of these deaths or of these disappearances, you know, we're seeing names like Michael David Hicks, who was a NASA scientist, And you know, off the top of my head, I'm like, well, I don't necessarily think that it's so odd that there's no cause of death listed. He didn't have an autopsy. You know, we
don't know his religion, et cetera. But then when you see a pattern, you know, someone else whose deaths kind of echoed that, like Frank Maywold, you have to wonder is it one possible?
And I'm speculating.
You know, they did take their own life, and this is because out of respect for the family, they don't want this out there.
Or is it the elephant in the room here? Is is it something bigger?
Is it something connected to the government where these people have a lot of classified information, you know, And I don't even want to I've gotten a lot of heat for saying that, and I want to be clear, I don't have proof of anything, but I am just saying the elephant in the room.
The government is not above this, and it doesn't always go through the president. The president doesn't always.
Know what that means. They are gone, right, And so I go.
Back to saying, you know, Tim Burchett, love him, love the guy, but he's like President Trump will disrupt, he will do this. Okay, go for it. We'll all be waiting. I just don't see that happening. President Clinton said he wanted to release the JFK files, you know, also the UFO files that never happened. Obama, you know, really wanted to release the UAP files. Talks very highly about Area fifty one. Nothing happened there. There's a reason for that, guys.
And I know that whistleblowers have come out and said that we might be ready. Right as a society, we might be ready. I think it's twofold. I think it's a tough answer. What I will say why we want more transparency now and why the House Oversight Committee is demanding these forty six UAP videos is because we are
at war, guys. I mean it is very important because if you look at this list of videos, you know they do indicate some videos or I'm sorry, some UAPs are flying over Iran in twenty twenty two Syria one shape like the cigar. We're talking about conflict areas. So we are not able to tell in real time if this is a drone, if this is a UAP, or
if this is some kind of enemy defense. And so I think that you know, us getting transparency it he a big, big difference in whether or not we face disaster or defense.
Well, let's get this next headline up on the screen. This is from the New York Post last week on the case of Michael Hicks, another mysterious NASA death, as ninth scientists linked to secret programs dies now, in the case of Michael Hicks. This death was in July of twenty twenty three. The Post reports, quote it is unclear if there's any foul play linked to hicks As death, but his obituary asks for donations in his memory to go to alcoholics anonymous. He joins eight other scientists or
top officials who have died or disappeared recently. A couple of things I just want to zero in just from that last paragraph. First of all, the evidence of foul play limited in this case, looks like they're asking for donations to alcoholics anonymous. Secondly, when they say quote recently, this is a death back in twenty twenty three, people are going into the records, doing what journalists should do and trying to connect the dots see if there are
any more dots to be found. Frankly, so are there similarities that stand out in these cases?
I have seen a couple of them where it.
Seems like maybe there's a substance pre existing substance condition but that doesn't or substance abuse condition, but we don't have any confirmation. We don't know what that actually could mean in the context of the deaths and disappearances. Even that question of which of these are deaths and which.
Of these are disappearances.
Now that we're up to ten, it's sort of all hard to wrap your head around. So maybe help us find patterns that you've noticed.
Yeah, you're right about that, and we don't have enough info. I am in the process of reaching out to certain family members that I can find some of these deaths, though, and I'm talking specifically about the deaths that we are one hundred percent confirmed on, Like Carl Grillmer, these are
very fresh. I don't feel, you know, as a human being, just you know, comfortable reaching out to a widow right away, right But you know, Michael David Hicks, it's been a few years, and I go back to saying, I don't necessarily think that his death is direct connected to let's say,
General mccaslin's death. I think Michael David Hicks's death could be more connected to Frank Maywald and possibly yes, they were dealing with substance abuse issues and that could be connected to everything that they were working on that they knew, and.
I don't have proof of that, but go ahead, Can.
You just explain a little bit If people aren't super familiar like General mccasklin. We you and I are familiar Frank Maywold as well. What were they working on? What's the possible connection? Because you've done a great job of actually highlighting the suspicious circumstances around these Yeah.
So Frank Maywald, he was a NASA JPL scientist. He was a principal researcher at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, and so he was trying to detect signs of human life on other planets. I obviously don't know what he found. He knows what he found. I'm assuming of a handful of people know what he found. I don't think Congress knew what he found, but I don't know. And Carl Grillmer what I will say about his death. I connect Carl grill Mayer's Oh I'm sorry, let's go back. I
will say Neil mccaslin's death. General Neil McCaslin, he was retired Air Force general, and he retired a number of years ago. But he was stationed at one point at Wright Patterson that's in Ohio, And if you're not familiar, reportedly they hold extraterrestrial debris from the nineteen forty seven Roswell crash there again, I've never seen it with my own eyes. But he also worked with Monica Rasa there, and she was a rocket science She co patented the
Mondoloi or co invented the Mondeloy. So she was very very intelligent, as was General McCaslin. And Monica Raisa disappeared while hiking in June of twenty twenty five in California, and Neil McCaslin disappeared in February of twenty twenty five, just walking out of his house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. So these are months apart. Monica Raisa gives me chills. Number One, she seemed to have disappeared into thin air. She was behind a friend or two while hiking about
thirty feet. It's kind of like they look back and they're like hey, and then a second later, or I don't even know, you know, a minute later, she's gone vanishes into thin air. There's very little known about this search, but what I could find was that they had a canine dog. They were sniffing around. They found a hat. Her scent stopped at this hat. I mean what, And she was actually marked deceased and had like some kind
of biodegradable burial. And I know that anybody can go online and do this, you know, I understand how that works. But that's very odd that someone would do that when there was no body and there was no statement from NASA, no nothing. We just kind of skimmed over this. And what I'll say is, and again I don't have proof, but former FBI agent Chris Swecker, he has a lot of great information and a lot of great intel about what happens when these people are possibly kidnapped and tortured
for in intelligence. And he's not saying it's by our own government, right, we don't know who it is.
We're not saying that it's not right. But there's all these options.
And then Neil McCaslin, this is very similar to the tenth person missing. The tenth officials Steven Garcia. Both of them were last seen in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I mentioned General McCaslin walked out of his home. At the time, his wife didn't know if any guns were missing from his gun safe, but officials from the sheriff's office later reported that he was missing a revolver. He didn't take his phone, didn't take his wallet, nothing that he would
need not his glasses. And Steven Garcia, and I think I mentioned this was February of twenty twenty six. Steven Garcia, he is another official tied to He worked. He had top security clearance at Casey nsc Out of New Mexico. He was in charge of all of the classified equipment and assets tens of thousands of dollars.
And you know this is through a source.
I do not know his job description, you know verbatim here, but he also was last seen walking around New Mexico with a handgune and so you know, with Steven Garcia, it was stated by officials he could be a danger to himself. Neil McCaslin, there was a silver alert and his wife in this very in my opinion, disturbing nine one one call kind of indicates that quote he may not want to be found. She said he deliberately changed
his clothes before he left. She said he was experiencing this brain and mental fog, and this is one of the reasons that he retired. And she just said he was getting frustrated. But she never would have thought that it would have meant this, and she's been criticized about this.
Nine one one call, And.
I don't want to criticize her because she called immediately, you know, when she realized he was gone, and everybody reacts differently. I don't think that she would have thought that it would have been anything like this. She just said he was kind of frustrated. The last thing I'll say, The last thing I heard from authorities was that they found an Air Force sweatshirt a couple of miles away, but they have not confirmed whether or not that belongs
to General McCaslin. So I've got to make some calls. And then lastly, I know I am blabbing so.
Hard right now.
Yeah, one of the deaths that I am very very invested in, and I think this is this kind of crosses over into some other things we're mentioning in society right now. But Carl Grillmaer, he was a Caltech astrophysicist, reportedly a genius who's doing amazing work and finding water on other planets. He lived in Lano, California, and a very isolated area. I mean you can pull up the map and you can just see his house. Very isolated. So in December of twenty twenty five, he sees a
guy walking on his property. Who we now know is Freddie Snyder carrying a rifle, and he's freaked out, obviously, so he calls nine to one one. Freddy Snyder gets arrested. He says, oh, I was going to the post office. I just needed this to protect myself against wild animals. Well, the post office was the other way, and he gets arrested, and for whatever reason, you know, they give him a felonies charge, and I shouldn't say for whatever reason, for
whatever reason is, they let him go. They release him roar after that felony's charge, and by February sixth, prosecutors drop the charge entirely.
The judge drop the charge entirely.
There's some kind of California penal code where essentially it says, in lai terms, if you don't have any priors, you know, something like this would make sense, we're gonna drop this. We're not going to keep you coming back to court, et cetera. Well that was February fifth. By February sixteenth, Freddie Snyder allegedly goes back and shoots Carl Grillmer in the torso on his porch at his home. And now Freddy Snyder is sitting at Twin Towers. I'm assuming, you know,
pretty close to Nick Reiner and waiting arraignment. He gets arraigned April twenty ninth. So what's crazy is that California is so ridiculous with their court dockets and their papers. I've had to write letters to get indictments. I've had to send Foyer request here. But one thing I will say is Carl Grillmayer's wife has spoken out. I was right before I went on News Nation last week. The producers,
we were all kind of diving in. They were making calls, and his wife said, it's not connected to any of these other scientists.
That's her belief.
Neil maccason's wife came out and said it's not connected. The Bernalillo County's Sheriff's office in New Mexico has said enough with the conspiracy theories.
I get it.
I totally get it.
Neil mccason's wife also works in aerospace research. And Carl Grillmaer's wife, she's a widow. She probably saw this crazy person with her own eyes. But my question is why was he released? Why was he there? He was absolutely targeting him for a reason. This house is way too isolated and reportedly he did live in the area, this Freddie Snyder guy and neighbors. I say neighbors because it's miles apart. They said he was a little unhinged. I mean, it's bothering me. I can't help it saying.
And if you look at every individual case, it is a possible explanation. And yet in no way you know the widows, of course, they don't want to be harassed. And anybody's watching this, please don't harass these people, right and you know, and leave them alone at the very least. Let's let's go to the authorities, and those are the people who he can ask. But as you said, members of Congress and others, they're worried about this. That seems to be maybe an indication of something, or maybe they're
just responding to media pressure. But from your view, maybe not each individual case. In totality you see some sort of pattern you originally opened with UFOs. Why did you make that connection to UFO.
Yeah, it's funny because I always grew up thinking that their bogus's they're just something in an alien movie. And the more research you do, the more you realize how important it is that we understand what a UAP is, and I'm calling it a UAP because it just sounds less crazy.
It really does, and I do.
I just feel like it's we're past the point of thinking, yes, aliens are going to come and invade our country.
It's not about that.
The House Oversight Committee wrote this letter in March, but they were stemming it from a congressional meeting they had, I think it was back in September. They really started to push again for transparency. And again, this is for the national security reasons.
This is a threat. We need to know what is going on in.
Order to defend ourselves as Americans, and I think it's really important. And what's so frustrating is that the list of UAPs that were actually due on oh I'm sorry, it was yesterday, April fourteenth. They were due, no one from the Pentagon responded until Rep. Anna Luna had to reach out and apparently, I mean I was born at night, but not last night. Someone didn't pass the letter on to the proper authorities, so we're.
Not getting it yet. But they claim that this is coming.
This is coming, and the President authorized this release, so we're going to see it soon. I'm just like Okay, guys, release another Epstein dump for us, so we look this way while you guys scramble.
It's just coming. You know, it's so annoying.
It's just it's it's irritating, and it's like, this is our tax money. Also, this is our money, you know, going to this. I don't know how much I'd like to know. I don't think we'll be told the truth, but I think again, it's important to know that it's not just about independent state aliens sitting in glass, you know, cages in water. It's more than that. This is war, this is this is America's national defense.
Yeah. Well, Lauren, thank you so much for your time. We got another guest standing by. You were phenomenal. Everybody go follow her on Twitter. We'll have a link down in the description. Appreciate your time and thank you for the work on this case.
Thank you so much for having me and discussing it.
Yeah.
Very excited now to be joined by our great friend of the show, Professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago, author of The Escalation Trap on Substack, which everybody should go subscribe to. Thank you very much for joining us, sir. We appreciate your time.
Oh, absolutely, always great to talk to you.
So let's go ahead and start with some of the latest news from the Washington Post. We'll put it up here on the screen. It appears now some thousands more US troops are heading to the Middle East as Trump seeks to squeeze Iran. Professor, you have long held that these cease fire talks and others remain either a cover or a delaying to the inevitable escalation to ground troops. Just confirm your hypothesis. How are you looking at this structurally?
Oh? Absolutely, yeah, this is exactly what I'm saying. So we can pay attention to the rhetoric, which is the noise, or we can pay attention to the movement of troops, which is the signal. And what you are seeing is over and over and over again. Uh, this now in our seventh week of this of this war. There's all this noise about back and forth rhetoric, what does this mean or that mean coming out of the White House. But what you see are troop movements, and those troop
movements are going in one direction. There's not troop movements coming out. There's troop movements going in, and they're going in just as I said, they're going to be limited, They're going to go in salami slicing essentially, And that is what you are seeing. We are not on a path of peace. We are on a path the war is metastasizing, and we are seeing thresholds being broken. There's
multiple and I'm glad to talk about those. But what you are what you are really seeing is a path of escalation and uh, it is toward that stage three and this is just going to build.
Right and so actually that's if you could break that down for us, that would be very helpful. I'm sure everybody what you said I could do it. Everyone in the audience was like, yes, please, including us.
Professor, that's right.
So as and our audience really is familiar with stage one, stage two, stage three, where stage three is coming to the limited ground operations, which could expand. But let me just unpack what I mean by breaking threshold. So what we are seeing since the talks, since JD Vance came out of Pakistan in his three minute speech, which everybody should go and listen to. That three minute speech was
important for a couple reason. Number one, he made absolutely blisteringly clear that we are not going to make concessions. The United States, We're going to choose escalation over concessions. And number two, he made blisteringly clear he personally is on board with the escalation. The hope that we were had JD Vance was going to kind of push us over to another side that really has disappeared. Now what you are seeing with the military blockade is and I
can understand why people are confused. I've studied these for thirty years. This is part of that repertoire of what I study. What you are seeing isak it's breaking thresholds, including just this morning with the news out of Iran.
So number one, it's breaking a threshold in the region where now the United States is using military force to shut down horror moves against Iran, and what that is doing is widening the war inside of the region because Iran, as completely predictably, has just responded by you do this, We're going to shut down that other choke point or try They'll try that other choke point in the Red Sea.
So that would take another hunk of oil off the market here if they do that, and the houthis they have the excellent proxy with which to do that, and of course they have their missiles and drones. But number two, another threshold that's being crossed here is notice that it's China who gets a lot of the oil and who has flag some ships. So what this means is that US naval blockade is now going right up against China. Now, we have not sunk a ship, we have not you know,
but this is an act of war. A naval blockade is not a political statement. It's an act of war. It says you either go back or we sink you, we shoot you. That is a very very important threshold because obviously China now is this is another actor and that actor's got six hundred nuclear weapons. So we need to understand this is not again going up against you know, Panama, Greenland.
We're breaking real thresholds here. And then there's the third threshold, which is when you bottle up the entire strait of horror moves and then possibly also now the Red Sea gets in gets bottled up with this. This is essentially another threshold here where you're locking in the consequences for the world's economy for at least weeks, if not months from now. And there's already the stories the different economic organizations are starting to come out on my substack this week.
I have a very I wrote this on the plane back and forth from London, so I have this long explanation of what happens in these blockades so people can understand the consequences for the world's economy over time forty five day, sixty day, ninety day. And this is just now locking in that analysis here. So we are really heading to not just it won't just be like one
giant cliff. I'm explaining, there's a series of decline, a little bit like roller coaster, a series of these declines which you need, which we need to expect, and the markets just simply aren't paying attention.
Yeah, professor, I saw your comments, Will Yeah, And I think it's very important to underscore what you're trying. The Trump administration has done, I mean and honestly a shockingly good job of job owning the oil markets and the stock market. They have convinced them that the blockade or a ceasefire will inevitably lead to some sort of memoranding understanding that will return to normal. You have consistently maintained
that is absolutely not going to happen. And yeah, I do want to go a little bit into your first thesis, which I think really struck a lot of our viewers and myself, is you're about how Iran has become this new world power. And a piece of news that I instantly thought of you with is F four. Let's put
this up there on the screen. Was this US carrier, the George H. W. Bush, which it has been revealed has had to sail around the entire continent of Africa rather than transit through the Red Sea, specifically because of fear of the hoothies in the Bab al Mendeb strait. I mean, what do you make of that? For this, you know, reflection of power that Iran can project to force a multi billion dollar you know, multi multi billion dollar here if you are just.
So on it, and I really this is one of the reasons I love coming on because you're not just hearing my words, you're seeing the implications with the new piece of information. So what you are seeing here is a power projection capability by Iran. So we are used to thinking of Iran back in pre twenty February twenty twenty eight time period where we're thinking we've been told Iran is crushed, it's on its last legs, just one more nudge, and there's this pro democracy movement that's totally
going to take over. This was all always extremely unrealistic. It was the most exaggerated version of the weakness of Iran, which was just right. Well, what the reality is, and you see this with their drones here, is that as their drones have reached, they can and missiles have reached. It's not just about a short term thing. They have reached across the region and even further than that. You would not have our carriers essentially a thousand miles away
here if it was not for Iran's power projection capability. Well, power projection is what we define well, one of the leading indicators of a world power and noticed a Secretary Higgseth said in his briefings, which he has now stopped giving of course, but what he said in his briefings was we've taken away their power projection capability. No, we haven't. That's that victory rhetoric eating escalation reality which you're now
demonstrating here. And this is also, by the way, when the Iranians are making their threat this morning, they're not simply saying this is only going to be a threat to the Red Sea choke point with the Hoothies. We need to understand those destroyers here that are within range. Now there are three hundred sailors on those destroyers. Now, they don't have to be sunk for those people to
be hurt and killed. You can have fires, you can have a lot of things happen under those attacks, which is why none of the oil tankers themselves want to go through and risk this. You see. So this is an extremely tense situation. So we are not de escalating the situation. We are escalating the situation. And let me just add one more point here if I might, because I'm getting this in emails from some really smart people who aren't yet ready to say we can I can
identify them, and we can apply. But these are not These are really really smart people. And what they're asking me is why exactly, Bob, that's what they call me, Bob, Why exactly won't the Iranians make the concession? Because, after all, aren't they facing all of this pressure. And here's the fundamental thing that people need to hear, which is, if Iran makes a concession, say, gives up its nuclear material or gives up the power over the Strait of Hormuz.
That makes Iran more vulnerable. You see the problem here is that the United States and Israel, if they get more, if they get concessions, they can pocket those concessions and that weakens Iran. Those are actual power tool power assets for Iran, and it makes Iran more vulnerable. It's more likely that Iran will be attacked by Israel and the United States directly if it doesn't have a nuclear deterrent.
It just is. It's also more likely that it will be attacked in one way or another for whatever reason, if it gives up world power. And we have history here. The Ukrainians gave up their nuclear weapons, Kadafi gave up his movement toward nuclear weapons, and look at what to happen to those states. Okay, this is not a good history. You can also look at the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War. You can say, well, they gave up world power, global power. What they're a
basket case right now. Putin is barely keeping two percent of it used to be. The Soviet had fifteen percent of the world's economy. Now they have two percent. And what is Putin doing? He's fighting back to get it back. So you look at the history of all this, and that history is you may and by the way, the United States promise and all those three cases, you were gonna have an enormously beautiful future, just like Donald Trump.
I mean literally those other presidents right out at Donald Trump page of It's gonna be beautiful, and it's not because they're vulnerable. So this is really the problem. We're asking Iran to take sucker deals that other states have taken in the past in their lifetime, and it just is not working out. Because what's happening is when the Soviet Union basically gave up power, we rode NATO right up to its doorstep. You see. That is what I mean by vulnerability. So if Iran gives this stuff up,
this is not making Iran safe. This means Iran has a really, really even worse future over the next five or ten years.
And we're hearing these really right already talking about Turkey, no surprise there, but oh.
There you go. This is another and Turkey he doesn't have nuclear weapons. Yeah, okay, So I'm just pointing out that we are teaching the world, you know, uh, yeah, it's it's nice to be uh, you know, send Donald Trump, Uh, you know, some presence, but better get a bomb.
Yeah, that's right.
And Professor I wanted to ask, actually, we're shifting through this enormous amount of propaganda, what do you think actually is the sticking point at the end of the day for both the Trump administration and the Iranians? Just looking ahead? Because as we look at what seems to have fizzled last weekend, what could that tell us about if I.
Again, Yeah, that's a great question, and I would say again the three minute clip by jd Vance when he came out is really important here for everybody to watch. It's not just another one of the clips here, because what jd Vance did is he zeroed in directly on the nuclear enrichment that Iran is going to become a
nuclear weapons state. And I've been saying here in the substack, in the live briefings on the sub stack, this is actually the tap roote, not just of this crisis, but the whole military antagonistic relationship with Iran going back to two thousand and two and two thousand and three. We had a politically antagonistic relationship from seventy nine to two thousand and two, but once Iran started to enrich uranium,
this really took it to a new level. And what you see is all this talk that, all this confusion about the goals. Yeah, absolutely, Donald Trump's all over the place and what he posts, but there is a core through line here, and that core through line is Iran is enriching uranium and we are teaching it, by the way, in these twenty five years, that their only chance of real survival is to get that, is to trans into a weapon. And what you're seeing is jd. Vance is
right on that. He's explaining that, and that is what the Trump administration really is going to have to concede. They're going to have to they can make a choice. They're going to have to make a choice. If they want to get Iran to allow ships to pass through the straight of hor moves here, then that is going to come at the expense of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons in about a year, maybe a year and a half.
And they can talk out of both sides of their mouth all they want to, but the bottom line is this is what is becoming more and more in Iran's rational security interest. And if we had a hope of this not happening. It was the Obama deal and everything since Trump ripped that up has been making everything worse.
Professor, last question for you on my end here is it's possible that we get no deal and Trump just declares some sort of unilateral walk away in a permanent blockade. What do you think would happen as a result of that? Iran would attack, you know the Babel mendep straight, they would escalate, maybe they wouldn't. Then they would just suffer economic pain.
That will just go. Yeah, that will just be that path. So there's path four, which is we let Iran become the fourth center of world power. You're seeing Trump doesn't want to do that, but that there's only two choices. Either you do path four Stage four, or you do stage three. There's no going back to Feb twenty seven. So stage three is where you're moving along the path
of escalation. And the real consequences here of you say that, you know what we're talking about that's permanent blockade is going to be that first of all, within the region, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Cutter, Kuwait, they're all going to see their GDPs declined by twenty thirty percent or more here in the next in the next coming months, it's all going to go over a clip for them. But then also you're going to see that for the world economy,
you're going to see that this pattern here. And basically what happens is up till day forty five of a oil blockade of some kind, you have prices go up. Then from forty five to day sixty you start to get actual shortages. And then from day sixty to ninety that's when you get economic contraction, and then you get the prices keep going up, the shortage is cut worse, and the contractions start to happen, and that gets baked in.
And what we're going to see here if you just take that blockade as like a permanent blockade, is yes, you will stop Ron from becoming that world center of power, at least without them fighting for it. But at the price here of taking the world's economy over the cliffs, and that is not going to make the world happy, with the United States.
And probably losing American more American soldiers.
Stuff surely here because the idea that Iran will not Iran was willing to attack the Gulf States. They were also willing to kill twenty to thirty thousand of their own people, So the idea that and they also have already bombed American bases, so what those vessels are are essentially floating American bases. So if Iran was willing to bomb American bases in the region, I really think the idea they they're going to be scared to bomb the ships here, I don't think so. I think they're going
to be probably playing some tactical games here. They're going to be thinking through what's their best way to go forward, and they probably would really like China to go through and force the blockade, to confront China, because all that does is put China even more deeply in their camp. So if you're wondering why they're not already firing back and forth, it's because there really are. You know, there's a long game here, and Iran has played it pretty
well so far, We're not playing it very well. And as we go forward here, getting China more deeply on Iran's side, you know, it's already got Pakistan working with it, and I've got sixty to one hundred nuclear weapons. You bring in China, that's six hundred and now of course you've got poot, so you're really building this coalition here for Iran. We are helping Iran build it.
Yeah, well, professor, as always, you're so enlightening. Escalation trap on substack linked down in the description and we will see you later, sir, Thank you very much.
Absolutely, thanks again, great, great, great session, great discussion.
Thank you guys so much for watching. We appreciate it. Thank you Emily. It's been great.
Have fun.
Got to keep the arm down in the show tomorrow with Crystal Crystal backs tomorrow. We'll see you guys, then see everyone