Hi Thomas. So it's been a situation that's
happened a few days ago. Hamas out of Gaza has both
invaded Israel, taking some hostages, shot a bunch of
people, retreated back into Gaza, and now Israel's
responding. Some people think this is sort
of World War 3. Some people believe that this is
all one big giant conspiracy from all the Israeli side to to
allow them to annihilate Gaza. Other people believe this is a
symbol or a symptom of a general competency crisis.
And it's showing that Israel is not as strong as we once were
led to believe. So we brought Thomas on because
I couldn't think of anyone else better to talk about this in the
at least in this sort of initial burst of activities to share his
thoughts. I think we're prerecording this.
Usually we do these things live. We don't know what's going on
with YouTube and censors and all the rest of it.
I don't want anyone ever to have to protect their words or say
anything that they don't think it's true.
So we'll just have the conversation.
And this may pop up on YouTube and might pop up on some other
places. Who knows?
Thomas, thanks again for coming on thoughts in general on the
Israeli Hamas conflict. There's there's three layers
here that conceptually they need to be addressed.
And within one of those layers, there's a couple main subjects
that need to be addressed. There's a, there's a military
and strategic aspect to this. There's a political aspect and
there's a there's a historical aspect that is impacting affairs
globally today. And within that political
aspect, it's not a normal war and peace paradigm.
Israel's a totally abnormal state.
I don't think that's controversial.
Even people don't agree with my views and values shouldn't find
that controversial. Ernst Nolte made the point, and
Martin Grant. Martin van Creveld, the Dutch
Israeli historian, stipulated this directly, citing Nolte
Okay. Israel, the Soviet Union and the
Third Reich were totally abnormal States and just value
neutral terms. They weren't normal countries
and they all developed in dialogue with each other and out
of a out of a zeitgeist of crisis.
Okay, that discreetly impacted the.
Radicalized populations that created those respective
political cultures. The only one of those states
that still exist is Israel. That's one of the reasons why.
I mean, America's policy corridors have totally been Co
opted by Zionist interests. I mean that goes out of saying,
but one of the reasons. But that aside, one of the
reasons why the way people talk about Israel doesn't make any
sense is because I don't think they truly understand this
conceptually. I mean, I don't think people
really understand politics any meaningful way generally.
I mean, not because I'm so smart that I do, but this is pretty
much all I do. Israel's not a, quote, UN quote
democracy. That doesn't make any sense.
Okay, it's not a democracy in kind of the Aristotelian sense.
It's not a democracy in kind of like the liberal shorthand
sense. And like nobody, like nobody in
the Israeli government or no, like hardcore Zionists would
like suggest that. So that's just bizarre.
That doesn't make any sense. Like, nor is Israel kind of
this, like Rhodesia or South Africa kind of like realist,
like racial state that's trying to manage, you know, kind of the
reality of an emboldened, like colored world or during the cold
world we call Third World. Like, they're not dead either.
Like Zionism is a premise done that okay.
It's premised on this idea that the Jews are discreet and
insular people, unlike all other people.
They're uniquely threatened in existential terms by everybody
else. Nobody else really has a
legitimate right to racial posterity or, like, blood
posterity, if I'm looking like that, except for Jews.
It's absolutely imperative that this kind of right to that
posterity be protected at all costs and that that's completely
at odds with. Not just kind of hard, hard and
fast like realist logic, but it's totally at odds with what
kind of the prevailing like value system is of globalism.
Just in like, just like on its own terms.
Okay. However, it's inextricably bound
up with that. And that's why I'm always making
the point that, you know, much of it seems to be like at odds
with kind of like, you know, the global liberal paradigm, what I
think of as the social engineering Nuremberg paradigm,
it's actually like an inextricable like component of
it, but it's something that people don't like to discuss
openly, like the minority that does actually understand the
nuances of it, because that raises some, that raises
contradictions that can't really be mitigated by appeals to.
You know, the kind of self-contained ethics of the
aforementioned system, but that's that's the way to
understand Israel. That's what I can always say to
people and I'll bring it back in a minute.
I don't want to proselytize or something.
People are like, oh, I don't care what all those savages do.
It's like, well, you better care man, because you're under,
you're being ruled by these people, okay.
And what you're talking about the war in Ukraine, we're
talking about the war in Syria. And by the way, like the reason
why, the reason why, the reason why?
The reason why American Israel went all in against Russia and
Ukraine is because of what happened in Syria, by the way.
OK, so you can pretend like you don't care about that.
But they if that's if that's really the case, like don't
don't complain about wokism. Don't complain about, you know,
like the excess of the Bite administration.
Like, don't complain about these crazy people like Lindsey
Graham. Just like targeting half the
countries in the world for annihilation, for being
insufficiently like woke or something.
Because it's all like bound together within the same kind of
like conceptual Nexus, Okay. But to bring it back, what's
different about this conflict cycle from previous ones between
Israel and all of their neighbors since 1948?
I believe that clearly I think Hamas is performing better than
they have before and. In large parts the the, the
sectarian, the kind of terribly saying what every sectarian
division between XI and Sunni at least unlimited operational
terms, has been overcome Okay, because Hezbollah and Hamas and
Hezbollah is probably the best infantry element in the Middle
East. Okay.
If it's not arguable. Like again, being Preveld, he
like stipulates that okay. They are very, very tough.
They're a real fighting force. They're not just like ragtags or
or or like crazy jihadis or something.
They're not even like really in that culture.
I mean they're they're they're overwhelmingly Shia for, you
know, for one. But it it's long been the the
claim by people who would be in a position to know that Hamas
has been drilling with Hezbollah and there's been some
operational integration there, Okay.
And at least at like company level, like Hamas scenes,
they've like gotten its, its, its acts together.
OK. So that's what's different.
At the same time kind of the myth of like Israeli like
superiority on the battlefield, that's kind of an overstated, I
mean 1973 kind of like kind of like squashed that sensibility,
OK. And that's one of the reasons
why the Camp David, of course, became so imperative, because I
mean, first of all, like removed Egypt from the Soviet camp.
But it also it like Israel basically realized like we've
got a kind of negotiating table with some of these people, okay,
because it's not manageable. So what's different now, again,
is the operational sophistication of the OP for
that Israel is fighting. But also there's a basic
irrationality that's unprecedented to America and
Israel these days. You know, like I and you see
this in the Ukraine war too, like how everyone would feel the
Ukraine war, this is just being allowed to continue in
perpetuity. Like that's not, that's not how
you manage politics. So how do you manage war and
peace? You know, you don't just say
like Moscow is evil and we're going to drag this war out as
long as absolutely as long as possible like that.
That's irrational. That's not what you do.
You know you don't saying, you know, Netanyahu is saying. 1
billion people are all evil and they hate us and we will never
stop fighting them because anti-Semitism, that's not
rational and that's not sustainable.
The only real comparable paradigm what Israel's dealing
with is what South Africa was dealing with from PW BOTA until
the end of the existence of the Bo Republic.
Like, I'm not saying there's like moral equivalence between
the two countries. Obviously, my sympathy is with
African honors. I mean, they're quite literally
like my people. I mean, they're reformed and
they're, you know, Germanic and, you know, they're they're
they're they're a pioneer population like us in America.
But aside more of that, like, there was always more of an
interdependence between white S Africans, you know, it's like
Clive Ruby Lewis said. There's not like white S
Africans and black people. You know, there's dozens of
ethnicities in South Africa like, some of which were
adjacent to the white minority, some of which were neutral to
it, some of which were actively, actively at war with it.
But there was never anybody in South Africa, except maybe the
most unhinged Yahoo. There's no advert government who
said we're going to, like, perpetually wage war on every
black ethnicity because they hate us and we will never
surrender or give a single inch. Like, you can't conduct politics
that way. You just can't.
You know you can't. You can't declare.
Everybody but me is evil.
I will never negotiate under any circumstances.
But that's a uniquely Zionist thing to do.
Like nobody else thinks that way.
Like to think that way. You've got to believe in some
deep and axiomatic way. No one else is really human.
Nobody else has a legitimate claim to anything.
You know, nobody else is is is acting in a way I must abide for
any reason at all, because only I matter, You know, only my
ambitions are valid, and beyond that I simply don't need to
abide anybody else's claims, even for pragmatic or reasons or
basic reasons of of physical security, because I am always
right and everyone else is always wrong.
Like that's literally the way these people think.
I'm not just like being funny or something.
So that's. That's my basic takedown, kind
of. I realize there's a lot there,
but, you know, yeah. And I don't.
Well, no. I think what just to jump in for
a second, I think what underscores it is that is that
we've seen now over the last since 2020.
Really. This what I call sort of
Saturday morning cartoon logic being applied to health issues,
to the war in Ukraine and now the situation with Hamas where
people are saying truly outrageously stupid things as
you said, like a war to end, no to a never ending war that has
no end goal, has no, seemingly has no other point other than
other than to mass murder people.
That seems to be the only like we can just look at the Ukraine
situation like Bachmot still is is a I I I strained my brain to
to to to conceive of a reason for it.
You know you have to almost make up stuff that is also Saturday
morning cartoon stuff, like maybe there's something hidden
in the salt mines. Maybe there's like there must be
something else right because you strain for rationale.
Why would Why would a country send its people into a into a
meat grinder for nothing, for a for a podunk town that that they
used to have a salt line in it like it doesn't?
It doesn't conceivably make any sense, but.
It's also like in the case for Israel, like, I made the point
of view before. Look, if you don't like Arabs or
Muslims, I do. And a lot of them are my
comrades. If you don't like them, that's
fine. You don't like anybody, You
don't want to. But if you're going to sit
around, it's, you know, Gaza literally is an open air prison,
Okay like it is. It's a giant concentration camp.
It's high. Probably that's what it is,
Okay. These people are basically under
a permanent blockade and an opener of prison.
You know, it doesn't mean to me they feel bad about that.
Doesn't mean you need to sympathize for these people.
But saying like, those people are savages and folk, all of
them, you know, if you're going to be a bigot man, like you have
big and favor your own people, don't be some, like, fucking
dumb Hick and like decide you're going to be like a bigger Jewish
bigot than Jews themselves. I mean like that's that.
This is like fucking asinine. And it's also, again, it's like,
you know, there's something. You, you know, you like, like
these people in Gaza. You know, unless, unless people
are truly talking about, God forbid like the political will
and technology to like kill every single one of these people
or beyond that they kill literally 1 billion people who
populate Dar al Islam, you're going to have to deal with these
people. That's reality, OK?
Adults within reality understand that.
And that's saying fuck everybody else, I'm going to kill you as
long as I can. That's not that's not policy.
You know, and also I'll add, you know, you mentioned before we
went live about the communcy crisis and its relationship to
to military affairs. One of the reasons, I'm sure I
mean, I that Israel does not have meaningful human
intelligence, which, despite what people claim, still
matters, especially if you're talking about a literal like
racial war. You know where where people live
quite literally on top of each other.
You know if you're going to, if you're going to, if you're going
to try and like erect like brand apartheid between populations
and just absolutely refuse like any any kind of meaningful
negotiation. You know, it's just to achieve
some kind of peace at distance like you're not, you're not
going to be able to understand the strategic paradigm as it
impacts you in very intimate terms.
And since we're a being was assassinated, that's like a
whole other issue. But the course Israel produced
some fairly competent statesman, like whatever I think about
Israel, anything else, you know, before the mid 1990s, like after
Rabin was killed, that really was the ascendancy of leekhood
and permanent capacities. And I'm not, I'm not saying
there's like I don't want to get into, like whether like why he
was killed or really loves conspiracy people have drunk
things with that. That's not my point.
Like something went to that event.
Like, like Netanyahu, Is that me?
Like a crook, The guy, just there's something wrong with
him. You know, like he's not, he's
not an intelligent person and he's not a reasoned guy and he's
certainly not a man you want as warlord.
You know, like Sharon, Sharon might have been a terrible
person and like, not a good guy. But before he became elderly and
kind of and and kind of compromised by, you know, his
people doing to get old, you know, he was a career military
man. And you know, they did, however
objectionable. And you know in the long term
like leakage orientation towards the problem was you know at
least like one could say that like wasn't about a rationality
of of of of operational military affairs like Sharon like had his
shit together. I mean like net Netanyahu is a
fucking buffoon. You know he's, he really is.
You know. And it's I don't, I don't see
how a man like that and you know like a crony cabinet around him
can see their way out of this. But, you know, it's also, I
mean, the amazing thing about Israel is.
I think Michael Sawyer, I mean, sometimes he seems unhinged, but
I think sometimes during the Iraq War especially, I think he
was, I think he was doing God's work.
But he, he made the point years back.
How can you make an enemy of everybody?
You're at war with the Shia, You're at war with the Sunni,
you're at war with the Christians.
You're worth the Arab, you're worth the Persian, You're worth
the like, you're literally not, not at war with anybody.
I mean, like, how is that sustainable, man?
You know, like doesn't make you some kind of, like, base badass
or some kind of? You know, or some kind of like a
lone Spartan contingent, You know, against all odds.
It makes you crazy or it makes you suicidal or makes you like
self defeatingly incompetent. You know, I mean I think that's
it wasn't rambling a bit but that's yeah, man, I mean these
things are all very well. No, but it's.
But I think it underscores, it underscores this, this sort of
ideas. Like, you know, one of the
things that I got very good at, especially with the Ukraine
Russia thing, and I think it's because when media reports
started started talking, it was something that I have been
following for 30 odd years. Sure.
And when media reports started coming out and talking about
Putin acting in ways that Putin has never acted, I was like, oh,
so you're talking about Bill Putin?
Like, this isn't Vladimir Putin, This is some other guy.
This is Rob Putin or whatever, who?
I don't know who. You're talking about or like
Daryl Putin, like my cousin from the Hood or whatever, right?
And it's amazing to me how propaganda works until it hits
you and it hits up against your actual knowledge about a
situation. You're like, no, no, what are
you just talking about? The same thing with Israel now,
I feel is that, you know, when I first saw the reports, you're
automatically going, well, wait, where was where's the IDF?
Where's this? Where's that?
You know, where's the intelligence like this?
We're always told this is world class intelligence.
And then you catch yourself saying it, you're like, wait a
minute, how do I know that? And why do I know that?
And more importantly, why do I want this to be true?
Because almost everything in the media narrative structure is
based on that. You want something to be true
for some reason. You desire this thing and it's
going to feed you the information that confirms that
desire. That Israel's this badass
country in the Middle East, that you know, the IDF and and the
intelligence services out of Mossad is just like, you know,
all knowing, all seeing can do everything.
And you better not screw with these guys cuz they're they're
they're total badasses. In reality it might just be a
bunch of 19 year old girls who don't want to go serve in the
military who are now you know who are who you might be in a
situation where your operative army is has a competency crisis
you've there's one report out of that I mentioned before went
live that it's quite possible that that Israel's low on
artillery so their iron shield doesn't have the MIT right
missiles they don't have enough artillery to just to just attack
Gaza from a distance Hamas has now taken.
They've been waging, they've been they've been waging a war
against Syria for no particular reason for you know a decade and
a half. I mean like it, which, which
again, like I said, and I mean the fact that they the fact that
they got their face broken by Russia and Hezbollah.
In in Syria I mean that that's why they went all in against
Russia and Ukraine when they did but it But with regards as in
regards to the Assad and intelligence matter.
I I firmly believe like I said I'm not I haven't visited the
Holy Land but I but I do I I do know a fair amount of guys who
are from there who are there now not in the battle space but like
guys no live on told me you know in the past 30 years especially
like you don't really associate like if you're if you're a
Moslem or if you're a Christian you don't really associate with
Israelis like you used to like these people used to whatever
the bad blood was whatever the wider political paradigm.
You know whatever kind of apartheid features kind of drove
a wedge between you know people in in kind of common spaces.
There was a basic you know they'd socialize in some basic
way and of course you know there there'd be the odd kind of like
marriage across the ethnic racial sectarian line.
But I mean, the less that happens, like, the less you're
going to be able to insinuate yourself into these spaces.
And you're not really going to know what what what you're not
going to. You're not going to have a
conceptual picture of like what what the what what the Gaza
Street is doing. And it's also too literally like
I said, I'm not, I don't resort to hyperbole, man, unless I'm
like making fun of stuff. The Gaza Strip is literally an
opener of prison, Israel's disengagement from it.
There's this kind of, there's this, there's this kind of like
Demilitarized Zone, like Barrier Strip that's hyper militarized
that that Palestinians are forbidden to transverse.
There's essentially like a permanent embargo on it.
You know in terms of essential goods.
The only majority of people who live there, other people who
were displaced by the ethnic cleansing operation from 1946 to
1949, it's it's it's an it's like an iron cage.
That's the term like Rashi Khalidi used for it.
Okay. So if you're basically, if
you're basically treating these people like you're a warden or
you're a jail cop and there are your charges, you don't you
don't know what they're up to. Like, you're not, you're not
getting good human intelligence. And if your notion is we don't
have to deal with these people because we're Israel and fuck
everybody else on the planet, you know you're not going to
have the psychology for that either.
Like, if you want to, if you understand people, if you have
to like, walk among them, OK? And like, if you're not in their
race, there's always going to be like barriers, but they are
going to like, come to like you even like, in spite of
themselves, OK? And they are going to like get
comfortable at least around you and you're going to like pick up
like tells. You're going to like overhear
things. You know, you're going to like
observe pattern even among like very insular peoples.
And in the Middle East, I mean, they're like the insular of
insular peoples, frankly, a lot of these populations.
So you're never going to have like a complete picture, kind of
like their cultural mind, but you are going to discern when at
least when things change or or when the kind of like war drums
are sounding around Gaza in like subtle ways.
And I don't believe Israel can do that anymore for reasons I
said. But again, I've not been there
on the ground. I mean, people can tell me that
this is totally off base, but I don't think it is, OK.
There's comparable precedent for things like that, where the
capability to devise a picture from human intelligence just
like completely disappears for reasons I said, because of total
isolation. And you know, kind of like the
most basic, like human level of sociality, but but all for only
two. Like the IDF is like U.S.
Army and it's like full of like fucking fat people and like and
like idiots and like, you know, intersex like women who weigh
like £400. I don't know.
And if that's the case, yeah, I'm sure that's not helping any.
So what do you think? Okay?
One of the main concerns here was because they've already
listed in the media a few things.
This is why I found interesting and disturbing at the same time.
They're claiming that these that.
When Hamas broke through the lines, shot up a a rave or an
outdoor festival and and kidnapped a bunch of women
mostly and went back into the Gaza, there's now reports that
they're mass rape, they're gang raping these women, which is you
keep seeing this narrative pop up.
I just did a preliminary like search on it, like where is this
coming from? And it seems to be the only
confirmation I could get from it was that the the the report of
gang rape came from? An account on X.
It was called the Israeli war room that are making these
claims. It it what I think is important
for people to understand is like it.
There's some some things that you can deal with just small
little things and then go okay. If they're lying about this or
this is inconclusive, why they're repeating it and where
does this lead us to what I can say.
What I can say to that man is you remember in 1990 there was a
testimony before Congress by that Kuwaiti nurse who said that
when the Iraqis invaded, I wasn't nursed.
And they took all the babies out of incubators and threw them on
the floor and they died. And then they like raped all the
boys and girls like, you know, these like teenage boys and
girls, you know, And then they and then they went from bed to
bed and like mass occurred like all the elderly and invalids.
And then it comes out like five years later.
That Lady was a member of the Saudi royal family.
She worked with this, like big international PR firm, like she
wasn't a nurse. This story was literally made-up
by like these Madison Ave. like Horror Story writers, you know,
like this sounds like made-up, but it's not like that happened.
I mean it's like, I don't do I find it hard to believe that
like very jumped up angry young man would like gang rape women
in a war zone. I do not find that hard to
believe at all. But it's like why are there
these like pictures where it's like a found footage of horror
movie of these like pretty girls being led away and he's like
grimy looking like kind of stereotypical like dirtbag Arab
guys like like, you know like acting on like, why what's like,
what is this It's like the Blair Witch Project like Arab Rape
Edition. Like it doesn't like who's who's
taking this footage guys like, oh this is me committing war
crimes. I mean, like, I mean I'm sure
there's some of that like, but it's it's it's weird, man.
And it's like, I going back, what was the what was the what
was the War Department's big coup after Wilson's war
declaration? It's like this King Kong gorilla
and the poster with, like, a naked girl over his shoulder.
Stop. The yeah.
The the eternal Huns. Yeah, yeah, weeping German
girls. It's always raped.
You know, like, you gotta save them.
You gotta save these, these like, poor girls being raped by
these like brutes. That's always the narrative.
No, again, I'm not trying to be flipping like women get raped
constantly in war and that's fucked up.
Like, I'm not saying that does not happen, but it's like, why
is that always the narrative, you know?
And it's like, I mean, I know why, but it's like, it's also, I
mean, I don't. But, you know at some point it's
like, what's the point? I can, I can pull up like gross
pictures all day of like little kids, like little Arab kids,
like soccer who got like fucking lit up by like 50 calibration
ammunition. Like what does it, what does it
prove? Like bad things happen at war.
Like I don't. It's like, well, that's that's
wrong. If, like Hamas does fucked up
shit like, I don't, OK. I mean, I don't accept it.
That's the interesting part about this whole thing, right.
Because it's it's bad enough that Hamas did invade that that
rave that's, I don't think there's any contention about
that. Did shoot people at at that
festival. Did kill people that festival
and did take prisoners absentially for now.
There's there's speculation going going crazy about why they
did that, whether it's being using them as human Shields or
is. Exchangeable tokens or as a way
to to draw the Israeli military into Gaza and then and then have
urban warfare. I'm I'm open to all those
possibilities. The the the thing that I
rejected off the top of it is that it doesn't make, typically
speaking when people take when people kidnap people in a in a
time of war, they tend not to mistreat those people that
horrible. I'm not.
I'm not saying they're putting up at the Ritz, but.
It doesn't make any sense for them to to to visit horrors upon
them when they could just shoot them in the head, right?
I mean, there's there's like, again, too, there's like a
horrible sexual violence that happens at war.
But it's like I like so in the opening salvos of this these
guys who presumably if they're in the kind of, if they're in
the kind of first wave operationally on the Hamas side.
I mean presumably these guys would be kind of like the
hardened cadres. You know they'd at least or at
least led by guys where they're equivalent of like pretty
experienced Ncos like their first order of business is like
kidnap girls to like rape them. Like that's I mean so morality
and fucked up aspects that aside like that that that represents
kind of a breakdown in military discipline like immediately I
mean that's not you can't in in terms of like military necessity
and pregnancy. You can't, like, have men doing
that kind of thing, you know, like, again, not to minimize,
like a horror of, like sexual violence, but you know what I
mean? And, like, it's but the whole
thing is it's smacked of, you know, like what I said, like
these kinds of this kind of entirely predictable, like these
kind of entirely predictable propaganda areas always having
to do with sex, always having to do with, you know, the the
destruction of innocent victims. Like, you know there's like a
pattern here and obviously like that inflames the passions of
people in a way that and I see it too.
Like people. I was like I got like 50 emails
or like TM. Some people think you're a piece
of shit you support rape. You folk.
I'm going to kill you. It's like, what are you talking
about? Because it's like, you know,
it's like in these people's minds like they can't.
They're not capable of of they're not, they're not capable
of of discerning that like things they see on TV or the
Internet like aren't reality. You're like aren't happening to
them or like or that there's, you know, there's facts and a
paradigm present that supersedes, like bad guys raping
women. Like, it's really kind of
fascinating as a study in human psychology, albeit it's pretty,
it's banal and it's kind of upsetting.
But. Well, it goes back to what I was
saying about. So no, it's okay.
It's about, I think, going back to what people wanting somebody
to be true. If you can attribute the worst
possible crimes to a group of people then you can do whatever
you want to those people and not feel bad about it because
obviously, well, look they're they're mother rappers and and
and murderers and and look and I'm I've always been very
neutral on both the Hamas or let's say Palestine is Israel in
general. I recognize that neither side or
my friends, they're not interested in me or and helping
me at all. And you know I I wish them good
luck and God bless and hope they they figure these these things
these things out the but as you alluded to the the the issue of
course is that it does involve us because geopolitics whether
you like it or not is part of your life and movements in
Levant are going to actually start affecting you know whether
we send people out to the desert to die again.
And you know just general policies and if you know, if if
we have to send that print out more money to to to to beef up a
war measures in in in Israel. What does that do to our, you
know to your to your local economy?
Well we're going to find out because that seems to be that
that seems to be the case. I want to touch on two other
things. That's why we have you here.
One is that the absolute disappearance of Ukraine from
the media narrative. Which I thought was a little
bit, you know, beyond coincidental.
Let's, let's put it that way. Especially as we're getting
reports that the entire Ukrainian offensive line is now
completely crumbling in in in in real time.
And then of course now everyone's freeing World War
Three. So maybe you can just comment on
the first briefly, but but especially with the 2nd.
The I guess the the things we should I would guess I'll defer
to your to your expertise. What should we be looking for if
this if If we are worried about World War Three, how would that
actually come come about from this conflict?
I'll address that question. First World War Three and the
way people bandy. It isn't possible at present.
People forget or they don't. The 20th century was totally,
totally, totally totally abnormal.
Okay. Things like that happen
literally once every thousand years if that.
You know, this is like there's really nothing you can like
extrapolate from there like generally about about the status
quo on at scale, at temporal scale as regards power politics.
Because that basically almost never ever ever ever happens,
OK. It was a uniquely dangerous
strategic landscape. Although there was like only a
handful of conflict dyads, if they were tripped they they
would have almost inevitably led to like general nuclear war.
And I never accepted like Carl Sagan's kind of piece like view
that this is the end of life as we know it.
No. But if 200 million people dead
like worldwide like that that that that does change life as
you know it, OK. There's there's no chance of
that kind of escalation happening because there's not
there's not the political will. There's not the forces and being
there's not, there's not the mobilization, there's not the
ongoing mobilization of of war readiness.
There's not the mindset. There's not the knowledge even
to like do that anymore. But also like it wouldn't like
the the constellation of alliances would not develop
whereby that kind of destruction at scale is possible.
What I believe is kind of the main conflict theater in the
21st century is Central Asia. I do agree somewhat with a lot
of what Pepe Escobar says, not entirely, but when he describes
Central Asia as like a continent unto itself.
And if you looked at it as like a discrete continent, it has
like the the the majority of the world's remaining like coveted
natural energy resources, petroleum, natural gas, you
know, all all these things. You know, a huge percentage of
the global population. There's there's basically like a
great game like Ward, like like low intensity war development
between like the United States, China, Turkey, the Russian
Federation, like secondary players are Iran and Kazakhstan,
you know and some of these other countries and it there's there's
potential for that by midcentury.
I think the trip into like a hot like a hot general war between
like some consolation of those combatants.
But I think that that's really kind of the only like burdening
conflict dyad that has like potential for like general war
between like nation States and the way we think of it like
combined arms, possibly even tactical nuclear weapons if
things get to that point. But I don't like, I mean the
issue with the mid, the issue with the Near East is that if
America is going to simply say no matter what, you know, we're
going to, we're going to fight some like racial, holy war,
literally the posterity of the Zionist state as it exists.
We will not compromise. We will not give an inch.
We will not allow the state to be reconstituted into like this
kind of like multiethnic like you know like kind of like
normal like managerial regime, you know, there, there, there.
There's a potential for like a real bloodbath there, owing to
both, you know, an unreasonable kind of spirit of of of
vengeance as well as a basic a total like lack of conceptual
literacy on the reality of these things.
At the same time, I believe that it's quite obvious Russia to a
lesser degree, China, because their interests are different
and there's less of a military aspect to it.
But also Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, this, these consolations
of lesser like Arab and Islamic states, you know, who are at at
permanent a prone enemy footing with with with with America,
Israel, people. It's kind of like letting
America fail and like not responding with provocations and
it's like letting it fail over and over again.
And like, you know, and I I I don't.
I think Putin is a poor warlord in a lot of ways.
I I think Putin tolerates provocations to the degree that
now he's fighting NATO, literally with the decapitation
range of Moscow. And he never should let things
get to that point. But at the same time, there is
like an internal logic to that basic strategy.
Why? Like why?
Why? You know what?
Why confront America directly when it it's hurting itself?
Like more than I could. It's an oversold vacation, but I
think that's part of it. That's my take on that, Why
Ukraine has left the news cycle. I don't think.
I don't think Biden's joking. I think Biden really is like a
fucking moron. He's like a doddering idiot.
Yeah. He has no idea what the fuck's
going on, Even when he's a young, even when he's a young
man. There's that footage of, like,
him talking to Clarence Thomas saying like, you and I
understand each other and Tom was like, senator, I literally
have no idea what you're talking about.
You know, like, the guys are fucking idiots.
So, like, when Biden comes out and says, like, we're gonna,
we're gonna, we're gonna stand with Ukraine to the end.
There's no kind of what that means.
Okay. The people who do understand
what that means and the Pentagon or do have a clear picture.
I've said from inception, it's just about money and clout and
and and and and and and hurting Ivan because they've got, you
know, these kinds of perverse tribal prejudices owing to their
own parentage or they've taken them on or something.
But there's no there there. There is.
There is not now. There has never been, there will
never be some military path to victory for Ukraine.
There's absolutely no chance Ukraine can defeat the Air
Force, the Russian Federation, chase the remainder of it into
Russia, annihilate it, go to Moscow, occupy it, prevent
Russia from ever reconcentrating forces, and then declare
victory. That's there was no chance of
that happening. None like the odds that
happening or me, like, going to, like, play professional football
in the NFL tomorrow, OK. It's literally a fantasy.
It can't happen. So the purpose of this war has
always been, you know, basically, you know, for I'm not
what these people claim, like, oh, war is all about big
business and bankers. But there's an aspect of war
profiteering, especially now because there's like nothing
else going on in that regard. These, like, Zionist types, they
don't give a fuck about Ukrainian people.
If Ukraine turns into like a wasteland, turns like a big
cemetery, they don't care because their ideas like, well,
you know, for a few years we hurt Russia.
So fuck it, who cares? And we got rich doing it.
I think it's like that simple. But it's like, you can't at the
First of all, Zalenski's an incredibly grotesque person.
He's literally like this, like a little rat man, you know, shows
up in like dirty clothes. Like we need the more money to
fight. I mean, like after a while like
that greats on everybody. And it's like even people who
are kind of, who are kind of, you know, just to be sure that
we're not really sophisticated political affairs.
You can't just declare for like years on end like oh this, the
Ukrainian offensive is going to turn everything around like at
some point like that loses like its percentage, you know, even
in even in even when we're dealing with the kind of like
goldfish memory of of your average kind of like cable news
watcher. So I think that's why.
But it's also, I do think that I nobody thought Ukraine could
someone win this war militarily. But I think some of these fools
actually did think that like, Russia was going to, like
internally fall apart and like Putin was going to be sidelined
by some like military Hutu. That was like all fucked up.
And like that didn't happen. And like, basically like, OK,
Russia's like a mess, but Russia's always a fucking mess,
you know? And like, it's so you basically
have like nothing to show for this, for this grotesque, you
know, kind of endless, you know, like parade of human suffering
and destruction based on asinine rhetoric and it kind of
hysterically bigoted, kind of declarations that without any
substance. I mean, I think that's what it
is. I think it's that simple.
Well, I think that pigeonhole that leads us into where we can
wrap up here is that I think. One of the difficulties is
trying to understand wind conditions.
You know, a lot of people now openly speculating about why
Hamas is doing what they're doing.
Obviously they if if Hamas isn't going to be able to take over
Israel from Gaza by itself, it's the the actions seem to be just
almost it fits into an evil narrative if you're just looking
at it like Hamas just wants to kill Jews.
And that's that's the only reason that they're doing any of
this stuff is just to. To be evil and kill Jews but
what if you look at if you try to but yet you can't factor that
into a coordinated attack so So what So they spent all this time
and effort to be hyper coordinated to get all these
missiles to to paraglide over positions to to you know to to
strike Israel where where their weakest and and and and complete
these military goals and yet are just crazy evil people like that
doesn't that doesn't compute so. And again, we're into
speculation zones, but if we're going to speculate or if you're
going to speculate, I should say what do you think Hamas is
general wind conditions here are.
And I only really ask this because one of the things that
if I can pull it up here, one of the interesting reports I think
was out of Reuters, I don't know where it is right now.
They they talked to one of the one of the leaders over in Gaza.
And had asked if he would be open to ceasefire negotiations
or any of that already that kind of thing.
Initially they had said no they're going to fight to the
they're going to fight to the to the end here.
But he made a statement which I thought was telling which is
saying yeah we're we we could be open to the to something like
that we've we've achieved our our our.
I think I forget what a word he used, but he's he's they've
achieved their objectives, so that's interesting to me.
What are your thoughts on all that, Thomas?
It's a long campaign, okay. I mean, it's more there's more
of a conventional arms aspect to it than something like the
provisional IRA's long campaign or like probably maybe a more
apropos analogy to the Popular Front for Liberation of
Palestine General Command. But what I said earlier, I made
the point that I'm not resoling. I had probably when I say that
Gaza is literally an iron cage God, just literally under siege.
It's under for all part of a purposes.
It's under starvation blockade and it's it's it.
These people are boxed in under under Israeli arms.
Okay. They they're they're they're
they're quite literally trying to liberate that space okay.
They're they're trying to bring down the prison walls okay and
making it make it clear to Israel when as we discussed war
and live Israel may in fact be vulnerable and as as regards
like their their munitions and and the forces and being and and
munitions and things. This may be an opportune time to
strike or Hamas finally has the discipline and the operational
competence you know, to in fact really hurt Israel in Gaza and
beyond and force them to make concessions of of what people
might characterize as a human rights nature.
I don't, I don't like that term. But you know what I mean.
You know, to basically afford, afford Gaza like basic access to
the freedom of movement as well as access to the commodities and
things that we equate with, with civilized life in the modern
world, Okay. And finally, Hamas is more
politically savvy than people give it credit for.
In the West and in the Western world, this stuff doesn't
resonate. But among Arab people, even
those aren't even those who aren't particularly radical or
even particularly religious. It's highly resonant and they're
bringing world attention. Again, I'm not talking about
like America and like Western Europe or Japan.
I'm talking about like Darl Islam and beyond, you know, the
the 2 billion other people, you know, in the global South or
whatever, it's bringing attention to their plight, as it
were. Like whether you or anyone
sympathize with them, it's not important.
And that is huge, especially these days.
I mean, it was huge 30-40 years ago.
But especially these days, like any kid or any any Hamas fighter
can like pull out like it's cheapo smartphone and like say
this is what's happening here. That's why and also, you know,
Israel. Israel.
Like I said, Israel just got smacked down in Syria, Israel's
fighting in Yemen. Israel's fighting in the Levant,
Israel's all over Iraq. Israel's arming Ukraine.
And this kind of like endless campaign against Russia, like
Israel can't afford to take on like another, another, another
enemy in like some hot battle theater.
It's all of those things. But I'm, you know, I'm not at
all like a military type, but I think I do know something about
power politics and I think I do know something about the process
of political warfare. Whatever meets the road, just,
you know, because I do okay. But yeah, that's.
What do you think of the, what do you think of the likelihood
of of Iran getting dragged in through through a Lebanon
because I know my initial thoughts.
About all this is like if if this spills over to Lebanon,
that could pull Iran in because of Hezbollah.
If that was going to happen, what happened in Syria and in
2006, that was the last time Israel fought, fought Hezbollah
like an open combat and Hezbollah performed exceedingly
well, Okay, they claimed that Al Quds and like Iranian elements
were on the ground and Lebanon. I don't doubt that.
I mean I'm sure that's probably true Okay in Syria.
I'm sure that I'm the reason why Mr. Trump like had Suleimani
murdered was. I mean that was the allegation
if I recall correctly. I if there was going to be if if
Syria had truly fallen to to to these to these to these tech
theory murderers that are supported by like you know these
terrorists and American Israel support and like it.
It was open season on Shia and Alawites and and Christians in
in in in like the constellation on Assad.
Basically I think there would have been direct Iranian
intervention and so we're not we're not going to let like
Syria become. We're not we're not going to let
America create some Green Zone and what was Damascus.
I think that was very possible and that's another thank God.
Like Russia didn't let that happen.
But I don't Israel did Israel, Iran, Syria, the PLO, Hezbollah.
I mean they they were fighting a hot war in in the Beirut St. you
know for a decade and a half. And the big fear then was like
oh Iran's going to escalate and Iran is more cunning than people
think I think. I don't think they have it in
them to be like a great regional power in the in in power
political in like conventional power political terms.
But they're an ancient people and they they're they're more
cunning than people think man. I mean so that was Saddam's
Saddam's claim you know was when when I, when I ran launched it's
you know crusade against the NASA and Islamic Republic was
that these people can't fight like they're they're effeminate
pacifists. They're a bunch of calligraphers
and and and and and and and ayatollahs and and and rawafied,
you know, whatever, like I. But it proved him wrong.
I think they're, I think they were cutting the net.
All right. Let's wrap this up.
Thank you, Thomas. I appreciate it.
We will be putting this out as soon as we do.
I'll let you know. No, thank you.
Just on a personal note, you know, my cohost, Mark is, is
married to an Israeli. I know emotions are.
That's not why he's not here, right?
Yeah, he's not. That's not why he's not here
today. He had work and stuff, but.
I know emotions are incredibly high about these things.
I wanted to be clear from this channel's perspective that we're
certainly not endorsing either side.
It's not a good guy, bad guy situation, you know.
We have of course detailed our objections to Zionist and
Zionist policies and and the Jews in general, but that
doesn't mean that we wish any kind of harm to happen to
anyone. On the streets or or any any
specific individuals. And so we we send our hearts and
prayers out to everyone in that region and hope that we can hope
that this doesn't go on for his for longer than it has to
unfortunately but Thomas so I don't want to know on a sober
note but there's nothing there's no like haha moment I can I can
figure out here for that one. Thomas let the people know where
they can find you where they can hear you.
And again, thank you very much for coming on.
No, you're welcome, man. I thank you.
It you can find me on my sub stack.
It's, it's realthomas777.subset.com.
That's what the podcast is. That's where we got a chat
going, you know, about stuff. And that's where, like some of
my longer form writing is. Season two of the podcast is
going to drop like a Halloween weekend and then that way, which
point like you're going to be able to access all of season one
for 100% free and now it's literally only $5 a month.
That's the lowest I can make it without eating a loss.
I'm hoping I I'm hoping within 2024 I can I can make like
everything free. But I I'm trying to make things
like literally, like as cheap as possible without, you know, but
I'm on Twitter or like X right now.
I mean whoever. I don't know if I'm gonna get
like nuked off off of these social media platforms but I'm
there at a real capital rel under score #7 hmes 777.
I got I got I got banned from Telegram again for like some
reason. I mean there's people in there
like literally like post, like snuff porn and like they
probably again like saying like mean things about Ukraine or
like Israel or it's crits insane like the same like 5 *.
I I do not like Telegram at all. I only was fucking with it
because like every time I got new people like begged me to
come back because like that's you know, that's like the
platform a lot of people like, but I'm not on there right now.
I don't really want to return and it's just it's just
something just like grimy about it, man.
But the that's basically and I'm launching, you know, I spent the
summer like shooting content for my channel, the channel's Thomas
TV, on YouTube. It's not populated by stuff yet
other than like, you know, some like tasks and introductory
stuff. But I mean, I'm based in 2024 in
the seasons with the pod and sexing it up a lot.
And I've been blessed, you know, with a great editor and and and
cameraman, but also, you know, I want to transition more to like,
video content. So that's basically like what
I'm trying to do. And as a whole lot of people
going to test, I'm always traveling over the place and
like meeting people like you want to meet me.
That is like incredibly easy to do.
And I'm all about social capital and all kinds of people can
vouch for me, man. So don't hesitate to reach out
if like, you want to do that, too.
That's all I got. Thank you again, Thomas.
Thank you for getting for everyone who's watching,
listening of course subscribe and share and like the channels
and this we are experiencing unprecedented growth in the last
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Subscribe to our Patreon or sub stack, I'll be putting up more
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giving us your money because I got bills, man.
Again, Thomas, always a pleasure, man.
Well, thank you so much. Likewise.
Thank you, Jason.