# Iran–US Ceasefire Deal: Is It Legit? | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

An episode of [The Team House](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1492797340), 25 May 2026, 1 h 05 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/clrtpod.com/m/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/72143596/iran_mou_60_day_spreaker.mp3

The guys break down the proposed Iran ceasefire extension, the Strait of Hormuz crisis, frozen assets, sanctions relief, and whether the war actually left the U.S. or the Iranian people better off. They also dig into Gulf security concerns, Israel and Hezbollah, the political backlash from Iran hawks, and what the conflict means for U.S. military posture in the Pacific. The episode then shifts to Cuba, Tulsi Gabbard’s resignation, the future of ODNI, and Russia’s massive strike on Kyiv — including Ukraine’s air defense performance, Russian hypersonic weapons, and the lack of a strong U.S. response. GhostBed ⬇️ https://www.ghostbed.com/team FOR 10% off! Support the show on Patreon:⬇️ https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse Subscribe to our newsletter!!!! https://teamhousepodcast.kit.com/join Andy's new article:⬇️ https://warontherocks.com/the-operational-case-against-israels-gaza-campaign/ Jack's news outlet:⬇️ https://thehighside.substack.com/ Find Jon Hackett here:⬇️ Jon's Twitter: https://x.com/jonathanhackett Jon's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejonathanhackett Jon's books: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0C5L659N5?ccs_id=e11a2062-f8d3-498e-bfd7-7d2f3869caf6 Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejonathanhackett Twitter: https://x.com/jonathanhackett Check out Mick's new podcast here:⬇️ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/at/podcast/pub-and-porch-applied-stoicism/id1836955475 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1k3QPmkAMwnGJxMLDwUSSd?si=n6piIu8XRcag1Z0K43A3bQ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@UCd0Hq6QFk8CoTu5j-VU0Ong Find Mick Mulroy here: Fogbow ⬇️ https://fogbow.com/ Lobo Institute ⬇️ https://www.loboinstitute.org/ Twitter ⬇️ https://x.com/mickmulroy?s=21&t=-Ze3F_Ix2vlJ18KFvORTCA LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/ Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.social Mick’s publications ⬇️ https://www.loboinstitute.org/publications/publications-of-michael-mick-patrick-mulroy/ Whitefish security summit ⬇️ https://whitefishsecuritysummit.com Find Marc P here: https://x.com/Mpolymer Find Andy Milburn here: Twitter ⬇️ https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8 LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023 Substack ⬇️ https://amilburn.substack.com/ Andy’s book ⬇️ https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-Operations Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.social Find Jason Lyons here: LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?u Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.social "Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio 00:00 — Start / Memorial Day, sacrifices, and the Eyes On crew checks in 02:17 — Iran ceasefire extension, Strait of Hormuz, and the proposed MOU 04:28 — What the U.S. and Iran actually appear to have agreed to 06:44 — Sanctions relief, frozen assets, and the political backlash from Iran hawks 09:19 — Did the Iran war actually leave America better off? 11:20 — Iran’s economy, IRGC resilience, and pressure on ordinary Iranians 13:13 — Gulf states, UAE concerns, and regional support for a ceasefire 15:52 — Lebanon, Hezbollah, Israel, and unresolved ceasefire complications 18:31 — How the Gulf may rethink security after the Iran war 20:27 — Strait of Hormuz tolls, mines, insurance rates, and reopening risks 23:29 — Highly enriched uranium, verbal commitments, and Trump’s political problem 27:21 — Did the U.S. misunderstand the political reality of the war? 29:25 — U.S. military strain, carrier deployments, and risk in the Pacific 31:04 — China, Taiwan, and shifting attention toward Cuba 33:01 — Cuba sanctions, regime pressure, and possible U.S. military options 39:32 — Rubio, Vance, 2028 politics, and the MAGA succession fight 45:30 — Tulsi Gabbard resigns and the future of ODNI 48:32 — Russia’s massive strike on Kyiv and Ukraine’s deep-strike momentum 49:31 — Ukraine’s air defenses, Russian hypersonics, and civilian resilience 56:56 — U.S. silence on Russia’s…

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics.
[0:03] Speaker 1: I fired everybody now it's just Greeks only you know,
[0:06] Speaker 1: I'm just kidding. I'm here with Mark poly Moreoppolis, who
[0:09] Speaker 1: might be joining with a couple of the other guys.
[0:10] Speaker 1: Everyone's traveling. It's Memorial Day weekend. So Happy Memorial Day
[0:14] Speaker 1: to everybody. You know, take a second while you're grilling
[0:17] Speaker 1: or trying to stay away from the rain that's here
[0:18] Speaker 1: in New York to think about why we celebrate it. So,
[0:22] Speaker 1: you know, people that gave up their lives for what
[0:25] Speaker 1: we have and stuff like that from every single war
[0:28] Speaker 1: we've been into. So Happy Memorial Day to everybody. Mark,
[0:32] Speaker 1: how you doing?
[0:33] Speaker 2: I got a nasty cold, But unlike our other colleagues,
[0:36] Speaker 2: I've chosen to join I know podcast today I think
[0:39] Speaker 2: that yeah, the hero move, no, but the great comments
[0:43] Speaker 2: just now about Memorial Day. You know, there's so much
[0:46] Speaker 2: to kind of say about that, but just the idea of,
[0:49] Speaker 2: you know, those who paid the ultimate sacrifice. I think
[0:51] Speaker 2: back to friends and colleagues at CIA who lost their lives.
[0:55] Speaker 2: This is a very difficult day for their families, and
[0:59] Speaker 2: so it's always it's always good to kind of stop,
[1:02] Speaker 2: you know, step back, take a pause. Whatever you're doing
[1:04] Speaker 2: on this weekend, as you said, Grillan, enjoy something you
[1:08] Speaker 2: don't have to mourn. You don't have to you know,
[1:11] Speaker 2: kind of lock yourself in your room. Uh, but do
[1:14] Speaker 2: take a moment to think about those who made the
[1:16] Speaker 2: ultimate sacrifice. And I think, you know, one of the
[1:18] Speaker 2: things when I've I've thought about this in other Memorial
[1:20] Speaker 2: Days and talked to in essence gold Star families and
[1:23] Speaker 2: they actually told me, they said, you know what, enjoy
[1:26] Speaker 2: the day because their son and daughter would have wanted that.
[1:29] Speaker 2: And I thought that was important too. So no, thanks
[1:31] Speaker 2: for thanks for mentioning that. Yeah, of course we got Andy.
[1:35] Speaker 1: Andy Milburn's here, Andy, how are you.
[1:38] Speaker 2: I'm doing peachy.
[1:41] Speaker 3: Love that being on Curious I have a big channels
[1:46] Speaker 3: today speculating the questions they asked about what's going on
[1:53] Speaker 3: in Trump's mind. And I always say, hey, I would
[1:57] Speaker 3: be a I wouldn't be on your damn channel for
[2:00] Speaker 3: a couple of hundred bucks. If I could get inside
[2:03] Speaker 3: Trump's mind, I would be a millionaires.
[2:05] Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, So we said happy Memorial Day and
[2:08] Speaker 1: stuff like that, and for people to take you know,
[2:10] Speaker 1: a little bit of time and actually think about what
[2:12] Speaker 1: it means. And you know, let's I guess get into it.
[2:18] Speaker 1: I mean, Andy's been on you know, Arabic TV for
[2:21] Speaker 1: probably the last couple of days talking about this deal
[2:24] Speaker 1: that was supposed to happen. What is it called the
[2:26] Speaker 1: Memorandum of an Understanding or whatever kind of bullshit they
[2:29] Speaker 1: tag onto it. It was for a sixty day seas
[2:31] Speaker 1: fire extension that would talk about hopefully opening up the
[2:36] Speaker 1: straight of Horror moves, lifting the blockade on the Straight
[2:40] Speaker 1: of horm moves or our Iranian shipping, and obviously stop
[2:44] Speaker 1: the hostilities and also set up a framework to talk
[2:47] Speaker 1: about the nuclear stuff. A lot of stuff's been going
[2:50] Speaker 1: around back and forth on social media. Both sides have
[2:52] Speaker 1: been trying to get there. I guess they're talking points
[2:55] Speaker 1: out there. We don't really know where it's gonna end up.
[2:58] Speaker 1: We all thought it was gonna happen either yesterday or today.
[3:01] Speaker 1: It doesn't seem like it's gonna happen today either. It's
[3:03] Speaker 1: going to take a few other few extra days. There
[3:06] Speaker 1: was some mention about like how the new Supreme leaders
[3:09] Speaker 1: like the method of communication is like takes a while
[3:13] Speaker 1: because he's obviously not picking up his cell phone to
[3:16] Speaker 1: avoid you know, getting fucking catching a jay dam or whatever.
[3:21] Speaker 1: So here we are speculating again. Everyone's spinning the neo
[3:25] Speaker 1: cons on the right or freaking out because you know,
[3:28] Speaker 1: they just want to blow things up at all times.
[3:31] Speaker 1: And you know, it's just my two cents is like,
[3:37] Speaker 1: what's happened in the straight up in the Iran over
[3:39] Speaker 1: the last two and a half months is a nightmare.
[3:42] Speaker 1: We're the same situation and same like basic you know,
[3:47] Speaker 1: aspects that we had about a deal or possible deal
[3:50] Speaker 1: on February twenty seventh and today or it's a different reality.
[3:54] Speaker 1: So I think people need to understand that before they
[3:56] Speaker 1: start popping off, that we're living in a different world
[3:59] Speaker 1: than two and a half months ago. So you boys
[4:02] Speaker 1: mud wrestle over, who wants to go first?
[4:05] Speaker 2: Go ahead? Eddie?
[4:07] Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I you know, obviously, point out front
[4:10] Speaker 3: is the gap between President Trump's framing of this and
[4:15] Speaker 3: Iran's version. That's the story that's that's got headway here
[4:21] Speaker 3: in the in the Middle East and probably around the world. Right,
[4:25] Speaker 3: So the headline is a deal is largely negotiated, but
[4:30] Speaker 3: of course the devil's in the details, right, and that
[4:33] Speaker 3: and the devil in this case is on is in
[4:36] Speaker 3: what has each side actually agreed to so far, and
[4:40] Speaker 3: as you pointed out, not a lot, all right, So
[4:44] Speaker 3: you know, they've they've agreed to the they've they've agreed
[4:49] Speaker 3: to talk basically. Now, Iran's made some substantive agreement subfront.
[4:55] Speaker 3: We haven't seen movement on that to open the streets
[4:57] Speaker 3: of hor moose right. Washington says Tehran has committed to
[5:03] Speaker 3: surrendering its highly enriched uranium stockpile. Turan says that it
[5:08] Speaker 3: said nothing about the nuclear program at all, and that
[5:11] Speaker 3: all of that's going to be negotiated in the next
[5:14] Speaker 3: sixty days. So there's certainly contradiction so far in the
[5:20] Speaker 3: detail of what actually has been agreed. So sixty day framework,
[5:27] Speaker 3: Iaran opens us straight and clear's minds. That's my understanding.
[5:31] Speaker 3: They've agreed to that the US lifts the naval blockade. Okay,
[5:35] Speaker 3: that's a significant agreement, and holds out twenty five billion
[5:41] Speaker 3: dollars in frozen assets. Okay, we haven't said the US
[5:45] Speaker 3: hasn't said that's going to be released, but they say
[5:48] Speaker 3: that's going to be part of the negotiation. But all
[5:52] Speaker 3: the hard questions, you know, En Richmond, sanctions, regional proxies,
[5:58] Speaker 3: ballistic missile all of that has been deferred. So really,
[6:03] Speaker 3: I mean it's both sides have an incentive not to
[6:08] Speaker 3: go back to war. That's clear. Neither side wants to
[6:11] Speaker 3: go back to war. I think that is clear too,
[6:13] Speaker 3: despite all the chest beating and this MOOU buys time,
[6:17] Speaker 3: but it doesn't hasn't resolved to conflict.
[6:20] Speaker 2: Yeah, I would Andy. I think that's a good synopsis
[6:22] Speaker 2: of what we know so far. And of course everybody
[6:25] Speaker 2: kind of is watching social media, you know, religiously on
[6:28] Speaker 2: what gets released by you know what kind of the
[6:31] Speaker 2: dribs and drabs of the details. I think you know.
[6:34] Speaker 2: A way to also frame it is that it's not
[6:36] Speaker 2: actually a deal. It's just it's an extension of the ceasefire,
[6:40] Speaker 2: and you're kicking the can down the road to then
[6:42] Speaker 2: talk about what could be in a deal. The one
[6:46] Speaker 2: thing I think we should focus on, and I'll go
[6:49] Speaker 2: over kind of something I just I think I sent
[6:51] Speaker 2: to you guys earlier. I think there's a lot of
[6:52] Speaker 2: questions that have to be answered big picture, but the
[6:56] Speaker 2: thing to focus on is that sanctions relief, the twenty
[6:59] Speaker 2: five billion, whether it's release of funds. You know, however,
[7:03] Speaker 2: the Iranians get a hold of that, that's a really
[7:05] Speaker 2: big deal because that's stuff that can't be taken back,
[7:08] Speaker 2: that you can't bomb that back. The Irunian economy is
[7:12] Speaker 2: in a disastrous straight state. And one of the things
[7:15] Speaker 2: that the US did have and really you know, the
[7:18] Speaker 2: Allies if you want to call it, that did have
[7:20] Speaker 2: his leverage in terms of the deteriorating Iranian economy with
[7:25] Speaker 2: the notion they can't pay their soldiers on employments, up inflation, everything,
[7:30] Speaker 2: twenty five billion is a lifeline the regime. So I
[7:33] Speaker 2: think that that that to me is one one kind
[7:36] Speaker 2: of aspect of this that really has to be looked
[7:38] Speaker 2: at closely. The other thing, d you you mentioned it,
[7:43] Speaker 2: uh in the in the opening, is the kind of
[7:45] Speaker 2: the apocalyptic meltdown from kind of the pro war crowd
[7:49] Speaker 2: on on social media or on the hill. I mean,
[7:53] Speaker 2: you have everybody from kind of the current crew, from
[7:56] Speaker 2: the kind of the pro Israel think tanks like Freedom
[7:59] Speaker 2: Defensive Democracies and to Mike Pompeio, to Hugh hewittt Lindsey Graham,
[8:04] Speaker 2: Ted Cruz, uh, you know, and that that goes to
[8:07] Speaker 2: kind of the kind of the GOP hawks on in politics,
[8:11] Speaker 2: who are who are melting really melting down? And I
[8:14] Speaker 2: wonder if uh, this is having an effect on Trump.
[8:18] Speaker 2: He pushed back, I just saw now on true Social
[8:21] Speaker 2: with something his his kind of really odd looking human
[8:27] Speaker 2: uh communications director uh in this kind of really kind
[8:32] Speaker 2: of wretched post back to Mike Pompei, a former CI
[8:35] Speaker 2: director and Secretary of State, telling him to shut the
[8:36] Speaker 2: fuck up.
[8:38] Speaker 4: Uh.
[8:39] Speaker 2: You know. So so this this is going to have
[8:40] Speaker 2: some kind of effects. So it's it's gonna be interesting
[8:42] Speaker 2: to see if, as you know, Barack Revied of Axios
[8:45] Speaker 2: has just reported that a deal won't be signed today,
[8:48] Speaker 2: there's still some outstanding items. Does does Trump start backtracking
[8:51] Speaker 2: after this opposition? I don't know the answer to that,
[8:54] Speaker 2: But what I think we should do is kind of
[8:57] Speaker 2: and and maybe it's a little early because we don't
[8:58] Speaker 2: know the details, but you know, you do have to
[9:00] Speaker 2: ask kind of the big picture questions. You know, are
[9:03] Speaker 2: we in the United States? You know, those of us
[9:05] Speaker 2: who do care, and I think everyone here is in
[9:07] Speaker 2: that camp. The strategies might might differ from the administration,
[9:11] Speaker 2: but we do want to constrain the Iranians. The Iranians
[9:13] Speaker 2: are enemy of the United States. But are we better
[9:17] Speaker 2: off right now after after the war? You know? And
[9:22] Speaker 2: and you know, you can go down the road. You know,
[9:24] Speaker 2: is the Iranian nuclear program been diminished eliminated? Well, you know,
[9:31] Speaker 2: I think that remains to be seen. But I think
[9:32] Speaker 2: the pretty easy answer is no. The ballistic missile and
[9:35] Speaker 2: drone inventory has it been damaged? Sure, but is it gone?
[9:38] Speaker 2: The answer is no. Uh, you know, is a is
[9:42] Speaker 2: a regime in Iran that's going to be more amenable
[9:44] Speaker 2: to feature negotiations in place? Or is it more hard line?
[9:48] Speaker 2: Looks like it's pretty hard line. And then kind of
[9:51] Speaker 2: the biggest thing for me, And I'm still one of
[9:53] Speaker 2: these kind of you know, believers in the notion of
[9:55] Speaker 2: America is the bright, shining city on the hill, although
[9:57] Speaker 2: we don't always act that way. Is the idea if
[10:00] Speaker 2: Trump promised the Iranians, remember back, I think in January
[10:03] Speaker 2: that help was on its way. So are the Iranian
[10:05] Speaker 2: people better off now? And I think the answer to
[10:07] Speaker 2: that is an unequifical no, especially if we give a
[10:09] Speaker 2: lifeline to the regime. Remember, there was an idea and
[10:13] Speaker 2: I actually subscribe to this. If we had done nothing
[10:16] Speaker 2: and not started this war, there are protests on the street.
[10:19] Speaker 2: The crackdown was terrible, but the Iranian economy was in
[10:21] Speaker 2: such a place in the popularity of the regime was
[10:23] Speaker 2: at an all time low. There could have been organically,
[10:26] Speaker 2: over the next year or two, collapse of the regime.
[10:28] Speaker 2: But have we, by you know, ironically enough, by starting
[10:32] Speaker 2: this war and now giving the hardliners a lifeline? Have
[10:35] Speaker 2: we kind of now are we in a position in
[10:38] Speaker 2: which the regime is strengthened and will live longer, and
[10:40] Speaker 2: that is not good for the Iranian people. And I
[10:42] Speaker 2: think these are you know, I'm trying to be as
[10:44] Speaker 2: kind of nonpartisan as possible. These are questions that one
[10:47] Speaker 2: should ask, you know, are we collectively and then the
[10:51] Speaker 2: Iranian people better off at this point? And I'm not
[10:53] Speaker 2: sure the answer is a good one. Yeah, that's a
[10:56] Speaker 2: good point.
[10:57] Speaker 3: And you know, if we had John Hackett on he
[11:01] Speaker 3: points out, and this is backed up across across the
[11:07] Speaker 3: you know, the more intellectual media outlets.
[11:10] Speaker 2: The fact that.
[11:11] Speaker 3: The ILGC has isolated itself from the Iranian economy, if
[11:19] Speaker 3: that makes sense, it is so, it has so many
[11:22] Speaker 3: tentacles out and is has has money and businesses and
[11:30] Speaker 3: interests both overseas and within Iran that that that have
[11:35] Speaker 3: proved to be resilient, in fact even bolstered by the war.
[11:40] Speaker 3: So you've got this dichotomy.
[11:44] Speaker 2: How do you like that?
[11:44] Speaker 3: D all right between? You know, the fact Iran itself
[11:50] Speaker 3: is suffering widespread layoffs, the people are suffering skyrocketing inflation,
[11:56] Speaker 3: medicine gasoline prices shooting up. Infrastructured doubt, infrastructure damage has
[12:01] Speaker 3: made it about three hundred billion. Remember a lot of
[12:04] Speaker 3: that is dual use of civilian infrastructure. You've got reports
[12:10] Speaker 3: of ordinary Iranians stockpiling water and batteries anticipating a new
[12:16] Speaker 3: round of strikes. And it's hard to say whether that
[12:22] Speaker 3: is bringing pressure to bear on the regime. I you know,
[12:25] Speaker 3: to to Mark's point, the regime seems to be bolstered
[12:32] Speaker 3: and even more isolated from the effects on not just
[12:38] Speaker 3: the economy but kind of the popular opinion than it
[12:43] Speaker 3: was before, which is not a good thing from anyone's
[12:46] Speaker 3: point of view. You know, Regardless, the twenty five billion
[12:51] Speaker 3: dollars in unfrozen assets is almost I mean, as far
[12:57] Speaker 3: as the Iranian economy is concerned, and the existential necessity,
[13:03] Speaker 3: and so perhaps that is indeed, I mean, that's certainly
[13:07] Speaker 3: a strong incentive for Iran to be at the negotiation table.
[13:11] Speaker 3: But yeah, I would absolutely agree with marks mark summary.
[13:15] Speaker 3: I mean, we are not noticeably we United States US
[13:19] Speaker 3: interests certainly not. The global economy is in no better
[13:24] Speaker 3: shape than it was before, and the Iranian people are
[13:27] Speaker 3: significantly worse off. I was interested, you know, from where
[13:32] Speaker 3: I am in the Middle East, there is there is
[13:36] Speaker 3: strong GCC support for the memorandum, but they want security
[13:44] Speaker 3: assurances from the United States going ahead, you know, I mean,
[13:48] Speaker 3: especially from the UAE, which is born the brunt of
[13:53] Speaker 3: Iran's attacks during the war. And you'll notice on on
[13:59] Speaker 3: social media shows clips from Iran state television of shooting
[14:04] Speaker 3: missiles into a UAE flag and it's kind of an
[14:09] Speaker 3: implicit threat. Right, So u AE is there no shrinking violets, certainly,
[14:17] Speaker 3: but they are they or all the golf countries or
[14:21] Speaker 3: certainly benefit from a peace proposal. They're the the fact
[14:26] Speaker 3: that the straits are closed that hitting them very strongly,
[14:30] Speaker 3: all of them. You know, whatever you may read about
[14:32] Speaker 3: by the gas lines, bypassing, you know, across the board
[14:37] Speaker 3: it's not just oil, it's helium, it's LNG and and
[14:42] Speaker 3: and they're they're feeling it the bite economically they want
[14:46] Speaker 3: Trump to agree to the m ou I would say
[14:49] Speaker 3: the only sticking point probably Israel and a and a
[14:53] Speaker 3: sticking point that I don't know if it could derail
[14:56] Speaker 3: peace talks going ahead, aside from all the other things
[14:59] Speaker 3: that we talked about. That's not being sold it out.
[15:02] Speaker 3: But what is happening in Lebanon. You know, Lebanon hasn't
[15:05] Speaker 3: been brought into the terms so the ceasefire, but potentially Ron,
[15:12] Speaker 3: who knows, Ron may may take a May may try
[15:18] Speaker 3: and bring the Lebanon in and it's unlikely that the
[15:21] Speaker 3: Israeli is going to agree to cease shellacking his balla
[15:25] Speaker 3: as terms, So this ceasefire we'll see.
[15:28] Speaker 2: My understanding is that Lebanon was brought in at least
[15:31] Speaker 2: second tier, like at least the second tier in terms
[15:34] Speaker 2: of like what they're on. And that's why the Israelis
[15:36] Speaker 2: are upset about this because that's kind of a no
[15:38] Speaker 2: go for that.
[15:39] Speaker 3: Yeah, that's that's a that's a buzz of development.
[15:44] Speaker 1: Your mattress is one of those things you don't think
[15:45] Speaker 1: about until it's too late, so you're waking up with
[15:48] Speaker 1: aches and pains and realizing you've been sleeping on a
[15:50] Speaker 1: problem for years. Today's sponsored gost bed is here to
[15:53] Speaker 1: change that, and with the summer coming, there's one more
[15:56] Speaker 1: thing worth thinking about sleeping hot. If you ever woken
[15:59] Speaker 1: up in the night overheated and uncomfortable, you know how
[16:02] Speaker 1: much of rexis sleep. Most mattresses trap heat. Goostped is
[16:06] Speaker 1: built specifically to prevent that. It's built different. Baby, I
[16:10] Speaker 1: had a go I've had a gosped mattress now for
[16:12] Speaker 1: probably like ten months. I love it. It's freaking awesome. Uh.
[16:17] Speaker 1: I have the cooling thing definitely keeps it cool compared
[16:20] Speaker 1: to my old mattress.
[16:21] Speaker 2: I love it.
[16:21] Speaker 1: I'm so happy I have it, and I'm so happy
[16:23] Speaker 1: that they sponsor this show. Every mattress in the Ghostbed
[16:26] Speaker 1: lineup comes with cooling technology built right in, not an
[16:29] Speaker 1: upgrade you pay extra for. It's part of how every
[16:31] Speaker 1: mattress is designed, from their entry level comfort all the
[16:35] Speaker 1: way up to the Lux. I have the Lux, by
[16:36] Speaker 1: the way, because I'm fancy, which features their most and
[16:40] Speaker 1: the Lux features their most advanced cooling system. And if
[16:43] Speaker 1: you're not sure which one is right for you had
[16:45] Speaker 1: to go sped dot com slash team and take their
[16:48] Speaker 1: mattress quiz. A few questions and you get a personalized
[16:50] Speaker 1: mattress recommendation, fast free shipping, and one hundred and one
[16:54] Speaker 1: nights to try it out. If it's not the right fit,
[16:57] Speaker 1: you get your money back. Simple, easy, psy baby. Right now,
[17:00] Speaker 1: you can take advantage of memory pricing and Code Team
[17:03] Speaker 1: gets you an extra ten percent off when you upgrade
[17:05] Speaker 1: your sleep and ghost Spread the makers of the coolest
[17:08] Speaker 1: beds in the world.
[17:10] Speaker 2: Go get some.
[17:11] Speaker 1: I love gospad that's gosped dot com slash team and
[17:14] Speaker 1: use the Code Team t E a M for an
[17:17] Speaker 1: extra ten percent off side wide. Thank you guys for
[17:20] Speaker 1: supporting the show, and thanks Ghostpad for supporting the show.
[17:22] Speaker 1: Love you bye, and so you know that.
[17:25] Speaker 2: But but I think that well, there's a couple of
[17:26] Speaker 2: things Andy, I want to ask you. One is I
[17:29] Speaker 2: agree that the GCC countries wanted this to end. Uh uh.
[17:34] Speaker 2: We can talk about Israeli politics and how this affects
[17:36] Speaker 2: the you know, upcoming Israeli elections, because I think it will.
[17:41] Speaker 2: But but the I think you raise something about security
[17:44] Speaker 2: guarantees and I think there is, and you're there in
[17:47] Speaker 2: the region, although you never tell us exactly where you are.
[17:50] Speaker 2: It's very mysterious, but you're there in the region. And
[17:52] Speaker 2: so I think that that everything I've read and correct
[17:55] Speaker 2: me if I'm wrong, that there is going to be
[17:56] Speaker 2: a reassessment country by country on what to do about
[18:00] Speaker 2: with the Iranians. For example, it looks like the Saudis
[18:02] Speaker 2: are more interested in some type of or the Omanis
[18:06] Speaker 2: as well as some type of kind of of I
[18:09] Speaker 2: don't know, non aggression packed with with Iran. But the UAE,
[18:13] Speaker 2: of course, who has gotten totally in bed with the Israelis,
[18:17] Speaker 2: and you can you know, you can say that that
[18:18] Speaker 2: that that might have been smart or not, but they
[18:22] Speaker 2: probably feel differently. And so I think each country, I
[18:24] Speaker 2: mean the u A when that, you know, when you
[18:26] Speaker 2: pull out of out of Opek, I think each country
[18:31] Speaker 2: is going to kind of reassess where they are in
[18:33] Speaker 2: terms of how to counter the Iranian threat. And uh,
[18:36] Speaker 2: you know, you have countries like Oman and others that
[18:38] Speaker 2: might cozy up to Iran. Again, the u A won't.
[18:42] Speaker 2: Saudi's may Uh, there's the Saudi Pakistani kind of UH
[18:46] Speaker 2: cooperation agreement where you have the Pakistani military there just
[18:50] Speaker 2: so it's it's it's you know, is this you know?
[18:53] Speaker 2: I guess the question for you is, you know, do
[18:55] Speaker 2: we need to have a discussion on kind of the
[18:57] Speaker 2: fundamental rearrangement of some security relationships? And in many of these,
[19:02] Speaker 2: I think the United States does not come out on top.
[19:05] Speaker 2: I think countries may choose to go at it alone
[19:07] Speaker 2: because we did start this war, and while they wanted
[19:12] Speaker 2: us to end this now because of the straight up
[19:14] Speaker 2: our moves obviously and the damage to the economies, I
[19:18] Speaker 2: also think they probably have the notion that we did
[19:22] Speaker 2: not finish it. And so you know, Lee, you know,
[19:25] Speaker 2: you might have talked about this before Andy in a
[19:27] Speaker 2: previous podcast. You know, you poke a bear or you
[19:29] Speaker 2: kick a bear in the nuts? Did you say this
[19:31] Speaker 2: or maybe someone else did you kick a bear in
[19:33] Speaker 2: the nuts? You better finish that bear off or it's
[19:36] Speaker 2: gonna be angry. And so, you know, do you think
[19:38] Speaker 2: there's a kind of a discussions going on in the
[19:41] Speaker 2: halls of various foreign ministries and National security councils and
[19:44] Speaker 2: the GCC countries on Okay, what do we do next? Yeah?
[19:48] Speaker 3: Undoubtedly, I mean it's hard to tell exactly what's happening
[19:53] Speaker 3: from social media, but I can I can say certainly
[19:56] Speaker 3: that that the US has lost cre ability in the region,
[20:01] Speaker 3: you know, and that may be an understatement. And you know,
[20:05] Speaker 3: in in the media was the fact that the Arab
[20:07] Speaker 3: leaders called Trump on Saturday to express support for the
[20:10] Speaker 3: m OU. I mean, that's undoubtedly true. But at the
[20:15] Speaker 3: same time, I don't think there's a good deal of
[20:19] Speaker 3: confidence that the that they will be protected from the
[20:22] Speaker 3: consequences of whatever happens. Yet you mentioned UAE leaving Opek,
[20:29] Speaker 3: discussions about UAE leaving the Arab League, you know, and
[20:34] Speaker 3: so you're seeing a kind of a breakdown of cohesion too.
[20:38] Speaker 3: That is not good news for US interests. Discussions perhaps
[20:43] Speaker 3: of bilateral agreements, as you pointed out, that don't involve
[20:47] Speaker 3: the United States. So for now, Golf States are backing diplomacy.
[20:52] Speaker 3: But but they're going to be watching closely, and they
[20:56] Speaker 3: certainly are going to maneuvering to to get secure assurances
[21:01] Speaker 3: or ensure that security assurances are embedded in any final
[21:05] Speaker 3: agreement coming from from Iran, not just from the United States.
[21:09] Speaker 1: Now, what happens if it comes out and they're you know,
[21:12] Speaker 1: the Memorandum of Understanding for the sixty day extension has
[21:16] Speaker 1: some language in there where the straighth Hord moves is open,
[21:19] Speaker 1: but it's under the because they've been taught guys of
[21:23] Speaker 1: like you know, Iran and the surrounding countries are essentially
[21:26] Speaker 1: taking a toll and splitting it between themselves. I mean,
[21:32] Speaker 1: how is that. Have you guys heard anything about the
[21:36] Speaker 1: GCC countries being okay with that, because I know they
[21:38] Speaker 1: just want us to open up the straits so that
[21:39] Speaker 1: you start getting some money.
[21:40] Speaker 3: But I think it's so so first of all, from
[21:44] Speaker 3: the US perspective, it's surprising because we I think, you know,
[21:48] Speaker 3: on this show, we've talked about the fact that the
[21:51] Speaker 3: US will never agree to tolls, and in fact the President
[21:54] Speaker 3: himself has said that. But I think we're seeing a
[21:56] Speaker 3: weakening of that position. And there's news I was reading
[22:01] Speaker 3: today that the tolls may be portrayed all right, because perception,
[22:09] Speaker 3: perception is a big deal in the Middle East, but
[22:11] Speaker 3: they may be presented as being an environmental thing, right,
[22:17] Speaker 3: this is an environmental toll for cleanup that we're paying.
[22:21] Speaker 2: A fee exactly.
[22:24] Speaker 3: Yeah, And there's talk about you know, obviously Oman as
[22:29] Speaker 3: well as Iran being recipients, which would of course be
[22:32] Speaker 3: good for Omard. So I think I think there's going
[22:36] Speaker 3: to be some negotiation room for negotiation on that. To
[22:40] Speaker 3: answer your point, B, I don't think the golf countries
[22:43] Speaker 3: would be against that as long as these It depends
[22:47] Speaker 3: on what the tolls are, how prohibitive they are, if
[22:49] Speaker 3: they if they're prohibitively high and they slow down commercial
[22:53] Speaker 3: traffic and they change the economic calculus of exporting oil
[22:59] Speaker 3: father rates, and that's going to be absolutely a no go.
[23:07] Speaker 3: But the the the offer by Iron too to open
[23:12] Speaker 3: the strates to clear minds that it's already deployed and
[23:17] Speaker 3: mind clearings technically there's you know, complex, time consuming can't
[23:22] Speaker 3: happen overnight. But but it does mean that any reopening
[23:27] Speaker 3: is going to be gradual. There's not going to be instantaneous.
[23:30] Speaker 3: I mean, obviously we'll see the stock market shoot up
[23:32] Speaker 3: because the stock market's being kind of separated from reality, right,
[23:38] Speaker 3: but you know, we're not going to see an instant
[23:41] Speaker 3: relief for pressure on the global economy. Reopening is going
[23:44] Speaker 3: to be gradual, uh. And there's a real risk of
[23:47] Speaker 3: accidents and the end insurance rates are going to come
[23:50] Speaker 3: aren't going to come down right away either, So you
[23:55] Speaker 3: know there's a practical military trip wire embedded in the
[23:58] Speaker 3: diplomatic process of of of miscalculation, of mind strike some
[24:07] Speaker 3: you know, errant, I R not not rogue, but but
[24:11] Speaker 3: we've seen how decentralized the IRGC has become, but isolated incidents,
[24:16] Speaker 3: the Iranians still have hundreds, you know, I've seen estimates
[24:20] Speaker 3: of four hundred fast attack boats still out there. So
[24:27] Speaker 3: you know, there's certainly there's certainly room. The risk is
[24:31] Speaker 3: still there, and that's going to mean that insurance rates
[24:34] Speaker 3: are going to remain high, and so the effect on
[24:37] Speaker 3: the globe economy is still going to be severe, regardless
[24:40] Speaker 3: of outcome.
[24:42] Speaker 2: One of the things that's really interesting is this notion,
[24:44] Speaker 2: you know, of what to do about the highly enriched
[24:47] Speaker 2: uranium and apparently the Iranians and this is rather incredible
[24:54] Speaker 2: if you think about this, that the years we would
[24:56] Speaker 2: accept this. Trump keeps claiming in public. I think the
[24:59] Speaker 2: New York Times reported that the Iranians have given a
[25:02] Speaker 2: verbal commitment to allow to leave the country. A verbal commitment.
[25:07] Speaker 2: I mean that that to me is rather extraordinary, that
[25:09] Speaker 2: that that's what we're going to go on the Iranians,
[25:12] Speaker 2: who are master negotiators, as the old adage. You know,
[25:14] Speaker 2: they've never won a war, they never lost in negotiation.
[25:17] Speaker 2: They probably have well they don't drink necessarily, but they're
[25:20] Speaker 2: popping champagne corks. If the idea that the US would
[25:23] Speaker 2: actually be okay with this just a verbal agreement from
[25:27] Speaker 2: the Iranians, to me, is is quite amazing. And to
[25:30] Speaker 2: choose perhaps the desperation the Trump administration wants that they
[25:33] Speaker 2: want an agreement, I think, you know, one of the
[25:36] Speaker 2: things that's really interesting again as I'm sitting here right
[25:38] Speaker 2: outside Washington, d C. Is you know how politically disastrous
[25:42] Speaker 2: is this going to be for the president? And you know,
[25:46] Speaker 2: because at the end of you know, I don't like
[25:48] Speaker 2: the idea and I don't subscribe the idea that the
[25:50] Speaker 2: US lost this war. That's such a strange, simplistic thing.
[25:53] Speaker 2: I mean, the US military put a beating on the Iranians,
[25:56] Speaker 2: and so you know, to say that that's kind of
[25:59] Speaker 2: a weird kind of one liner that but and and
[26:02] Speaker 2: of course all conflict ends. It's very murky. Even when
[26:05] Speaker 2: the US can do really well in something, it's always
[26:08] Speaker 2: there's always trade offs, it's always kind of messy. Uh So,
[26:12] Speaker 2: but the idea that the US lost this war, that
[26:15] Speaker 2: doesn't make all that much sense. But they certainly didn't
[26:19] Speaker 2: certainly didn't win. Uh And and so you know, how
[26:23] Speaker 2: how kind of the Trump and kind of his accolytes
[26:27] Speaker 2: deal with this is going to be quite interesting. And
[26:30] Speaker 2: you know, at a time where you know, is his
[26:35] Speaker 2: approval ratings are an all time low, the economy is
[26:38] Speaker 2: a mess. Uh And, and you have so many Republicans
[26:42] Speaker 2: on record having kind of supported the maximalist demands. It's
[26:46] Speaker 2: it's going to be interesting to see all these people
[26:48] Speaker 2: d that we just talked about who were kind of
[26:51] Speaker 2: over the last twenty four hours hammering the administration for this.
[26:53] Speaker 2: Are they actually going to come around or not? Uh
[26:56] Speaker 2: you know Bill Crystal, who you know had a bulwark
[26:59] Speaker 2: for you know, former neo con We've become a very
[27:02] Speaker 2: strong trunk critic. I think said something right. He said,
[27:04] Speaker 2: you know it's going to happen. Wait to see the
[27:06] Speaker 2: next couple of days. You're going to see all these
[27:08] Speaker 2: people hammering Trump. His allies are going to come around
[27:11] Speaker 2: and they'll try to somehow get behind this, this this agreement.
[27:14] Speaker 2: But politically how this you know, that's going to be
[27:16] Speaker 2: the dominant theme in DC over the next couple of
[27:18] Speaker 2: days is how this is played just because you know,
[27:22] Speaker 2: we are are maximalist demands. You know, we're not met
[27:25] Speaker 2: now sometimes they never are, but it looks like it's
[27:28] Speaker 2: not even close again. And I'm not sure it's helpful
[27:31] Speaker 2: for the Democrats to say to start screaming the US
[27:34] Speaker 2: lost this war. I mean that's just not true. But
[27:36] Speaker 2: we didn't win it, and it became a just a
[27:39] Speaker 2: giant economic disaster and perhaps a strategic mess too, So
[27:44] Speaker 2: it'll be politically it's going to be very interesting to
[27:46] Speaker 2: see in the next couple of days.
[27:47] Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, strategically, we haven't accomplished any of our
[27:51] Speaker 1: goals at all. I feel like we've taken step back
[27:54] Speaker 1: steps back from that. So you could technically, you know,
[28:00] Speaker 1: arguably say that we did lose this. I mean, especially
[28:04] Speaker 1: for people that are like not paying attention to this
[28:06] Speaker 1: day to day and like hour to hour, like maniacs
[28:09] Speaker 1: like us do, it does not look good. And another
[28:14] Speaker 1: like just a dovetail like back to your point about
[28:16] Speaker 1: like the neo cons, Yeah, that would mean they need
[28:19] Speaker 1: to show courage and they don't do that ever. They're
[28:23] Speaker 1: gonna fall back in line like good little boys and
[28:26] Speaker 1: girls like they're supposed to do. It's I mean, that's
[28:30] Speaker 1: the easy. I wish they could bet down on polymarket.
[28:32] Speaker 1: I'd make a fucking boatload.
[28:34] Speaker 3: The the you know, the the who won the Wall thing?
[28:39] Speaker 3: Probably too early to be resolved, but it's certainly true that.
[28:44] Speaker 3: I mean, it's pretty that that we didn't display a
[28:48] Speaker 3: good understanding of flou switz, right. You know, we we
[28:51] Speaker 3: attrited the Iranians, but the war turned on a different pivot.
[28:57] Speaker 3: The war ended up being about economic pressure, leverage, straits
[29:01] Speaker 3: of hor moves, and to a certain extent, it ended
[29:05] Speaker 3: up about being global perception and America's standing and credibility.
[29:10] Speaker 3: And it would be hard to argue that we were
[29:14] Speaker 3: successful in those two areas. Again, we'll see how the
[29:17] Speaker 3: negotiations work out, but it's there is a good argument
[29:22] Speaker 3: to say that although we attrited Iran's military military capability,
[29:30] Speaker 3: we didn't destroy it, That we misunderstood the political context
[29:36] Speaker 3: of the war and in that sense did not achieve success.
[29:39] Speaker 3: And we've got a problem, I mean, not a problem
[29:41] Speaker 3: as well, Yeah, it is a problem. I mean, we
[29:44] Speaker 3: are investment right now, as far as military is just
[29:48] Speaker 3: massive right now, and that's an open question what we're
[29:51] Speaker 3: going to do. We have to, we have to retain
[29:55] Speaker 3: them there for a while, and that's a significant cost.
[29:59] Speaker 3: We've got three aircraft carriers now in the Middle East.
[30:03] Speaker 3: That's the first time that's happened in right since the
[30:07] Speaker 3: beginning of the Iraq War twenty three years ago. Twelve
[30:10] Speaker 3: accompanying ships and those in those carrier groups there's that's
[30:18] Speaker 3: three aircraft carrier's like two hundred aircraft alone assigned to
[30:22] Speaker 3: the carriers. Then fifteen thousand additional personnel just with the
[30:28] Speaker 3: carrier groups. I mean, it's massive naval force. And it's
[30:33] Speaker 3: forty one percent of all US Navy ships. I don't
[30:36] Speaker 3: know who worked out the one percent on that, but
[30:39] Speaker 3: so forty one percent of the entire US Navy right
[30:42] Speaker 3: now deployed worldwide in this one region. It's a great
[30:45] Speaker 3: time to invade Taiwan, isn't it. I don't think that
[30:50] Speaker 3: we can sustain this posture in definitely without cost to
[30:53] Speaker 3: other commitments and now mentioned Taiwan, I mean Pacific. I
[30:57] Speaker 3: know we don't care about NATO, but NATO's eastern flank.
[31:01] Speaker 3: So but the deal gives gives Trump a face saving
[31:04] Speaker 3: way to begin drawing down without appearing to retreat. All right, yeah,
[31:12] Speaker 3: I mean they so. So although the US economy has
[31:17] Speaker 3: been relatively isolated compared to the economies of the rest
[31:21] Speaker 3: of the world, UH, that won't last for long. And
[31:24] Speaker 3: we talked here about the second order effects of UH,
[31:29] Speaker 3: you know, fertilizer of shortage of helium. It isn't all
[31:32] Speaker 3: about oil and UH and and so that that also
[31:39] Speaker 3: is UH is pressure down the road that's already already
[31:43] Speaker 3: gathering momentum. So it's you know, light or Heart b F.
[31:50] Speaker 3: Lit Or Heart, who was a British strategist, was a
[31:55] Speaker 3: former British Army officer. He famously said, the object to war,
[32:00] Speaker 3: as in the purpose of war, is to attain a
[32:03] Speaker 3: better piece right for those involved, for those who initiate
[32:08] Speaker 3: the war go to war. It's hard to argue that
[32:12] Speaker 3: right now we're in a better peace right than we
[32:14] Speaker 3: were before the war.
[32:16] Speaker 2: And that's the thing that's going to have to be
[32:18] Speaker 2: kind of resolved when we see the MoU and what
[32:21] Speaker 2: kind of transpires. But Andy, you bring up a really
[32:23] Speaker 2: interesting point because you know it, you know, the world
[32:26] Speaker 2: doesn't stop. We have the issue in the Pacific. In
[32:30] Speaker 2: terms of China. You know, Trump went for a summit
[32:33] Speaker 2: with gi in Beijing. I think it achieved nothing. But
[32:36] Speaker 2: there's you know, the at least before this current national
[32:39] Speaker 2: security strategy kind of China was the long term pacing
[32:42] Speaker 2: threat and the biggest concern we had in US national
[32:45] Speaker 2: security strategy was the Pacific, a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
[32:49] Speaker 2: And if you take a look at the ordinance expended
[32:52] Speaker 2: in our military, I'm not sure we're even remotely capable
[32:55] Speaker 2: of doing anything now with an administration that I think,
[32:58] Speaker 2: I'm not sure we'd even react, and our allies in
[33:00] Speaker 2: the Pacific know this. But let's let's switch to the
[33:03] Speaker 2: actually the next near term conflict, which is Cuba. We
[33:07] Speaker 2: had we do have a carrier uh uh you know
[33:10] Speaker 2: uh within the vicinity of Cuba now. And it's clear
[33:14] Speaker 2: that to me, at least that you know, Trump has
[33:17] Speaker 2: been laying hints all this about this NonStop. Marco Rubio
[33:20] Speaker 2: has as well. It's you know, there there's the idea
[33:23] Speaker 2: that Trump wanted to take care of three issues in
[33:25] Speaker 2: his second term politics we damned and that was Venezuela,
[33:29] Speaker 2: Iran and Cuba. I think the you know, the the
[33:32] Speaker 2: outcome in Venezuela is at very very best mixed Iran, uh,
[33:38] Speaker 2: probably even less so. But now we're gonna kind of
[33:41] Speaker 2: see what happens with with Cuba. And I do think
[33:44] Speaker 2: you're going to see, you know, if there's this sixty
[33:46] Speaker 2: day seas fire, everyone's going to shift south to the
[33:50] Speaker 2: western hemisphere and see what's happening. You have, obviously Marco
[33:53] Speaker 2: Rubio talking about this all the time, but the visit
[33:56] Speaker 2: of CI director Ratcliffe uh to Havana again, carriers on
[34:01] Speaker 2: station there, and I guess one of the questions that
[34:04] Speaker 2: we have to kind of ponder is, you know, let's
[34:06] Speaker 2: obviously we have a very strong economic squeeze on Cuba,
[34:12] Speaker 2: and in fact, over the last several but about a
[34:15] Speaker 2: week ago, we put on essentially secondary sanctions, which is
[34:19] Speaker 2: a huge thing because in the past Americans couldn't do
[34:21] Speaker 2: business there, but now nobody can, and so you know,
[34:26] Speaker 2: you know what comes next they are I think it's
[34:30] Speaker 2: kind of the biggest question, and I guess one of
[34:33] Speaker 2: the things we'd have to kind of contemplate is or
[34:35] Speaker 2: if you all can think about it too, is or
[34:37] Speaker 2: the America you know, again. Economic squeeze of Cuba, got it,
[34:40] Speaker 2: probably the right policy. I'm both for this, in fact,
[34:44] Speaker 2: military moves against Cuba. You know, are we really going
[34:46] Speaker 2: to do this again? What does that even entail? Are
[34:49] Speaker 2: we going to actually send in you know, special operations
[34:52] Speaker 2: forces to snatch a ninety year old or ninety four
[34:54] Speaker 2: year old I don't know over all casters ninety four?
[34:56] Speaker 2: I mean, and you know, do the American people have
[35:01] Speaker 2: appetite for another military adventure? You know, even though try
[35:04] Speaker 2: Trump wanted that kind of hat trick of Venezuela iron
[35:07] Speaker 2: in Cuba, Cuba via military means to me you almost
[35:11] Speaker 2: kind of scratch your head and saying at this point
[35:13] Speaker 2: when we talked about, you know, no more never ending wars,
[35:16] Speaker 2: Trump's campaign pledge, are we really going to do this again?
[35:21] Speaker 2: And with the you know, look, there's not going to
[35:23] Speaker 2: be the same kind of economic effects at all, But
[35:26] Speaker 2: you know, at some point, I mean, this is this
[35:29] Speaker 2: is getting pretty wild when you think about if we
[35:31] Speaker 2: actually employed the US military again for a third conflict
[35:35] Speaker 2: over the last several months, what are your guys thoughts?
[35:39] Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I I would if I was involved
[35:43] Speaker 3: in the discussion, I would ask to what end, what
[35:46] Speaker 3: do we gain, right, I mean, in Venezuela, and it
[35:52] Speaker 3: was very loudly publicized, there was the prospect of Hannas
[35:59] Speaker 3: singhs some of the profits from oil, right, But in
[36:06] Speaker 3: Cuba's case, very very difficult to discern any substantial benefit
[36:13] Speaker 3: that we would get from going to war.
[36:17] Speaker 1: I mean, even squeezing them economically like we're doing. I mean,
[36:20] Speaker 1: it's affecting the poorest of the poor. They have no
[36:22] Speaker 1: power for like twenty hours out of the twenty four
[36:25] Speaker 1: hour day. But like you know, there was a gaggle
[36:29] Speaker 1: of like left wing, left wing twitch streamers and influences
[36:34] Speaker 1: that went over to Cuba like a month ago. They
[36:38] Speaker 1: were able to you know, they're spreading the good word
[36:40] Speaker 1: of the Cuban government right, Like they were able to
[36:42] Speaker 1: stay in a super nice hotel with power and internet
[36:44] Speaker 1: and be able to stream. But the reality is on
[36:48] Speaker 1: the ground that like most of the people that are
[36:50] Speaker 1: in Cuba are fucking poor. They can squeeze, like you know,
[36:53] Speaker 1: the regimes not so much shuffering is as compared to
[36:56] Speaker 1: like the actual person that lives in Cuba, the actual citizens.
[36:59] Speaker 1: So it's like the economic squeeze unless you could really
[37:03] Speaker 1: like pinpoint and UH and strategically hit the regime without
[37:08] Speaker 1: affecting the people on the like the actual citizens of Cuba.
[37:12] Speaker 1: I don't know if I'm with that either, because like
[37:14] Speaker 1: they against they again. Fuck, it's like a blockade essentially
[37:16] Speaker 1: on Cuba. And I'm sure Raoul Cash is so smokings
[37:19] Speaker 1: to God's having his caviar whatever the fuck, and regular
[37:23] Speaker 1: people against screwed per usual.
[37:25] Speaker 2: When I talked to kind of my I have an
[37:28] Speaker 2: interesting you know, UH contacts and friends set with some
[37:31] Speaker 2: of the Cuban exiles down in Miami, and so you
[37:34] Speaker 2: know there that is the big question is you know,
[37:36] Speaker 2: with this economic pressure, be enough to have the regime
[37:39] Speaker 2: fall apart? And there there's some dispute on that or
[37:41] Speaker 2: does there have to be more of a push from
[37:43] Speaker 2: kind of the from the US military. But you know,
[37:46] Speaker 2: the look there is, you know, Cuba is a national
[37:49] Speaker 2: security threat to the United States, not imminent, but there
[37:51] Speaker 2: are listening posts there, there's you know, signals intelligence collection
[37:54] Speaker 2: from the Chinese, UH and the Russians. Of course, it's
[37:57] Speaker 2: a thorn in our side. I mean it's is it
[37:59] Speaker 2: is it a you know, is it a top five
[38:01] Speaker 2: issue for US nationalist cretey players, of course not. Do
[38:04] Speaker 2: we want to have kind of some type of regime
[38:06] Speaker 2: change there, yes, And that's and look if you look
[38:08] Speaker 2: at the US demands, I mean, Marco Rubio is kind
[38:11] Speaker 2: of three demands which make total sense. Are you know,
[38:14] Speaker 2: lift you know, release political prisoners, uh, you know, ensure
[38:18] Speaker 2: that there's no more political or religious repression there, and
[38:21] Speaker 2: then open up the area to private investment. And so
[38:23] Speaker 2: you know, the ideas will will the Cuban government ever
[38:25] Speaker 2: degree to some of this? I think it would be
[38:28] Speaker 2: in everybody's interest if they did so without military intervention,
[38:32] Speaker 2: but you know, it'll you know, and I think the
[38:35] Speaker 2: constituency on this, you know, for Trump is South Florida.
[38:39] Speaker 2: Now I thought kind of the Republican Party has Florida
[38:42] Speaker 2: locked up anyhow, So even politically it doesn't make all
[38:44] Speaker 2: that much sense, but it's going to be I guess
[38:47] Speaker 2: just you know, in this discussion that we're having now
[38:48] Speaker 2: would be the same discussion that the American people should have,
[38:52] Speaker 2: you know, if there ever were to be military interventions
[38:54] Speaker 2: and say, you know, okay, why are we doing this?
[38:56] Speaker 2: Keep the economic blockade on? Got it? But you military
[39:00] Speaker 2: forces there, you know, And then and then we get
[39:03] Speaker 2: into the kind of the problem. And you see this,
[39:05] Speaker 2: of course, with some of the press reporting that there
[39:08] Speaker 2: was clearly leaks from the administration about you know, US
[39:10] Speaker 2: intelligence assessments that said, you know, Cuba could unleashed drone
[39:13] Speaker 2: swarms against Key West, which you know, uh, you know,
[39:17] Speaker 2: and then you know this, this seems to be to
[39:19] Speaker 2: start starting to justify you know, some type of US
[39:22] Speaker 2: military move and so I think, but you know, everyone
[39:25] Speaker 2: kind of rolled their eyes at that. Uh, but let's
[39:28] Speaker 2: let's putting this all aside. Let's be very clear. They
[39:30] Speaker 2: are laser focused on this. Everybody I talked to with
[39:33] Speaker 2: contacts within the US administration say Cuba's next and soon.
[39:37] Speaker 2: I think Jack has said that too when we've talked
[39:39] Speaker 2: to him. You know, Jack has just been down at
[39:40] Speaker 2: h at whatever soft week done in Tampa, and so
[39:43] Speaker 2: Cuba is on everybody's mind. And I think Trump got
[39:47] Speaker 2: bored with Iran and he wants to do this thing next.
[39:49] Speaker 2: And so you know, we can disagree with it all
[39:51] Speaker 2: we want, but I think we're gonna be talking about
[39:52] Speaker 2: this next week and the week after. And the big
[39:55] Speaker 2: question is, is you know, if we see kind of
[39:57] Speaker 2: you know, Andy's old colleagues some how, you know, arriving
[40:00] Speaker 2: on Osprey's in Havana, and we do have to kind
[40:04] Speaker 2: of sit back and say, you know, what are we doing?
[40:05] Speaker 2: How when the world has this happened? And and of
[40:08] Speaker 2: course did the American people actually you know, vote for this,
[40:12] Speaker 2: And clearly the answer on that is no.
[40:15] Speaker 1: And like, yeah, I'm with you when you mentioned about
[40:16] Speaker 1: like South Florida and the Cuban and the Cuban diaspora there,
[40:20] Speaker 1: how it like affects like Florida's not swing state anymore
[40:23] Speaker 1: at all. Right, Like so I understand that they're like
[40:27] Speaker 1: very powerful and they swing they you know, they spend
[40:29] Speaker 1: a lot of money in politics, especially local. But yeah,
[40:34] Speaker 1: this will not even be a blip on the radar
[40:38] Speaker 1: of like a campaign, whether it's the mid terms or
[40:42] Speaker 1: the primaries coming up in twenty twenty seven.
[40:47] Speaker 2: You know, if they if we okay, let's just playing
[40:49] Speaker 2: devil Devil's advocate. If we pull this off, if there
[40:52] Speaker 2: was some kind of successful intervention, economic or military, Rubio
[40:56] Speaker 2: is the nominee.
[40:59] Speaker 1: I'll bet with you right now, how much today's the
[41:04] Speaker 1: day even if they take over Cuba and we and
[41:07] Speaker 1: they wheel Old Raul Castro in a fucking wheelchair down
[41:10] Speaker 1: over here in Brooklyn to roommate with uh Maduro. It's
[41:14] Speaker 1: five twenty six. I'll bet you one hundred dollars that
[41:18] Speaker 1: it will not be Rubio.
[41:20] Speaker 2: If it's a success, I bet it will be.
[41:22] Speaker 1: I'll just I'll generally, I'll say success failure. It will
[41:25] Speaker 1: not be Rubio in twenty.
[41:26] Speaker 2: He's already actually in a very good position because Vance
[41:30] Speaker 2: has been you know, uh, pretty much minimized in so
[41:34] Speaker 2: many ways. I mean, it's clear that that Trump is
[41:36] Speaker 2: favoring Rubio a bit. Now I don't know who's endorsed.
[41:38] Speaker 1: But so I think if we're getting into I think
[41:40] Speaker 1: Vance is actually being pretty strategic by by removing himself
[41:46] Speaker 1: from the Iran debacle and uh, the likely soon to
[41:51] Speaker 1: be Cuban debacle. I think he's doing the right thing politically.
[41:54] Speaker 1: And I disagree with everything he says or believes, Yeah,
[41:59] Speaker 1: but he honestly he gets on the mic and he's
[42:02] Speaker 1: pretty good man like. And that's that's what this is. Now.
[42:05] Speaker 1: Politics is vibe based.
[42:07] Speaker 2: I would I would, I would disagree with you and.
[42:10] Speaker 1: Undred bust that Undy. Get it, Chris ready for me?
[42:13] Speaker 2: All right?
[42:14] Speaker 3: Fans everything that fans campaigned on has has has evaporated.
[42:25] Speaker 3: Right do you remember you know one of his leading
[42:28] Speaker 3: points was no more wars, no more wars in the
[42:31] Speaker 3: Middle East, right, I mean, and and yes, he's been
[42:36] Speaker 3: a front runner in negotiations, or maybe not a front runner,
[42:41] Speaker 3: but he's he was involved in negotiations. I know, I
[42:44] Speaker 3: noticed no longer. But he he doesn't seem to be
[42:50] Speaker 3: He seems to be ignored, right, I mean he's not.
[42:54] Speaker 3: But who knows? I mean, do I understand what you're
[42:56] Speaker 3: saying too about track record means nothing? Back to Cuba,
[43:01] Speaker 3: you know, I mean the US is already essentially at
[43:03] Speaker 3: war with Cuba economically. I think you know probably that
[43:08] Speaker 3: that pressure that war is working faster than any military option.
[43:13] Speaker 2: Word I think.
[43:15] Speaker 3: I don't know, of course, I don't know. But you know,
[43:18] Speaker 3: when Trump says, hey, we may stop by Cuba after
[43:20] Speaker 3: finishing Iran, I think that's I don't think he's I
[43:25] Speaker 3: don't think he means imminent military action. I think this
[43:28] Speaker 3: is all a pressure campaign, you know, within it, and
[43:31] Speaker 3: that's kind of a placeholder for escalation. Right to see
[43:35] Speaker 3: the kind of maritime mit addiction potentially that we saw
[43:39] Speaker 3: in Venezuela. But I would be astounded if there were
[43:44] Speaker 3: military said.
[43:45] Speaker 2: The other day that they, you know, Southcom has been
[43:48] Speaker 2: tasked to come up with some and people kind of
[43:51] Speaker 2: got a in a kind of a little bit nervous
[43:55] Speaker 2: about that. But that's normal. I mean that there's nothing
[43:57] Speaker 2: to that. That's what you do, contingents. That's me. That
[44:01] Speaker 2: didn't mean anything.
[44:03] Speaker 1: So like, what would it like, let's speculate a little bit.
[44:05] Speaker 1: Is it gonna look like what Iran looked like? Or
[44:08] Speaker 1: is it going to look like what Venezuela looked like?
[44:10] Speaker 1: Like a jsuck raid to go snatch the octogenarian from
[44:13] Speaker 1: his fucking palace.
[44:14] Speaker 2: You got to be there for him. It's got to
[44:15] Speaker 2: be that, I mean, good lord, rather than like airstrikes
[44:18] Speaker 2: and and you know, and I would say the Cuban military,
[44:21] Speaker 2: and I this is this is dusting off stuff that
[44:23] Speaker 2: I probably shouldn't even talk about or know all that
[44:25] Speaker 2: much about. But I don't think there're you know, this
[44:27] Speaker 2: is this is a decrepit old military. I don't think
[44:29] Speaker 2: there's there's gonna be any kind of military match for
[44:31] Speaker 2: the United States.
[44:31] Speaker 4: And so.
[44:34] Speaker 2: Yeah, but we'll, you know, we'll we'll see. But I'm
[44:36] Speaker 2: telling you, uh, you know read the US. You know
[44:38] Speaker 2: that the tea leaves here. I'm in the Washington area.
[44:41] Speaker 2: Everyone's talking Cuba now NonStop. Now what that means? Who knows?
[44:46] Speaker 2: And uh, and so we'll see. But the other point too,
[44:48] Speaker 2: and I think you know, there's there's enough open source
[44:51] Speaker 2: in which you know we will see. You know, there's
[44:53] Speaker 2: the whole idea of signal versus noise. There's a lot
[44:55] Speaker 2: of noise now, but you know the signals would be
[44:57] Speaker 2: when you start seeing you know, certain soft units deploy.
[45:01] Speaker 2: I mean, the crazy thing about Andy, your old world
[45:03] Speaker 2: is that there's nothing secret anymore. Every time there's some
[45:06] Speaker 2: movement from you know, from Virginia Beach or Fort Bragg
[45:09] Speaker 2: or from you or or you know, air elements anywhere
[45:13] Speaker 2: in the ASSTOC world. I mean, people like within fifty
[45:15] Speaker 2: five seconds put it out on Twitter and they've been
[45:19] Speaker 2: right every single time, you know, the vendors, Whales stuff.
[45:21] Speaker 2: When we saw soft going down there, you're like, all right,
[45:23] Speaker 2: and then Iran too. Once they move, that's a pretty
[45:28] Speaker 2: pretty compelling sign that something's there. So I think when
[45:32] Speaker 2: you kind of if you can do the signal versus
[45:34] Speaker 2: noise right now, there's a lot of noise, although I
[45:36] Speaker 2: would say signals also there is a carrier there that's
[45:40] Speaker 2: a data point. But at the end of the day,
[45:42] Speaker 2: I mean, you know, I think we all should kind
[45:44] Speaker 2: of take a moment and sit back and say exactly
[45:46] Speaker 2: what you said, if we actually launch a military operation
[45:49] Speaker 2: against Cuba, you do kind of sit back and scratch
[45:51] Speaker 2: your head and said, how in the world is this
[45:53] Speaker 2: president who ran on it? I mean literally, his campaign
[45:56] Speaker 2: thing with Kamala Harris is she's going to get us
[45:58] Speaker 2: a war with Iran and he will have had three wars,
[46:02] Speaker 2: one of which she was with Iran. That's just extraordinary.
[46:07] Speaker 1: Yeah, don't don't forget Greenland because that's on our fucking
[46:10] Speaker 1: bucket list too, dude. Also, a little bit of like
[46:12] Speaker 1: the rumor mill rumor mill ish like soft Week was
[46:15] Speaker 1: happening last week in Tampa. Uh, the one sixty is
[46:18] Speaker 1: supposed to do a demonstration there and they pulled out
[46:21] Speaker 1: last minute because they had to be somewhere. So I
[46:24] Speaker 1: don't know what that means, but take that as you'd like.
[46:28] Speaker 2: Right again, that's that's kind of the signal thing you
[46:32] Speaker 2: gotta kind of think about. Now, you know, who knows
[46:34] Speaker 2: could all be stuff? Could be stuff that we don't
[46:36] Speaker 2: know about what's happening world. Hey, next week about the
[46:41] Speaker 2: the Tulsi Gabbarde resigning, I can't remember, No, we.
[46:44] Speaker 1: Didn't that happened. Yeah, so that was a very sad Also.
[46:48] Speaker 1: I wanted to touch on Ukraine too because Kee got
[46:50] Speaker 1: smoked last night by Russia. But you just talked Tulsi
[46:54] Speaker 1: real quick.
[46:54] Speaker 2: Very quickly, on on on Tulsi. You know, there's not
[46:57] Speaker 2: much more to say other than someone who doesn't have
[47:00] Speaker 2: the president's here cannot be the DNI period, you know,
[47:05] Speaker 2: Intel chief one oh one kind of in Washington, d C.
[47:09] Speaker 2: Is that whether you're the head of you know, CIA
[47:12] Speaker 2: or particular DNA, you have to have access. You have
[47:15] Speaker 2: to go see the president, call the president. Basically, have
[47:18] Speaker 2: you know, a direct access at any time. And she
[47:20] Speaker 2: had none of that, and you know, the writing was
[47:23] Speaker 2: on the wall for a lot of things. Of course,
[47:25] Speaker 2: she was in opposition to Iran war, that's the worst
[47:28] Speaker 2: kept secret, but that she was not involved in any
[47:30] Speaker 2: of the planning, wasn't in the Oval office, Sessions, wasn't
[47:32] Speaker 2: in the sit room, and then tried to just save
[47:35] Speaker 2: her job by running around doing this kind of crazy
[47:37] Speaker 2: conspiracy stuff.
[47:38] Speaker 1: So also being on the raid in Georgia with the FBI,
[47:41] Speaker 1: why they all dn I would be there. I have
[47:43] Speaker 1: no fucking idea.
[47:44] Speaker 2: Well that's that was just designed to curry favor. But
[47:46] Speaker 2: you know the so she's out, no surprise. You know
[47:50] Speaker 2: her deputy Aaron Lucas, former CIA case officer, but not
[47:53] Speaker 2: a heavyweight in the policies or you know, national security
[47:56] Speaker 2: circles here and kind of the big picture. So I've
[48:00] Speaker 2: been kind of talking about a lot and media in
[48:01] Speaker 2: the last couple of days, is that you know Tom Cotton,
[48:03] Speaker 2: who is a very influential senator, the head of the
[48:06] Speaker 2: Senate Selectmittee on Intelligence, wants to abolish odn I period,
[48:09] Speaker 2: end of story. And so I think that's what that
[48:14] Speaker 2: the discussion is going to shift to what in the
[48:16] Speaker 2: world does the dn I do anyhow? And ultimately CI
[48:20] Speaker 2: Director Ratcliffe has won out. I mean, he has an
[48:22] Speaker 2: office in the White House and golfs of the President.
[48:25] Speaker 2: So whoever is going to take over that job is
[48:27] Speaker 2: not going to have that same kind of juice. And
[48:28] Speaker 2: there's the question of even in the kind of the
[48:30] Speaker 2: post nine to eleven reforms, you needed some kind of
[48:33] Speaker 2: coordinating function. Can something else do that, rather than an
[48:36] Speaker 2: office with a thousand people in it, all of who've
[48:38] Speaker 2: been seconded from the other agencies. So there was so
[48:40] Speaker 2: much redundancy. Final point on this is in that as
[48:44] Speaker 2: a field officer for the agency, and even when I
[48:46] Speaker 2: was at headquarters as a manager, I never had contact
[48:49] Speaker 2: with od and I or the DNI for anything, really nothing, zero,
[48:53] Speaker 2: had no up bearing on my life. When you're in
[48:55] Speaker 2: the field and the DNI comes out, you scratch your
[48:57] Speaker 2: head and say, shit, we've got to trot him over
[48:59] Speaker 2: to the liaison chief in whatever country we're in. But
[49:02] Speaker 2: I don't even know what they do. You know, CIA
[49:04] Speaker 2: is still the top dog when it comes to kind
[49:07] Speaker 2: of the overseas presence.
[49:08] Speaker 1: And so.
[49:10] Speaker 2: What was what was most interesting just about Tulsi's uh
[49:15] Speaker 2: departure is uh, Number one, what a strange person she
[49:20] Speaker 2: is belonging to this kind of odd cult in Hawaii
[49:22] Speaker 2: they eat toenails, no kidding, uh. And number two, Uh,
[49:27] Speaker 2: that she was so viscerally opposed to basically every policy
[49:30] Speaker 2: choice the administration made, so it almost took too long.
[49:33] Speaker 2: And finally one of the you know, obviously her husband
[49:36] Speaker 2: sick with with some with cancer and so you know
[49:39] Speaker 2: you wish them well.
[49:41] Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I was rooting for really I hope you know,
[49:46] Speaker 1: I wish she did like stayed the whole four years.
[49:50] Speaker 1: All right, Ukraine Russia, we've seen over the last couple
[49:54] Speaker 1: of weeks, probably maybe more than that, Like are Ukraine's
[49:56] Speaker 1: reaching to Russia has been deeper and deeper. Russia is
[50:00] Speaker 1: there at least their air defenses seems to be dwindling
[50:03] Speaker 1: more and more. They have to move it around. You
[50:05] Speaker 1: saw it with the Victory Day parade and stuff like that,
[50:09] Speaker 1: and you are seeing just overall more and more derne
[50:12] Speaker 1: attacks inside of Russia, deep inside, like fifteen hundred kilometers
[50:16] Speaker 1: and stuff like that. So, like the momentum kind of
[50:20] Speaker 1: perception has been shifting over the last like almost three weeks.
[50:24] Speaker 1: And yesterday Russia launched a massive attack on Kiev. Obviously
[50:30] Speaker 1: hit fucking civilian targets and stuff like that, because they
[50:34] Speaker 1: don't give a fuck and they're evil. So let's just
[50:37] Speaker 1: have a little bit bit of a talk about that. Andy,
[50:39] Speaker 1: you go for it, let me hear you.
[50:41] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[50:41] Speaker 3: So yeah, last night it was the Ukrainians sank six
[50:48] Speaker 3: hundred and ninety assets, right, the drones and missiles targeted
[50:54] Speaker 3: Kiev alone, and they you know, Kiev, although every district
[51:02] Speaker 3: was hit. I think it's a sign of how good
[51:07] Speaker 3: the interception rate is and how you know, I have
[51:11] Speaker 3: some personal experience of this obviously, but how efficient their
[51:17] Speaker 3: civil defense procedures are, you know, just getting civilians into shelters.
[51:24] Speaker 3: That only two people were killed, you know, unfortunate for
[51:27] Speaker 3: those who know those two people. But you think about
[51:30] Speaker 3: the scale of the attack, I mean, it's just hard
[51:34] Speaker 3: to imagine, you know. I mean, I'm trying to think
[51:38] Speaker 3: of so here, so where I am in the Middle East.
[51:44] Speaker 3: I mean, this country was hit by a few missiles
[51:47] Speaker 3: and drones, and the scale of I won't say panic,
[51:52] Speaker 3: but fear among expats here was pretty high. And yet
[51:59] Speaker 3: you know, it was nothing compared to what Kiev goes
[52:01] Speaker 3: through night after night after night, you know. And uh,
[52:06] Speaker 3: and so two killed, seventy I mean, there was seventy
[52:10] Speaker 3: seven injured. But but at of when you when you're
[52:13] Speaker 3: thinking of that that many missiles and drones. And and
[52:17] Speaker 3: I want to add too, how the Russians have improved
[52:21] Speaker 3: the technology on their shah drone since the initial strikes.
[52:25] Speaker 3: And a key point was during the strikes they used
[52:31] Speaker 3: a hypersonic weapon called the Nik. In fact, they used
[52:35] Speaker 3: they used at least two kimsole missiles and UH and
[52:43] Speaker 3: three or four Zircon hypersonic missiles. But they but the
[52:47] Speaker 3: headline was the Rashnik. And you know, Putin has talked
[52:51] Speaker 3: about this saying it travels like a meteorite and cannot
[52:55] Speaker 3: be stopped. And and there's some truth in that it
[53:00] Speaker 3: cannot be stopped. And so the Russians hit They didn't
[53:04] Speaker 3: hit Kiev, they hit a town to the south of
[53:06] Speaker 3: Kiev with the Arshnik. And I don't know whether that's
[53:10] Speaker 3: because they were concerned it would be intercepted, or it
[53:14] Speaker 3: might just be a demonstration of the fact that they
[53:17] Speaker 3: could do it. But that is, you know, using hyperstonic weapons.
[53:23] Speaker 3: We've we talk about defending against hypersonic weapons, right, but
[53:30] Speaker 3: I mean, the Ukrainian air defense systems are so far
[53:33] Speaker 3: ahead even though they I'm not talking about the technology,
[53:37] Speaker 3: I'm talking about just how they operate them. We need
[53:40] Speaker 3: to be learning from them. So anyway, an extraordinary event.
[53:44] Speaker 3: The Ukrainian was catastrophic as far as to in terms
[53:49] Speaker 3: of property damage, but thank god, you know, more civilians
[53:53] Speaker 3: weren't killed. So why do the Russians do that. Aside
[53:56] Speaker 3: from the fact they're all shit hits, the Russians are
[54:02] Speaker 3: under they're under a lot of pressure right now. They've
[54:06] Speaker 3: stalled in Dombas. They're taking as we've talked about here,
[54:10] Speaker 3: no exaggeration. This is according to r USI, which is
[54:14] Speaker 3: a British think tank, they're taking thirty to thirty three
[54:18] Speaker 3: thousand casualties a month a right, one thousand a day.
[54:22] Speaker 3: Actually it's a thousand, one thousand a day. On a
[54:25] Speaker 3: good day, it's between one thousand and twelve hundred casualties
[54:28] Speaker 3: a day. And and the Ukrainians have been schlacking their
[54:35] Speaker 3: oil infrastructure, as you point out, d very far away
[54:40] Speaker 3: from I mean far into the Russian hinterland. And then
[54:45] Speaker 3: a few days ago they hit they hit a drone unit,
[54:52] Speaker 3: one of the Russia, Russia's prominent drone units in Ukraine.
[54:56] Speaker 3: They hit it in Luhansk and by they struck their
[54:59] Speaker 3: head called is by all accounts, wiped out the entire unit.
[55:03] Speaker 3: It was a very successful strike. Putin lost his shit
[55:08] Speaker 3: over that. He claimed that they'd hit a school, you know,
[55:11] Speaker 3: and that's eighteen children were dead. But of course Boutin
[55:13] Speaker 3: wouldn't have lost his shit over that, and so that's
[55:17] Speaker 3: why he's saying they launched they launched a strike from
[55:24] Speaker 3: kind of a strategic level. You know, there's really four
[55:27] Speaker 3: things Russia's communicating, if you if you can call it communicating.
[55:31] Speaker 3: One is, you know, to Ukraine, it's consistent message that
[55:35] Speaker 3: doesn't matter what's happening at the front. There's no city,
[55:39] Speaker 3: there's no infrastructure, there's no part of your territory that's safe,
[55:44] Speaker 3: not even the capital. And then to the west, they
[55:49] Speaker 3: I think this display of the Arshenik was saying, hey,
[55:53] Speaker 3: can't be intercepted. That might be why they didn't try
[55:56] Speaker 3: and hit Kiev, because if it had been decepted then
[56:00] Speaker 3: then that wouldn't have looked good. So you know, they're
[56:05] Speaker 3: trying to say we've got this. Putin's all about threats
[56:09] Speaker 3: of escalation and the Irishnik, of course, can be on
[56:12] Speaker 3: with the nuclear warhead blah blah blah. But even without
[56:14] Speaker 3: a nuclear warhead, there are doubts whether any aired defense
[56:18] Speaker 3: system in the world can intercept it. And it is
[56:20] Speaker 3: definitely a concern and probably an implicit message to Washington,
[56:26] Speaker 3: although we don't seem to be listening to Russia that
[56:29] Speaker 3: Ukraine's not settled. You know, you go ahead and be
[56:32] Speaker 3: consumed with Iran, but the Ukraines we're still at war
[56:35] Speaker 3: with Ukraine. In the US pressure on Russia for a
[56:38] Speaker 3: peace deal comes while Russia is demonstrating its own escalation dominance.
[56:44] Speaker 2: Right.
[56:45] Speaker 3: And then of course the European leaders von der Leyden, Macron,
[56:50] Speaker 3: Kallas and Karni, who are all nemeses right. I know
[56:54] Speaker 3: Karnie is not a European leader, but he's I mean,
[56:57] Speaker 3: he's pro Nado. They've all condemned the attack. Obviously, the
[57:02] Speaker 3: US hasn't really said it, hasn't said anything about it,
[57:06] Speaker 3: but the EU has promised more aid defense support Ukraine.
[57:09] Speaker 3: So this could be something that's backfiring on Russia. We'll see.
[57:13] Speaker 3: And then finally, Zelensky, I mean a Ukrainian intelligence I'm
[57:20] Speaker 3: sure markle agree is to say it's world class is
[57:23] Speaker 3: an understatement. But Zelensky warned of exactly the strike less
[57:26] Speaker 3: than twenty four hours before it happened, and I think
[57:30] Speaker 3: that might be why they had so few casualties. The
[57:32] Speaker 3: civilian population was pre warned. That wasn't because the Russians
[57:36] Speaker 3: warned them. It's because their intelligence picked up, picked it up,
[57:41] Speaker 3: and so that the warning was accurate. The attack happened anyway,
[57:45] Speaker 3: tells you something important. Russia calculated, it calculated that forewarning
[57:52] Speaker 3: that even with fore warning that you know, they they
[57:56] Speaker 3: could they could impostcast on Ukraine, though as we've seen,
[58:01] Speaker 3: probably the costs went as high as they expected them
[58:03] Speaker 3: to be.
[58:05] Speaker 2: You know, Andy, one of the things that is that
[58:07] Speaker 2: was most interesting about this, Uh, that's it's tragic if
[58:11] Speaker 2: you care about you know, US foreign policy is the
[58:13] Speaker 2: lack of US response on this. This was a terrible
[58:17] Speaker 2: war crime. It should have had absolute condemnation from the U.
[58:21] Speaker 2: S side. But you know, at this point, I think
[58:23] Speaker 2: a lot of US have given up. And the one
[58:26] Speaker 2: thing that you know, the the it is it is
[58:29] Speaker 2: to me actually perhaps a positive that Trump doesn't care anymore.
[58:35] Speaker 2: And Rubio actually came out the other day Secretary of
[58:37] Speaker 2: States saying, hey, we're not even going to try it
[58:39] Speaker 2: for you know, neither side is interested in a peace deal. Good.
[58:42] Speaker 2: The best thing that could happen to Ukraine and Europe
[58:44] Speaker 2: is for the US to stay out of this, because
[58:46] Speaker 2: when we were staying in it under the Trump administration
[58:49] Speaker 2: was a debacle. So and and you know, there was
[58:52] Speaker 2: a couple of commentators who thought, you know, Trump's going
[58:54] Speaker 2: to get bored of this. It's not. It's too hard.
[58:57] Speaker 2: You have kind of these, you know, the the dynamic
[58:59] Speaker 2: duo of and Witcough is envoys witcof Witcough in particular,
[59:03] Speaker 2: who are disasters, but the farther they stay away from this.
[59:07] Speaker 2: And then of course the Ukrainians in all of their
[59:09] Speaker 2: capabilities improved really dramatically. And so to me, this was
[59:13] Speaker 2: this was a you know, it was it was embarrassing
[59:15] Speaker 2: that the US didn't say anything, the Europeans did. Let's
[59:19] Speaker 2: see what kind of concrete actions happen. And at the
[59:22] Speaker 2: end of the day, you know, it's uh, the less frankly,
[59:25] Speaker 2: the US is involved in putting any pressure on Ukraine,
[59:29] Speaker 2: which is where the pressure would come. Uh, the better
[59:31] Speaker 2: the idea that somehow we would come down hard on
[59:34] Speaker 2: Russia for this, I think that's just you know, we
[59:36] Speaker 2: would have in the past, but not under this administration.
[59:38] Speaker 2: And so what what I think you mentioned before, those
[59:44] Speaker 2: those casualty numbers certainly are are something else. Oh final piece,
[59:48] Speaker 2: you're one hundred percent right in terms of Ukrainian intelligence,
[59:50] Speaker 2: and and I will say that the one area in
[59:52] Speaker 2: which the US is still contributing, and it's this one
[59:56] Speaker 2: of these strange mysteries of Washington is that the you know,
[59:58] Speaker 2: my old outfit is still heavily involved, and it's most
[1:00:02] Speaker 2: heavily involved in not the paramilitary side of house, more
[1:00:06] Speaker 2: so than helping on targeting, but on on that provision
[1:00:09] Speaker 2: of intelligence. So I wouldn't be surprised if it was
[1:00:11] Speaker 2: the combination of usn Ukrainian collection that was allowed for
[1:00:16] Speaker 2: proper for warning. And we've seen this before as well.
[1:00:20] Speaker 2: I mean, and and you spent a lot of time there,
[1:00:23] Speaker 2: but I also do kind of recall, and you you
[1:00:26] Speaker 2: would you were there firsthand. You know, the warnings you
[1:00:30] Speaker 2: get were you know, were in advance, and that's because
[1:00:34] Speaker 2: the intelligence net that was set up. But ultimately, let's
[1:00:37] Speaker 2: see how kind of Europe comes through. Air defense is
[1:00:40] Speaker 2: a critical need, but some of the other stuff is
[1:00:42] Speaker 2: not anymore. I mean, all the things that we were
[1:00:44] Speaker 2: kind of howling about, whether it was attackers or tomahawks,
[1:00:46] Speaker 2: all that stuff. I mean, the Ukrainians are doing pretty
[1:00:48] Speaker 2: damn well with their domestic redigenous capability on drones. It
[1:00:53] Speaker 2: is you could you would be a much better person
[1:00:55] Speaker 2: to address this. But you could probably spend an hour
[1:00:57] Speaker 2: talking about how it's the finest fighting force in your
[1:01:00] Speaker 2: up right. Now, maybe that's exaggerated, but maybe not.
[1:01:05] Speaker 1: Uh and so uh uh.
[1:01:07] Speaker 2: But but boy, if you're you know, someone like myself
[1:01:10] Speaker 2: who was involved in the US national security world, the
[1:01:13] Speaker 2: idea that US is silent after what happened is just embarrassing.
[1:01:19] Speaker 2: Agreed on all.
[1:01:22] Speaker 3: All right, boys concluded, Well done.
[1:01:25] Speaker 1: I know that was beautiful, beautiful, little bow on it.
[1:01:28] Speaker 2: I want everyone you're here, I have had this death flu.
[1:01:32] Speaker 2: You know, Andy's from millions of miles away, and our
[1:01:34] Speaker 2: other colleagues are off gallivanting around.
[1:01:36] Speaker 1: Yeah, they're on flights.
[1:01:37] Speaker 2: Noted who showed up?
[1:01:39] Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, everybody. Do us a favor if you want
[1:01:42] Speaker 1: to check out any of the guy's stuff, Andy's book
[1:01:45] Speaker 1: Mark's book marks, Twitter, Andy's Twitter, whatever, mark, Andy's got
[1:01:49] Speaker 1: a new article out and warn the rocks. I'll put
[1:01:52] Speaker 1: that link in the description as well.
[1:01:54] Speaker 2: Kind to dive into that. I saw some some controversy
[1:01:56] Speaker 2: on social media.
[1:01:57] Speaker 1: And he was just trying to make people mad, you know,
[1:01:59] Speaker 1: I got.
[1:02:00] Speaker 2: Jump into that.
[1:02:01] Speaker 3: So hey, I'll tell you this is an this it's
[1:02:04] Speaker 3: an operational argument. I say morals, I stick, I'm just
[1:02:08] Speaker 3: saying operationally it was this is this is why the
[1:02:13] Speaker 3: plan was so flawed. The campaign in Gaza was such
[1:02:16] Speaker 3: a mess. I promise no sense.
[1:02:19] Speaker 2: I'm gonna jump in and read it and I gotta
[1:02:21] Speaker 2: comment on it. I did see some someone and it
[1:02:22] Speaker 2: doesn't even matter who said, like, who is this andy person?
[1:02:25] Speaker 2: Is he qualified to comment on this? I like that one. Yeah, okay, yeah,
[1:02:29] Speaker 2: I'm getting people deferent stuff like I think he's he
[1:02:32] Speaker 2: probably has a thing, he's.
[1:02:34] Speaker 1: Got a couple experiences in warfare.
[1:02:37] Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, you could criticize what you said. You
[1:02:39] Speaker 2: don't want to go down that road. Yeah.
[1:02:43] Speaker 1: Yeah, So check out that article. That link is going
[1:02:45] Speaker 1: to be in the description. It's for war on the Rocks. Uh,
[1:02:47] Speaker 1: follow the guys, and of course, if you want to
[1:02:49] Speaker 1: help support the show, you can go to patreon dot
[1:02:51] Speaker 1: com slash the Teamhouse. You get episodes ad free and
[1:02:55] Speaker 1: early of both eyes On and The Teamhouse. We have
[1:02:58] Speaker 1: a really cool one coming out today with a World
[1:03:01] Speaker 1: War two veteran first time ever, which is exciting. And yeah, guys,
[1:03:06] Speaker 1: Happy Memorial Day and we'll see you next time.
[1:03:09] Speaker 2: Thank you, guys, Thanks everyone.
[1:03:15] Speaker 4: Hey guys, I want to take a moment to tell
[1:03:17] Speaker 4: you about the Team House Podcast newsletter. If you go
[1:03:20] Speaker 4: and subscribe, it's totally free, and what it will do
[1:03:24] Speaker 4: is aggregate all of our data, all of our content
[1:03:27] Speaker 4: that we put out, the things that are on the
[1:03:30] Speaker 4: Team House on our geopolitics podcast, Eyes On, things that
[1:03:35] Speaker 4: I write journalistically with Sean Naylor on the high Side,
[1:03:39] Speaker 4: anything else that we have going on books, we recommend
[1:03:43] Speaker 4: upcoming guests that we have coming on the show, and
[1:03:47] Speaker 4: also you know, filtering in some fun stuff in there
[1:03:49] Speaker 4: as well. If you go and check it out, we
[1:03:52] Speaker 4: send it out just once a week. We don't want
[1:03:54] Speaker 4: to spam you guys. It's just a kind of roll
[1:03:56] Speaker 4: up of all of our content on a weekly basis.
[1:03:59] Speaker 4: You can find our newsletter at Teamhouse Podcast dot kit
[1:04:03] Speaker 4: dot com, slash join again. The website for that is
[1:04:07] Speaker 4: Teamhouse Podcast dot kit dot com, slash join.
[1:04:11] Speaker 2: Uh So, we hope to see you there. The link
[1:04:14] Speaker 2: will be down the description
[1:05:01] Speaker 1: Assass

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them.