The Complete Cold War Series w/ Thomas777 - 3/3

He's become something of a presidential historian. He wrote a book called The Brink, which was about which is about the ABE. It's it's about about half it's about like the Able Archer War scare, and the rest is kind of about nuclear command and control in the final phase of the Cold War, and you know the deeper parodies they're in and kind of how this informed policy. And

it's really fascinating book. But it's about the only guy I can think of who's written a dedicated book about like the post they taught pre Perastrika Cold War, which I don't really understand because that's tremendously important. A lot of the technologies we take for granted just in day to day life, you know, telecom stuff, it literally like came out of that epoch. I mean, this stuff was in people's contemplation, you know, in a research and development

capacity for decades before to it. But the perfection of those things, you know, I mean, including the Internet, you know, the survivable command and control platform. I mean, this stuff all came out of like late Cold War, you know, strategic planning, and the degree to which the potentiality of and preparation for a general nuclear war kind of shaped American life in ways prosaic and profound that really can't

be overstated. You know, I've people people under about forty five, they don't remember that, and even some people are older, it didn't like impact them in their daily life in concrete terms. So they think I'm overstating it, but I'm not. And if you look at the structure of the US government, you know, as I'm always coming back to this point, it's quite literally like structured to wage the Cold War

and not much else. And the strategic nuclear dimension of that obviously became pre eminent owing to technological and existential realities. But you know, what I'm getting at is that this is not just some kind of like esoteric, like peculiar point of interest these people who you know, right, and it's big. It's big not to write about the deep

State in varying capacities. You know, I guess, I guess because uh, William Cristal or whatever like you know, in guys of that kind of ilk to right for those kinds of publications, because you know, they since they've started like banging the term in like the last like five ten years now, it's like okay to do so. So you know, people write about these things, you know, in a very kind of contemporary way. But it's like, okay, if you want to understand the Deep State, you've got

to understand the late Cold War. You know. It's that that's that's that's that's why these things exist. I mean they some some aspects are are emphasized more than others, and you know, in some kind attract budgetary pork more than others, you know, in the Postpullar wrapp Buck obviously, and like there's been cosmetic changes to a lot of these things, but that's just what they are. They're cosmetic changes.

You know, they they came out of, they came out of the uh, the Cold War, and specif they came out of the strategic nuclear UH paradigm that uh, you know, the regime was was structured to UH wage what's anyway post Vietnam. I'm of the belief, uh from you know, seventy three to to UH to eighty three approximately, grenade Grenado was a was a was a big moral victory in addition, you know, being tactically significant in ways that

I think most people don't really consider. I don't want to get into that yet, but the point being, let's say seventy three to eighty two, perhaps, I'm of the belief America was actively losing the Cold War militarily, Okay, politically no, in terms of values if you will, and and and and legitimacy, no, But that didn't really matter because the bad in the you know, the Cold War was the battle of hearts and minds after the after the nineteen fifties, I mean realistically out with the exception

of Germany, which was owing the unfortunate accident of geography and geostrategic reality, you know, they they they had to fight a way to deal with the Soviet Union and the Communists, but no nobody in Europe. Nobody in Europe in the nineteen seventies and nineteen eighties was like, you know what we want, we want to Marxist Lenini state, we want we want to live like people do in the East Bloc. Like nobody thought that way, okay, And nobody in the developed world that you know, in North

Asia thought that way. People who did think that way were in subsear and Africa, in Latin America, in the Middle East, you know, and in the Global South. This was still very much an animating principle, okay, and it

could be foreseen pretty easily. It's like, okay, it doesn't matter if you know, in in the world in nineteen eighty three, you know, it was clear to everybody, and you know, kind of in in the free in the developed free world, that the Stalinist states just generated a lot of misery, created economies of shortage, you know, didn't deliver on these promises of of Tulluric utopia and you know plenty and really were just kind of uh, you know, miserable places to live that didn't matter, like it was

foreseeable that you know, America could become this kind of garrison state literally surrounded by a third world you know, including you know, including Mexico and in Latin America that basically was solidly in the Soviet Camp, was animated by a revolutionary impulse towards Marcus Leninism, and uh, you know, the United States basically you know what like like like meaningful inner dependence as you know, economic or otherwise would would would just be cut off, okay, and the only

meaningful currency would be, you know, the ability to project military power. But again, you know, if if if the global South and similarly situated developing states were pretty much all in the Soviet camp, you know, the ability to the ability to project hard power would have been profoundly compromised too. So it was foreseeable again, you know, like that's that's kind of like what Millis was getting out

the Red Dawn scenario. Like, yeah, it was silly to you know, to to envision you know, Spetsna's parashooting into Colorado Springs and shooting up the local high school. But the political map that he kind of envisioned like an intro where it's like, you know, West Germany becomes this, you know West Germany with draws NATO because it's green, and so them government you know, decides to like just

go all into the Soviet Union. NATO falls apart, the global South goes all in with Ivan, you know, so that you have like America kind of standing alone, you know, with a couple of remaining states like the UK and Australia that you know, really are kind of you know, not meaningful powers in their own right. And you know, it's it's it's a red world with America as kind of this is literally this like Garrison, Okay, I mean

that was the real risk. By the late Cold War, post Vietnam, it wasn't that it didn't matter that you know, Marxist Lenini is Marxist Leninism had lost in like you know, the the marketplace of ideas or whatever, you know, people who still bandy Thomas Paine or whatever and claim that you know, through through like the process of reason and like meaningful discourse, we all like arrive with the truth.

Like that doesn't mean anything in the world of power politics, and it certainly didn't mean anything amiss, you know what a miss you know what, in less delicate times, people are fruit. Was the colored revolt, you know, within the

developing world. You know, I mean this this was very this very much could have become reality, and a Soviet Union a worse up pact that basically could plunder, you know, the the collective capital resources of you know, South Asia, SUPs in Africa, Latin America could pretty much like stagger on indefinitely. You know, I mean it doesn't matter if you know, the the value added in absolute terms to

their economy is nil. It wouldn't matter if you know, they were experiencing you know, like one point two percent growth annually. You know, they could they could Certainly, the Soviets were certainly going at manufacturing guns, and they could and they could have they could poach a enough proverbial butter as they needed to if uh, you know, they had they had access to the world as they're kind of proverbial orchard doesn't work. So I think that's important

to keep in mind. Okay, this is the world situation, uh, after America withdrew from Vietnam. Now Nixon, you know, Nixon was the author of the tent. I mean bresnev uh obviously had to be receptive to that. But uh, it really this, this really was a America was kind of determining the course of uh, the conflict paradigm in the developing world, because the Truman doctrine was what carried the day, and you know, Nixon, the Nixon doctrine superseded the Truman doctrine.

You know. The next the Nixon doctrine, which was you know, announced formally as you know, Saigon as a as A as America transferred authority for uh, the defense of the

Republic of Vietnam. You know, it's a Saigon, you know, and Nixon declared that, you know, a no uncertain terms, America is not gonna you know, take direct action to intervene in states where the internal situation you know, precludes those states from you know, resisting communist version from within or without you know, on on on their own terms. So that gave I think, uh, I mean that was

just practical number one. I mean, there wasn't there wasn't the political will, you know, to wage another Vietnam War and subser in Africa or even in Latin America, you know, in nineteen seventy three. But also, uh, it kind of provided an opening to get the Soviets to the table without uh, without further compromising American credibility you know, in some in some kind of pitiable way. It didn't appear

to be it. It didn't appear to be uh America like folding the flag and quitting the Cold War, or even have some hawks like interpreted it that way and the Soviets. What's important is the Soviets didn't interpret it that way. But the uh, the real uh, the real lynchpin of the tent was uh, the Salt Treaty strategic arms limitation talks. I'm not gonna bore everybody with, you know,

the minutia of it. The important details is that it limited not just nuclear forces and being and the destructive power of existing platforms as regards like you know, how many warheads and what kind of throw weight and mega tonage could be packed onto those pre existing sets pre existing platforms, but it also limited It also limited the counter measures you know, deployment as well as purportedly uh

development of countermeasures. The idea being that you know, emergent deeper parodies you know, including things like decoys, you know, including things you know like interceptor UH missiles you know, and including in including uh including next generation then next generation early warning systems. If this kind of tech could be frozen, or if not frozen, you know, agreed upon, you know, to not be deployed, that this would build in some kind of additional stability, which I think is

incredibly fatuous. But that's a different issue. And then the event this was in May nineteen seventy two, UH, by nineteen seventy six, UH, a few things that happened to undermine this burgining deton regime, which ultimately was was as you know, was unceremoniously ended in nineteen seventy nine for one reason of material we'll get into in a minute. But a couple of a couple of things happened subsequent to sult First and foremost, UH, there's the nineteen seventy

three war. On October sixth, nineteen seventy three, as people know, Syrian Egypt preemptively assaulted Israel. The Arab armies, particularly the Syrian Army, performed better than anticipated. Frankly, this UH, Israel had a real problem on its hands. In tactical terms.

Israel responded by marrying nuclear war heads to their Jericho missile platforms in part to you know, try and terrify the Arabs into submission in part as a ployee to force a reluctant mixed administration to reprovision and resupply them because the Israelis were desperately running short ammunitions and everything else they needed. Deploy worked. And then Nixon tapes and

hear Nixon and Kissinger and Nixon lamenting. You know, Uh, I'm not gonna repeat the language because they would probably upset the YouTube sensors and that sends up on YouTube. But you know, Nixon was not happy at the state of affairs. The Soviets responded by deploying service warfare frigates and amphibious assault craft to the port of Alexandria. And this was not publicized at the time, but the White House knew those service warfare frigates were carrying nuclear weapons.

As the IDF surrounded the Egyptian Third Army, uh Brezhnev contacted the White House and said that if the Egyptian Army were surrounded and destroyed, the Egyptian Third Army were surrounded destroyed, and if the Audia have continued to Cairo, the Soviets were gonna deploy and intervene directly, you know, to save Egypt. Nixon responded UH by ordering death Con three alert status, the first time they had been such a raised an alert status since UH Cuba in sixty two.

This was really, this was this was profoundly serious. Alert status wasn't what it is like after the Cold War in like post nine to eleven. It wasn't this like meaningless thing. It had actual It had actual significance and it acts it it in material in concrete terms. That changed the status of forces. Okay, it indicated real readiness to wage war, is what I mean. Okay, at deaf Con three. UH. During the Cold War, it meant that UH strategic nuclear bomber forces were on alert status such

that in fifteen minutes they could be scrambled and deployed. UH. It meant it meant missilliers in their silos in order to strap in to like their command chairs and prepare for incoming uh ICDM assault. You know. So I mean it was. It was very very serious. The Soviets responded in kind the UH. The Soviet defenseman at the time was Gretzkoh It was soon to be replaced. He asked the Kremlin for seventy thousand troops to be mobilized and

deployed in proximity to the battle space, which didn't happen. Obviously, why that didn't happen is not entirely clear. Did bresn have put the brakes on that at deliberately? Did the Soviet general staff decide to wait and see, It's not clear to me. According to UH, a guy named Andre Daniellevich who was a he was a colonel general or it's equivalent. I guess that'd be a three star. I think in the NAT old tronim like military guys in the comments correct me if I'm wrong, and I'm not

a military fit. His testimony in the nineties that he gave to the Wilson Foundation in some of those ngeotypes, I think is instructive and I think it's credible. What he said was he said that the ninety Sentary three crisis exposed real weaknesses in the Soviet commanding control system and its ability to respond to crisis in the moment, and that the Soviet Union wasn't really capable. Is that

the Soviet Union couldn't incrementally mobilize in that way. There was a binary kind of alert structure, like either you know, either you were at war, you were not. And when you were at war, either you know, the nuclear trigger was cocked and ready or there was no chance of

that happening. So basically and interestingly, because you know, during the Tsarist era, one of the issues that one of the issues that uh Hoveg was dealing with in Germany and you know, the lead up to the Great War is that once like the tsar Is, a mobilization protocol was was triggered like very little could stop it, you know, and uh to put the brakes on it would mean that you know, the the Russian Empire returned to a

state of uh, you know, of peace time vulnerability. So I think that's interesting, Okay, not just for trivial reasons, but at any event, the inability, the inflexibility and the lack of uh, you know, the lack of a nuanced UH alert structure was something that gave the Soviet General

staff pause. And I mean the Soviet general staff it was modeled very much on like, you know, the old German general staff, and you know, as was the American as wasn't his the American joint She's a staff, So I mean these Danielovich was a powerful man and he also he was he was kind of the statistics and

research man on the Soviet general staff. So what he did in nineteen seventy six, and this was not accidental nineteen seventy six is generally agreed upon some historians and some defense intelligence types positive nineteen seventy four or seventy five a handful as late in the nineteen seventy seven this was when the Soviets truly achieved strategic parody in terms of in terms of their nuclear forces and being okay.

This is when the point at which inarguably the warsaw pick could fight a nuclear war against NATO and or the United States, you know, jointly or severally on uh on, on terms of parody as regards forces and being okay, they were always disadvantaged as regarded you know, the strategic nuclear forces until then, you know, despite despite you know, what the Pentagon claimed, you know, in the run up to the ninety sixty election, in spite of what you know,

subsequent administrations alleged about you know, force levels. This this, this was the moment at which the strategic balance became you know, one of of true parody. But what Danielovitch did was he oversaw the first uh computer analysis scientifically structured quantitative simulation of a general nuclear war, okay, coding all available inputs, you know. And the Soviet general staff

was pretty uncorrupted by ideology. You know. This was not you know, some kind of cheerleading exercise so that they could you know, deliver you know, some kind of hackneyed official statement, you know, to the to the General secretary and say like, you know, see, comrade, we we we can defeat the imperialist It was nothing like that. It was very legit. And what Daniellovich's conclusions were was it under best conditions and a general nuclear war, the Soviet

military would be utterly powerless. If the USSR was hit with a splendid first strike, they have no ability to retaliate effectively. Okay. Even if early warning did perform adequately and the Soviets were able to retaliate, at least eighty million Soviet citizens would be dead, and god knows how many more you know, and more sow packed altes allied

estates who are also targeted in varying capacities. In the aftermath, it'd be virtually impossible for the Soviet military to rebuild and reconstitute critical infrastructure, because over three quarters of heavy industry would have been just outright annihilated. And finally, Europe

would would be reduced to a wasteland. Like even if you even if you reject the kind of Carl Sagan doomsday, you know, hypothesis of nuclear winter and all that kind of thing, there's no way Europe could survive a general nuclear war, you know, I mean, if you're you're talking about literally the death of Europe. And obviously that you know, had profound implications from the Soviet Union as well, you know. So what uh, what this led to was a couple

of things. The way to really understand the way to really understand why the Soviets invaded Afghanistan owes to what I just described in terms of real anxieties about their ability to fight a nuclear war and survive, not even win, just to survive. Okay, Now, I know nobody likes the Russians these days, and I guess most people don't really like the Russians anyway. I'm not trying to be like

Bigott or mean. I mean, it's a fact. Okay, however, anyone feels about Russia, whoeverybody felt about the Soviet Union, Russia, the Soviet Union. In the twentieth century, they lost more p led war then all other states combined. Okay, you know, in the between ninety forty forty five, like one in seven of their population was like died by war attrition, okay, or of starvation or in you know, a bombing raider

in some way proximately caused by hostilities. I mean this this this to say this was impactful on their collective psyche, I mean doesn't even begin to describe, you know, the degree to which this informed policy. But beyond that, by uh, by nineteen seventy nine, you know, we're in under conditions

of strategic true strategic parody. I mean potentially we're we're talking about the window of decision making an event of a general war of you know minutes, you know, like five or ten minutes or in best case scenario, you know, fifteen or twenty minutes. And you know, we're dealing with weapons systems, and we're dealing with the you know, levels of social organizations at scale wherein like human decision makers

are increasingly being sidelined. You know that that was reality. Okay, like this idea that just oh well, if we have if we have sensible men, you know at the controls, you know, cooler heads will just prevail. And you know, it's unthinkable that some general nuclear war would happen. That was not the case at all. You can find yourself

at war before you even realize what's happening. And in the case of nuclear war, again, we're talking about being forced to render decisions within minutes, you know, Uh, if you even realize you've been hit, you know, I mean there's that too. It Uh, the possibility of decapitation raises a

whole new possibility or set of possibilities. You know, if the enemy can potentially achieve a splendid decapitation strike, then the issue becomes like, well, you know, how do I identify imminent indicators of attack before there's even you know, before there's even like a mobilization, or before like early warning you know, is even is even activated. You know. So these are not things that human minds can adequately identify, interpret, contemplate,

and respond to. So we're talking about incredibly dangerous conditions. Okay, now I missed all of this, uh, this whole union and to their credit, to the to the credit of the General staff, I mean, as I indicated a moment ago, they were kind of the best of that system, them and probably some of the KGB. I mean, that's where I drop off came from. That's where mister Putin you know,

uh rose to the ranks as well. After after this nineteen seventy six UH wargame exercise, the Soviets realized that, you know, they had to try and find a way to develop a flexible response whereby you know, they had the capability to fight and win a nuclear war or at least you know, respond to any nuclear assault with a devastating counter strike in the form of a survivable deterrent.

But they realized that they had du they basically the Soviet Union by way of a frankly progressive minded general staff. They tried to implement their own revolution and military affairs. Okay, and this is uh, this is this is significant to the final phase of the Cold War. But what remained paramount was, uh, you know, was the ability of you know, the ability to survive a smudded for a strike or to deter it with you know, a survivable a survivable deterrent.

So another uh, another Soviet military type who offered his testimony. You know, in the aftermath of nineteen ninety one was uh, a guy named Alexander like Kowski, a major general. Lakowski was present pretty much when you know, the the Inner polic Bureau, if we can call it that way, convened

to discuss the invasion of Afghanistan. That's documented. So his testimony at least, uh, you know, I see no reason to think he's not a credible witness, but it's documented that he was present when he stated he was present, so you know, he's as much of a from him, we get as much of an insider's perspective on the decision making process as we're going to get. On December eighth, nineteen seventy nine, there was a meeting held in Bresnev's

private office. You know, Bresnev was the General Secretary at the time still you know, uh that he would be until his death in nineteen eighty two, but he was increasingly you know, suffering dementia on a matter of health problems, I believe, as I've said before, that and drop of Gramco who was the Foreign minister, and Ustinov, who was then Secretary of Defense, and he was this big war hero like when you think of those guys of Red Army generals got like rose and rose and medals, you know,

and and look like they're you know, they got they got like a viscigin looks like it's card out of Grantite or something like. Ustanov was that was kind of one of those guys. But the issue at hand, uh, was the present situation in Afghanistan. And then drop Off

and Usanov in particular were gravely concerned about it. And what like Kowski says is he said that the way I drop of and and drop always holding court, it wasn't bridgment of and drop Off said that, look the efforts undertaken by the US intelligence apparatus, you know, Central Intelligence, d I A. You know, elements of the State Department

that are in fact intelligence, you know oriented. He said that, Uh, their big plan is to beef up Herky, you know, concede the Turfs, you know, within reason whatever they want in Central Asia, you know, so long as the Turks are willing to play ball with a NATO war plan. And ultimately he said that the goal, the Turkish goal is to bring Sunni Moslims on the southern Soviet frontier, like into their number or orbit, and the US ambition is to encourage that sentiment, you know by what, by

whatever means possible. Now, the reason for this was, among other things, by nineteen seventy nine, Soviet war planners realized that if America was going to launch a preemptive assault to the Soviet Union, it was going to basically force the Soviet Union to fight a two front nuclear war if you can think of nuclear wars that in fronts. But the point is they're going to assault from the

Pacific ause what was from the West? Okay, They're gonna do that for a few reasons, World War three would have been decided by naval weapons platforms and eventually by those like an orbital space But by nineteen seventy nine, Asia would have been key for reasons that I we can get into at some point, but it's it's kind of too there's kind of too much there to you know, de vote with the rest of this episode to that

and nothing else. But the big Soviet concern also was that Soviet Command to control to fight a nuclear war was based in Moscow, and it was based in Kazakhstan where stars where Star City is, you know, there's space Center to this day that's still are Russian space crafter launched from. The big concern was that pursing missiles deployed UH, you know, in proximity to Kazakhstan, would be targeted at

Star City. And you know, again like if we I mean it's an imperfect descriptor, but if of a two front nuclear assault in the Soviet Union, it would be blinded and then it would be decapitated and that would be the end of it. So why the concern in Afghanistan? Well, Amin who was a communist, he was this revolutionary UH firebrain in Afghanistan, you know, who'd become uh, who'd become

the president, and he was a dedicated Marxist Leninist. Oh to the kind of peculiarities of uh or are the kind of peculiarities of of of the culture there which I can't speak to in any kind of you know, meaningful capacity, but just generally and this is this is what like Kowski he stated, you know, Amen fell back a lot on kind of appeal to Islamic pietism and couching Marxist Leninists kind of gobbledygook in those terms. The Kremlin had a hard time kind of discerning those signals.

They thought that Amen was likely gonna kind of court like an Islamist coalition around like a nominally Marxist Leninis garment, and then it was gonna pivot to the West through Turkey and become this client regime of the sort that America always wanted they ran to kind of become that would was gonna welcome, you know, force US to be based there, you know, including things like pursing two missile platforms and in the end drop of usanov gramco view

like this was the checkmate scenario in the Cold War. And secondarily, a lot of people don't know this, Afghanistan actually has fairly stantial uranium deposits. Pakistan was literally at war at the time intermittently with the Soviet ally India, who was their head against China, which uh in turn, you know, uh, mister Kissinger and some of his successors and the Chinese accorded Pakistan and started giving them everything

they needed to wage war with India. You know. Uh. So what I'm getting at is that this was this was not and drop off being crazy or this was not just Soviet paranoia, like this actually was very forward thinking, strategic logic, and they were one hundred percent wrong about I mean, he had no intention of doing that. He was what he appeared to be, which was a basically doctrinaire Marxist Leninist, you know, accounting thick out of the peculiar cultural nuances of of uh of of his country.

But UH, Unfortunately what was decided was UH. At the conclusion of this meeting, like Cosky said, he was kind of sitting there the thing that this was just kind of like a typical like intelligence briefing, but and drop of just kind of like looked at, you know, every man in the room and said, well, you know, our plan is gonna be this. You know, we we've got to remove I mean, you know, by by way of special action, I mean, which everybody understand. Meant, you know,

he's gonna be whacked. He's gonna be replaced with UH, with with Carmel Uh, who was the Soviet Union's preferred for whatever reason, the KGB said that this is the man, and we can why you know, it was just some kind of cipher. I don't know anything about the man beyond that, but you know he I believe hen til nineteen eighty six. So for Bosth of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, like he was at the helm and drop offs. Said, uh, in order to preserve you know, he anticipated, you know,

some kind of smooth transition of power. But uh, you know, just in case, you know, he he said, we got a plan for the continency of civil unrest, and you know, deploy at least some contingent of forces to the ground on the ground there. And uh, this was put to uh. U said, I put this too, O Garkov, who was chief of the General staff, and he was outraged. And uh Usandov said, well, to be on the safe side, don't worry, We're going to deploy seventy five to eighty

thousand troops in theater. Gharkov said, that's not going to be able to stabilize the situation. And this is the conventional military problem anyway, and uh, apparently Usanov said, are you saying, you know, comrade, are you suggesting that you you are to teach the you are to teach the poet girl. And reading between the lines, uh Ogarkhov realized that if he continued on this path of you know, conscientious resistance, he would be disappeared. If not physically, which

was very possible. You know, he he would have found himself, uh, you know, unpersoned and some and some basic capacity the U. This tells you too about the divide between again the military leadership and uh the true kind of vanguard, which was of the Communist Party, I mean, you know, which was uh in drop Off by that point, um Gramco and uh Ustanov and uh, this was a totally unofficial meeting of hand picked officialdom. You know, this didn't go to the Supreme Soviet This, this didn't go to some

you know, officially convened subcommittee of the polit Burro. There wasn't even any record of it other than the notes of the meeting that I just referenced when it drop Off died. Apparently the notes of this meeting were any safe. Every Soviet General secretary had had a personal safe, and when he died it was opened, which seems strange, almost

like mafia lake in my opinion. Like I'm not being corny, I mean like quite literally when uh like when Bresnav died, I think he had like ten thousand dollars in American can which at that time was a lot of money. He had, he had he had like he he has.

He had like some chiefs regal or some kind of like mid show off like brand of American liquor, and uh like a bunch of personal effects and drop Up had a whole lot of he had a whole lot of fairly sensitive stuff, including apparently the notes from this meeting, which was the only documentation that it even occurred, which is crazy because the Soviet Union, the Soviet was brazen.

The Soviet Union in some ways was uh it did did didn't respect convention in the international system, you know, stuff like the downing of Flight oh seven and other things, but they were obsessed with their own like internal protocol, like this is something that just like wasn't done. Like you can tell, in my opinion that Soviet Union was in trouble at this point that they were doing things

this way. This wasn't just ordinary. I mean, the Soviet was secretive and paranoid, but like not that this isn't how they did things, you know, and when uh when when even within the the inner party, literally you've got that kind of like mistrust, so you're resorting to this kind of ad hoc uh decision making, you know, with uh with kind of like a mafia coterie of official dumb you know who are loyal to like the defect though decision maker on more in peace questions like that's

that that's a very very bad situation. I mean just in terms of the potential for you know, the potential for you know, uh, catastrophic decision making. But also it means,

it means the proverbial center cannot hold. And I'm actually someone who thinks pretty highly even drop off in the bounded rationality of you know, rather the like the a moral you know discussion within an am world, purely a moral discussion of power politics, I think, and drop it was probably the best man the system produced other than steal and purely uh, you know, power political terms. But this, uh, this is how, this is what underlay the decision to

go to war in Afghanistan. You know, it was not you know, to fight Islamic fundamentalism, like Islamic consciousness definitely was an aspect. It was a part of the constellation of factors, but not not in the way like people

think about it. It wasn't because like Osama bin Laden was radicalizing people or something, or because the CIA created bin Laden or whatever kind of stupid stuff people say it very very much absolutely had to do with critical judgment relating to the you know, uh related to the nuclear paradigm, you know, and then and the need of the Soviets to protect at all costs key commanding COTRO infrastructure in Asia in order to survive of a bull from the

blue as salt and preserve a survivable deterrent. And I think that's fascinating. I mean not just because I you know, I don't think it's just because I have a strong

interest in the topic. I mean, this is a It goes to show you how during the Cold War, you know, warfare within very within, very secondary theaters, very peripheral theaters head you know, profound significance in a way that you know before a sense like just wouldn't like it's not emergent within you know, ordinary security paradigms.

as it were in Afghanistan. When it became clear of the Afghames we're gonna fight and the Caesar of the Grand Mosque by extremists in Saudi Arabia, including a lot of guys who ended up joining Bin Laden himself, that the Iranian Revolution, ironically, because I mean, you know, the first two Islamic republic revolutionary Islamic Republic was like a Shia republic that very much inspired Salafi uh muja Hadeen types.

These things kind of coalesced, and you know, guys from far and wide started streaming into Afghanistan to fight the communists. And I don't think people really saw that coming. When that became clear, Uh, it was around like Carter was

on his way out. Reagan was on his way in, and the Reagan doctrine, you know, for the minute Reagan took the oath of office, it was clear, uh that you know, the team b uh Kodian went out and the Reagan doctrine was like, we're gonna fight Ivan pretty much wherever he's insinuated, and we're gonna give the people under arms. We're fighting the reds anything they needed. What Carter did, when I'm gonna get to momentarily, Carter deserves

a lot of credit. Carter totally changed the command and control structure and brought it back within constitutional parameters as well as just you know, putting an end of the kind of garbage UH that UH had made America vulnerable and UH strategic nuclear terms. You know. Carter said that like you know this, you know, this centering debate around you know, mutually assured destruction, which never was anything more

than a talking point. Anyway, that's over with. You know, we're gonna I'll I'm gonna get into that now, Like it was. The issue was this okay by by the time Carter took office. Carter realized very quickly a few things were a foot. First of all, Strategic Air Command had just decided by that point that in the event of the general nuclear war, the president and all civilian

decision makers just going to be dead within minutes. So why bother you know, really like advising the president about nuclear war decision making anyway, because Strategic Air Command from the looking glass a wax aircraft, we're just going to like fight the war, you know, from that command post. And oh well, it sucks the president's dead, but that's just the way it is. Carter said, that's not acceptable. Okay. First of all, the President of United States is the

President of United States. You know, he's the sole national representative the people of the American people. Secondly, Article two confers upon the president, you know, uh, the power of commander in chief. It doesn't confer that upon Strategic Air Command or like General Curtis Leamy or General Thomas Powers

or General whoever. Okay, that's parently and constitutional. Finally, what what the hell are we doing just saying like, you know, we're just gonna throw our hands at and accept that like the government is gonna die immediately an event of war. Like that's not that's not how you're prepared to fight and win a war. So what Carter did was and these measures weren't perfected and implemented until about eighty five eighty six. But a list of a designated national command

authorities what's called national command authorities. There are people from the president on down, you know, all the way down like forty people total. You know, if like one man and they're almost aways men is dead, the next one will take up a command and control authority. This is a pre cell phone and pre GPS. So all these people they were issued ID cards that you know, we're

we're or where. They were given a cipher that upon being contacted you know by sick nor ed an event of war, you know, they they'd be able to reply to a challenge with like the correct you know, like the cipher code or whatever. But the nancial command authorities with the people who would direct nuclear war, like an event that the president and his cabinet are dead, and like on down the line. Okay, designated safe houses. Some

are on military bases. Some were purpose structures that were designed and built for this purpose that they could be shuttled due to survive the initial assault. They were to report in to uh seck nor ed every day as to what they're you knows, as did their goings coming, some goings when they left town. You know, they had to they had to report like every six hours or something. I mean this this is a revolutionary system, Okay. Carter

also that was President's director of fifty eight. Carter said that, you know, he reiterated that America will never, you know, will never utilize a nuclear first strike in order to

resolve a national security exceptency. However, if America finds itself in a nuclear war, and this is in the language of PD fifty nine, America will fight to win a nuclear war, and it will develop and maintain forces in being to fight and win a nuclear war against the Soviet Union Warsaw Pact, and that represented a that represents

this was the end of daytime. Okay. This is America saying that, you know, if God forbid, we go to war with Warsaw Pact, you know, and this escalation to general nuclear war like America's gonna treat nuclear war like it does any other conflict modality. America is gonna fight to win a nuclear war. That's also one of the reasons why continuity of government is important. That there's nobody negotiate the end of the war is like, that's not

that's not reasonable, you know. So the idea is, you know, civilian control as intended and demanded by the Constitution is uh is gonna be guaranteed. You know, through these continuity of government measures. We're gonna spare no expense in maintaining a survivable deterrent and our strategic doctrine is gonna be an event of war. We're going to fight and win. We're gonna fight to win a nuclear war. National command authorities are UH are gonna seek to endstilities as quickly

as possible, if that is possible. But uh, there's no where this horseshit of you know, like we will not fight a nuclear war in these weapons can never be used. It's like, you know, you threaten those nuclear weapons, he can deploy those weapons. You know, we're in a wage total nuclear war against you in kind and drop of who is becoming more powerful, you know, pretty much every day and in the final months of the bresion of regime.

The way he interpreted that, and he could say, this is the most cunitive possible way, but just in realist terms, if your enemy suddenly and kind of jarringly adopts a different strategic posture that tends to be a war indicator. I mean, not like not of imminent attack or something. But that's pretty much exactly what the German Reich did, what the Kaiser Reich did. What I mean that, I'm

not saying, oh, like the Germans are bad. I'm saying that in the Russian experience, when their primary adversary does this, it means that something is afoot, you know, and that something usually is that, you know, the executive of the adversarial power was preparing the population to mobilize for war, or at least he's doing what he has to do in order to concentrate war fighting authority in his office so that he has that option in order to use,

as you know, a as leverage against the Russians. And there is some truth to that. I'm not gonna lie, and that's that's not good or bad. I mean, that's just state craft. But arguably this caused an escalation intensions. But again, I mean, the Soviet Union had just gone into Afghanistan, you know, I mean, it's not and you know, one of the problems with these treaties, however well intentioned, they were like salt and salt too, which was the Cabals put on that by the invasion with Afghanistan by

the way, and then later the Start treaties. I mean, even if you I I think, on principle, on principle, I have a problem with that kind of uh, with with those kinds of agreements, because because bargaining away your preperaatedness and ability to survive is not legitimate. I realized

the Cold War was unusual conditions. But I mean, even even if you think that those that sort of thing is the most well intentioned, you know, mechanism for preserving the piece, you can't somehow like stop technology, you know, and I mean the usued with deeper parodies is that. Yeah. A lot of this stuff that made nuclear weapons more accurate, more deadly, more powerful was because guys that Los Alamos

or you know, guys that in Kazakhstan and USSR. You know, we're like developing you know, weapons purpose tech to do that. But other stuff like commanding control tech. A lot of that stuff just it emerges. It's emergent, you know, due to all kinds of endeavors, you know, some profit driven,

some not, some military purpose some not. I mean you can't just say like we're gonna we're not gonna know things that we come to know because we got to like keep weapons from becoming even more dangerous, you know. So that and that's really that's really what SDI was about. And I think we're coming up on about an hour. We'll get into that stuff next time, as well as

Able Archer and Granada and all that fun stuff. And like I said before, I can't remember if we were recording already or not, but a lot of the fellows they want us to talk about stuff, especially like especially a lot of like the English guys and French dudes. You're not a lot of Europeans like fought in in Goola and stuff, and it's just like a cool conflict. We should do a dedicated episode about stuff like the Dominican Republic, about you know, like Latin America and the

Contract War and about like in Gola. I want to do that, like a dedicated episode. If that's cool, it's your show. I want to tell you, like this is what we should do.

that's what the podcast is. Real Thomas seven seven seven dot subsec dot com. I am launching my YouTube channel. I know there's been like many many delays, things are coming together. I got an incredible editor. I've got a lot of people helping me because I frankly I don't know about video protoc from at all. I promised it's coming imminently, hopefully by next week. But it's coming. So that's and that's Thomas TV's on YouTube. But for Thomas TV, the first T is a seven and you will find it.

That's all I got, all right, So.

from this weekend trip. Will we'll deal kind of more with the Soviet side, you know, just conceptually, but also just in terms of you know, the factual record, because I realized we haven't dedicated a lot of attention to that yet. But you know, the the degree to which human decision makers were becoming less and less significant within the strategic arms race, and I mean were fighting in general. If you're talking about you know, kind of the zenith of of of nuclear war technology as it was in

you know, nineteen eighty one, that can't be overstated. And this idea that you know, just cooler heads could prevail, you know, to invoke Curtis LeMay's kind of for rism.

That's not really possible when you're talking about uh, you know, certain certain technological variables as well as certain uh you know, as well as organization at scale of hundreds of millions of people quite literally, you know, it's not you can't even if you're a chief executive or a general who's got a great deal of of authority, you know, intrinsic not just to his mandate, but you know, in terms of you know, key decision makers subservient to him being

willing to execute his orders basically without a centation. It's just not possible. Okay, It's that's not the way, that's not the way. That's not the way human systems work, and that calls for certain remedies when we're talking about something like nuclear war planning, you know, where quite literally decisions need to be rendered in and it's you know, but even where that not you know, necessary kind of remedial measure, you know, to apply and aim to research

and perfect an ongoing way. It was understood that you know, the way man related to technology was becoming kind of the key question, not just in terms of fighting future wars, but you know, in terms of production modalities, in terms of how you know, people at scale perceive information and you know develop uh developed political sensibilities, which which totally changed with the advent of television, you know, and the ability to broadcast you know, over across thousands and thousands

of miles, you know, and it quite literally turned the world into one place in terms of you know, the uh, the the concepts being you know asserted and early on kind of the earliest game theorist, uh, I mean, he was a game theorist some of the many other things, but kind of the first uh, public intellectual who really sort of articulated this and and in like a very kind of concrete form was was a guy named Norbert Norbert Winer. Okay, he published a book called Cybernetics, or

Control and Communication and the Animal and the Machine. That sounds very strange and almost kind of science fiction like, but I wire was a consumately serious person. He wasn't some crank, and he coined the term cybernetics, and uh, within Winer's vernacular, cybernetics quite literally referred to self regulating

mechanisms of all kinds. He cited the earliest examples of you know, servo mechanisms, you know, be them hydraulic electric mechanical that were error sensitive and their feedback you know, even like something like a Roman aqueduct, you know, in in a primitive way, not primitive in terms of its construction, but primitive in terms of you know, the applied technology utilized, you know was wasn't It was an example of you know,

error sensitive machine learning. Okay, Now, when you add humans into the equation, I you need a human operator at at least, you know, in a at least to initiate machine processes. You've got to take care, you know, to structure how that relationship ensues and how it is sustained throughout the duration of processes. Okay, there's got to be mutual intelligibility, you know, between what the human mind is

telling the machine to do. Uh, and the human mind has to be not only comfortable, like literally physically carntible with the machine that it's operating, but it's also got to be sensitive to you know, the feedback emergent from the machine. Okay. One of the reasons why and Whiner was sensitive to this there was such a revolt of the laboring cast. When there truly was a laboring cast, you know, working on an assembly line of any kind, whether it was a slaughterhouse or whether it was you know,

a or whether it was a textile mill. In the early twentieth century, it was incredibly unpleasant. It was difficult, it was physically painful. The there was not a good coupling that had been achieved between the human operator and the machine. You know, the human felt overwhelmed by the machine, or the machine was forcing a pace of work, you know that the human couldn't keep up without significant pain

or sometimes at all. You know, these machines often are dangerous, and even when functioning is intended, you know, they they they harm people, you know, And that's not that that's gonna do a couple of things. I mean, it's gonna do more than a couple of things. But first and foremost, it's going to create certain inefficiencies and choke points. And it's also gonna hurt people, which itself is not good.

I mean, I think we're gonnall agree on that. But also it's gonna really gonna sour the human operators view of the machine, you know, and even if only subcasually, even if even a very duty bound or conscientious person or a true believer, you know, particularly somebody in a military role who you know, copies that role they're in.

You know, if if if this machine causes them pain or difficulty or frightens them, or you know, they they they're always worried that they're gonna be somehow harmed or meaned by it, that that's going to compromise their ability to interfere and function as intended. So what Winer did was he said, look, you know, these machines need to be accessible, you know, and the ability to initiate and program them in a rudimentary way as intended, you know,

at the critical moment required. You know, it's gotta it's gotta be. He's talking about like you're talking about being user friendly. Okay, I mean, nobody use those terms then,

but that's that's what he was talking about. And he also said that, you know, one of the ways not just to kind of guarantee you know, an appropriate coppling that's both safe and efficient to the human operator, but that also you know, is gonna is gonna you know, create a kind of punctuated advance and our ability to develop you know, machines that truly learn, you know, through irresensitive feedback. Is you know, He's like, we've got to

start structuring machines like we would a human nervous system. Okay, not literally and say like, you know, okay, this is the way the brain is structured. You know, I've got to make my I've gotta tweak my Babbage device to look more like that brain. Obviously, but you know, it couldn't be something totally alien and you know, to what I mean at the end of the day, you know, like the human brain is just an incredibly complicated, highly evolved like you know, uh like feedback mechanism for the

purposes we're talking about. Okay, I mean it's a lot more than that. But you know, so uh making machine thinking or machine learning at that you know, as it was understood at that time as human like as possible in rudimentary terms, Okay, that that wasn't just a way of you know, kind of guaranteeing you know, maximum efficiency you know, in terms of the the interface of the human or like the animal in uh liners terminology with

the machine. But it also he said, this is the path that kind of you know, greater development in terms of you know, in terms of our in terms of our design engineering. Okay, And I think I think it goes out saying is right about that if you if you cud of like the brass tacks, what guys like Steve Jobs we're talking about, you know, And I'm not I'm not a computer guy or a tech guy at all, but I've read a lot about Jobs because for better

or worse, he was a very significant personage. And when he talks about design, optics and aesthetics, you can tell he's doing it like the way like a guy who's not an engineer, but he's more an engineer than he is like some artists, or like you know, kind of eccentric like architect. I know, I tried to convey the image of the latter, but he was the former. And

I guarantee that he said. I guarantee that as a young man he definitely read cybernetics, and if he didn't, you know, like the stuff he was reading was so insinuated with that kind of ethos, but like everybody way to describe it, that he very much took that on as his own. Okay. And also just I mean Winer didn't just make these things up. I mean, there's an intrinsic Uh, there's a there's like an intrinsic existential reality

to these things. He was positive, you know, it's just that's the way machines work, that's the way humans think and feel, that's the way they interface in very basic terms, and cybernetics and like the postulates there in. That was

really the earliest. That was really the earliest discussion of you know, audit, automated navigation, analog computing in the way that we understand it or understood it, you know, in the later twentieth century, and you know, which was the you know, the forebear of it as we know it. This is the first time people talked about AI in

an applied capacity. It uh, it led to neuroscientific modeling, and most importantly, uher Reiner was always it was always uh, it was always emphasizing the importance of communication and communication regime and also UH like physical structure like across distance that was integrated, that was reliable, and most importantly, that was survivable. Okay, And I said was importantly not not just the general proposition, but in the case of nuclear war,

I mean that's everything, you know. So these are things to understand. We're talking about nuclear war, We're talking about the Cold War paradigm, and especially in the UH in the final UH in the final in the final phase of the Cold War, the Cold War conflict paradigm. Okay,

it these things, UH can't be overstated. And it like the desires of of human decision makers, you know, particularly those you know in public roles, it really was not up to them, like the course of of of events in in terms of crisis UH resolution or you know, the deterioration of of of remedial strategies you know, in in the general war. But the the UH, it's very

clear too, you know both. It's even people who uh, even people who write pretty good histories of the late Cold War, like the guy what's his freak, Yeah, Mark Ambinder, Sorry, I was having a senior moment, Ambinder. He he deemphasizes the degree to which kind of like the trajectory of American policy very much had a nuclear vector. And what I mean by that is that you know, UH us UH global policy and in not just in a hard power of terms, but but just in general terms, it

really orbited around you know, America's nuclear capability. Uh, it's ability to wield Dad's a credible threat. You know, the response of the Eastern Bloc and the Soviet Union as well as China, I mean, despite the China by that point have been courted quite successfully as a strategic ali This was the This was the variable or set of variables that everything revolved around between the superpowers. Okay, some

mean there's that too, even Uh. It just the existence of these capabilities and uh, you know, the continuing emergence and new technologies to to perfect the effectiveness of these things kind of dictated the course of policy between the superpowers. It doesn't matter what anybody's rhetoric was. It doesn't matter what anyboy's intentions were or how much they made very well have been committed to peace, you know, I don't

I don't doubt that. You know, some of the things Bredon have said before he lost his marbles, and you know about the Soviet Union must avoid you know general lookally word all costs. I'm sure that he meant that. I'm sure Reagan like corny and kind of made for sound by television, as some of the things he said in the matter may have been. I think earnestly believe those things. But moving on the way the Soviet Union

responded to this emergent strategic landscape was very interesting. In nineteen eighty one, the Soviets launched the biggest peace time, dedicated, peace time intelligence operation in its entire history, which says a lot because the Soviet Union, for the duration of its existence really was mobilized for war in a way that even you know, even America in the nineteen eighties, which which was very much you know, on a war footing,

would would would view as extreme. And drop Off, who in nineteen eighty one was u was still a year away from uh, you know, a sending of the role of General secretary. As I've said before, I believe, I believe he himself, Gramico and ustan Off were very much kind of that tried effected the content good shadow government.

But he was the eminence behind the KGB really for the duration of his of his of his life, okay, and on strategic matters, oh on Sundry and I can tell you that in nineteen eighty one, you know, the and drop I was the key decision maker and those in immediate orbit, what what what this this intelligence operation was called Project Rion or Ryan literally r y a N. It's an acronym that uh for a Russian language phrase which translates to nuclear missile attack or nuclear missile assault

or something in that order. I'm not going to try to pronounce it and butcher it and embarrass myself. But the entire purpose of Rayon or Rion was this. And drop of address he members of the poet Gul as well as uh, the the general staff, and he said, look, you know, we're we're losing the code war on key fronts, you know, political and technological that very much nullify our are the advantages we do have. And one of those

fronts was in in computing. I think there's there was less than a thousand computers in uh the Soviet Union in nineteen eighty one. I mean to give you an idea, you know, which is bizarre. What do you think about it?

That the Soviet Union and they they logged far more man hours in space flight than the United States head and uh, you know they were they were crying out these chess masters who you know, uh, we were schooled in uh in formal the kind of formal logic that that in America, like really built, you know, like the you know, the kind of like early like analog computing industry. But that's that warrantance dedicated episode Like how uh uh the uh like, how how computing in the Soviet Union

really was? It really was sabotaged. Oh, you know, like interesting rivalries within the design bureaus, you know. And you you can't create a high tech economy, you know, based on a central plan. I mean, I mean, I mean you can't. You can't base the traditional manufacturing economy and

on a central plan. But particularly you're talking about high tech and I t I mean, it's you're you know, there's just no there's just no chance that it's going to produce what's required, you know, in order to meet the meet the needs of of you know, of nuclear

war command and control planning. But with what they did have, what uh what what Project Rihannim to do was to anticipate a bolt from the blue nuclear strike by using, uh, the computing technology they did have alongside human analysts to monitor indicators, to identify monitor codable indicators you know, from the United States and NATO, and uh determine when these

indicators could be relied upon. That you know to to that that that that an imminent nuclear assault was you know, was a foot such that uh, with the technologies of the day, apparently with submarine launched ballistic missile platforms, you know, as well as intermediate range missiles, which you know, if deployed in the theater by NATO, would reach their targets you know, within fire or ten minutes, you know where we're talking about. It's not you know, early warning is

not enough. I mean, no matter how sensitive it is, no matter how possible to spoof it is. You know, like before before there's any but there's where there's any commanding control indicator in America in nineteen eighty one, you know that Strategic Air Command, you know, is going to scramble its heavy bombers. You know that that the the

miniman missiles are about to emerge in their silos. Like you've got to be able to identify the variables before there's any actual you know, command and control indicator, which I mean it says a dawning proposition, I mean, doesn't It is almost comically inadequate. But it also it creates a very dangerous circumstance. If you've got to be able to identify evident assault indicators you know, based upon you know, uh, based upon apparently benign events and human behaviors at scale

that could very very easily be misread. I mean, this goes beyond fog of work kind of stuff. But it

also this is a difficult question. You know, It's like, Okay, let's say let's say that there could let's say, let's say attack indicators, you know, codable attack indicators could in fact be reliably identified, and that there was a machine that, uh, you know, could pretty reliably evaluate these things and could I'm smollifying this for the saying with counterfactual, you know, spit out a probability ratio of what the likelihood is that you know, these indicators mean, you know, an attackism

in it if there's a ten percent probability you know, if you preempted with your own attack, if it's anything over fifty percent, if it's one percent, like you see what I mean, like it where you're you're you're running into a kind of paradigm where increasingly, like the winner is gonna be the one who just preempts in absolute terms and when he's confident that you know, he can at least survive a retaliatory strike, just perverse incentives to attack even when not in a reminted threat.

Soviet Union, We've got to go to war. Now, if you wait ten years, there's gonna be nuclear parody. We can't win that, you know. Now, Yeah, we'll take fifty million dead, but will survive. They won't. Plus, there was one of the reasons why the Salt Talks kind of became obsolescent. It wasn't just that, you know, this Soviet invasion of Afghanistan meant that the State Department and as well as Congress no longer had any interest in, you know, pursuing a follow up kind of regime until much later.

We'll talk about that later. But like deeper parodies, you know, multiple warheads, you know, being slammed onto existing presisting platforms, you know, creating like this, these these massive throw weights, you know, create like reduced circular error probable, know, the perfection of penetration aids and decoys, you know, the ability to spoof enemy early warning, and the emergence of AI you know, like the uh, the movie War Games is

actually a great film, and it's a smart film. I Mean some stuff in its corny because it's Hollywood and it's you know, uh a movie that was aimed at like teenagers, but some of it's actually very smart and uh the opening uh, like the opening sequence where you know they're running this command post exercise, you know, and one of the miss layers won't turn his key. That was part of the issue. But then in the movie, like the civilian advisor I think's supposed to be Thomas Schelling.

He says like, look like why we we can't we can we can't wait until you know it's clear Ivan's gonna assault. You know, we gotta know he's gonna assault him before he does, you know, which he was there was like gallows humor. But it's also not entirely inaccurate.

I mean, that's that's what was changing things. Plus the you know, like I said, the in nuclear war, if you're being able to identify an attack is underway, characterize the nature of that attack, then interminal response based on survive surviving forces or probable surviving forces, and then giving the order to retaliate. In nineteen sixty you probably had about an hour to do that, Okay. In nineteen eighty one, you had ten minutes to do that. You know, arguably

you had five minutes. Like by the time the Soviet Union fell apart. It's basic, it's basic assault strategy was gonna be it always parked U two typhoon class submarines

within striking range of the eastern United States. Okay. The idea was that they were going to launch a volley of of of submarine launched boistic missiles at depressed depressed trajectory that would air burst over the entire East coast and you know, create an EMP blackout, then follow up with a massive volley and basically like annihilate the eastern

United States. And you know, if they could do that fast enough and assuming their systems went off without you know, a glitch or whatever, they had a reasonable probability of winning a nuclear war if it was truly like a bolt from the blue attack. You know, stuff like this wasn't possible in Elsberg's day. He was foreseeing that it would be at some point, even if he couldn't foresee the exact platforms. But by nineteen eighty one there was parody as regards forces and being and arguably, uh, the

Soviet Union had the edge. You know. And like I said, this is in terms of data that since the wall came down, it's been verified. It's not just it wasn't just like missile gap nonsense, you know, the kind that people were banning in nineteen sixty election. Uh, you know creates this kind of doing cityway just idea Yeah that you know, Uh, there there's a gap in American in uh in uh, in American in a in an American defense capabilities, you know, visa the Warsaw Pact, that's what

that's what changed. And plus the UH you know the I mean, that's the problem with anything else designed to preserve the the design to preserve stability. You don't know whether you're talking about like you know, the strategic arms limitation talks, you know, whether you're talking about these arms reduction agreements. You know, you can't you can't just freeze

technology in situ. You know, It's like and even if you you know, you were, even if you live in the number of platforms, those platforms have become more efficient, but become more effective, you know, uh, the killing technology will become more and more catastrophically utile, you know, things

like this, and uh. Plus to the UH orbital space, you know, becoming the key kind of emergent battle theater was changing things too, because you know, you launched like the Outer Space Treaty, you know, technically banned orbit of bombardment platforms. That didn't mean anything. And also the Space Shuttle obviously was UH. What was a UH was was an orbit of bombardment delivery mechanism. I mean, it was it was uh. It was other things too, but you

know that that's that was first and foremost. Its role. It wasn't its rule wasn't to take you know, civilian school teachers into space to do experiments on goldfish and zero gravity or something. But these are the things that were kind of destabilizing what had been. I mean, the the paradigm was never truly stable, that's by people say, but it was becoming unmanageable, like owing to these owing to these variables. This really reached the zenith in UH

nineteen eighty three. You know, there was the there's the Able Archer Command Post exercise in in November seventh, and that was really that that was really the way to look at that too. I mean, for those that don't know, there's this bi annual exercise called reforger UH, which was short military short end for Return of Forces to Germany. It was this UH. It was this mass military exercise. We're in UH the forces and being in UH in Germany,

and there was about three hundred thousand US troops. They are backed up by a contingent of about two hundred thousand other natal elements, contributions by the naval omens I mean, but the Reforger exercise was an event of a general war in Europe with warsaw packs. How rapidly can we can we reinforce those forces and being deployed to Europe, you know before they were totally overrun by Warsaw pacts. Okay, So I mean it was actually important. It wasn't just

a make work fake work thing. I mean actually on on the logistics side and the commanding control side, this actually was important operationally, and it also demonstrated UH political will to the Warsaw Pact, and that was important. What able R Trad three was was UH concombinant with Reforger.

It was a command post nuclear war simulation, and it included even civilian UH chief executives, you know, like Margaret Thatcher like went to her uh you know when when when went to like the designated you know, UH follog shelter, you know, uh the helmet cole was similarly like does

a beer from sight. I mean, when you consider Project REN, I mean you consider, you know, the kinds of deep parodies that were causing real alarm on on both sides of UH the Cold War, this seems incredibly risky, you know, because what you're doing is this command post exercise. And you know that the Russians have been attacked many times under the auspices of you know, peaceful military exercises by

their enemies. So there's that. But then also pretty much every indicator of an imminent bolt from the blue nuclear result was emergent in uh, the able Archer exercise. Okay. Now, now, on the one hand, yeah, if you're if you're if you're gonnapply on a nuclear ward to win it, you've got to run those kinds of exercises, okay, and they've

got to be as real as possible. And also if you want true data on how fast you know, the Warsaw Pact, you know, you know, in then in existence at that moment, you know how fast they would respond, you know, uh to being spoofed. You know that that's how you corral your data about you know what the response time, how fast it's gonna be, and what stuff it's gonna entail in a real war situation. So yeah, I mean, there's there's there's a deep internal logic to that.

But it also there's a very good chance that you know, your enemy will perceive this as you know, indicators of an actual attack and you can find yourself in a general nuclear war very very easily. That Uh it's both instructive as to you know, not how tense things were between you know, actors, but also uh it shows you, uh, the degree to which you know, like we were talking about a minute ago, the degree the degree to which you know, conditions of of absolute peace, you know, could

become conditions that general nuclear war. I mean rapidly, you know, there wasn't. There wasn't this kind of like you know, scaled escalation over you know, over days or weeks or even hours. You know. The second aspect of this was Reagan, uh, you know, kind of prompted about people like Kasper Weinberger

and a lot of the Team B types Reagan had. Reagan, he Green led the deployment of the person too intermediate range ballistic missile platform to Europe, to the Buddhist Republic, to uh Italy, to the Netherlands, some of the UK, I believe, but I don't think they ever arrived. This would have, uh, this would have given NATO a profound edge on in theater nuclear weapons and so deployed, Uh, they could reach Moscow within minutes. Okay, this really terrified

Soviet war planners, and for good reason. And there's a nuance here too that I can't remember we raised it for or not, but ironically, owing to uh, you know, politics, NATO was very forward deployed. Like literally the way it was deployed in West Germany, in the Netherlands, in you know, all all throughout the the continent. It was not deployed at all in depth and specifically in Germany. Looking at a map of NATO deployment, US, Benelux British forces were

in offensive deployment, Okay, like they can't be denied. So if you're raying now, some of that had to do with, you know, there's a way kind of placating, you know, people like the Greens who who literally didn't want, you know, like NATO forces to be seen, you know, and uh, it was a way of kind of mitigating the kind of besic hostility over the fact that Germany quite literally

was occupied. There's all kinds of things, but it was also you know, the understanding was if warsaw if in one warsaw pack moves, you know, like what difference does it make we can deploy in depth a we want they're gonna break through, you know. But from the Soviet side, it's like, okay, we've got NATO in kind of permanent offensive deployment. Now there deploying. Now. Now they're deploying these pershing two platforms, which are not only not super hard,

and they're totally vulnerable. I mean, there's no such thing as a truly defensive nuclear weapon. But the only way you can use a persing cyst platform is if you're on the attack, you know, like it's because if it's it's not a survivable uh platform. You know. So the Soviets weren't being crazy or weren't crying wolf or something.

And even even Robert Gates admitted this kind of labor in his memoirs, you know, he said, you know, and anybody who understands these things and understands what gupl cases indicators were. Uh, you know, anybody looking at this on the warsaw Pack's side would have said, you know, these these people are basically preparing a wage in nuclear blitzkrieg, you know. And and there was some truth to that. Frankly, kind of the genius of Reagan, if you want to

give him cross for something. And I'm not any any huge like Reagan fan in history. But uh what uh what what Reagan's uh State Department did was they said, well, you know, we'll remove uh, we'll remove the Pershing twos from Europe. Yeah. Oh if all uh if all theater based nuclear weapons you know, natalarsaw packed, if we agree to move all of them, you know, but that's that's the price essentially of of of dismantling the system. And I mean two in defensive Reagan had been the the

impetus for the deployment of these platforms. It was because they're a hell of a good way if you're gonna wage not a nuclear war to to do it. But also, uh, the Soviet Union, uh, they'd massd s S nineteen's those are one of those those one of those physically huge uh missile systems. You know that we're based on trucks. It's kind of brilliant in its simplicity. For those mobile launch vehicles. The Soviet would move them around every day, like literally, so it's would be.

But yeah, the UH, but the Soviet idea was, uh, they were threatening Europe with annihilation with UH, with these deployments, and they were doing it basically decouple UH Europe's UH national security policy and the respective Natal States from that of America, basically saying like, look like, you know, if uh, if if you avail yourselves to UH, to NATO and the United States, you know, the United States is nuclear deterrent.

You know, you're we consider you to be a fair target and we're gonna continue to target Western Europe as long as that indoors. I mean it was, it was and you know, deployment of the person too, was a way of rooking that uh, that that ambition. So it's more complicated than just Reagan being you know, I'm gonna

it's still gonna hawk ish. Uh, it's still got a reckless hawk and it's it's not just a matter of uh, you know, Pentagon types and in defense intelligence types saying well, let's spoof, let's spoof Ivan, you know, to the brink and see what he does. I mean, there was an aspect of that too, But it is. It is, uh, it is slightly more complicated and more than slightly, but it I gotta pause when it to reeth my water.

I'm really dried out. Is that okay? Yeah, I thank THEE and yeah, the I mean, on the one hand, I obviously and I mean this isn't really material were disgusting. I mean, obviously, my some of these uh in history uh uh are are what you know yackys were, And I I realized this is very much a way of holding Europe hostage quite literally to the Cold War. But at the same time, I mean it within the bounded

rationality of that Europe was afforded. Your Europe was ultimately made more secure because again Reagan's ultimatum was uh, you know, in nuclear for Europe, and that was accomplished, you know, ultimately, I mean it it it. It wasn't until well into Reagan's second term and after you know, the kind of concuord itcounts with Gruschev. But all these things were a process, and you know, like I said, next episode, we'll get into the view from the Soviet side quite literally, but

there had to the crisis. Uh that the crisis cycle is becoming more and more critical and if you look at it and you know, the uh, the Korean War, the Chinese intervention in the Korean War, really that that very well could have led to a general nuclear war a N fifty three, uh not ninety fifty three, ninety sixty two in Cuba ninety seventy three, you know, in the Mid East War nineteen eighty three with uh, you know, able Archer Reforger and the emergent you know, uh deep

parodies that you know, gave riseen and drop off some project rhon like this was becoming unsustainable and more and more dangerous basically every decade, you know, like I, had the Cold War endured into the you know, another twenty years, there probably would have been a nuclear war by the late nineteen nineties. Like I firmly believe that, you know, and Gorbachev uh gets kind of a bad rap. I mean, he was presiding over a structural crisis that I think

is basically imprecedented in the modern era. Okay, there the Soviet Empire constituted like one of six of the planet. Okay, like U and every the world was literally divided such that you know, half the world was essentially you know, the Soviet system was insinuated into it through kind of I mean, I mean interdependence. And when you're talking about you know, marginist letter, This planned economy is different than

you know, globalism. We know it. But you know, about half the planet was reliant in some way, even if it was just you know, occasional brain deliveries, you know, or uh or strictly you know, military hardware to wage you know, some Simon gooing, you know, Simon gooing, uh, localized conflict you know what about about half the about half the planet was reliant on the Soviet Union, just as you know the competing blogs relying on the United States and Europe. I mean, this was i in the

in the preceding five dred years. There's nothing comparable in that except uh, you know, the except that the fall of the Western Roman Empire. And even that wasn't like it's punctuated. I mean, the Soviet Union fell apart like in months, you know, I mean, and that the fact that there wasn't there was violence. People have forgotten that now, but I mean, you know, the actually learned guy, but the you know, they're and you got to look at uh,

you know, you got to look at stuff. Uh, you know, not just you know, in like chess Fan and Dakistan, but also like you know, the bulk At wars as direct I mean remote as they were in relative terms from the Soviet Union. I mean you got to look at those things as as approximately caused you know, by the the punctuated shock the Soviet collapse. But point being that it, uh, this was getting the conflict diad was getting,

it was getting, it was getting impossible to control. And garbaschewv realized that the sovietnion needed a way out of the Cold War. Okay, and and drop off because they drop off was the consummate realist. Uh, and drop off realize you know, what has to contemplate is the way out of the Cold War to you know, wage a preemptive nuclear war against the United States. And I mean obviously, I mean America was thinking that too, you know, and vice versa. You know, is this the way? Is this

the way out of the Cold War? But I mean to say that, to say that this was dangerous, uh branksmanship, it doesn't even scratch the service. It's been ridiculous these days and people like, you know, this is the world you created, This is like this is the most dangerous time ever in world history. It's like, the fuck is the matter with you? I mean, it's it's literally insane

that people think that way. You know, like the like the single issue basically in every presidential election for forty years was, you know, do we have a survival nuclear deterrent? You know? And is the man of the old love is gonna keep us alive? You know, because there's there's like a very real possibility that you know, we might become to make it dead when World War three happens, you know. I mean that's I guess people under like forty five or so like came and conceptualized that, but

it's I'm trying. It sounds like a cantankerous old guy. But because it made this also, this goes to show you how how uh how critical of these these these wars in the periphery were in the nineteen eighties and something. You know, we'll get into this in the next episode, but you know, the the uh, the Battle for Central America, you know, uh, Nicaragua becoming a prox literally a proxy regime of the d d R, the Soviet Union, you know,

the uh, the the the proxy war in Chile. You know, which led to uh, you know, Pinochet removing you know, the Soviets client in Alende, you know, the war El Salvador. I mean, these the Soviets are trying to rectify the strategic the strategic imbalance by carving out comunist blocks that would have changed everything, you know. I mean, and it's

the Soviet Union was doing something's right. I mean, like I said before, I think from nineteen seventy three until about nineteen eighty two, the Soviet Union was winning the Cold War in military terms, in political, sociological, technological terms, they were losing. And he's been pure military terms. They were racking up victory after victory after victory, you know, like in Africa, in Latin America, in East Asia, like you know, the this is not a good thing. I mean, however,

you wherever you fell on. I'm talking about, you know, people who are saying I'm not talking about crazy is like Peter Ronett and like the the kind of the kind of crazy Karens you know, calling for nuclear disarmament. And I'm talking about people actually sensible, whether whether you love Reagan or not, or whether you or whether you know, we're particularly on board with the kind of cold or enterprise.

You know, this was not the prosect of the Soviet Union kind of you know, like we talked about in previous episodes, you know, kind of becoming like the only true superpower because the third world is you know, basically signed on with you know, with Marxist Leninism. So America is just kind of like it's kind of like fortress scaring state amidst the hostile world of of of of tinpot dictators and kind of crazy uh shaku vira types like that would not have been a good thing. Man.

at war with them like by proxy. So it's like it's America obligated to attack itself because it's like it's ally Turkey has been attacked and like incident to the NATO charter, it's like an express condition. I mean that's some thing that's like goofy. This was made in the nineties or like Kissinger said that and then late nineties I met because during nineteen ninety nine and to his credit, you know, he was one of the few voices it really was coming out against Clinton's war on Serbia and

the kids that are made that pointium back then. He's like what like what like so so so like NATO is like, uh to provide a nuclear umbrella of defense against like you know, the great power of slovan On Melosovich.

Like it doesn't, I mean it doesn't. Like that's not even if even if you needed some kind of like it namely uh you know sort of it's sort of you know force uh structuring alliance, you know, to allow America kind of like deploy to deploy whatever wanted, uh willy nilly, Like it doesn't make sense to like may try and maintain the NATO fiction. Like it just doesn't make sense. On his face if you're gonna try and

do that. I mean, that's why the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is actually a pretty for looking alliance all kinds of ways, you know, and it's it's got a military aspect. It's gonna ask an economic independence, you know. It accounts to that kind of the fluid nature of the current music landscape. Like Russia didn't say, like, well, warsaw packs still exists. Yeah,

you know, this is warsaw at. You know, I get any you know, any uh and any any uh if any foreign troops like set foot in Kazakhstan, We're gonna wage nuclear war on you. Like when that doesn't you know, it's like even like a principle of law too. Again, aside from the kind of absurdity that in bad faith the concerts natal and any contract and the treaty at the end of the day is just a permissive contract. The express conditions of it have to be rational, you know,

and they're just not. And it's like, okay, an attack on an attack on Hungary as Rita as an attack on the United States, like America is obligated to go to war with itself because of the attagging Turkey, which is its ally like it doesn't you know, I mean I'm being I'm being a jig off and deliberately up two, so I kind of am. But uh yeah, it doesn't.

It's it doesn't make any sense. And this part of it, too, is just kind of the foolishness of the bureaucrat, Like this idea that you know name exists for its own sake because it's it's at the point of it is to just exist, and like it's just it's just this awesome thing for reasons nobody can articulate, you know. Uh,

it's like it doesn't. It's like, well, for that reason, it's like, okay, well this does that mean that like the America should abide like the express conditions like the Yelta, because like that's how America and the Soviet Union won World War Two? Like, uh, I mean, should should Austria started invoking like cont trees, you know, uh, Entine doing

the Habsburg Empire Like I don't. It doesn't make any sense, but it's a clumsy way of preserving the fiction that this this is that this is some kind of like you know that that this is some sort of like common defense. Uh, architecture and not just you know, unilateral aggression. That's I mean, that's that's you know, the short answer.

content for the channel at long last. So that's what I'm gonna be working on and that I will drop that imminent leap when I get back. But for the next two days I'm not gonna be like real active content wise. If you got to get a hold of me, just like be patient until Sunday. Please, That's all I got.

of the Constitution in the bundest Republic. I mean it's you think they I mean realize that's like a make work uh you know uh or William bureaucracy. But you think there are any things to do than harass a kind of creator in America. But they've done that before. Every time they do it, Twitter finds some arbitrary reason or no reason at all is suspend me or ban me.

They claim that I'm banned for a week. I mean, I'm trying to disengage from Twitter as much as possible anyway, you know, But I know a lot of people that's kind of still like where they try to find me and stuff. But if I'm not back on Twitter in a week, I mean just like hit us up on substick or on t Gram. And I launched the channel promo so that people know that, you know, by April first,

I'll have uploaded the first episode, you know. And I I owe a tremendoustetic gratitude to my guy Rake, who you know, he's just incredible with what he can do with you know, video editing and things like that. And he and I are are gonna are gonna bear down on filming next week. So I mean blown if we're if if if if we are like permanently kicked off bourback again, like it doesn't matter. It's happened like nine times.

So but that's that's that I just wanted to I just I just wanted to like get people put people in notice about that.

favorite movies. It's like I did, and uh, like all of them are in there, and there's like a bunch of other just like crazy stuff. But it's yeah, it's really incredible. Man. I'm not I'm not just like I'm not just like stroking myself because you know, it's like my content. I it's like really freaking cool. But uh yeah, you know, I'm very very lucky to have him on

board man. And he'll he'll be in front of the camera sometimes too, and like I I think people appreciate that because he's, uh he's he's a really funny dude. And uh you know, yeah, you'll you'll so you'll you'll you people will get to meet him and and kind

of see like what he's about. But yeah, I the responsibilit one has been overwhelmingly positive and I really appreciate that, and I believe it'll be worth the way, not because like I'm so great or anything, but I think I've got a sense of what people want to see and hear about, and I'm really really dedicating kind of like all my time and energy to you know, providing that in equality capacity. So yeah, I think he'll be very good man. Well yeah, wiping myself and you.

he wants my ship on his freaking platform. I'll ask him, you know. I mean, but it's I'm not gonna I'm not gonna just like assume like, oh, of course he wants my ship on his on his you know platform. But even if we don't fuck with Cozy, you know, there's plenty of other there's plenty of other other platforms we can utilize that are are friendly or at least neutral.

It'll be fine. And you can you can upload video direct or you can you can shoot directly on substack, or you can upload the pretty much unless you're trying to upload like an entire freaking movie link thing. I mean, it's like I all fails. I mean, i'd yeah, i'd be like just you know, uploading my stuff to Odyssey and substick. I mean, we're gonna say, I trade a lot more than myth but it'll be I I realize

I'm gonna get gangs from YouTube. The reason I dropped it dres so that people can find us and know about it. But yeah, all right.

apologizing with subs. He's got like twenty dollars subscribers, because like it's just caust of getting yanked and it's it's you know, uh, I mean for the most dubious a reason. It's like my point being, I mean, yeah, there were absolutely gonna get terrorized like you are. But that's that doesn't matter. The whole point is, you know, like I do have a YouTube channel right now that people kind of like YouTube's kind of like their first go to

for stuff. But it'll it'll be fine, man, I mean I I built the substick basically with no social media presidents, because it seems like I launched it that was like the first time got perm band from Twitter. I didn't get back on Twitter about nine months, you know, I didn't have an Instagram. Then like I got on t gram you know, after about six months. But it'll, I mean,

it'll be fine. You know, people people are loyal and they follow us, and we've got we got a good you know, community of people who know how to you know, kind of like remain in contact.

We're gonna go a little bit backwards, okay, And as we mentioned, Able Archer happened in October nineteen eighty three, there was immediate precursors to that that dramatically exacerbated tensions and really kind of created in you know, in I kind of generated a zeitgeist of not war fever, but what what was What is esteemed you know, unthinkable only a few years before suddenly became very possible again. And there was very much an atmosphere of terror. I mean,

you remember the actually little ole than me. I was a little kid, and my mom was singularly terrified in nuclear war. Okay, I mean a lot of people were, and my mom was like, I don't want to drop some highly personal weird thing, but my mom was kind of like apocalyptic and or thinking quite literally, and this didn't help any And obviously my dad was reinsinuated into the Cold War, so it was but everybody, I mean, it was like everybody in the country was like that,

I mean, and to some degree or another. You know, when I can't emphasize that enough to younger people, and even as a little kid, obviously I couldn't. It was it was a few more years before I could fully understand what this was about. But you you fully, even as a small boy, I fully grasped that, you know, this was monumentally terrifying. Now. Honestly, like if they, if they, if if i'd been like a you know, a guy pushing fifty in nineteen eighty three, I frankly I wouldn't

really care. I mean, that's not that's not some fucking edge of the lord shit like legit. I mean, you just like learn like you just like learn to you come to terms with things, and you know, the the kind of frailial life and things don't seem scary anymore. But yeah, as like a kid or like a young person like it was, it was kind of awful. But in any event, let's uh, let's dive into it, but proceed did able. Archer by several months was the disruption

of Korean Airlines flight double O seven. What was KL flight OH seven KL flight O seven. It was a Korean Airlines flight obviously from New York City, or yeah, from New York City to Seoul via Anchorage, which in those days, uh was the common flight pattern. You know, Uh, the sol South Korea was a key kind of Cold

War proxy client state. But you know, this is not the South Korea of the two thousands, you know, the ninth largest economy in the world or something, you know, other than uh, other than in in in kind of political and military terms, the van Korea was kind of a backwater. So on these flights to Korea there tended to be a lot of a lot of heavy personages from the national security establishment, the diplomatic corps, you know, these kinds of these kinds of these kinds of you know, communities,

and and KL double seven was no exception. What befell KAL flight O seven, well KL O seven straight into Soviet airspace and about the same time we're talking like within you know, a couple of hours of a of

an American aerial reconnaissance mission. During the late Cold War, America was constantly spoofing Soviet early warning or buzzing it, you know, to see kind of what would cause it to light up proverbially and to kind of gauge what their uh, you know, what their what their protocol was, you know, the literally literally the order of operations, you know, when when hostile aircraft reached their airspace, possibly incident to

a nuclear attack. And unfortunately for the passengers and crew of kl O seven, a Boeing seven forty seven, even

at visual range, looks almost identical to an a wax aircraft. Okay, And in those days still for certain UH deployment of certain weapons platforms, you would advance deployee a UH a what's called a masson M M A S I N T aircraft in order to acquire targets in order to discern, you know, what air defenses were present, as well as to interpret, detect and interpret, you know, any electronic signaling which could then be you know, deciphered or interpreted to

paint a picture of what the state of enemy command and control was within the target area, you know, theater wide.

And this was also a particular concern because, as we discussed in the last episode, American UH nuclear war planning by nineteen eighty two eighty three essentially involved forcing warsaw pack to fight a two front nuclear war, if we could even think of nuclear com band is having fronts assaulting the Soviet Union hard in the Pacific, knocking out their commanding control in Central Asia, you know, and and then saturating them U with you know, with with with

heavy bombers, IS and and and naval based weapons platforms would potentially, you know, uh, it would potentially accomplish the splendid first strike in a BOT from the Blue scenario or in a UH in a general Wars Mario, you know, that would be that would be the way America would escalate anyway. So this had all the telltale signs of something potentially very very dangerous in the eyes of you know, the uh, the Soviet Union, and there are people uh

interpreting uh, the breaches of their airspace. So the flight was intercepted by a Sukhoi fifteen interceptor. UH, it was destroyed, all all everybody died. Of course, this was a huge international incident. Okay, it was almost comparable to nine to eleven, not in terms of the attrition and you know, the lives lost, but it was incredibly shocking to people on board the aircraft. Was UH, Larry McDonald, the US Congressman who also was the chairman of the John Birch Society, and UH one.

was He was a Democrat. He ran as a Democrat for the you know, for the entirety of his career, and he was really the last true like right wing Democrat. But he you know again, not only was he a Bircher, but he was you know, chairman of the Birch Society and he'd only been nominated for that position a few

months before he died. He uh, you know again, he was one of the founders of the Western Goals Institute, uh, which the the British Conservative Monday Club was very much affiliated with them, as was the World Anti Communist League. You know, people who know the history of these Cold War packs of the right, well these will be familiar organizational names. But you know, uh, it's a Jesse Helms initially was supposed to be on that flight. I mean

this was a big deal, okay. I mean not just because you know, you had these public you had McDonald and you had some other person Jess who weren't elected officials. But you know, we're very much insinuated in the in the BELWI policy corridors. But uh, you know it was there. There was something almost kind of like cinematic about it in all the worst ways. You know, here's this guy's like a lifelong night communist. You know, he's been saying

his entire professional life, the Soviet Union is dangerous. It only understands force the seeing currency. It can you know, deploy in order to assert it's it's it's it's vision of of ah, you know, of of of of political order around of the world, and lo and beholding. How does he die? You know, he he dies with you know, dozens of other people on this on the civilian airliner. That yeah, I think there are two hundred and sixty nine people, you know, he dies with like, you know,

hundreds of other people on this seven forty seven. You know, that's un ceremonials blown out of the sky by you know, Soviet warbird. It. Uh it really really really upset people, and uh, the Soviets, in typical fashion, you know, went into kind of you know what, went into kind of garrison mode. Uh, I started claiming that first they claim

that this didn't happen at all, you know. Then they claimed that it was a deliberate provocation and the United States wanted this to happen, you know, so that you know, they could so that they could uh, you know, provoke a war. And then that kind of rhetoric itself, I mean that that was grossly irresponsible. I mean it, this is very very bad the uh in the United States.

In turn, Reagan's people said that the Soviet Union was obstructing search and rescue operations, which they probably were, you know, I mean, it got it got very very ugly. And uh this was uh, this was a couple months prior. There had been a Reagan's uh, evil Evil Empire speech March eighth, nineteen eighty three, just almost exactly forty years ago, as of a couple of days ago. And I don't know if people it's it was not a long speech,

and it hit really really hard. You can find it obviously on YouTube or at least a used to be able to do. I don't know if I would assume it's still there, but you know, in some there was. There was some of the normal, you know, kind of State of the Union type policy stuff, but the core of it was, you know, Reagan essentially stealing people for the possibility of nuclear war. And I I know that, you know, for at the time and then for decades subsequent.

It's been kind of a favorite of people on the left. Mind you, I'm not some great Reagan apologist, because I think people know, but it's because I got to say that this was, in fact a great speech and it wasn't corny. You're misplaced. And I mean people people always accusing Reagan of being this kind of moron with his head in the clouds, who was always invoking stuff like Star Wars, like you know, it's why they that's where

they kind of it was. Ted Kennedy point the actual phrase star Wars described Messdi, which itself is moronic, but calling the Soviet Union the evil Empire wasn't just a corny floating signifier. The actual relevant text is what Reagan said, and I quote, let us pray for the salvation of all those who live in that totalitarian darkness. Pray they

will cross over the joy of knowing God. But until they do, let us be aware that well they preach the supremacy of the state, declare its omnipotence over individual man, and predict its eventual domination of all peoples on the earth. They're the folks of evil in the modern world. So in your discussions of nuclear freeze proposals, I urge you to beware the temptation of pride, the temptation of blankly declaring itself above it all, and label both sides of

equally at fault. To ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding, thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil. That sounds like a worst speech. Okay, I'm not saying that was misplaced. I think that was entirely a prop

for you. Within the boundary rationality of the Cold War, a very very strong statement had to be made, and drop Off took that to mean that Reagan is planning to sue for war, and I it's it's it's understandable in context why he would think that. Okay. And plus I think this is a damn good speech. Okay, that's that's not folk. That's not that kind of cringe soaring language that these uh, these kind of these these belwey

types are are prone to invoke these days. I mean, it was it didn't it didn't seem a hoky at the time, you know, And and it was a it was there. There was genuine there's a genuine strategic paradigm shift underway that was profoundly destabilizing. Okay, I mean I I I I said, frankly, the Evil Empire speech is better than these speech Kennedy ever made. Okay, just an objective terms. And again I'm not any kind of I'm not kind of Reagan lover or something, but that that

can't be denied. It's kind of incredible to me. That. But the other thing, the biggest like middling speeches by like Churchill, we're just kind of drunk and like mumbling about, you know, like we will never surrender, you know, or like Martin Luther King with this kind of just these kind of like nonsense platitudes, you know, people hold this out, is like just this kind of an incredible example of

of of of of modern oratory. It's like, really, man, like the Evil Empire speech is kind of is is peak, Okay, I mean not just going to the not not not just not just going to the you know, for fun of the other language, but the context in which was delivered at least I think so, Like I said, I'm sure people just claim that that's you know, that's some you know, love for Reagan for something.

and that was remarkable because generally Reagan didn't. That's why you know, the bit Berg speech. Buchanan wrote that and that wasn't just Nancy Reagan. He was in as an excuse to throw patter under the bus. But you can't actually wrote that speech like it. And that was you know, in Reagan's era. It wasn't yet at the point where you know, just it was part of the chorus for you know, presidents and candidates for the White House, you know, just to rely on you know, people to write their

their copy for them. I mean some people did, some people didn't, but yeah, Reagan generally didn't.

it was entirely appropriate what Reagan said. He said these he said, these men were victims of the war too, and I don't I don't see how they could be construed as controversial and Helmet Cole essentially insisted that you know, the the war that the German War, that'd be acknowledged. Like if anything, if if people wanted to throw mud on somebody for reported, you know, fascist symbo these like Cole would kind of be the guy to hang that on.

But I think it was among gonna think it was an excuse to sort of uh excize you can, from the Reagan from Reagan's in her circle. Nancy real was in some ways like Priscilla was the Elvis, you know, and and the way she just decided that she like hated some guy or hated some guy's wife who was part of the Memphis mathias. So we had to go like Nancy did that too. Like I'm not that there's a certain kind of woman who does that. I'm not trying to trash females at all, but I mean everybody

knows that's true. And Nancy Reagan was a very strange bird, like she really was in all kinds of ways. I'm frankly surprised. It's it's i mean, that's a whole other question. It's it's strange that she was. I mean, she was Reagan's second wife, you know, once he picked her up, well after he had kind of decided he wanted a political career of some sort. It's very strange, but that

that's my read on it. And yeah, obviously, you know, like we talked about, it wasn't nearly as extreme because Reagan truly did have a pretty remarkable mandate for a post uh for a post war president. But there was there wasn't there was a kind of Reagan derangement syndrome. You remember that, Like, yeah, if it rains on Sunday, it's because of Reagan. Like if if your corn flakes don't taste good, it's because of Reagan. Like everything that happened in the world is like some work by Reagan.

Like yeah, so that, I mean, that was part of it. But but yeah, the regardless, like I said, I mean, even even people who you know, were in our cynical about the Cold War, even people who don't particularly even even people think Rag was just some kind of like glorified pitch man. I mean that that that was a great speech, and you know, I don't think it was pratuitous,

but again it did it. It did sound like a war speech and and drop off and uh, you know ustinof Gromico Trenenko, I mean, all these guys who constituted you know, the inner Inner Party. I mean they all, they all lived through the war with with the German Reich. I mean they to say they were sensitive to these indicators, it doesn't even begin to kind of scratch the surface of you know, the kind of depth of their fears

of these things. But it's this is what's important too to keep in mind is as to why this this you know, nineteen seventy nine to eighty four into eighty five was so dangerous, you know, like what happened? You know, like what what happened? What happened to Dayton? What killed it? What? What constituted Dayton? In brass text terms? In terms of policy of uh, you know the East Block and you know the West slash NATO And what what kind of treaty if not law? Because I mean we we cann't

really talk about treaties as binding law. It can never be anything but permissive. But particularly during the Cold War or it was kind of more like a statement of good faith than anything. But it did you know, it did have it did have moral force. Okay, really what kind of constituted Dayton? Where rubber met the road? One of its big kind of aims and for a for a limited time. We're gonna get into why this was

problematic as it was constituted. One of its big ambitions was to kind of take off the possibility of war in Europe, take that off the table. You know, as we talked about, there's basically two issues in strategic terms. You know, there's obviously America and the Soviet Union could come to a real blows in any number of theaters. Although the primary diad was Europe, but the Soviet Union visa of the Europe I mean that was that was an open ended question. I mean, where did Europe stand.

There's several uh constituent elements in NATO, like where did they stand in divisi dually and so far as they did have you know, a cognizable, you know, discrete policy independent of the NATO structure. You know, what was their relationship to the Soviet Union in pure geostrategic terms. I mean, this had this this had tremendous significance politically, not just for you know, global stability or and the potential for a crisis diads, but but also it was understood by everybody.

I mean, even a conventional war in Europe with you know, modern combined arms it would have been utterly devastating, you know. I mean that there would have been the end of Europe quite literally, you know, it would not have survived, you know, or if it did, it would it would have been some sort of you know, it would not have been It would not have been Europe as we

know it anymore. Okay. This kind of brought quite literally every European state, exempting Albania, which is always you know, which which was under the which was under the rule of inver hawksa you know, and they had all their little bunkers everybody knows, like what the hawks of bunkers. Well, like Albania was protesting like any anything relating to UH de Tante treaty making because they claimed that they supported the people's probably in China because they were the true

like Marxist Leninist vanguard. But other than that, every every member state in NATO and the Warsaw Pact plus UH Norway plus you know, plus UH Spain, which I don't think was a NATO yet because it was seventy three. They UH signed on for what came to be called the Conference and Security and Cooperation in Europe, which was

Canadi in ninety seven to ninety seventy five. It was held in Helsinki, Finland, the final phase of it, which came to be called the Helsinki Accords or the Helsinki Declaration, between July thirtieth and August first, nine seventy five. Now, this followed two years and negotiations of this kind of tortured process. We're in again, uh, thirty five participating states plus the United States and Canada. Did I did I disconnect from it? It? No, you're good, Okay, I'm sorry.

For some reason, the freaking you're by my my video kicked out? Okay. The Helsinki Declaration it cons dude, the thirty five participating states, you know, all the all the members states in NATO and Warsaw Pact, you know, plus UH plus Sweden or plus Norway plus Spain, the United

States plus Canada. What it can with this, with this declaration came to constitute was it was supposed to be basically, you know, a kind of a kind of quasi bill of rights that was understood to be, you know, kind of like represent the fundamental rights of man de Girey

on both sides of the Iron curtain. You know. It was a sovereigny quality, respect for the rights inherent and sovereignty of all you know, constituent states of Natal and Warsaw Pact refraining from the threat of use of force to advanced policy initiatives other than defensively, which I realized that's kind of meaningless and existential terms, but it has political currency in these kinds of situations. You know, a

recognition of the territorial integrity estates as existed. Then you know with the you know, the post war boundaries that have been drawn, the peaceful settlement of disputes, not intervention and hostile terms, and you know, the affairs of the constituent states either NATO or worse up packed and a basic and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. And this was a big one, including freedom of thought, conscience,

and religion. Okay. Now presidentev made a very big deal about this, okay, and this was before he was you don't really compromised in terms of his mental faculties. And so did Eric Honecker. Okay, because Honaker, especially because he's Jeremy, always been struggling for legitimacy. You know, they weren't even recognized as as as as a state until the seventies by you know, a majority of this planet, but the

worst up packed or the Iron curtain. Rather the states find the Iron curt and the constant with the Soviets fear of influence. They were always gonna they were always clawing for respectability, which you know, in the Cold War context was essential because this really was u a battle of zeitgeist and which system and which superpower would become

the world system. You know, this wasn't just cosmetic or something, and it wasn't just you know, it wasn't just these kind of career statesmen, you know, wanting a feather in their cap, you know, so they could like look at, you know, their proverbial trophy case and like Admyer, their own you know, great career or whatever. It's had like actual impact. That's important to keep in mind, but would

really kind of opened the door to this. What really made this possible, what really made the tame possible, was the situation between the two Germanys, and specifically the sendencee of Billy Brandt. Who is Billy Brandt. Billy brand was this crazy, uh kind of sixty eight or socialist and he was middle aged by that epoch you know, he was of the war generation, but he'd been the governor.

He's been the governing mayor of West Berlin, and Berlin to this day remains like, you know, an independent polity like all the several German states or prefectures are. But during the Cold War it had special status or like or you know when the inner German boards and tags. It had special status, you know, because there was a quasi protectorate of of you know, the the of of

of America, France and the UK. It uh, it was situated completely within uh you know, the territory of the d d R. So the Marror Westbroo, the governing mayor of West Berlin. He had unusual clout. Okay Brand was the chairman of the Social Democratic Party from sixty four to eighty seven and most significantly and to understand his kind of contribution to history as it were accidental or not or uh you know, uh literally like accidental or not, like you know what he kind of what he kind

of fumbled into. He was the chance of the Buddhist Republic from ninety six ninety seventy five. He was this big uh you know, he was this big liberal reformer. He he really compromised the bon the buds uh comic capability, which was a big deal because the BUN was the spear point of NATO in the first decades after the Day of Defeat. They really were like a crack military force, and they had to be because they're opt Fur was, you know, the notional volks Army. This should all be

very clear. You know. There was a slew of other you know, kind of brand Brand's apologists and supporters were his point in the fact that you know, the the number of Germans made the poverty line, you know, like fell from you know, two point nine percent to like, you know, something totally marginal. But entrepreneurial activity also dropped down to zero, you know, I mean it was a typical kind of it was the typical kind of like

socialist stagnation written large, you know. But but hey, you know, the and the cope for for for those that defensive things are we got this great education system and now nobody's poor anymore, I mean everybody. This is a very common uh that this was a common occurrence. You know, when when when when social democrats are Greens later on, you know, gained majoritary and status and any of these you know, any of these West European states. But more importantly,

Brandt's big thing was ostpolitic. He wanted a true like reconciliation with East Germany, Okay, and towards that end, starting nineteen sixty seven, herestad was diplomatic relations with Romania, He entered into a trade agreement Czechoslovakia. You know, he restored formal relations with Yugoslavia. This was set back in August sixty eight when you know, with the Fremlins invasion in Czechoslovakia. But uh, you know, he condemned brand formally condemned the invasion.

But uh you know he uh he when he basically renegotiated the ruling coalition, you know, the Free Democrats and you know who bagged to continued approachment with the worst up act and that was that was kind of his way of finessing you know, what could have been a

careruning crisis into a way of staying alive. But uh it uh, this reached this kind of zena in sixty nine when uh he agreed to meet uh he agreed agreed to me with Willie Stuff, who was East German premier, who was you know in this kind of byzantine DDR system, technically the head of of state contra, you know, the the head of government you know, to the who was you know, the General Secretary of the se uh D, which by then was Honiker, but he he agreed to

meet with Honiker too, and so he basically in one fell stroke, he basically you know, gave the d DR the legitimacy that it it had been attempting to apture

really from inception. And this, uh, understandably, this really really outraged you know, not just people who had family behind the wall, but also uh, you know, people who had real concerns about the fact that the Soviet Union worse upack that genuine momentum then in military terms and frankly in political terms in the Third World, like we talked about, you know, like it appeared that Brandt was was uh was selling Europe out UH to the Stalnists in a

real way, owing either to malice or malice or naivete it didn't matter. And this, in my opinion, it was kind of the zenith of UH a Warsaw pack power politically, because what had always been the way Warsaw Pact wins is it demilitarized Germany, you know, I mean this was the subject of the aid note as we got into many moons ago. This is what the Soviets always wanted, okay, and it looked like they were gonna get it, albeit in some gradual capacity. But what what brought this down

is fascinating. Willie Brandt's or Billy Brandt's top aid you know, his uh and and the and the and the Social Democrat Party like secretary was a guy named Guter Gillom okay and uh Gillam was a connected with the hip to uh to Billy Brandt. And he was just kind of he was just kind of he was this kind of shifty looking guy. Frankly, you know, always were dark glasses. He was always dressed impeccably, but you know, he truly

was ubiquitous. Like when Brandt went on vacation, you know, Gion like went with Brandt and his family too, Like they were close and it was believed that basically Brandt was a womanizer, you know, he he liked pussy too much. He was at drunk like like Brandy Villy was his you know, kind of nickname. You know, friends and foes alike called him that he relied on Gillam, you know, to kind of like hold it together. Okay, Well, in nineteen seventy four and April twenty fourth, Gillom gets arrested.

Because Gillam was he was a Stasi officer and he had been for his whole life. He's quite literally deployed to the Bonus Republic to get close to anybody he could, and he got close to Billy Brandt and he quite literally made Brandt Chancellor. I mean, I think about that, like think about what a coup that is. And Guillam was able to steal the uh I is only above top secret NATO nuclear war plan from the Chancellor's safe and he was able to deliver it to East Berlin.

And UH, from that point forward, it was never clear like what the Stasi knew, you know, and like how long they had known, you know. And this was this Ode DeMarcus Wolf, who was you know, kind of the uh it was kind of the genius of the Ministry for State Security. He was the he was the he was the chief of the Foreign Intelligence Directorate, the main director for reconnaissance. And UH, Guillome was his like like

the mole that became Guillome. This I mean this was his this was his operation, you know, from inception to conclusion.

And uh Wolf made the point that Gillom's arrest and exposure this is really kind of what killed uh the ambition of a Warsaw Pact and everything they'd accomplished, because after that, the Bonis Republic became basically a police state, you know, like they a couple of years subsequent the bottom Miindhaw faction, you know, the Red Army faction, you know, in nineteen seventy seven, Uh, that was the German Autumn

as it was called. You know, they they kidnapped and murdered a number of you know, of of highly of highly situated personages, you know, industrialists, consertive politicians, people of this nature. You know, the uh it uh this is really what facilitated the ascendency of a man like Helmet Cole or the chancellorship. And this is one west, this one. The Bonis Republic like rejoined the Cold War in earnest, you know, and then all bets were off. And it

also there's something that profoundly sinister about this. I'm not saying that in like a charny way, but you know, the intelligence game, for whatever reason, the Russian the Soviets and other Russians are very very good at it. They were always way way better at it than NATO and for whatever reason, and this was a testament to that. You know, about ten years after the Guillaume affair, Hans Tige, you know who was the who's the chief of the

counterintelligence Directorate of West German intelligence. He just literally defected the East Germany. Okay, I mean there's nothing there, weren't any people going the other way of that static. I mean, yeah, there's people. There's people like you know Suberov, you know, not the super Off, but you know, the guy whose pen name was Victor Suvaroff. You know, there's mid level Soviet officers, there's even a couple of generals, but nothing

like this, you know, and that's that. There's entire value is written on why that was. But the point is that this kind of killed anybody's idea, you know, even kind of the most starwart you know, kind of soci them like East Block apologists, I mean they realize that, like the Communists, truly words aiming to subvert the Buddhist Republic, render a defense list, you know, penetrated by any means necessary. You know and and and thereby you know, remove Europe

from the American defense umbrella for all time. Okay, I don't want to get into an argument about what the implications of that are in like world historical terms, like people know my opinion, but that that's not important. We're talking with the bound of rationality, the Gold War and in it's epoch, how people viewed these things because of the tant and the hell stinky course and everything else.

So you look at that situation and then you know, like we talked about last episode, uh, the assault in Afghanistan, you know, the uh, the emergency deep parodies, you know, and and uh and the Soviets attempt to to remedy that, you know, by by deploying uh even more UH weapons platforms, the massive throwway in the European theater, you know, and Reagan regeway returning the serve was the deployment of intermediate range UH nuclear weapons to uh, you know, to to

the Buddhist Republic, to Italy, to the Netherlands and another key theaters. And that's uh, that's basically how I mean. You can see kind of like a perfect storm of causality leading to the leading to the status of tensions, you know, by nineteen eighty three. I don't think that there's I don't think that there's a comparable set a

crisis cycle in the Cold War. I mean there was, like I said, there was nineteen seventy three, you know, where the Soviets actually they deployed nuclear weapons, you know, to the Middle Eastern theater in anticipation of a general assault in support of their Egyptian ally. Nineteen sixty two. Obviously, you know, there were the world, the United States and the Soviet were very close to nuclear war. But that was well before that was well before nuclear parody had

been achieved. So it yeah, okay, I mean I realized it sounds like I'm being flippant, but if America took twenty million dead, it still would have won. I mean,

there would have been no more Soviet Union. You know, that's got different implications, you know, And it's not it's not so much that you know nineteen eighty two to eighty four, it's it's not so much that you know, it was this punctuated moment like seventy three, when uh America reached Defcon three, or like sixty two, when the question was, you know, are the stories just gonna you know, just gonna run the blockade. It was just kind of ongoing.

It was it was just kind of it was just kind of like never ending state of elevated tension when it seemed that at any moment, you know, uh, a general crisis could deteriorate, it could deteriorate into nuclear war before anybody even knew it was happening, owing a large part two to the state of you know, weapons development then and commanding control technology, which is essentially neutralized generally warning.

That's uh, what's important to consider, I believe, because I do get asked by people like, well, why was this

so dangerous? There wasn't some you know, moment like in the human missile crisis, So there wasn't some ultimatum issued, you know, like when the Soviets declared that you know, if the Israelis annihilated you know, the Egyptian army and then and then Martina and Cairo that you know, the Soviets would intervene and then if if met you know, biconoparable American forces that you know, they resort to nuclear weapons in order to prevent their own people from you know,

being surrounded and destroyed similarly. But that's that's kind of what I got for today, because I don't want to the the GORTROSSI sendency and kind of what ended this strategic paradigm is significant. And the roll of Attias rust the roosts, you know, the uh the kid who flew his uh who flew his prop plane into Red Square. That's a fascinating story and it's got huge significance for you know, the kind of internal in like for for Kremlin intrigues that you know led to a led to

a real policy shift. Why with the fact that it costs many many Stalness hardliners and key rolls their jobs. But I that I think we should say that for next episode because again I want to deal with, you know, the end of the drop of chert Ancle era in the ascendency of gorbachhow next episode. So I think that's all like.

of the era, like even at visual arrange. So the Soviets are like, you know, why why we're not just being spoofed. This is you know, this isn't this isn't early They're trying, they're trying to detect their early warning and how much it's lit up. They tried to hail the pilot on you know, whatever the you know, international emergency frequency is, and it was dead silence. This Sukoy got on his tail and made clear that like it was you know, at attack range you know, and it

still didn't deviate from its course. You know, the pilot who took it down obviously, you know, he was forced to lie by the cremlin and stuff. You know, sometime in the two thousands, you know, he he he testified to this British filmmaker about everything that happened, and uh, he's like, yeah, you know, he's like, when I got the order to the fire, I didn't hesitate, and he's like, I didn't think it was. He's like, I didn't think we were gonna He's like, I didn't think it was,

you know, a precursor to an attack. But he's like, I it didn't make sense what it was doing. You know, He's like, I thought something wasn't right here. What some of these FAA types, some of these like investigator types and guys you know aviation claim or like what they think. I mean, we take for granted that it's a hell of a lot easier I mean, in in aviation and anywhere else these days to identify your your true position. In those days, it wasn't. The consensus is that these

Korean pilots were wildly off course. They had no idea they were in the Soviet airspace at all. So like when a sue who got on their tail ivan does their their idea with their nose. Probably ivan does crazy things all the time, you know. Uh, they wouldn't even occur to them, like we're gonna get blown out of the sky. Plus yeah, the fact it was a perfect storm of of of concrete tensions, you know, going to

the global situation. But it's weird, and it's weird that McDonald was just having to be on that plane, you know. And it's like and then too like a lot of Burcher types and stuff and not and and other just like right wing guys not even like Bircher cranks were like obviously the Soviets are just doing this because they can, and they hated McDonald anyway, so they just killed it.

And I mean, honestly, I can see why people want have thought that because it's weird, you know, and I mean the Cold War was weird, you know, and it's uh, and plus the they the Soviets did grindy ship. I mean they you know, in the same epoch, you know, they it's clear now like they they retained some freaking you know, this this Turk to try and murder the Pope, like you know they uh, the uh, these Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine guys were going berserk. You know.

They were the guys who blew up the Disco tech in West Berlin. Like those were those guys were like in the in the influence of the Stazi and Operation Control of KGB was over the Stazi. It's like they you know, obviously it's a different thing that you know, to blow a civilian airline around the sky with with a war bird. But it, you know, the Soviet Union was behaving. It was behaving very much like a lawless actor, you know.

Birth Society, but there's some good guys in there. Like that is now when McDonald was probably he was not the last Congress when it was actually worse shit, he was a good dude, you know, I mean it, I missed the days when there was like democrats who weren't just like not like shit bags and perverts, but they actually were like dude who represented their constituents. And McDonald's a guy who did that. And arguably, I mean he

died for him. He wouldn't have been on that stupid plane going to South Korea, like if he you know, wasn't acting in his official capacity. I mean that, you know, in the Cold War, I mean politicians now they're like they're like total devans and losers because like, no man who's got anything going on in his life like goes into politics. But the Cold War was different. You know, you had you had like real guys, and you had people who had something to offer, who went into who

went into public life, you know, like McDonald. You know, I mean it's and it's it's a tragedy, you know. And as we're you know, the right, those other two Hudred and six and nine people on board. You know when there was like I said it was it was multi official types and business people, but you know there was still there was a couple of dozen women and kids. I mean the thing was fucking awful. But uh yeah, yeah.

the channel. The intro. Rather, I'm in the process of recording the first episode, as I hope people gleaned from the intro that my dear friend and bro Rake created for us. I I want this to be very high quality. I'm not just like throwing shit out there, you know, so it takes time to produce it. I I'm I'm I'm piecemeal getting the equipment I need uh to do this in a more exponitious capacity. But like, please bear with me. I promised by April first we will have

like actual episodes. But that's that's my that's my jive as of today.

few years of his life. But Bresna was a serious personage, you know. I mean, there's a reason why he replaced Khrush chief, you know, like he was writing the ship. He was writing the ship after the you know, the kind of disaster that was crui if in power political terms, you know, in Brezhnev was in a lot of ways he was kind of a true Stalinist, you know, I mean,

but the true I mean a state. It's at the scale of the Soviet Union, you know, even even accounting with the fact that you know, the Russian the Russian Russian political areas, sense of constrate power in one man, even in times of peace, like in a way that seems peculiar in the West. I mean, I'm not even saying that punitively. I mean, it's just like an objective account of things. But you know, the Soviet Union at its zenith, it just was not that the scale and complexity.

I mean when I parttically would consider you know, the the way that Marcius lantin the states were organized, where there you know, we're central planning, you know, truly was the order of the day, you know, not I mean that that's what policy was. That's that's that that's what the production is scheme it was. It wasn't you know,

It's something that they aimed to realize. I mean that that's how they They truly had, you know, an economy that you know, had abolished the price mechanism and was managed by you know, thousands upon thousands upon millions of inputs. So I mean, no, what I'm getting at is that no, no matter how much of a brilliant uh, you know, personage bresident of would have might might might not have been like no, no single man could have managed that.

So I mean the point that kind of the the trifecta of Soviet power was really a drop of u gram Eco and Ustinov, dmitriy Houston off the field, Marshal and uh, you know, particularly on Mayor's a warrant peace and drop off was kind of the final authority. And you know, the decision to go to war in Afghanistan is very much and drop off decision. And I think we got into that and the uh, the decline of that trifecta, I mean, most frankly, I mean, I drop

Off died and then Usanov died shortly after. I mean, that's that's really what allowed Glassnos and pera strika like as policy to become develop and evolved the way it did. However, you know, Gerbachev was in drop offs protege, and that's the reason why he truly was in drop off successor. You know, this idea that Grbachev's like this kind of crazy liberal or that he was like this kind of yeltsin like buffoon who was just kind of like drunk on the prospect of uh, you know, of of of

kind of like slash and burn capitalism. That's not true at all. We'll get into the next episode, which will probably be kind of like close to the end of our series. That's like why you know, why why the Soviet Union went down in flame the way it did. But it wasn't because Gorbachev wanted to just like burn

the structure down or like pull the plug. But when it drop off died his immediate his immediate successor was Constantine Schernenko, you know, who was kind of like a doddering fool in the eyes of the world, and I mean, by that point he was totally senile. But the reason why that this kind of placeholder was insinuated into the General Secretariat was because there was a real battle within the Kremlin as to which way the Soviet Union was

going to go. Not even it wasn't nobody foresaw in the early eighties that you know, the East Blocks is going to come apart, like nobody, you know, like we talked about before. There's people like Kennan and people like Yaki himself, you know, who didn't the Soviet Union as it existed, you know, in the nineteen fifties and during into the twenty first century. But even they did to see the whole system just like dissolving, you know, like the way it did. So people were suspicious of garbageow Off.

It wasn't because they thought, like, you know, he's gonna he's gonna sell the party down the river or something. It was because you know, you had you had these discreete personages who you know, to whom kind of like the up and coming uh commissars like had had like individual loyalty to you know, and garbage Off despite the fact that he'd been in drop offs guy, I mean it uh that that carried a lot of cloud, but

it wasn't. It wasn't enough, you know, to just to just hand hand him the reins and like an absolute capacity without you know, any kind of without any without without anything being finessed beforehand, and like you know, promises being made and you know and kind of certain uh ceremonies being stood upon as a word. But Tarnanko was not and his youth, he actually the guy was kind of like at pure commissar. I mean, obviously he's sert.

You know, he's started in the Red Army, you know, during the you know, the Russian Soviets and the Russians today called the Great Patriotic War. He spent his entire career at propaganda and and and and as an ideological cadre. You know. Like I said, the guy was like a pure commissar. You know, it's just like what he did, you know. And he he was very much an intermediary like uh with the Defense establishment, even though he didn't like spend a career in uniform like uh. And they

trusted him and they liked him. You know. So this guy you can see with the Soviet Union, the fact that they took you know, every William Odam who will we'll talk about a little bit later in this episode. Uh, you know, an American general and and probably the preeminent authority on a nuclear warfare. And I say, I'd say Thomas Schelling on the civilian side would be entitled to

the moniker. But as far as the general officer goes, it was Odam and William Odum he was he was kind of the one, you know, Uh, he was kind of the one, like you know, common experience general officer who was saying in the wake of Able Archer that like Loo, the Soviet Union is serious, Like they're not, They're they're not, they're not pretending to be on high alert like they they actually are, you know, and they

actually are in a war footing. And like the more you the more you you spoof them, you know, the more paranoid you make them, and the more likely it is that, you know, a real war is going to develop, uh before we even realize what's under way. But Odam, uh, you know, he he was right. Uh. And uh, the Soviet Union being that it was very much on a war footing and kind of the entire vector of policy it had had like a strategic nuclear axis. Sharon Anko, if you're gonna go to war, Sharon Anko is a

guy who you'd kind of want in the General secretariat. Yeah,

but at that point he was dotty in senile. But the fact is, uh, the guy had tremendous esteem from the military, from the uniform to the design bureaus, you know, to the men who were suits every day to work, but who were like the kind of military industrial complex as representatives of the polit burero like Chernanko was like a guy like none of them would have like disagreed on and on the party side, you know, the guy had been basically chief ideologists like when he was young

and had his brains. So it didn't matter that Chernanko himself was wholly out of it because obviously like his proteges or people very much who were you know, viewed as carrying out like his will and legacy. And if it was gonna come down like a general war with NATO, he's kind of a man you'd want there. He would not want to hand the reins to borbashaw Off, even if he thought he was a great prodigy because uh,

you know, I mean he was in his fifties. He wasn't like young and absolute terms, but he was like a sprats like in the Soviet system, like he was literally like the youngest man like in the polit Buro. But beyond that, as much as he shadowed it drop off and when it drop us final year when he was you know, bedridden, basically, Garbachov would literally stand in for him. That's definitely being the actual decision maker, particularly a general secretary in a system like the Soviet Union.

So considering the international situation, it wasn't just internal politics and egos and and kind of literally byzantine, you know, intrigues that led to Scheronanko getting installed on a general secretary there, there's like an internal logic to it, like weird as the Soviet system was and kind of strange

to us as the Russian system is. But as uh As Garbachev succeeded Tcheronenko who died in office just like interrop of day and just like bresnav did you know, and that and that hurt the Soviet Union in in in in terms of their optics in a basic way in eighty two, like Bresnev you know, dies like a year and ten months later like and drop Off dies,

and then literally thirteen months later like Cheranngle dies. It's like you've got this, you know, the world's one of the world's you know, one of the world's only two superpowers, you know, the mighty Soviet Union. It's like they've got these doddering old men, like one after the other, like

who just literally keep dying. That's not a good look, you know, and especially contra Reagan, who uh, I mean these days, Reagan wouldn't seem like pretty elderly, but in those days, people talk a lot of shit, like, you know, Reagan's just this old man, even though he was only about seventy, which was old, I mean in nineteen eighty. But Reagan, the guy had like an absurd amount of energy, you know, like almost Trump tried to capture some of that. And Trump is a high energy guy pretty lately for

a guy who's like pushing eighty. But with Reagan, it like was not at all like an affectation. So you've got like Reagan, who's you know, Reagan's aways got a smile on his face, so he's got perfect hair. You know, the guy's like sharp as a fucking tack, and you know, he's got a sense of humored arrival, like he's got he's got a dry humored arrival Johnny Carson. You got him, and then you got like literally doddering, shaking Bresnet, who's like,

you know, dropping dead week later. You know, you have to replace me. And it's like even worse. I'm like, you know, he's you know, he's dead within you know, within less than two years. Like it it indicated like a real, real structural problem. But that's why, that's why there's so much uncertainty on Garbachew because, like I said, he was, uh he was the youngest man in the poet Burrow. His main rival was a guy named Gregory Roumanoff, who was very much uh it was very much a

hawk uh on on on strategic matters. He uh he staunchly opposed any kind of compromise and intermediate nuclear forces in Europe. As we talked about last episode, that that's what prompted the person to deployment was uh, you know, that was the primary like theater based nuclear weapons platform for the US Army and deployed in the Buddhist Republic or in Italy or in the Benelux countries that's at

the cavitation range of Moscow. And the impetus for that was a Soviet deployment of of SS nineteens and SS twenties. Obviously the intention of Soviets with the decopple European strategic policy from America's, you know, like if you threaten Europe in nuclear annihilation and tell them like look and in general war, we're gonna target you simultaneous United States and as long as you're in NATO, like there's no way

out of this. That changed things, and I believe that's one of the things that really put the Green Party on the map, Okay, like environmental stuff or like social justice stuff as we think of it today, that was incidental, Like there is a will fly out of the Green Party is because Germans are genuinely terrified of of Germany being the designated like nuclear battle theater of World War three,

and like I don't follow them for that. Okay, I'm not thinking, I say, with the Green Party, but it's easy for people to say no, like, oh, those guys are all just like faggots. It's like, okay, man, but like I you know, some guy in the Buddhist Republic in nineteen eighty, like he wasn't just being a fagot if he's like, you know, I don't like it. I don't want to be the designated, Like I don't my house being like a designated you know, like like nuclear

battlefield between Ivan and America. Like you know, it's not we can't even really be secialize what that was like. And I mean it's also you know, West Germany was like little like.

they were like loafing around playing cars. Like these guys were like treating it like they were at war. And I mean so it's like the Buddhist fair and so was like the US army. But it's there's not there's not like a joke or something where it's you know like it. I think people imagine almost like old cartoon where there's like uh, where there's a there's like the fox and he's like trying to like get the chickens. Then there's like the sheep dog and they like they

had clock it. He's like big Carl like Sai, you know, and then they kind of like pretend to go through the motions. I mean, I'm sure there, I'm sure there are like like hostle borders like that, like inner German border, like that was not the case. I mean like you know, I mean yeah, but it's so you know, but be as it may. Like Reagan's Reagan's uh like like Reagan's big kind of first like foreign policy coup in like diplomatic terms, was was getting to the Soviets the table

uh on the I n F Treaty. And the way he did it was he said like look like you know, we'll we'll take the persons out and we'll take any any comparable and like successor systems like off the table. Like what basically he's like, we can either have a nuclear free Europe or like we're gonna be shoving these theater based weapons up your assi decapitation range like in perpetuity.

In the school of conventional diplomacy, like that's not the right way to do things, because it's like very freeing Biery. But you're talking about when when you're talking about strategic nuclear conditions of parody, when you're talking about kind of the strange you're talking about it, and we're talking about the stakes like the Soviets had in this that actually it was like a brilliant move and Reagan deserves like

mad credit for that. But there was a lot of resistance within uh, the Soviet military establishment, especially from people like Usanov to this happening. So obviously Gorbachev did you know, like succeeded Sharon succeed Sharonenko and Romanov. UH one of his first when of Goerrichov's first act of General secretary was like sideline Romanov. He didn't he didn't like punish the guy, but he basically like retired to him like

you know with with in in genteel kind of powerlessness. Okay, so, but what Gorchov still had was uh and then and then and then Usanov died almost immediately after okay Uznov died to believe at the restart in nineteen eighty five.

It was late eighty four or eighty five. But within the military itself, like Goorachov, had a tremendous amount of opposition and they had clout, I mean in America, like the military during the Cold War had a huge cloud, but it was like nothing to bear to the Soviet Union, like the defense establishment even now in the Russian Federation they I'm not saying it's like cunative leader like the way that like Neo Kon say that like it's some

bad thing. Is that the reality, like the trajector, and I mean Russia also was like existential threats that they faced as a country that most states don't. But like the traject the course of policy is set by the defense industry in a way that it's not in a way that it's not you know in a state like like in like America or like the UK, even during the Cold War. But what changed that, what kind of allowed Gorbachev to essentially purged any kind of hostile general

officers is really fascinating. And the immediate catalyst to that was the was the flight of a kid, like literally a kid named Matthias rusk Roost. He was a German kid, and he took Assessma. He didn't have many flay hours. He only had about fifty or sixty like like hours of flight time. He rented the Assessna one seventy two P, which is like, you know, like Assessna like prop plane, okay,

like it. And what he did was he ripped out a bunch of the interior like including all but like the pilot's seat, and he replaced him with auxiliary fuel tanks. And what he did was, uh, he tested out kind of his chops on long flights. He flew to the

Faroe Islands, he went to Iceland. Uh. From Iceland, he flew to Bergen and uh, ultimately he did this because his idea was to fly to the Soviet Union, which seems totally insane and it was, but what he what his note He he claimed he did it as like an emissary of peace and to build like a proverbial bridge between the Bunus Republic and Moscow, which is actually pretty profound. I'll get to that, and and kind of how this this was actually videotaped by a British tourist

who was on the ground in Moscow. That's why, like everybody saw it. There was a little kid I remember being this was like a very like awesome event, you know, it was like it was wild. But Matthias roost he uh he leaves from Helsinki, Finland. He had he reached the Soviet airspace with the intention, with the intention to

reach Moscow. Now how did he do this? Okay, we're talking about kind of a reverse hispanically, kind of like reverse situation of what happened with KL double O seven, okay, which was you know shot down as it was misidentified. Rust was flying this little plant, this little prop plane that looks at visual range almost exactly like a Yakol of twelve, which it was used all over the Soviet Union for various purposes, you know, like in the UH

in the Siberian wilderness. They used them because you know, kind of like Alaska, like that's your basic uh means of travel in there, like on the open step, like surveyors and like naturalists would like use them, you know, like party members that use them. That's kind of like shuttle around. So like the sudden appearance of of like the cest now like it wouldn't really throw alarms in conventional in a conventional situation, but Moscow was known to

have like the toughest air defenses in the world. Like, uh, it's telling like during Linebacker two, you know, when downtown Hanoi was hit, uh, the kind of kind of final massive strategic air operation against Hanoi, Like downtown Hanoi was considered to be the most fortified city in the world, like the hardest target in the world other than Moscow, and like nothing in the Soviets very much cultivated this, not just his image, but you know, Moscow was supposed

to be like the hardest of all targets. So the fact that the fact that this kid could fly his aircraft into Moscow and he crossed like several uh uh designated like air defense you know, uh checkpoints and uh apparently at first, uh there was a there was a rookie ground control crew and uh when they sent the signal out for a I f F you know, identification friend or foe RUS like switched off his uh his communication equipment and like went dark and not knowing what

the proper code was to send out like over the airwaves for like what the status of the aircraft was, these guys, these Russians on the ground like dropped the code for like friendly instead of like unknown like possibly hostile.

Like so then like, uh, when he breached, like the next kind of uh, you know, the the next kind of a hurdle verbially speaking, you know, he he he'd already been like identified as like as as like a friendly aircraft, and then like as he as he approached like Moscow, like Moscow Air Defense, Like it's just like you know, they saw it look to be like a yacko leb like on the on the gate at at the at the gates of Moscow, Like they didn't even twice about it because it's not it's not a warplane.

I think it's here in the first place. Obviously it's okay, I mean, so it's it's this weird kind of like failure, you know, Like I said, it's kind of like the splendid reverse of of what happened with the kale F like double O seven, but but at the same time again too. Like in under normal kind of uh peace time conditions, this wouldn't really be an issue. But this, uh, this this had a horrible effect that I'm like the

prestige of the Soviet military. And what Gorba job did was, uh it gave him essentially the mandate to clear out basically like anybody in uniform that he did not like. And that's exactly what he did. The like the Officer corps of of of the the Soviet military was just completely freaking like smashed Roust himself. He literally landed in Red Square and the footage is crazy because like this guy just like lands like and then he landed on a bridge adjacent to Red Square in the middle of

the afternoon. He gets down here like waves and he says, you know, like I'm German, you know, I'm from West Germany, and people like, you know, like what the fuck? And

he said he landed. He said originally thought about landing in the Kremlin, but he said that then he realized if he did that, like he'd be arrested by KGB or f S or g r U, and uh, you know, the Kremlin just denied that like it happened, you know, so He's like at least I mean he had he'd have no idea of knowing that, you know, there'd be this like this this this British tourist like a video camera camp quorder. But at least it'd be like eyewitnesses and be like, hey, I saw this dude land he

like this happened. You know, you can't just say it didn't. But he roost was, uh, you know, like like two hours later, like he was arrested.

It was them like showcasing like why the Soviet Union is good, but also like it was supposed to draw like tourists, and there's a lot of stuff you couldn't see and a lot of places you couldn't go, and like you'd be followed, you know, uh in like at least casually, you know, because like everybody was it was like a foreign There was like an entire KGB direct direct to like keep an eye on like foreign visitors.

But I mean, yeah, you could. You could visit the Soviet Union as long as there was nothing it was as long as there was nothing about your background that that fled you. Like the real these were the Soviet unions that was hard to leave. It wasn't hard to go eastward like basically like throughout the Eastern Block. He could basically go where if you wanted. But uh, you know, a sist in the Soviet Union, he was not going to be able to visit America. If he was not

gonna be able to visit the UK. He might be able to visit the Buddhist Republic if he's like a trusted person in related terms, but that was kind of the issue, and it especially during the sixties. There was a lot of guys I can remember, and this was kind of dumb at the time, Like I really despised Bill Clinton, but like Russia Limbaugh was. I remember when Bill Clinton was running a ninety two was like he visited the Soviet Union as a college student. It's like, okay,

but like a lot of guys did like that. Bark cruise is big thing, like hey, if you want to, you know, we're an open book. You know, we want American college students to come see how good the Soviet Union is. And they in turn set some of their exchange students. But these guys were all dudes with like party you know, their fathers were party men. There's no way these guys are just gonna be like fuck you,

I'm defecting. Yeah, but like it, I mean if yeah, Bill Clint's a total shit big But the point is if you were if you were like going to Harvard or like Yale or like Stanford and like nineteen sixty five, there's like a good chance you would have like visited the Soviet Union because like they cultivated that some of

that started to change. Uh, you know, kind of like post aton like Asovie Unit started to look more and more like scary to people, frankly, And I mean in the I know a lot of guys who are like five and ten years older than me, like when I was a little kid who like visited East Germany and then like, oh, it's crazy, but like nobody really wanted to go to the Soviet Union frankly, Like I I mean, whether that's like ignorant or not whatever, but you know,

by like nineteen eighty, you know, it was kind of like why the you know that that place is fucked, you know, like I don't want to go there, but uh, and the like and again I think that's I think that's kind of twisted. Frankly. I would have loved to go to the Soviet Union because it would have been pretty awesome, like not not cool to like live there,

but like to see you know, like it. But that was kind of the deal and it and it's also and and like depending on like the you know, but yeah, the uh the uh it was basically uh, you know, the Sovietnion like welcome tourism in its own kind of way, and you know, but the fact is, you know, the the kind of splendid appsentence of like Soviet citizens here in America, like that was exactly why. But it was

like nobody had any money. It's like let's say, like let's say I'm like Joe, like you know, I'm even you know in uh in the USSR in nineteen nineteen eighty. Like even if I was, even if I was like educated at skills, I've got like no money. And even if like somehow as a miracle I got you know, like a visa from the Kremlin, like I'm gonna like land in Chicago or Philly or like la, it just big, Hey, I've got zero money. I don't really speak English, but

like give me a job. Like that's not especially in them days too, like stuff just didn't work that way. So yeah, but it it. But the Soviets too given with even with some in the show the Americans, which in some ways it's hokey, but in some ways it's

really dope. The guy and like his wife, who's yeah, the lady who like stands in his wife, you know, like they when they show like what he went through like as like a kg B like deep Cover operative, like they're basically making sure like he wouldn't defect, you know, and like just become like enamored with the American way

of life. And that actually is like legit. Like the guys the kgb AT in the g r U Lesser Degree had a lot of uh sleep ragents on the ground, like those people in that show, and they basically vetted them to be like you're not gonna go crazy when you know you realize you can like you know, you

can kind of like get stuff in America. You can't hear because it's like not you're either like you're in a seating and you and you're totally down for the party, or you've just been kind of like you know, like it's the kind of the you know, the kind of fascination such things hold over you has kind of been like bread out of you, were like smashed out of you. But yeah, it's uh, it's do you.

like primitive as hell. You know. He's like our agriculture. He's like, we're literally dependent and America from America and you know, you know, in a bad harvest. You know, he's like we've got less than like a thousand you know, like computers in America, like a computers a kid's toy. He's just like going down the list. Okay. That so

the Soviet Union. One of the things they did was they sent a lot of mathematicians and like guys with formal logic knowledge or guys who'd like bet in Western Europe, like in a formal capacity as like an operative. They sent them to America to get jobs like in nascent like it firms. And one of the guys who did that, you know, he was like posing as like uh as like at as like a West German of like Polish

dissent or something. He got a job with like this it for him in New York in like nineteen eighty one, and he'd do like dead drops and New York subway and stuff. And then he said that like the last basically after a while they just like stopped reporting, you know. And then like he said that, like a guy came to his apartment and just told him, like you know,

like he's like, I know what you're doing. And he's like, uh, you know, he's like basically like you should probably commit suicide or at some point like you're going to be killed, you know, because you're like a loose end. So like the guy said that, like he's like what should I do. He's like, you thought about like mocking up like paperwork to he like died of age or something. Is that's like the age thing was huge. He thought about like trying to like you know, he thought about like just

openly defecting, you know. But he's like that, he's like he didn't have any con He's like, I'm a deep cover agent. They're probably they're probably I mean, he's like they're not gonna be happy about this. You know, it's like, oh, hey, I've been spying on you to the has a decade, but hey, can I defect because now like things went left. But so he basically said, he's like, you know, like by the time he had like a wife with like

no idea, like what real identity was. I mean, it's kind of like a tragic story, but he said, he's just like what what the fuck am I gonna do? So like I just kept going to work and I just kind of like kept waiting for it, and then I turned the TV and like the Berlin walls coming down, you know, and like so yeah, like this there was there was a the guy got like a write off, I think, and actually the New Yorker or something like

back in like the nineties. I'll see if I can find it and like so you can like post a link, but it's yeah there there there definitely were guys like that. And in the reverse too, there was a Jens Carney. Uh, he defect. He defected the other way to the d d R and like nobody ever knew what happened to him, Like he was presumed he defected, but he just like disappeared. He was an Air Force guy. You know, he was he was he was he had knowledge of like he

was he was, he was, he was a cryptographer. Okay, but uh Jens Carney like if the wall comes down, he hides out like pretending to be like a Dutchman or something. I think that was or Dane. This cover story is that he was a Dane. And then finally, uh some like boon this fair or like US Army like MP types like who the fuck is this guy?

You know, just when they were kind of like going down the rolls like who's who actually is in the d d R and the like that's this freaking that's this guy like you know, a decade back just like you know went over uh when went over the the wall like the other way, you know, as as a freaking defector. And and he he got he got Courtz Marshall. He got jammed up for like seven years or something, I mean, which I think is kind of fucked up.

I mean it's like once the coldor was over, unless he killed somebody, unless he truly did something horrible like like passing eyes only nuclear secrets, they should have just let it go. But you know, the the Pentagon doesn't seem inclined to like let things go like that, and the guy wasn't uniform when he affected, So I mean it's it's okay, but yeah, there are there are some

very weird stories about that. But yeah, I mean it does beg the question like how many these guys were They're like just nobody knew about and they just like kept low key and like you know, went about their life. Yeah, probably more than people think, because I mean I made the point before and it guy named John Caller, he wrote a really good history of the sas you know, the kind of the one way that like the worst up pack like consistently beat NATO was like with their espionage,

you know, like it wasn't even close like it. Uh, and yeah, they they put a tremendous emphasis on human intelligence in a way that you know, like we didn't. So yeah, especially it was like more of these guys than people think, you know, were thought. Yeah, it's a fascinating topic. But Mattias Russ, but I mean what happened became a him is rather tragic. He he was sent up to four years at hard labor, but he was

actually never sent to a labor camp. He was housing isolation in Moscow, and ultimately he was released and then formally pardoned by Gramico when the I intermediately Nuclear Forces Treaty was about to be signed as like a a getric goodwill and he claimed he wasn't mistreated, and I believe he wasn't beaten or anything, but there was something

it was like damaged about him. And he later went to prison in Germany because he had a job in some hospital and there was some girl that he had like an unrequitted crush on, and he strayed just like stabbed her. And this guy like no history of like violence, I mean when I'm getting his in the Soviet Union destroyed him like psychically, like whatever they did to him, and he better believed that they didn't just treat him

like some kid pulling a prank. I mean, the then, like I said, I'm not anti Russian at all or anything, but there's there's a long history of guys who were political prisoners of the Soviet Union and they somehow came back like damaged or like not right, you know what I mean. It's and you know there's I speculate the same thing happened to him. And after that incident, apparently he never got in trouble again, but he you know, he seems to have had kind of like a sad life

after that. And you know, like I said, I as a little kid and then later as somebody who spent spends and spends a lot of time in the Cold War, I I think roast in some ways. But he did it was really a heroic I mean it was naive. I mean, he's lucky he wasn't unceremoniously, you know, blown out of the sky by a MiG driver or something. But you know, I believe he was idealistic in the way that kind of like last Cold War generation of

Germans was. And I think he really was like, look like I don't I don't want to be a casually a World War three as a counter value, you know, as counter value ashes in the wind. And you know, I I I've got love and respect to the Russian people, and you know, like we should you know, we should, we we should, you know, we should find a way out of this paradigm that's going to destroy us. All I found it like profound, as like an eleven twelve year old kid, you know what I mean. Maybe it's

because I was a little kid. But I mean, Taine, there was like something there and he wasn't just like some crazy dude like I mean, he literally like learned to fly like for this purpose, you know. I mean it's he had it in mind that it could make it. And frankly, I think it did. Man, you know like it, you know, I guess, I mean you remember it was a big deal. But the that but that, I mean obviously the what it shows you too out like discrete

events that nobody is intending to have these reverberations. Like literally like if Rust hadn't done that, I can easily see, uh, I can easily see, Like you know, the USAOV loyalists who were still in uniform is like saying, like, look like Garbaschev is he's compromising our ability, you know, to

defend in depth. And you know, he's we cannot allow the eye M treaty to be put the paper like ten be put the paper and some kind of like quasi military regime in the Soviet Union, you know, like either like relegating gorbachoff to the role of cipher or

just like outright getting rid of him. I mean, it's not like they weren't capable of that it like literally like what Russ did that that that allowed Berbachov to to decideline in sand bag like all of his enemies, and I mean from then on at uh, it's it really was his show until like you know that he was until the challenge from Yelson was the emergent. But

that's what we should cover, uh next episode. And that that's an incredibly complicated uh, like people who didn't weren't alive then, but also even people who are pretty serious students of the Soviet Union. The intrigues between Gorbachoff and Yelts and and what Bush and Baker actually wanted, Like Bush and Baker didn't want the Soviet Union to cease

to exist, like they wanted it to endure us. It's kind of like is it kind of like federated a like authoritary structure that it totally abolished, like the Party, but uh, that was totally disarmed, and uh was kind of like you know, accountable the United States as like

junior partner and like ruling the planet. It was basically they wanted to like recreate like the New Dealer concept for like how the world would be run and like the tm D types who not only hated the Soviet Union but literally wanted to see like torn apart, like Yelton was their guy. And that's like what's key to understanding this here, and that's why people have mixed feelings

about Yelson, I think. But it and then of course, like the the kind of the kind of variable to spoof things was that you know, all that the nationalities like all went crazy, you know, and that's and and that bears up too, like what the it goes It shows you too, like when uh, you know, like what what what what these fools they call the Chicken Kiev speech where push forty one went to Ukraine is like look like, don't like you're gonna be committing national suicide

if you decide you're gonna like fight the Russians, don't do it, which of course is like absolutely true. That's the idea of like you know, Boo was a pussy, like how dear you like not back Ukraine in dependance like what executive Ukrainians like exact of the Ukrainian has gotten o a losing like a quarter million people, I'm their country wrecked or like awesome things like ensuing from this. I mean, it's not like whether you love hate or

a neutral in Ukraine. Like the idea that like Ukraine like provoking a general war with Moscow was like this good thing or like this like base thing, like it's it's literally insane. But the uh, but I in my before it became clear, like what America and it's in geo affiliates and whatever you were doing in Ukraine. If you're gonna tell, if you told me like twenty years ago, like yeah, like you know, in twenty years like where will where will like the Russian army like be engaged.

I'd be like in the Baltic, Like I see like some kind of like really bloody you know, like asymmetrical conflict of them like in the Baltic Like that That's what I thought would happen. Honestly, I uh, it frankly surprised me that like the Ukrainians were so incredibly rash.

But but that's that's the fact that Moss. That the fact that Washington and uh kind of like the post Reagan foreign policy team, they wanted both the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia to endure, like you know, they this this this kind of policy of you know, let's try and detonate like every federated structure that exists, so then we can kind of like finesse them into into like these these like like fake client regimes. That's like very much

like a post Busch kind of thing. And like I'm not saying Bush forty one had like these great ideas. I think it was the last serious president, but uh, I'm not saying like his KNNA, it's kind of his kind of vision of like a neo like New Deal was like some kind of like good thing, but there's like an internal logic to it that like makes sense and is like sustainable in a way that like the competing perspective like was not and is not. But I

don't want to Uh I don't. I don't want to deep dive into that yet because that that that's going to take like an hour or an hour and a half. So that's uh, that's basically I got for today. I want to go.

like you know, like the the policy planning establishment. I mean I realized, like the Cold War was like talked about in my house one than other people's, Like everybody was like that. And like when those stupid emergency broadcasing system tested come on, Like my mom would jump, and like everybody would, you know, because it's like the people don't they don't understand that. That's why I get pissed off.

And people talk about like the COVID garbage, even like a nine to eleven, you know, it's like there's nothing comparable like what would have been like a general warsaw pack, like nuclear salt the United States like mad bullshit, like Carl SIGs nuclear winners bullshit. But it would have changed like life as everybody knows it. You know, there would have been one hundred million people dead, Huge swaths of

the country would have been like unlivable. The survivors would all migrated towards the equator, So you're basically gonna have this Like it'd be kind of like a giant Wild West with a poison environment that was like America, like no shit, and like just the fact that it'd be

like again, it'd be like world transform. You can't kill tens of millions of people within hours and not like have everything change, you know, And the fact that this was always a possibility, and especially as human decision makers become increasingly sidelined, you know, it became clearly like this this could happen without even anybody intending to, just because the trajectory of variables is such that like it has to happen according to you know, the indicators. Yeah, it was. Uh,

it was. It was like night and day. And I I think that some of the some of them, like the murder rate becoming totally lit for like a whole generation, and people it's like acting kind of crazy, Like I think part of that that. I think part of it was people are like, well there might this might not

exist tomorrow, you know, so like why why not? I mean it made people more ballsy definitely, But it was also like, uh, you know, there's there was an aspect of like, you know, the apocalypse is like imminent, so like who gives a fuck? And uh the uh yeah it was. It was weird, man, And like and the immediate Aftermaen is weird, you know, like I.

than an eighties war. It's like I was, I grew up in the eighties, but I was like a teen in like the nineties, and like people like kids are just like, oh, there's just like pornographic and grow So I'm like, yeah, it's both those things. But it's also like on the street in nineteen ninety three, that's like what shit was like, and like anywhere you went, like everybody had chip on his shoulder, like like every idiot and his brother was like gangbanging for like no reason.

It's not like now we're just like hood dude to do it because like they sell drugs. It's like every idiot was like, yeah, I like wrap this like nonsense gang and oh like I I got like a gun. I packed with me for like no reason, just because I'm like a fucked up asshole. Like that literally was like the way shit was and like uh you know, and like all there was like yeah, man, there's this like like the races like fucking hated each other and like it's you know, yeah man, and it's like so

like that movie. Yeah, it's like okay, maybe like Larry Larry Clark, I think he is the dude who made that movie. It's like maybe that dude is a pervert and like a sick fuck but like what he was like portraying was not like in his mind, like that ship was real and I I was a teenager in that epoch. It was like that, you know, like uh and I mean this particularly made an impact on me, like psychologically because it's like I you know, I'm i'm

I'm I'm I'm just fun people think. Man. It's by the fact like I've had like you know, I had like a heavy fucking drug prof and shit, I'm a pretty like square, like fucking white dude. Man, Like I'm not I'm not into I'm not into like fucking savage shit, and like that stuff like bothered me like as a kid.

It's like it seemed like everybody lost the fucking mind, like totally, you know, and like a yeah, but yeah, no, that's that's I mean again, man, that's why there's something too like zeitgeist, not just like the random aggregation of like pop cultural like symbols and the people's kind of like uh, you know, the discrete experiences and aggregate or like you know, of of of of the youthful generation in and kind of like what they associate with the

times that they're growing up in. Like it's a real thing. It really is like a spirit of the age. And yeah, like why I was like every haalking for like thirty years. Everybody was going totally insane and then suddenly like the nuclear specter like disappears, and then like you know, there's like three years or four years of total chaos and

then like suddenly everything's like normally in you know. Yeah, and like in forty second Street goes from being this like looking like a nice circle of hell to be in like Disneyland, like literally like yeah, you can't just say like, oh, well, that's because people got tired of crawing for something. It's like it's not how I'm not

saying you gotta believe in God. Okay, fine, you think God out of the equation, But there is like some kind of like invisible hand, like even if it's just like human decisions and arrogate developing some kind of harmonious like you know, in intent or like vector that you can't tell me. There's just like random shit that happens for no reason, you know, yeah, definitely.

And also as we get into the summertime, I'm gonna like disengage there and just kind of like fuck with my own website and my channel. But you can find me there for now at like real underscore number seven each one as seven seven seven. My primary home is substack real Thomas seven seven seven dot substack dot com, and uh my channel is Thomas TV on YouTube. We're gonna saturate when I started uploading like fresh shit there

on like Odyssey and stuff. But for right now, like if you join the channel on YouTube, like you'll be hipped, would you know when like new stuff is uploaded there and like when we kind of you know, migrate to other places. But that's all I got, And thanks for hosting me as always, this has been great.

around everybody. Like the Cold War, like people under people under about forty they don't. I think that's change somewhat like actually like Corneas, it sounds like one of the Call of Duty games was like special Work. I never played it, but I thought that was dope that some of these some of these game developer types, uh you know, they were they were trying to like plug people into the history of of the era, like with with you know,

those kinds of sims. But you know, the if you want to like literally, if you want to understand everything that's happening in power political terms today, like you've got to understand of the Cold War result, you know, And it's I think it's particularly if you identify his right wing. It's particularly impactful in terms of you know, uh, where we are conceptually and before we went live, like you know you're talking about you mentioned Paul Gotfreid. Well, yeah,

I mean it's hard. It's hard as hell to find now, which I think is very deliberate. But Godfred gave a talk I think it was at I think it was at the h. L. Mancoln Club. I don't even know if that's still a thing, but uh, and his talk was called how the Left won the Cold War? And it was really fascinating, and uh, you know, and and

and and again. That's why even if when it is, even if one's not ideologically situated in the same kind of camp that I you know, Visa via the Cold War and Francis Yaki and and that kind of hy Gaelian view of things, you know, it's it's fun of me if you want to understand why blood is being shed in in Ukraine and on the Russian frontier today, like you've got to understand what what developed between ninety

forty nine nineteen eighty nine, particularly how it resolved. So the fact we've gotten like mad feedback is I it is very inspiring. I feel like we're actually doing something constructive. Yeah.

Some of those causes were laid you know, around nineteen eighty eighty one when martial law is declared in Poland and the Soviet response to that, or more probably the lack of a Soviet response to that. Part of that was kind of the bizarre nature of the d DR government. The East German government was not at all organic it you know, East Germany itself. It was literally a fake state. Like there's no it's not even like the case of like North Korea, where like Northern Korea is like is

culturally different in South Korea in some ways. You know, they got a history of being you know, divided divided kingdom like East Germany was literally the border was where the Red Army just arbitrarily stopped, you know. I mean, so it's you have this completely you have this like rump state that you know isn't isn't precedent in terms of it's in terms of the geograhic situated in this. And people forget too that, you know, the guys who

became the d DR government. There was some genuine like pipe hitterers like Eric Milk who literally wasted a cop in Weimar and then he ran to this He ran to Moscow because uh, you know he was a KPD street fighter and uh then and and and the NKVD trusted him, you know, uh, and uh you know, he kind of became their man. Speaking of Spain, Eric Milk, it kind of became their man in Spain. He was like a commissar, you know, like fighting uh on the

Republican side. Guys like Eric Honecker, he somehow escaped execution despite being uh you know, uh a pretty high level functionary or cadre and the KPD organization. But he was in prison, you know by uh for the duration of the war. And some people think that he was a double agent. And then he was like he'd fed intel to to the Gestapo on the s D which I

don't know that it's possible. And then there was Walter Ubrick, who was kind of this dour intellectual you know, kind of humorless uh you know, cold cold hearted, uh, kind of functionary, the most cliche or stereotypical sort, you know he was. He was another guy who spent you know, time in exile like after after the National Socialist Revolution. It's like all these guys were there were this cadre element that was at odds literally with their fatherland, like

whether whether in NI phase or not. The point is like, these are the guys who will like get odds with Germany like their own you know, cultural uh a little. You know. They spent they spent the warriors either literally like fighting with the Red Army or in exile in Moscow. And then you know, when the dust settled in nineteen forty five, they were literally just like insinuated into this role. It's like okay, you know, like you're you're now like

the cadre of the German Democratic Republic. You know, these and who people like, who the hell are these guys?

You know, it's not the only way they the only the only mandate they had was uh you know, proceeded from the barrel of Soviet guns, and UH, over time, UH a kind of party state apparatus did develop in the d DR, particularly like the National volks Army, which was officer in NCO heavy compared to a NATO army, And that was very deliberate because he had a bunch of military career as who's you know, fortunes were inextrict,

like personal force, They're inextriguarly tethered to the survival and prosperity, if we can call it that of the regime. You know, in any any government that endures for decades, no matter how kind of contrived or unpopular it is, you know, if people are going to become just habituated to it, and you know, the people's fortunes are going to become

bound up with it in various ways. So, I mean, that did happen, but it was about the most like artificial of artividual states, which is one of the things one of the reasons I'm always kind of tongue in cheeks saying, you know, like East Germany, he was best Germany. I mean, you know, the d D are the reason why they did the National Volks Army, you know, their uniforms look like Rmack uniforms. They maintained some very into

the Prussian drill in the parade ground. You know, they a lot of their their kind of mythology they drew upon like Florian Geyer in the Peasants War. You know, they they kept a lot of like you know, they got a lot of the optics and kind of at least super visial trappings the of Prussian statehood, which is really the first kind of like modern welfare state. You know,

that's not they can't be denied. But the point is the d d R is kind of cant They they're kind of like hyper aware of like your tenuous claim to the mantle of power and them kind of insinuating themselves into this role ironically and and and somewhat perversely. But if if you're a Gelien, that this makes perfect sense. Them kind of cinema themselves as like the guardian of like what remained of like you know, the like authentic

German culture. That's really interesting and that I think I think people responded to that too in some basic way. That's why, in like the decades after the Wall came down, I think East Germans themselves like ostalgy. You know, it's like a play on like nostalgia. You know, they that that's that's you know, kind of a media term that's bandied, you know about people who grew up in the East to uh, you know, who's still pining for products you can't find anymore and kind of like what life was

in that era. And you know, I made the point too, like uh Proud Miracle, it's not an accident that she came up through the d DR, you know. And interestingly, is a law I see any any German politician you know who uh who who who who is a citizen of the d d R. It's literally against the law to talk about their past, like in East Germany. So it's it was a criminal offense. And when prow Miracle was a chancellor to talk about her background, a lot of people allege that she was a Stazi asset, which

is possible. She was a young pioneer, so I mean she her folks were like Communist party people or so that souls that there was no Communist party in the DDR as the Socialist Unity Party. But it uh, but the point being, I mean it wasn't she wasn't just you know, she wasn't like an apolitical you know, like her family was at least like regime loyal and so

far as already membership. But that miracles concord with with mister Putin, you know, and uh, the the the gas Prom deal which which led to the nord Stream pipeline, all these things like oh to, like the Cold War, okay, and like they oh to like you know, what the d DR was and what the inner German border represented in like power political and you know, in in his story of graphical terms, you know, this stuff isn't just you know, it's it's not it's not just like trivia

about you know, a strategic paradigm that's no longer extant. But you know, last uh, last episode, we got into you know, the kind of thaw, the Gorbachev thaw that was made possible in large part by Matthias Roost's flight. But before that, you know, we talked about, uh we we talked about the NATO Dual Track uh strategy, which ultimately led to the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty and why

this was a big deal. The Soviet Union and drop off had been very aggressively trying to decopple you know, Europe from the United States in terms of a strategic doctrine and it's it's willingness to wage nuclear war against

Warsaw Pact. And the way they did this was, you know, with the deployment of SS nineteen, S S twenty ICBM and theater ballistic missile platforms and in Europe as as the point of the Backfire Bomber, which was a maritime nuclear bomber like superficially it had u add things in common with the with the B one, but it was purposed essentially to the nuke the Royal Navy and then like open up the the Grainland Iceland UK Gap which the Soviet Navy had to shoot in order to break

out of you know, uh the North Atlantic into the open Ocean in order to you know, effectively wage war against the United States. But the uh the when uh I made the point that Reagan's uh dual track strategy, which was the Reagan administration offered to remove all theater nuclear weapons platforms from Europe, you know, ground launched cruise missiles as well as intermediate range ballistic missiles like the

person too. If the Soviets would have bided the same, Okay, if the Soviets wouldn't have buid the same we'll bets were off. UH, NATO was going to continue to deploy theater nuclear forces. Now arguably this led the Soviets to UH to say, well, we've got nothing to lose, and that's why they went all in Afghanistan. You can even go a step further and say, like, as we got into that, this caused terrible anxieties about the possibility of a decapitation strike on you know, on on Moscow and UH.

You know, we talked about how the real impetus for intervention in Afghanistan was was a proximity to Kazakhstan, which was as important to the Soviet Command, nuclear command and control as was Moscow. But as it may, what was going on during this era as kind of the Soviet Union was hardening its stance in power political terms, there

was odd things happening between the two Germanys. We talked about the hell Sinki Accords, you know that was UH, when the Warsaw Pact, you know it all the signatories declared that, you know, they they'd honored democratic processes, you know, people would not be discriminated against based on you know, political affiliation sect nationality. I mean basically it was uh, basically the Helsinki Accordus could not coext this with the Bread doctrine, which is what the Soviet Union relied upon

with their intervention in Czechoslovakia on sixty eight. You know, this caused a problem because on the one hand, the wars Up Pact was desperate for, you know, like a legitimacy and credibility in the world stage. On the other hand, the only thing holding the structure together, particularly after the sound of Soviets split was, uh, what was armed force. You know. The only thing making the SOVIETI as superpower was the fact that it had, you know, the world's

mightiest military apparatus. The only thing holding a strategic alliance together, which it depended upon, you know, in order to the achieve any strategic depth, you know, was the fact that if any if any of the satellite states tried to throw off the shackles of of of one party rule, you know, they the Soviet Union would directly intervene in order to defend socialism, you know, or defend the development

and survival of socialism within its sphere of influence. So this was probably this was this was very much tested in nineteen eighty eighty one, that's when Poland came under martial law. Poland was an interesting case because the uh owing Uh. One of the reasons why Carter courted Brazinski,

you know, as a key part of his ZIGNA. Brzinski is a key figure in his national security staff was h like Poland seemed to be the kind of the kind of it seem it seemed to kind of like the natural place to try and you know, create a wedge and warsaw pact. You know, if us it was inorganic to the d d R. It was totally alien to Poland. You know, Poland was basically it was it was still a largely in the amand of the war.

It was still like a largely backwards and not saying that the punitive or mean, but it was it was. It was still largely backwards country people westach Catholic, Uh.

They had a strong hatred of the Russians, you know, like ethnicran So Communism really kind of had to succeed in Poland, Okay, if if the if for for any kind of legitimacy to improve, not just to the regime is situated there, you know, with to a Warsaw Pact generally and uh towards that end, Poland was the recipient of a lot of subsidies, which, in turn they used to build up infrastructure, including one of the what was that that, I'm like one of the world's most advanced

uh like like like like commuter rail stations like it like the like Warsaw Central station. Like it's still like it's something like an architenttional marvel. And at the time it was like, wow, this is this is this is remarkable. But that that you like, like those kinds of public works projects or something like the communists like seem to do pretty well hit but he as it may. Like one of the things the polls did with these subsidies is they they set about to create like a fairly

diversified like manufacturing sector. And you know, the idea was that you know, they could build up equity and you know, create something of a like an export economy however like regionally limited you know, and and and you know and and then uh you know, and then become eligible for you know, like long term developmental loans and things, and you know basically become like a some kind of like modern country or at least I got a par with like easy Germany, you know, if not you know, if

not the West. But this obviously didn't work, and uh, you know, the Poles found like half the Polish GDP as of seventy nine. I think was was was was debt and uh the Poles, Uh, they were dealing with genuine shortages things like things like that there was raffic cards handed out for like meat and eggs and sugar, like nobody could get tobacco like cigarettes and actually were being used as currency by nineteen eighty one. I mean

this is like prison like it's literally insane. And one of the big one of the big problems in terms of rendering the legitimacy crisis was, uh Polish Polish workers were being saddled with you know, like increasing demands in order to you know, shore up again to look like Poland was still gambling on this idea that you know, they could they could create like a viable manufacturing sector

like fit for export. It's like Polish workers are being sad to look like more and more and more hours, you know, for like diminishing returns, and they couldn't even get like the bay is to consumer necessity is a life, you know, like cigarettes, like sugar. I mean in a socialist state. I mean, this is this is preposterous. You know.

So that was basically the impetus for solidarity. And you can't you can't take a labor union in a communist state where like, hey, we're you know, we are the proletariat and you know we're not we're having our surplus labor literally robbed of us. You can't like take those people out and shoot them, okay. I mean, like you could like a bunch of Catholics, or a bunch of a bunch of Fascists, or a bunch of you know, people protesting the party. I mean, so this, this is

a very tricky situation. The way it was resolved in Poland was Jerald Zelski Uh became a general secretary and he was a tragic figure. You know. He there's this kind of visage of him as a sinister guy. He was just you know, Polish military officer. He always wore

these dark sunglasses. The reason why is because he was a lesser of lesser noble birth than when he was a teenager when Poland was invaded by the Red Army, he his whole family I sent to a gulag, and he became his eyes were destroyed by the glare of the sun off the snow in the labor camp he was in, so like he couldn't stand light, so like

he'd he'd were sunglasses all the time. And I mean it tells you something too, like this guy was literally a kid who was like destroyed by the gulegg system, like physically in some way and mentally, like he became this kind of like this kind of military talent in these blocked like it there's something kind of like Shakespeare about that. But it's also it tells you something about

the way like Poland was brutalized by by Communism. It's like, you know, there there there was no there weren't even there weren't there wasn't even the equivalent of of of like the d d Ar Cadre in Poland. You know, for them to kind of insinuate us as the ruling cast, you know, they took this guy who was literally, you know, somebody destroyed by the gulag, you know, like and yeah,

I just find it fascinating. But so Poland stands alone is the only it was the only it was the only East plex satellite state that was under the direct rule of a military man and it was literally under

martial law. Now, as this developed first under Carter then under Reagan's first term, it raised an interesting question because according to the if if Poland went into open a revolt, the president of the President of Doctrine dictated that, you know, the Soviet army would invade, you know, to to preserve the regime and uh and drop off. You can tell it was react with anxiety that this is what was

going to happen. That's something that's clear from you know, the notes of uh you know meetings, uh, not just the Presidium, but of you know, like the kind of inner inner polt Burrow, like the facto, like you know, the the cadre that made the decision to a celt Afghanistan,

like we talked about the other week. But simultaneous to this going on, East and West Germany were uh engaged in this kind of delicate minuet of UH of reproach and Eric Honecker, uh, you know, stal War as he was as as as a Marxist Leninist, he'd always pined for, uh, you know, for Eastern Men to be recognized as like the truly sovereign state, you know, with with with a

somewhat independent foreign policy. And it was bizarre because on the one hand, on the one hand, the d d R they reviewed UH as kind of too Stalinist, like even prior to Gorbert shaw Off, but they were simultaneously viewed as being too cozy and friendly with West Germany. I mean, there's there's something bizarre about that. But in nineteen eighty seven, Honaker finally got permission for a state visit to the bundis Republic. And he've been trying to

accomplish this. Uh, he'd been trying to accomplish this UH for for for for like a decade, and UH initially in UH in nineteen eighty four, when he first put it to UH, the Soviet Poloit Burrow and the Foreign Ministry Sharon Anko said, you know, make a mistake. You know that this is not a visit aimed at approachment. UH, it's to established lines of demarcation, which is like a

typically like Soviet answer. It's like both like obnoxious and obtuson hostile, but also it doesn't really make any sense and like uh, but uh, so there's this weird arrangement where Honeker goes to visit the Budist Republic and uh the uh they flew like the DDR flag, but they full the d DR flags slightly lower than like the Booms Republic flag, and like uh they'd uh the uh.

He like like a band greeted him, like a military band, like when he disembarked, you know in Bond, but like nobody would salute him as he would like ahead of state. It was like this goofy like half measure and there's this really striking photographs like a helmet. Cole who uh he and Merkele whatever their respective faults, and they are many. I mean they they were the really the only post war German chancellors who did anything really to restore German

sovereignty and in various capacities. Cole was a like a huge man. He was like this huge, like bear looking guy, you know, like this kind of like big Bavarian kind of like a Herman Garring type, you know, like big loud dude, you know, like uh, just like a huge person. And like Honiker Honker was kind of like this creepy like nerdy eye, you know, like kinda kind of how you like imagine like you know, the kind of communists from metal casting this kind of like this kind of

like profest storial dickhead who like nobody likes. It's like there's this photo like you know, like huge like comet cold. He's gotta get big grin in his face. There's this like pissed off with a like Conker and like an east Block suit who's like you know, five five even like it's it's like he's like being dwarfed by like you know, it was like kind of like you know,

metaphor that seemed really resident. I thought that as like a little kid, and then just the other week when I came across it in uh In uh in this book in the nineteen eighty nine Revolutions, I'm like, wow, that's really striking. I wasn't sure if it was just like Mandela effect me like remembering it as being more

like profound than that. But the what ultimately happened, you know, the convergence of all these things it became, it became at some point unthinkable, even notwithstanding for the the intrigues of a of a you know, within within the Kremlin that out Garbachev to kind of rook his enemies, and and and in sideline any true uh, you know, hard

liners aim to sabotage parastrike on policy terms. It at some point became unthinkable for the Soviet Army to deploy you know, in Poland or in you know, East Germany, but came to that and and do what they've done in Hungary and fifty six and the Czechoslovakia on sixty eight. You know, I mean, zeitgeist is a real thing, man. I mean, like, I think people who take historical revisionism seriously, I don't think any of them would disagree with this.

But the but uh, even if you're not you know, prone to kind of hay gaily and interpretations of these things and the pressure of you know, like world moral consensus, that's a real that is a real thing. It's not just something that like in a history liberals bandy about. And what was possible in nineties sixty eight or ninety seventy eight or even nineteen eighty one was no longer possible by like nineteen eighty six, nineteen eighty seven. I mean,

it just it just wasn't thinkable. And I that's why when people post the question as the you know, well why why wasn't there at Kienman Square. Moment, It's like, well, considera like this what actually happened at the inner German border. And in the moment it was happening, I I A lot of people didn't even fully realize what the precipitating

catalysts were. In April of eighty nine, really the first chink in the uh in the iron curtain, like the physical structure of the hardened border was the Hungarian garment finally shut off the electric fences that saturated the Austria Austria Hungarian border. Uh. The guard towers remained, they were still manned, but uh, there literally was an electric fence like running the perimeter, you know it. Uh you know, I mean and uh by may uh the boy the

border guards. Uh, there's this, there's this big deal. Uh. The border guards uh in Hungary like met with their like Austrian counterparts and uh began dismantling like sections of the barrier, you know, and they like they the Autionans obviously invited you know, like Western news crews and stuff. And uh, this is the first kind of indication that you know, the like Warsaw Pact could no longer exist as it as it had you know, for decades, taking

its que from that. The Hungarian communists and I know that Hungarians, may Garrets, are really great people and they're really proud people, and they were actually at the forefront of the anti communist resistance. And I'm not praising the communist regime there at all, but to their credit, Uh, Hungary's foreign minister horn Uh realized that, you know, travel restrictions had to be lifted, even if his motives were cynical, and that you know, he he was operating with an

eye to preserve the party state apparatus. The point is that, you know, the it was, it was the Hungarian regime that really first, you know, kind of gave way, you know, and they they had a long they had a long history post fifty six a compromise. And again I'm not saying because they were good men or something or principled. I think a lot of it old, you know, the existential reality that in Hungary especially, they wouldn't have survived

if they hadn't made certain concessions. But people forget that.

You know, the Hungary the Austro Hungarian border is really where where you know, the kind of thaw began and what's fascinating too, at least I think so, because I've got kind of a fascination, a fascination with a Habsburg in Vienna, because i think some people know who like follow my content during the summer season, and there was always a lot of East German tourists in Hungary and nineteen eighty nine was no exception, because you know, Hungary is Hungry is a beautiful place, I'm sure, and as

such it has such a reputation. But you know, if you were East German, Hungary is one of the places you could visit, you know, like on vacation. And the uh An idea which was hatched by Ottovon Habsburg, who was the last he was he was the last crown prince of the hats for Empire, you know he uh he said, uh, let's invite uh let's let's let's invite our German friends to a picnic on the uh Austro

Hungarian border. And of course, you know, like there're these these East German you know, tourists swarm to the border, which was then opened ups. They could you know, travel to Austria and then from there, you know, they could get you know, to the Bundus Republic. And this totally neutralized uh, you know, the inner German border and its ability to plug the verbial see that you know, had

led to their hemorrhaging of population. And from that point on, uh and and and you know, unless unless the East Germans were truly willing to the open fire on their own people. And and I can't think of anybody who would have been willing to take responsibility for that. You know, there's nothing short of that would have uh what have uh would have changed things. And like I said, even before Gorbachev, the uh whatever, I I think it was

already unthinkable. You know again, like hard line is uh the d drop of Sharon Anco regimes were I think it was kind of the same regime as I've vindicated for reasons I've neigated before. It was clear even by then that you know, the prison of Doctionri was dead for practical purposes, and the Soviet Union was a superpower. Like people forget that sometimes you're not talking about Sam's Iraq, you're not talking about you know, you're not, uh, you're

you're not You're not talking about North Korea. You're not you know you were you weren't talking about you you're you're even talking about a place like two Gemount of Croatia, like which I think was a great regime. But my point is, you know, this thing, the Soviet Union still was accountable in some basic way, you know, as a superpower.

I mean they they they their territory spanned one six of the planet, and the sphere of influence was, you know, in territorial terms, exceeded even that of the United States, I mean outside of you know, the Soviet Empire proper. But what uh, what I think is key with respect to the uh, how the Cold War ended, is what was happening in Washington and how uh Bush forty one

and James Baker proceeded. That's the only thing that facilitated Gorbachev's like the realization of his and Edward chevit Nardza I always butchered the pronunciation of that name. He was the foreign minister who succeeded rom Eco later became President of Georgia. But in foreign policy terms, Schev Knadze was he He was really kind of the go between in some ways between the Kremlin and the US foreign policy establishment.

And as we talked about Team b and they kind of hold they had over the trajectory of policy in the Reagan administration. They've been somewhat sidelined by the Bush forty one administration. Shaney was kind of their man who remained in proximity to you know, to the sovereign lever of power. But Baker and Bush, as I've discussed before, their vision was not the Soviet Union being dismantled. Quite

the contrary. They at least wanted the Soviet Union to endure until total disarmament was realized, you know, total nuclear disarmament and almost total you know, reduction of conventional forces and being and moving forward even from that, I believe, yeah, no, please do.

he was on a records literally saying like fuck them, I mean the sty Union they lost. You know, let's detonate it. Let's let's basically detonate like all the all the republics, you know, the nationalities. You know, let's tear the sovieni apart. Let's like loot what we can keep Russia permanently down, you know, let's surround it based you know, we'll turn it. We'll we'll turn Ukraine into like a garrison state, will turn Georgia into a garrison state. You know.

Uh and basically you know, keep our basically you know, Morgan foul play in Russia. Okay, those are the guys who went out from Clinton administration onward. I mean Clinton was a complete buffoon in foreign policy. Like he literally was just like a fucking buffoon. He was basically he basically was. He was basically a machiavilion on on the order of LBJ like his in terms of his politicking, he was like a manchafule politician, like what he I think that's like a lot of what or not kind

of depends on your perspective. But he had like the zero interest, no understanding of foreign policy, like none, so uh basically it was like available to highest bidder, you know. And that's why everything all the goodwill like achieved by the Bush Baker concord was just like it was just

like you know, nuke to like proverbially subsequently. And then you know the uh, the uh the assault on Serbia, you know, which was deployed a strategic logic other than basically just to say, like you know, we're gonna like we're gonna break Ivan's face and get him out of the Balkans, Like like why would you even do that? But I mean it's some you know that. Uh, those those the two that's that's what's underway today. That's why these like neo con types and and like they're they're

kind of a sentence. They they still this day like Rake Bush forty one over the close but believe the Chicken Kief speech like how dare he? Like and modern the Ukrainians not to wage some like suicide suicidal war against Moscow for no reason. I mean like it's but that's uh yeah, I mean that's a post understand me too, Like I'm not saying Obviously, anybody who's not a freaking idiot should realize that I'm not advocating like some kind of like new deal or revision of the world like

two point zero. But what Bush and Baker accomplished was truly masterful. The golfer a coalition is unprecedented, you know. And the fact that basically like Busch forty one like at the whole world like like freaking in the palm of his hand, like that's crazy, you know, and he uh, he courted the Arab world in a way that was with an eye towards genuinely like normalizing you know, the Middle East and and kind of defanging uh Desigonist lobby.

Like that's not just again, I'm not saying Bush forty one was like our guy like at all, but he represented something very different than the neo cons and different from like even you know, even most like Rhino types you know, like that, and same thing with Baker, like these guys were like the old you want to, like, like the old Protestant establishment the last time they were

like at the Helm like that was it okay? So and frankly like in some basic way, like those guys are like my teen like even though like class divides us like it, I'm I'm not gonna sit here and like out and out like trash them because frankly, like their vision was like far better than anybody else's, like post war like now withsaying the fact, you know, the war shouldn't have happened. But that's that's what I want

to get into next week. And the Gulf War. Uh, the Golfer is like an Adam Dam to the Cold War, like it really is, and like the even you know, uh black Horse Regiment Armored cavalry you know who patrolled the full the gap like they fought like at the seventy three East thing. That's where Darelas McGregor like he was a black Horse regiment. Like there's all kinds of

plus two. I mean, it's that's that's where you got to see the you know, the bay like the post revolution in military affairs like US Army, which I believe was like the US Army at Zenith like at that that can be argued you know, fight against like warsaw pack weapons platforms and and just and the political climate globally like it's just something that like has never been seen before and will like like will never be duplicated,

you know, And that's and and that that was. So it's not just I it's not just an addendum because it was post November ninete eighty nine, but pre you know,

uh pre uh dissolution of the the USSR. It like you've got to really understand that it's kind of not just the zenith of American power and absolute terms, but also kind of like the realization of like the Bush and Baker kind of a vision of a of of of of foreign policy moving forward, other of globalism rather like which was you know, burn to the ground within half a decade by by uh by the foods like Clinton and you know people who would uh you know

who would would place h they're pretty you know, kind of ancestral hatreds overall over a meaningful you know, historical development. But yeah, that's what all I got for today.

Honeker stepped down because there was you know a lot of these protests that were underway in easter in the d d R. We're demanding that Honeker resign among other things.

Honeker steps down. The Volkes Comma UH appoints Egon Krenz, which was who was like the air apparent anyway, he was the guy who was like being groomed like as you know, successor Krans Uh ordered UH the Interior Ministry to draft UH regulations that were less uh that were less uh less oppressive unless byzantine that would allow people exit visas, you know, which it was totally arbitrary and capricious, like who would be a grand one and who wouldn't

be like like it didn't make any sense. But uh, the uh credsass Gerald Gerhard Gerhard Gerhard Louder, who was, among other things, uh, the volks Politici chief who were responsible for you know, border checkpoint security among other things, he heard the hymn to order the Interior Ministry you know, to draft some kind of workable uh you know, like

visa applications some that in there. What they were hoping was that people who were political unreliable, they could basically just like send them away to West Berlin, you know,

with good riddance. But you know they could uh find some way you know to grant visa the people that appeared like nominally like democratic, but you know, would would there there'd still be incentives them to like remain in you know, not not defect basically generally that would be you know, to not like the only like you have a ford like one member of a family, like a visa,

you know, stuff like that. But the way this was communicated was Uh you had people already like massing at the checkpoints, you know, in anticipation of like what the new like law would be, like awaiting the announcement, and uh you had louder and uh these Interior Ministry officials, you know, who are being bombarded with with questions, not just from like d d R state media, but although

from like Western uh television and radio reps. And finally, uh, this spokesman uh for the Interior Ministry, he read aloud, uh the statement from the Vogues Comma about the status of the new law, which was that private travel restriction was now permitted. And it's not clear if this was a broken memo or like you know, uh tell whatsoever, or if it was just poorly drafted. But then a reporter said, could you repeat that? Does that mean that

there's no longer any travel restrictions? And when does this go into effect? And uh this this this spokesman said, well, I believe it goes into effect immediately. And then the people the checkpoints I started charging the border. Now, nobody was willing to open fire on these people, so the or cops like overwhelmed. After a while, they just like threw open the gate, you know, because like what are they gonna do. It's like they were they gonna get stampeded.

They's either gonna be a riot or there's gonna be a riot, or you know, the Stasi was going to deploy like you know, the internal security troops and start you know, like killing people. And like none of these guys wanted any part of that, I mean, if not for ethical objections, because they didn't want to be held responsible. So it was basically just like the momentum of of you know, the will to kind of make this happen,

you know, like corneys. It sounds like people power if you can get me, just sounding like a forgetting hippie or something. But that's basically what went down.

for all practical purposes. He quit Warsaw Packed. Okay, you know it was uh, it was not despite beings. That's kind of arch Stalinist. He was not pretty clarly cozy with the Kremlin. But he during the final October eighty nine and the final Warsaw Packed summit, where internal security was obviously on everybody's mind, he said, like we've got to do with the Chinese comrades did at Tim and even Honeker apparently looked at him. He was like, what

the hell is the matter with you? At least don't say that out loud, like you know, like that's uh. But yeah, the uh, we'll get into that too, because that's fascinating and it's it's the outlier. Yeah, and I mean for all kinds of reasons, but yeah, the uh, the uh And then then and then mister and missus, I saw that when I was in my aunt's house and Mentura that Christmas, and I seeing that Cescu was getting getting blown away like on TV and that and

this is this is like young people understand. This is like you know, consumer internet was basically where you can see video was like ten years away, fifteen years away. Like this was like that's freaking crazy. It's like and it's it's I shook me up as like a young team. Then he killed his wife too, because there was like I mean, she was she was a terrible person, but

like she was an old lady. They just like wasted her like and I remember like one of the guards they were leading leading them to the you know, the to uh to the courtyard to be shot, Like the one guard like put his hand in his album and she just like shakes it off like that. I mean, she was like a hard lady. But it's like the point is she was like an old woman. I mean it's like that kind of shocked me as a kid man. But yeah, we'll uh well, uh yeah, we'll we'll cover uh,

we'll cover that. We'll cover Gulf War and bush Baker in uh the final episode, we'll get into like Borwich offers Yelton too, and so yeah, we we might go a little bit longer next time. And that's okay with you, but I think that'll be great.

first week in May, I promise. The channel is we're shooting dedicated content like my crime partner and my my my erstwhile editor who is is a is a prince of the realm. I swear like the he's the reason why all this stuff gets done because I I'm freaking illiterate with this stuff. But I uh, we're we're we're we're cranking out like fire ship, like I promise, But I am like he and I really a two man freaking operation. I mean, it's a lot of work, and

I I'm not being a murder. I'm an incredibly lucky person. But that coupled with these manuscripts I'm trying to finish, coupled with keeping up with all this other ship, I mean, it's it's it's a freaking lot of work, man, But it's come and I promise, man, Yeah, that's what I got.

It Uh, it has it has to do with power potential, not just of material resources, but you know of uh of mentioned material as you know that Germans used to refer to, you know, human population. It's not just in terms of their biology, but in terms of their capacity

to bear culture and things like that. Europe as this kind of rump peninsula, you know, forever on an enemy footing with Russia, artificially instigated and maintained by the United States, is never even if the United States withdrew its forces and being from Europe, but that status quo remained, Europe would never ever be able to you know, emerge again as as as a true power political actor of any of any significance and hard power terms, I mean obviously

in economic terms and in cultural terms. You know, your Europe is always you know, the kind of the center of the world. Okay, and in many respects, but so there's that part of it. Secondly, YACKI not incorrectly he identified, uh, what the Cold War is basically and in house controversy in ideological terms. You know, it was the the New

Dealer alliance with Moscow. Wasn't just a sort of alliance of convenience because Europe was in the third right, which is so evil like on his face, that doesn't make

any sense. You know, what this was is it was uh, competing viewpoints of a global socialist order, you know, one being the New Dealer perspective, the other being the marcis leninst perspective, colluding in order to annihilate fascism and any competing iteration of political order that would uh, you know, come to dominate the twentieth century and in all centuries subsequent. So you know what, one was not superior to the other.

You know, it's not like America represented the West. Contrary, you know, the the alien Soviet Union or the Socialist Soviet Union and America and a lot of it is more insidious because it had an ability to insinuate itself in the European cultural life. You know, I missed the occupation regime. I mean in a way that the Soviet just we're not able to. And finally, there was just a difference there. There was there was a divergence of intent.

The Soviet Union wasn't trying to socially engineer you know, white Europe out of existence, you know, I mean, yeah, Marcius Leninism was a horrible system. It was brutal. It persecuted people, It was hostile to religion, it was it Uh, it persecuted people who were who were deemed politically unreliable. It was anti human. I'm not acquitting that at all.

But again, it didn't aim to tear out the root of cultural life and carry out uh a programmatic genocide quite literally, you know, by annihilating uh, by annihilating European culture at the root. And that's exactly what America aimed to do, and in more concrete terms and in more crude terms, not crude in terms of you know, disreputable

or something, but just in in kind of more basic terms. Also, so you know, Yaki pointed to the Prague trials, uh, the Prague trial relating to what came to be known as the Doctor's plot, you know, where these twelve, these twelve medical people were were tried for treason and conspiring against you know, the Communist Party UH in Czechoslovakia, and

eleven of twelve of these people were Jews. Okay, a lot of them were involved as Zionism, you know, they it was obviously the Warsaw what was to become the Warsaw Pact, the East Bloc. It was obviously them purging, you know, the Jewish element from their leadership cast. And they weren't doing it on some quote unquote racial basis or some kind of sectarian basis, and their alibi was, well, you know, it's it's incidental that these people are Jewish.

You know, we we can't abide this kind of counter revolutionary treason, this activity. You know, it doesn't matter if you know, it hurts people's feelings that you know, there's certain certain ethnic groups are concentrated in the ranks of these these undesirable elements. You know, we're gonna, we're gonna realize, you know, justice no matter what. But it was obviously, you know, a deliberate effort to purge Jewish influences from from the ranks of the of of Fadres and in

in the Eastern Bloc. So if your notion is that, you know, as Jackey's was, you know that that Europe has to be liberated from enemy influences if it's going to survive, let alone thrive. And if your idea is that, you know, the traditional enemy of the West is UH, you know is the Jewish dias for, and that that dias for is is that their world of social existence is the progenitor of UH. You know, the most the

the ideological tendencies most in nymical to Western survival. And finally, again if if you view Europe's path to salvation and paraplitical terms as you know, a concord with Moscow, I mean all those things, you know, all the worlds need to Moscow, if you'll allow the metaphor, I mean that was Yaqui's perspective, you know, the and that's basically shouldn't

be controversial. I mean, the reason why the Soviet Union was dangerous, the reason why it was insidious wasn't because it was it was going around doing the kinds of things that like the American government does today. You know,

it's not it wasn't trying to. It wasn't going around declaring that like gender doesn't exist, or that, you know, you everybody needs to breed, you know, the everybody needs to breed into like one kind of like non race, and you know, you know, all all all kind of historical existences need to be eradicated, you know, so that some kind of like equity can be achieved, or like nobody has a historical memory, so we're all the same.

Like that that would never occur to the sol Union. Okay, that doesn't make them good guys, but it makes them far far less dangerous to uh, you know, racial survival and and and kind of human culture in any in any form than that. In America wasn't his you know, and I I homatize that people that what what what the American regime does today? This isn't something of like

recent vintage. You know, it's not like it's not like the US government was like doing good things or wasn't insane until like nineteen ninety or something, or until like twenty sixteen, like they've always been. I mean, the New Deal regime from inception, it was totally insane, and it's

totally insane ideas. It it was always sexually perverted. It always it always wanted to eradicate people's understanding themselves as as cultural you know, as culturally situated like it it uh, it literally plotted to genocide Europe and you know, and drafted up entire treaties. Is I don't even like the sexual habits of Germans and how we can work. You utilize this to undermine their potential to breed. I mean they're like this really really sick stuff, you know, and

I mean some people can't accept that. I mean whatever, Okay, if people have some like vestigial attachment to America, like as a government, I I I don't care, but they're they're not people I have any common cause with, and I think they're incredibly diluted if they insist on retaining that sensibility, will also insisting that they're somehow right ing or opposed what is going on.

like it. But just for the sake of coherence, you know that that's that's like the verdicular. But yeah, I don't,

I don't, Yeah, I don't understand how. I mean, Like, it's like even even if even if you've got no affinity for you know, kind of like European ideological tendencies, or even if you know you you don't like national socialism or fascism, like if you don't like any of this stuff like why why would you celebrate this destruction, Like why would you celebrate like Europe being literally annihilated by by uh by cop I mean this and by these like crazy new dealers want to like eradicate the

concept of race from this planet and and and do like man as some kind of like instrumentality to serve like good government. I mean that's completely perverted. But like I said, I think it's that there really is uh like a bougie kind of fixation, like really an obsession with like respectability. And there's people they want to like purge them people. People are like ambitious in the wrong ways. They want to like purge their own minds of like unclean thoughts and and and and and and not hating

fascism is an unclean thought. So they try and cope by saying like, yeah, like I hate the regime, but you know I hate you know, Hitler even more and and and that's the worst thing ever, Like I I mean, I don't know, I try. I I think I'm I think I'm somewhat empathetic in terms that I I'm pretty good at putting myself in the position of other people. I mean just in in like practical terms. I mean, that's there's a heavily psychological aspect to political life, you know.

And so I'm not saying I've got like great insights or something, but I've thought about this a lot, and I believe what I just indicated is like the source of a lot of that foolishness. I got another.

of had one foot in both camps. And as it turned out, they were very much a client, uh actor of UH the Eastern Ministry, Ministry for State Security, and they were they were very much kind of like the Branchell, the Marcus Wolf, who was an incredibly dangerous individual and he was the best intelligence man that Warsaw Facts had, in my opinion, in he's the best intelligence man and the best intelligence organization probably field by anybody in the

Cold War. But the bottom Mine Off faction they uh, their their notion was to basically render the Buddhist Republic ungovernable through terrorist activity, you know, just in kind of conventional the kind of conventional terms that that nacate the actors under arms, especially during the Cold War, like going

to the unique paradigm they're in like proceeded. But they also that was during the period when uh, you know, Billy Brandt was uh was seeking genuine reconciliation with East Germany, and UH the idea was uh, it was, it was, it was. It was very layered, okay, because on the one hand, UH, on the one hand, the idea was very simply like strike a blow against you know, like America and the and uh and the bundes and UH and and and sympathetic forces you know, within the Federal Republic.

But secondly, it also gave people like Brandt like an alibi like, see, these are extremes, you know, we have We're nothing like them. You know, we want an approachment with the d d R and the Soviet Union for Peace. So this kind of thing will no longer be happening like which is really kind of brilliant. But they they were very effective and they uh, they had they had substantial contacts with a Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command. They uh, I think they probably were uh.

I think they probably had contacts with the Provisional IRA, although some people the ass debatable and I don't want to I don't want to start some sort of argument with people who have those kinds of sympathies. But that was basically the Red Army faction and they folded their flag like officially in nineteen ninety I mean, which which goes to show and people acting like this was strange at the time, but I mean the Epochet it should have made sense that it's like, well, I mean, these

this isn't some fake organization. I mean they hit. They did have grassroots support, especially among you know, the student population and younger people, but they very much were like at operational terms, they were very much like an organ of the Sazi and horse to Maller interestingly, u uh, he wasn't a direct action element within the bottom Minehoff gang, but he was a lawyer who worked closely with them.

He became he ended up going to prison for quote Holocaust denial and quote promoting racial hatred, you know, a few years back. And because like immediately after the wall came down, like he he took up with the the NPD, you know, which is the legacy party of the Socialist Party. So I mean there you go, and like people like their Spiegel, which says incredibly stupid things with alarming regularity. They were like, see this man's insane. He was a

communist and now he's anti Semitic. But it's like anybody with like a fucking brain, Like it's like we're just like explicated about you know, uh, why a pro Soviet disposition is what any like you know, quote unquote neo fascist would basically you know, be be disposed to. I mean that's and I that that's I mean that that it's just a case in point. I mean, it shouldn't

surprise anybody, but I they they were interesting. They were an interesting case and an interesting element within the Cold War. But that's the good film about him, called The Bottom Off Complex. I highly recommend it. It's got Bruno gans and it's Bruno Ganz. He's the guy who played Adolf Hitler in Dirt Untergang.

ever seen, arguably will ever see. Yet this was exclusively for peaceful purposes or for no reason? You know, when the Germans attacked for no reason because they're evil. I mean, that's I mean that. I maybe it's just me becoming cantanker as an old but I think it's just me becoming a more rigorous and discriminating historical writer and researcher.

Anybody who accepts that conceptual narrative is it taints the entire rest of their research, even if they're facts and their data, like the rot data is good and well, so it's nothing wrong with citing those kinds of sources.

And I'm sure people who dislike me or dislike the kinds of things that right will turn around and say, like, well, you know, you're just you're abolishing the fact value distinction in your own way, and you know you're you're reducing a history of polemic No, I'm not, But you don't have to be like pro fascists or anything to accept that. The Soviet Union was what I just said. It was the first fully realized warfare state that was totally mobilized

for war. It was animated by a doctrine of revolutionary warfare and exporting revolution, and it was the single most powerful military actor on the world stage. On the eve of Barbarossa. And this is the only way to understand the Second World War that was, that was the catalyst, you know, And as any military type will tell you, capabilities, let alone forces and being are not are never benign. You know, they only have one purpose, and that is

to wage war. And the capability to weigh. The capability to wage war equates to power in uh it most distilled sense and is the currency of politics. That's the only currency olypics. Everything else is drestling. So I state that is always such a degree as the Soviet Union was. Not only is it never tweet be nine, it is actually the precise opposite.

and they're morons. But beyond that, the uh, the Russians lost thirty million people fighting the Third Reich. So like they they're they're they call people Nazis and fascists as like a stand in for enemy. It's not because like they're they're pink haired, fat girls who are into like lesbianism. It's not because they're it's not. It's not because they're like a bunch of crazy Jewish people. It's not. It's not because you know, they they listen to dead Kennedy's records.

Like it makes conceptual sense the way a kind of a kind of nationalist authoritarian Russia that would definitely be possible, but it wouldn't It wouldn't look like it would It wouldn't look like Mussolini's Italy, did you know, transpose the twenty first century, and it wouldn't even look like uh, it wouldn't even look like this, you know, the Syrian bath rule in Syria. Like it'd be like weirdly Russian. Its optics would even if only superficially, be very much

bound up with Orthodox Christianity. The uh, the uh. The military would have disproportionate clout, you know, more than like you know, the political cast, which would kind of like neutralize any like truly political projects of an ongoing nature, you know, Like it'd be it'd be kind of like it'd be kind of like ten miles wide and like one inch thick. Okay, Like it's not to say it be like a weak state, but I'm talking in terms of like an ideological chalist there just like wouldn't be

much there, Okay. I think Russia is Frankly, I think when Putin goes, either because he dies or or he actually finds a successor that you're not in Russia can live with, That's probably what you're going to have Okay, but it's not. It's not gonna be it's not gonna

be fascistic in any meaningful way. And it's not it's not gonna be some weird like Eurasianism like Alexander Dugan like fantasizes about, like this is not that would have no currency, you know, and and if there's something like they had to take off the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, like the stands to be kind of colloquial and like dumb about it, like they'd have to be looking to Moscow for their cues like culturally, politically, and

and and strategically, and they're like not doing that at all, you know, Like Eurasianism doesn't have any legs, you know, like it's like something cool that Russians like to talk about, and that it's like as a thought experiment. It's certainly like not impossible, but that the Eurasian moment was the Soviet Union, okay, and like that's gone, it's not ever coming back.

ethnic groups that the regime didn't like. You know, these were people who, as kind McDonald exhaustively researched and pointed out in his paper Stalins Willing Executioners, which was very cleverly returning to serve a Goldhagen. You know, when you something like seventy percent of the NKVD like direct action meant was Jewish during like the the the height of

the revolutionary phase. And these people were just like suddenly account so like people they didn't like, you know, whether they were Kulos, whether they were like you know, Belarusians, whether you know, they there were people who you know a lot of radicalized, very very vicious, you know, Jewish people under arms didn't like, I mean, this was what it was was it was neither it was neither truly organized, nor was it truly scattershot. But that's that's really where

the bodies got stacked up. And there really wasn't there. There truly was as a rubber conquest documented you know, a Soviet death camp system. I'm not being colloquial or using you know, hysterical language or something. They're really brutal aspects, programmatic aspects. After the Day of Defeat in nineteen forty five, the uh, then the uh, the American authorities were just as bad, you know, they uh, they starved out millions

of Germans. Was endemic, you know, and and and and and and if not encouraged, you know, like just just tolerated more than tacitly. You know. The the Morgans out plan in a sense very much was implemented, although not realized to its full event as a vision owing to

the strategic situation. But I'd say back to your question and the kind of four corners of it, the uh, the force population transfers, the literal ethnic cleansing from and you know of millions of German people from lands that they had occupied in some cases for a thousand years. That was very much something Washington encouraged in some ways participated in the planning of directly, but operationally it was the Soviet army and and and police who made that happen.

My opinion is that's the most uh kinda that's gone of the most like that's the strongest example of like naked brutality. And I mean people will come back and say, like, well, you know, the the Germans were ethnically cleansing you know, uh, the Soviet Union, and they were, but it was a race war, okay, And there's a difference between that sort of activity underway terrible as it is, it's into a total war and you know, just perpetuating a programmatic campaign

of ethnic violence after a cessation of hostilities. You know, there's I I don't really think that the latter can be justified in any absolute sense. And it's it's not it's what about ism o. But the Germans did bad things as any place. And also finally, and I know

nobody asked, but I'm gonna see way my own take. Anyway, you know, if you're a man of the West, and if you're pro white and if you want your race to survive, you even if, even if the Third Wig was literally the most evil regime that ever existed, you don't you don't. You don't cheer on the ethnic cleansing

of your own people. I mean, this is this is uh brass tax stuff, you know, and one doesn't need to be something of died in the little Machiavellian to understand aside from that that, uh, you know, politics power, politics does take place somewhere beyond beyond a good and evil if you'll allow the overused you know kind of kind of reference.

and then finally SDI the Rosenbergs are basically what they appeared to be. I think, uh, I certainly don't. They certainly should have been executed. I think, uh, at least Julius Rosenberg. I think Ethel Rosenberg wasn't like I'm not I'm not saying she was just like a stupid woman or something. There's plenty of women, particularly in radical politics through wherever he's smart and very dangerous. I think Ethel Rosenberg was not one of those. I think she was

kind of along for the ride. Okay, that doesn't excuse her whole liability. But Julius Rosenberg, he was kind of like an Orthodox like Jewish radical. Not Orthodox Jewish, I mean, like an Orthodox radical who was Jewish. But he I think I think in some ways though his from what by from his own testimony, just to his own intimate, it's not under oath or anything, I believe his notion was somewhat like that of Chris boys the guy who's the subject of The Falcon and the Snowman, although Boyce

obviously is a far more sympathetic character. I believe, aside from Rosenberg's own kind of socialist leanings, he believed in order for stability to reign you know, the burgening kind of bipolar system and prevent you know, the honset of another round of of of of just massive you know, interstate violence. There would have to be you know, a true balance of forces between the superpowers, and that can only be achieved if if, uh if Moscow had the

mom you know. And again, like I said, like I he didn't say this in open quart or something, or you know, he didn't he didn't raise us to the judge, you know, in the hopes that he'd be spared the gallows. These kinds of things he said to like his friends, you know, like reading between the lines. H m. That was why the Rosenbergers became these kinds why the Rosenbergers became these people who were held out by the usual suspects that see this, this horrible anti semitic lynching of

these people. That's incredibly weird because they're about the least sympathetic defendants I can think of. But that's there's like not really anything there. I mean, it's like Leo Frank, like like Leo Frank was uh, Leo Leo Frank was a child molester and a murderer, But like you're supposed to feel bad that he got lynched, because apparently it was like terrible that this guy who like victimized the

little kids got lynched. I know, I don't know, I don't quite understand that, but it's something, uh it goes to some of the kind of like moral bankruptcy of the of the people who who come to the defense of these of these personages and history. Like I'm not,

I'm not saying that like lynching is good. I mean, he's a frank I mean, I I believe in due process in a real sense, but I also don't feel bad if child molesters and people will harm children get killed, Okay, And anybody who makes it out like this is some terrible, you know, terrible instance of uh of of of rough justice.

I mean, I'm not, I'm not And I'm not comparing selling nuclear secrets some listing kids at all, like they have nothing at all in common, Okay, And I can easily see myself like Pat passing nuclear secrets, not the ivan, but uh, you know, and the last man is gonna sit here and and and I like fucking prissy about

such things. But you know, if there's in the modern era there's really no clear case of high treason than what the Rosenberg did and what the Rosenbergs did, except maybe for the Cambridge five just in terms of they share kind of like gravity of of of their ongoing espionage. But yeah, there you go. I realized that was long winded. But the short answer is like, there's there's nothing there.

It's exactly what it appears to be. You're supposed to feel bad for Jewish communists for some reason because you know, any anytime they face consequences, it's because of med anti Semitism or something.

They just weren't. That's not a polemical take, that's a fact. But it's also too it was like the the science of aviation, and particularly military aviation, it was something everybody was learning by doing. You know, like when Curtis Lamay first started flying and you know in the Inner Warriors, Uh, that's when pilots were still like flying by like visual sight of like you know, terrestrial land features and things, you know, and trying to match it up to like

a paper map. Okay. Now, the Earth Force obviously by uh by the time via but by the time the real escalation got underway in Vietnam in sixty five, the UH there was uh, you know, the Air Force. Uh. They'd been their bread and butter was Strategic Air Command. And that also is what they owed not just their lobbying power too, but also there kind of pre eminent position in in the UH, in the kind of American defense establishment structure, they were able to pretty rapidly repurpose

to a conventional role. But a conventional role that was Uh,

it was difficult to realize. You know, these arc light bombers, these BFFD two's, those were those were purpose those were those were those were purpose to attack with nuclear weapons, okay, and a strategic capacity switching them to a conventional repurposing them to a conventional role, you know, in a conflict like Vietnam where frankly until uh, you know, nineteen seventy two, you didn't even really have like through combin or of set piece battles where they could really kind of shine

the fact that they were able to, you know, kind of wreak so much havoc on uh, the ability of the North Vietnamese uh, not just reconstitute forces, but you know, to uh sustain infrastructure, not just command and control, but you know any any know, all kind of basic infrastructure relating to the war effort. That's pretty remarkable. And it's also the uh it was more more naval aviators, but

some air force aviators too. They got engaged over the battlespace tactically, and uh, Vietnamese pilots are pretty good and you're obviously we're Soviet pilots like flying sorties too. As it brought dog fighting back, you know that that's the all reason why why uh why you know Tagle Air Command like uh, you know, got got a boom and that's why. Uh, And that's why in the naval side, like you know, top gun got created in the first place. That's what I meant about the Air Force and against

the Marine Corps. The Marines, they were used to doing more with less just because of the nature of their missions and deployments. You know. The Small Wars Manual was uh was written by uh, you know officers and n c o s who've been fighting in nicaraguall like in the twenties and things. The Marines better understood how to like you know that the need for you know kind of like in the field diplomacy with indigenous elements like

stuff like that. And the the US Army, you know, after World War Two, it was just like senerally obsessed with firepower, you know, and like look what they did in Vietnam. It's like, uh, you know, let's let's show

up as heavy as possible. Let's have guys wearing fatigues that we don't wearing in the inner German border, you know, like carrying around like rations and metal tns, you know, uh, and toting like sixty pounds worth of gear on their back and like one hundred and ten degree tropical heat. Like that's not I mean that that's the whole thing's absurd.

Like Army Special Forces totally shined, you know. But that's but this was before like SOCOM was like it was like bros with like goofy beards and sleeved hats who like think that they're the police or something like. This was when like these guys were like genuine weirdos who were like kind of like their own branch the military, and they were really they were really up on some progressive and dynamic, like tactical doctrines. That's what I meant. And I think that in the nineteen sixties Army was

actually pretty squared away. Okay, they were very very well suited to fight Warsaw Pact, but they were not. They just lacked like operational flexibility in the with that in a way that was needed. But it's just I mean the US Army, the US Army had a hell of a time in the in the Far East. One of

the reasons. I like the way The Thin Red Line, Like nobody likes that movie, but I think it's a dope movie that is like love Terrence mal like, but it's about the US Army in the Pacific and like nobody thinks about that, and you know it's all about the Marines and the Navy, and I mean which and then that's where like a lot of naval and marine

re legends were made. But the U. S R. And the Pacific was fubar and like uh like in all kinds of ways, not just because it was view as the secondary theater, but it's just because like the army was fucked up, like fighting in Asia, you know, like and they were, it's they they they were not like at the command level. I'm not talking about you know, the guys in the field like doing you know, not talking with the actual infantry man where game is fucked,

but like the guys making operational decisions. It's like they didn't it, like didn't compute that. You know, this was not we're not We're not We're not we're not fighting Verdun or bellow Wood, you know, just against the against the jabs. You know, it's not all the same. Yeah, That's what I'm meant. But I'm not I'm not a military man, so I mean look at me obviously, okay, but I I'm sure that military will say, I don't know what the hell I'm talking about, but I I

mean whatever, Okay, I mean that's that's my position. I think I can back it up.

what NATO called the backfire. It was, uh, its actual name is the TUPELIV something. But yeah, no, that's you see, uh, you see some uh you see some cool aircraft over orger Chicago game.

stuff here by a lot of people. They are I'm just telling you what I'm not saying. I think that I'm telling you that's the way like a lot of fucking people look at it, especially like social registered types back when they had clout in Europe as a totally different story. The uh the Freemasons are reviewed by uh by by the Third Reich as like Roasta Crucian types, you know, they're like these fifth columnists, who are you know,

they're degenerate. They're they're they're neither loyal to race, nor king,

nor country nor kin. You know, they're they're they're you know, they're they're basically, uh, they're basically like a bourgeois fraternal society that's intrinsically subversive, you know, and that is you know, uh, these these these people, these people can't be relied upon because they're only loyalty is to is this kind of like odd set of beliefs which every reality often is nothing deeper than kind of cover for uh, you know, ambition,

ambitious social climbers to pretend as if there's you know, it's some kind of deeper ethos to their you know, to their convetousness of station and things. Okay, In terms of the Russians, I don't have a good understanding of Russian culture at all. I don't readers speak Russian. I Uh, I think I've got a good understanding of their political heritage and how their decision making process in war and

peace terms plays out. But I I cannot tell you, like what the Russian take is on Freemasonry, Like why the Ivens like viewed them as insidious, like why why

why the Germans viewed them that way? And this proceeded like the you know, the the national social revolution, but why why the why the Third Reigen in particular like viewed them as like a a an undesirable element, Like that's why there's a dedicated Uh, there's a there's a dedicated police uh creeple department or directorate, uh, dedicated to

like spying on Freemasons. And like I think in some capacity, like it endured after the war, like a memory serves like when, uh, when when the West German when the Buddhist republic like national police were restructured, and like that's when like GSG nine became this like badass special ops force.

Like I think I remember reading something like they were still like spying on Freemasons and fucking with them, and they made a bunch of people mad, like oh, this is like you know nuts use some rebooks like godar you like uh, but yeah, I don't, I don't have any insight in on that man, Like you'd have to talk to the Russian fellas in our circles or or some of the European guys.

the the subversion something was coming from Moscow. It UH in the in the in the in the the labor movement was UH was truly a national phenomenon with with political cloud manufacturing economy, the terrestrial manufacturing, like national economics was the order of the day, you know, really until uh, until nineteen sixty they're about, Yeah, you better believe that. Uh you better believe the common term in later common form they were. They were totally insinuated into that, you know.

And there was major unions that were shot through with like Soviet influence. Okay, last gas at was like the Welsh minor strike, so like the Kremlin was pouring a munch money into those efforts. Okay, But that's the reason why. And again I view it as a very imperfect signifier for all kinds of reasons. But I understand why people about cultural Marxism. Digital Marxist Leninism does not emphasize culture.

Everything is superstructure. It's all labor, it's all production, it's all capital, you know, it's all it's all how people's conceptual horizons and social behavior and and and and and class and cast structuring like derives from labor and production to schema. You know. So like if you asked, like even the most radical kind of mark like traditional Marxist lenin Is in nineteen fifty, if you like ask them about stuff like homosexuality, or like feminism or like about

race relations. You just like tell you like, none of that is important, Like these are bourgeois fixations or concerns, and you know, over to the alienation of of the of you know, not just the not just the exploited proletariat, but you know the people who profit from it. You know, they exist also in debate circumstances and you know, not not being not being invested in actual like you know, power processes of production, as humans need to be you know,

to live, you know, psychologically healthy lives. You know, they're they're drawing upon you know, these these kind of super structural meaningless like ephemora, like the surrounds, like human life. These are these things don't matter. Like that's literally what their take would be, Like they'd have no they have no interest. They either have no interest and these kinds of culture aspects that we are so familiar with, or

they'd say, you know, that's just not important. You know, Okay, it was interesting, maybe it's useful, maybe it can be exploded to some discreete purpose, but it's just not important. You know. That's that's the key difference. So when these Bircher types would talk into the eighties about how like everything bad that happens is coming from Oscow. I mean, that was like a fucked up perspective of all kinds of reasons. And it's just like, I mean not not

sensible and pregnant reasons and obvious ones. But that's also just like not that is not what like Sowetism was about. You know, it just wasn't.

very much was contextual error. Okay, like Latin America was and is kind of this hyper exploited, primitive economic backwater, you know that's like resource rich in terms of things like agricultural commodities and not really owing to any kind of conspiracy, but gowing definitely to kind of structural design. It remains mired in this kind of primitiveness, you know,

owing to the kind of odd racial dynamics. There's like this incredibly sharp cast distinction, you know, like there's uh like pretty much every kind of cliche that uh, you know, from the Leninists, specifically the Leninist kind of play bulk of history that's described, uh that describes capitalism and punitive terms, you know, is like very is like plainly evident in Latin America. Okay, and again not not for conspiratorial reasons, but for you know, the peculiar and kind of somewhat

tragic heritage of the region. That's why it's it's interesting you raised that. I was reading the Wilton Center, which I think is kind of abominable in a lot of ways,

but their archives are very useful and very interesting. When Bush and Scowcroft Bush forty one obviously, and Baker and Helmet Coal, you know, we're negotiating with Garbagehew, particularly as regarded specifically as you know, the art Tree, but generally, you know, the kind of extancies related to ending the Cold War, something that Coal and Bush and Scowcroft also to Gorrishev was like, look like, however, we leave this, you know, assuming that you know, we can cut terms

on a nuclear weapons, assuming we can come to terms on you know, a basically complete drawdown and forces and being in Europe. You know, he's like, we need your guarantee that your satellites in Latin America are gonna stop exporting revolution, you know. And obviously they couch this in like the language of diplomacy and in the language of of of of American propaganda, you know, like subverting the democracies in Latin America. But this is very much on

their mind, which is fascinating, and this makes sense. But that's that's why. And but there's also I mean, like Latin people's are they're uh, they're they're they're political romantics, man. You know, I'm not saying that like to make fun of them or in a negative way, like quite the contrary. It's like it makes them like effective partisans, you know, so you're gonna you're gonna be able to get You're

gonna be able to get a bunch of Kubanos. There are a bunch of Argentines or a bunch of Salvadorans. You're gonna be able to get them to kind of export the revolution in a way that you wouldn't a bunch of North Koreans. Okay, I mean, let's be honest. I mean it's like all those things. It's like historical as anthropological, it's it's it's cultural, it's dare I say racial? I mean that's why.

vision that they had for world order. Obviously, you know I don't agree with that vision, but there was something noble about it and something both pragmatic and uh and developed about it, the degree to which this was just utterly sabotaged, deliberately thrown in the trash, so that uh, you know, we could have you know, we can have this kind of free for all uh in in these states like Ukraine, and they can be turned against Russia's as these kind of like suicide torpedoes, you know, with

the ultimate purpose in mind of you know, ultimately deteriorating Russia's ability to defend itself from such a text the point that you know it it Russia can be stript of its natural wealth and looted. I mean that's incredibly grotesque, man, Like everything everything about how what developed subsequent term you know, the bush Baker regime is this grotesque. That's the only

word for it. And it really is. It's it's it's it literally is criminal, you know, and that should That's why I get still offended when these idiots like wave these like Ukrainian flags, like like what they're cheering on, Like you're you're you're cheering on destruction and mass homicide literally for no reason, you know, for the profit of a handful of incredibly evil people, you know, like this, the fact that anybody can look at that is like

some good thing or that that's like preferable to like what was accomplished in UH nineteen nine. It's just unconscionable, Okay. And I realized it's a board of ignorance because these people don't know anything, but it's that doesn't make it any less disgusting, you know, And I I behoove people.

I want to do a dedicated Gulf War episode because that that's a that's a natural kind of like bookend to the Cold War, not just like in linear terms, but like in conceptual ones, and that I want people to understand why I defend Bush forty one a lot. I don't defend Bush forty one because I like, I like these fucking Yale assholes, or because like I have something to common with social registered types. I get tired of that too. Like I don't like when people call

me like a quote wasp. It's like, look at me, like, don't be fucking basic. Do I look like a wasp to you? Like, you know, if I wanted to be a wasp, which I don't like, I would never ever be allowed like in their environs. Okay, Like de fact. Uh, you know, yeah, there is like some sort of like tribal commonality between people like me and the bushes, but.

But these guys were motivated by good intentions, you know, at least as much as intentions can be good like

in power political manner. And even if they weren't, I mean, even like let's say let's play Devil's abac and say, oh, there's nothing good about this and like moral terms, but it was, it was incredibly ambitious and it was you know, it was world transforming in a way that is laudable and for it, you know, the the uh, the kind of impactful list of things like that I think is is it represents like a good and its own terms.

And the uh, the fact that that was immediately succeeded by these like you know, by by these conceptual literates and and just you know, like like literal like bandits, you know, say, just just like bandits MAFIOSI, like, you know, just kind of like the lowest of the low, like uh, like kind of human carrion animals, eaters of the dead. Literally. I mean that that's uncomfortable and that's and also it also I mean it forces a question as to what you know, what what I mean you know, people people

fought and waging the Cold War. I'm not talking I'm not talking about these fools in Washington. I mean like regular guys, you know, and this was this was this wasn't the time, and you got you got a draft card, you got forced to do it. You know what we didn't have like this like Dickhead police department for an army, you know, like it was you know, like what basically like all the sacrifices that those guys made, you know, uh, and they were they were a bunch of white Christian

guys mostly. Uh. That was essentially like completely fucking neutralized among everything else by this by this kind of like you know, uh Semitic crusade against you know, Byzantium. But yeah, no, yeah, this was really great. Man.

to code and when they code and are basically accurate. No, the only thing that that that was William Odom's UH A big concern because UH, the only thing that would have stopped that onslaught is UH is theater nuclear weapons, Okay, and to hold UH if to hold UH, to hold warsaw bag armor and say nineteen eighty five in the North German plane and the fold the gap. You know, if you're gonna you're gonna start, You're you had to start hitting them with miss and Pershing Two's okay, And

what would the Soviets do? You know? UH? Would they like? Would they escalate, I mean to counter value with salt? I mean, I don't know. But even if they didn't, it's like, okay, well, now now the Bones Republic is is a nuclear battlefield, you know. I mean that's and that's somewhat pure. But I don't no, I don't think UH, I don't think no. I they War's up Pact would have UH War's up pack would have reached UH what would have reached the Ryan in five to seven days

and UH and and nothing could have stopped them. The the idea was NATO war planning was like late in the game. I'm talking like kind of the final literation of UH of of NATO war gaming was that uh the UH American, UH, British and UH and Benelux UH tankers like the British and the Benelux guys, they were a response for the North German plane like American uh

and like a look like black horses the fold the gap. Basically, they the idea was that if they could hold warsaw pack for seventy two hours, NATO could be rapidly reinforced and uh uh presumably like stage uh you know, a counter offensive that uh you know, under best of circumstances, uh would have been able to hold uh the enemy at the north at the inner German border. But it's

a fascinating question. I highly recommend Russell Stofeley's uh stuff on UH on NATO and he he gained a lot of this stuff with a bunch of former Wehrmacht officers. It's really freaking cool. But yeah, that's a great question, man, I mean, I love that kind of stuff.

real Thomas seven seven seven that substack dot com. Probably most the people who tuned in regularly know that the channel is on track. I uh, I've been apologizing well being kind of inerd lately because I've been I've needed time to get back to people because I was feeling really shitty. But every like we're on track for like production and stuff, and a bunch of a bunch of people been donating to like help explain the process, like

which is awesome. And I mean, like I said, I included the caveat, like if we raise zero dollars that is totally fine. Like nobody should feel obligated to you know, to to to donate, you know, harder in cash, just for the sake like exciting, like content production, like the something is important in this world that we do something is not so important, like our content is not one of those more important things. But like a bunch of people have donated and that is that that's like incredible, man,

and that like that just is dope. But don't anyone ever feel obligated, man, like one hundred percent, Like I'm not just being like gracious, but we're still on burb app. I'm gonna disengage as the summer goes on, but right now, that's right, drop a lot of stuff just kind of like housekeeping stuff as well as like you know, notifying people we're doing. It's real all caps R E A L underscore number seven h m as seven seven seven.

I'm still on t gram. I'm gonna up my t gram game and get more active there, especially as I kind of like slide back from Burbap. I'm on Instagram. I'm TikTok, and TikTok is like fucking retarded, but like a lady friend of mine, like uh uh she had the idea that, like I can make some funny TikTok videos and I'm gonna start like experimenting with that some and she only takes them to like nuke me for

like you know a number of things. But uh, yeah, that's where we're at right now, man, and you know, and then June ninth, uh Unlike some fucking people who will go a named who like organize like really gay events where gay things go on, and they like charge people like fucking half a stack to like go hear about gay stuff like once a year or so, Like I just see if people like convenient shytown to hang out. And like last year, we want to see craft work

and it was fucking awesome. Like this year, we're gonna go see the murder junkies at Reggie's in on the South Loop. If you're gonna like scrounge you up like fifteen dollars and get here, like you can go. It's like fifteen bucks at the door. But uh, a lot of people are are excited about that from what I'm leaning from the feedback. So it's June nights if you want to go, like save the date, And like I said, last year, we had a lot of fun, man, and well will you hang out and stuff too, like before

we enter the show. But that yeah, that's that's all I got man for Mike Flugs.