The Botched Afghanistan Withdrawal–The Flashpoint for Biden Admin Foreign Policy Failures

Squidani, your moderator. With us are members of Project Sentinel, including our president, Tony Schaefer, Lieutenant Colonel Retired Special Ops. We have former Navy Captain Pete O'Brien, who is a, who is our chairman, by the way, distinguished fellow as well. We have distinguished fellows Tim Wilson and Jay Homnick also with us. And we're going to continue our discussion that we had about a month ago, where we discussed whether the Biden administration was up for the challenge of a world at, let's say, a set of various conflicts. It's getting worse. We not only see nations at war, we're also seeing adversarial governments take aim at the United States. This is, in my opinion, because we have, or they believe they have, a less than one year window to get things that they want to get done. Why is that? They probably perceive the Biden administration as weak. However, gentlemen, what say you? Totally agree. I'm hard-pressed to name a single foreign policy success that they've had. Not a one. So, Chris, I have a question that spans this. Is there a difference between spin dancers and mariachis? I'm very confused on this fact. I think mariachis don't spin and they can actually play their instruments. Ah, I was confused by the border situation. So, there you go. Oh, all right. Yeah, well, of course, then. Look, I have to say this. Domestic policy has been a mess with the Biden administration, but you generally expect that out of Democrats. You expect that the foreign policy is going to be subpar, but this is ridiculous. It's almost like as soon as Biden stepped into office, adversaries stepped out of the woodwork. They joined hands and decided, hey, this is a time where we can do what we want. Russia invades Ukraine. China toys with Taiwan again and starts developing superior weapons. Not only are they developing it, they're not doing as much in secret as they used to be. They seem to be enjoying the idea that we know about all of this. Well, he not only came into office, but he made an announcement to the world by blowing Afghanistan. Right. I mean, Afghanistan has much more importance here than certainly the administration wants to admit. There was a recent article last couple of days in which some fairly smart folks were pointing out that the ghost signal for Hamas to move their operation that began in October to an actual event, that planning, that entire process cycled up in the wake of Afghanistan. They looked at what we didn't do, what we failed to do in Afghanistan and said, you know, this is the time to do this. And you look at the sequence of events. You had the clearly the decay that was Afghanistan, which was evident to everybody. It wasn't like this was a surprise. I mean, I had this conversation with Tony. I've had this conversation with other folks several months prior to the collapse of Kabul. We were, you know, engaged in kind of gallows humour about, geez, I hope the embassy in Kabul is stressed to take a B-22 on the roof. We did. We talked about this. Yeah. And, you know, and so, you know, this wasn't a surprise. And I think the rest of the world, I think, you know, particularly Iran, China, Russia, and a few other cats and dogs were in their own evil way pleasantly surprised at just how bad we were in the administration was in handling Kabul. And I think they sort of took it from there that there was this was sort of a carte blanche. They had a they had a window of opportunity that was going to run through 2024 and they were going to exploit it. It's almost like it's almost like at that point, the nations like China, Russia, and of course, some of the other ones, the BRICS nations as well, decided, hey, if they botched up Afghanistan and they kind of are not doing very well in-house, maybe this is the time to to pounce. It's like it's like the substitute teacher is here. Do their thing until the real guy comes back. There's a very clear example that went on. If you remember back a decade, the great fuss was over Iran and nuclear weapons. It's reached the stage where people are now saying that Iran are within weeks of having a nuclear weapon. Well, we all, I think, believe that they actually have the capability now. Certainly, they're North Korean friends with whom they've done an awful lot of work. And a lot of that comes from the example set by, as you rightly say, Biden's withdrawal from Afghanistan. And I'll give you another example. The Houthis are continuing to be a menace, despite the much touted hard hits that they've taken from our military bombing campaigns. And nobody is afraid of this administration. Tim, let me let me hit that, because my sources tell me that 90 percent of all the strikes are against training camps that may or may not have been occupied at some point within the last five years. So basically, we're bombing sand. And on the issue relating to the so-called weapons, there's a limited ROE. The rules of engagement are very limited. They're not permissive. And despite the fact, and I know Pat Ryder, General Ryder, I like him, but I think his statement the other day regarding the fundamental right of defense, that may be true, but it's not articulated within the current rules of engagement. Basically, there has to be an imminent, as in the rockets on the pad getting ready to be launched. And that's why the allies are now, by the way, the EU is now considering its own military force in the Red Sea, because, duh, we're not actually being proactive or effective in stopping the attacks against commercial shipping. So I don't know what to make of that. If I can chime in there, Tony, join sort of the dog pile and the rabbit here. For the folks who are listening who maybe haven't been in the military, like all of us have been, the issue with ROE and with striking, particularly striking mobile targets, the way you defeat mobile targets, this is an unpleasant truth, but this was something that the cavalry learned in dealing with the Plains Indians, is you don't defeat mobile targets by blowing up the missiles, you defeat mobile targets by blowing up the launch crews. And when you have any kind of sense that there is a more restrictive way of dealing that, and we're not essentially trying to get the guy on the horse or trying to shoot the arrow out of the air, it really does limit your effectiveness in actually stopping future attacks. And I would submit, without having seen any piece of the ROE actually written down, I would submit that that's probably where we are when we're doing our strike planning. Totally agree, and it must go back to Afghanistan, where the withdrawal demonstrated clearly military commanders' advice was not to be followed by the politicians. Right. The world was watching when we cut out of Afghanistan. The Trump administration wanted to do the same thing, but obviously in a different way. We all know how the Biden administration watched this whole thing, and we all know what they left behind, and we all know the ramifications of what happened. How much different do you gentlemen believe the situation around the world would be had we left Afghanistan correctly as planned? Incalculably different, yeah. So the plan, since we were all, and I was indirectly kind of involved in the plan with Mike Pompeo and company, the plan was essentially to have the government of Afghanistan reconcile with the Taliban. That is to say, you give the Taliban skin in the game, they won't attack the game. That was the theory. That was the reconciliation. And I do believe that that was the only way you were ever going to get out of there. Would there have been chaos? No doubt. Would there have been assassinations and intrigue? Absolutely. But it would have been Afghan-centric, not us. And so the whole idea was to do this turnover as agreed upon in the deal made in Qatar to allow for the merger of the two organizations essentially in the spring of 2020. But it was an event-driven thing. It was an event-driven thing, and it would have been transitional. It wouldn't have happened all at once. It wouldn't have been us leaving, literally leaving Bagram in the middle of the night, leaving the lights on. Not even turning the lights off, just leaving. And I would argue that the fact that the Biden administration dumped the plan, and then not only dumped the plan, went about being disruptive to the point of where you literally left, I think it was the fourth largest standing military in the world on the ground for someone else to grab, was all intentional. So to me, this was intended. I think what was miscalculated was the response. I think the Biden administration thought domestically, oh, us dumping the war was going to benefit us. I think it was that miscalculation which really set us on the current thing. They believe, because they are so focused on their whack-a-doodle scheme of the world, that, oh, this will help us domestically. And by doing what they did, they completely—it's like the Bergdahl thing. The Bergdahl thing was completely miscalculated. Oh, we'll get Bold Bergdahl back and they'll love us. Like, no. And I think it was the same thing here. And remember, too, that we did this backwards. We pulled the military force out prior to the termination of our president. So we had a military vacuum, a literal power vacuum, all of a sudden in the middle of this fray. If you look at the way the Biden administration attempted to use Afghanistan as a domestic victory—that is to say, we've ended the longest war in American history without regard to the outcome—this is a question for Jay. Jay, do you really believe that at this point, this administration, despite what they say publicly in supporting the funding for the Israelis, do you believe that for a minute they're actually going to help the Israelis win the war against Hamas? Well, I'll tell you what I believe, that Israel actually benefits from—in a paradoxical way, they'd rather benefit the other way, yes—but they do benefit from the incompetence to a certain degree. Because it's pretty clear that Biden, although he's going to keep sniping at Israel, I don't get what you're doing here, you're doing this not the best way, but there's no way he can back down and say, I'm not funding you anymore. And I'll give you an example of something Netanyahu did that was brilliant. Biden just looked horrible making that impromptu press conference to defend himself against the special counsel report, and everyone says, boy, the guy looks really dippy. And then Netanyahu comes out and goes, oh no, he's tremendous, so we have conversations and everything is great, which is a brilliant move, because he has to give some concession, rather than give a military concession, he'd rather throw some PR and help him out of his personal crisis. Well, that's an interesting point, because if you think about it this way, the special counsel report gave the Democrats an out for November. They gave the party a way to say, hey, our guy is still clean, but now we have an excuse to say, hey, let's replace him with somebody else, like a Gavin Newsom or a Michelle Obama or something else. But do the old switcheroo after the primaries. Absolutely. Everybody knows, has that old relative who sadly is losing their faculties. And what's very clear is that the implications of that are followed up by the childish political policies that are pushed down the throats, as I said earlier, against the advice of the generals, against the advice of the chiefs of staff, against the advice of common sense. It's a case of stamping feet and saying, I want this and I want it now. Yeah. Okay. So here's my question. If that's the case, if in fact, they're going to jump on this and try and replace President Biden, how do they replace President Biden and not give it to Harris? Oh, that's simple. They can just say, hey, this is what we want. Here's how the Democrats run their primaries. Okay. You remember when Bernie Sanders was running against Hillary Clinton and he had a good shot to win. The Democrats have always, unlike the Republicans, had a safeguard. They use superdelegates. Of course. They're predetermined to go for the person that the hierarchy wants. Okay. These things were already determined. Now, Kamala Harris might have been the woman maybe three years ago, but let's put it this way. She's going to be sat down by these people who are running the country or running the party and saying, look, Kamala, we're not going to nominate you as president because it's just not going to happen. People, they're going to blame it on Joe Biden to feed her ego and say, we'll give you a nice cabinet position or something, or a position in academia where you'll get six figures, a huge six figure salary, and you'll be set for life. Because once again, the people on the left take care of their own. Right. Well, Chris, I got to challenge you there. How do you know Kamala Harris is a female? I'm just asking for the audience because I'm not convinced. I have not seen any definitive evidence of what you say. So not that I want to dispute you or cause trouble, but I mean, have you had any personal experience? Just asking. I mean, I'm not, if it's personal, then I'm sorry, but it's something we need to figure out. I've never been her boss. So no. Well, there you go. I guess that answers that question. I think one of the ways how they can navigate Kamala Harris is simply by keeping her in the job and saying how great she's doing. In other words, instead of trying to replace her with a two person team, and they'll say, wow, she's been such a solid VP, let's keep her as VP and put someone in on top. Well, careful who you talk about being on top, Jay. I'm just saying, I think we don't want to go down that path. So let's stay away from being on top or on bottom. And we don't want to go down the BDSM path either. Just saying. So my question then is, is Taylor Swift in the running for vice president? I think she's after us already. Well, let's put it this way. If in fact she breaks off with the Democrats, she'll have a full album after that. So I understand the whole Taylor Swift thing. I could take Travis Kelsey for president. He dresses like a pimp, so he's halfway there. That's good. And he'll push the jab. He'll definitely push the jab. We haven't had a good beard since Lincoln. I guess that's true. Well, the millennials are coming of age, so I'm sure one of them will have a good beard. But going back to the original question, I am curious. I mean, it's been kept very, very quiet until the Democrat National Convention. And as you say, that's already preordained, but who's it going to be? Governor Grudin? Well, I think, Chris, I mean, Tim, the thing is, if you look at the three New York Times articles and the CNN story, which basically says Joe is done. So I think that indicates this is kind of the beginning of the end of the media covering for him. So if you look in those articles, I think there's hints of who they're going to go for. And I think it may well be trying to draft Newsom to do it, since Newsom has been out there very publicly trying to be the biggest supporter of Joe Biden. And I know a lot of people think, Michelle. Michelle is problematic. I don't see it. And she will be exposed enough where she would lose. We've already have one Mr. Obama. We really don't need another. That's right. That's the only thing that would convince Democrats to vote for Michelle Obama, because they know it will be Barack ruling from behind the scenes. Don't say behind the scenes, Chris. Don't go down that path. Come on. But, you know, I'm just not sure that Joe Biden is going to go easily. Joe Biden is the president. He is the president. And he's wanted to be president. And I think there's going to be a lot of a lot of fight there left in the president before he before he leaves that room. I think it's Joe and Jill. I think Jill's got a lot to do with it, Pete. Oh, yeah. Yeah. No question. The one thing Joe Biden did to ensure that he would win the Democrat primary is make sure that that his main competitor, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., was not going to get a airtime and be that he was not going to get Secret Service protection. Yep. Yeah. OK, this this he is the major threat. He's the guy that could win. It could have won the Democrat nomination at this point. So his independent run is going to definitely cost Joe Biden, which which will be rather interesting. Well, there was a very famous comedy show on BBC back in the 1950s and 60s called The Goon Show. I'm looking forward to the DNC as a potential rival. This goes back to the next question, though. The idea is Joe Biden. We've reached a consensus that Joe Biden either will not win or will not run. OK, no, I'm not agreeing with that. I'm OK. I've reached. I'm saying that's what's going to happen. And again, you could take five cents to the door with my opinion and you get back maybe some change. OK, that's about it. However, what I will say is that while this is happening, nations around the world, which is our original question, after seeing how the Biden administration botched Afghanistan's withdrawal, the withdrawal of the withdrawal of Afghanistan, excuse me, hairball, that's how it works. Other nations realize they have a short window to pounce. OK, we we have. And not only that, and I want to get to this, not only as far as war is concerned and conflict, I'm talking about ways to de-dollarize the world to the BRICS nations are staring at this whole situation when they're trying to build a currency and and devalue or dollar or de-dollarize the world and saying, hey, we only have maybe 10, 11 months to go here until somebody new comes in and stomps us. Yeah. Right. But let me just make one other point. If Governor Grusom actually does become president, look what he's done to California, because that's what every other world leader is going to do and say, oh, good. I'm glad he got president because he's not going to do good for America. No, no, he's not. But there is at least there is at least perception around the world that he has slightly better mental capacity than the current president. And I'm trying to find the bright spot. Yeah, me too. I don't I don't know if I see that. Well, we'll see what happens. Again, I believe you. I think I believe that any Democrat who sits in or or pulls in or replaces Joe Biden, if that happens, is going to continue such policies. You're right. And Gavin Newsom, Gavin Newsom may win a primary, but whoever gets handed this job, whoever gets handed the nomination is going to owe a lot of people. Well, that's the thing. So I'm sorry. Go ahead. I don't want to repeat. Go ahead. No, I'm going to say the other the other piece of this here is is that there is a gigantic pile of poo sitting in the punch bowl, if you will. And that is is that finally, for the first time in you know, I remember hearing Milton Friedman talking about this in the 1970s. So it's no surprise. But the debt bomb is catching up to us. And it is you know, when people start talking about Medicare and Social Security essentially running out of cash sometime in the 30s, that still seems like a while away. The next president who's going to be looking at by the time he is, he leaves office, he's going to be looking at in his five year budget plan. He's going to be looking into the 2030s. That's no longer going to be far away. And someone's going to have to deal with this. And in the end, it's going to be arguably the big problem that this country deals with in the first half of the century. And none of the none of the folks on the left have any stomach to deal with to actually deal with the problem, because it's going to require tackling the entitlement programs and rolling them back. By the way, I don't think there's any precedent for this. Putin mentioned in the interview with Tucker the $33 trillion deficit. And that has never been done by any world leader before. And if you start looking at what Medicare, Social Security and all the entitlement programs writ large, plus all the pensions, the federal, the total federal debt, including all the unfunded annuities, is not $33 trillion. It's $135 trillion. Yeah, it's way more. And that's going to need to be tackled here sometime in the next 10 years. And the next president is going to bump into that. And so it's going to be a very interesting thing. They're going to find themselves handcuffed. So you want to know what I learned from the Putin interview? Please. Anybody? Let's hear it. I learned that Putin understands it's in his interest to not see the U.S. economy fail, because we are literally a potential bulwark against China. Although he recognizes China as an organization he can deal with, he recognizes if we get gobbled up, he has no buffer against China doing what they want. So this is the thing I got, because he was very clear on this. And that's the point. He brought it up. He brought it up because he's saying he understands that's a vulnerability that basically he's not going to add to. Well, he's getting the bricks. He's talking about the bricks and all these other things. Tucker asked him about the dollar, about undermining the dollar. And he was very cagey about it. But he didn't say, yeah, look, it's something that we want to pursue is removing the U.S. dollar as the primary fiat currency. He didn't say that. I don't think he wants that, because the moment that happens... He didn't say it, but he was giving you statistics about how it's going down. Well, because he's monitoring, because he understands. Yeah, I mean, the other side of it is in China, China has made the noise. But deep down, you listen to what some of the folks, the Chinese are saying, the Chinese government figures are saying. They recognize that for China to become, the U.N., to become the global currency means they have to float the U.N. And it will be a brutal smash on the Chinese economy. And they don't want to do it. And they can't do it. They can't do it because China has been manipulating that currency for a long time. And they don't even want to show their books half the time. So that's a problem. But that's my point. Putin is not going to go against the United States on this issue. That's my point. But he's going to go pro-Russia on this issue. And if pro-Russia means the BRICS currency, the gold bank currency, that's fine. If it means that he wants to use that to cause a distraction between China and the U.S., well, again, it works out for old Vlad. How do you think he got to 80 percent approval? Think about that. Because he's acting in the interest of his people. His people have a stomach for the friction as long as they see that he's moving the country in a direction that benefits the citizens. That's why he's so popular. This is not rocket science. Well, let's go here then. Let's take the original question and move it to this section. The Russian people, at least according to the survey that you pointed out, 80 percent approval rating, says that the Vladimir Putin foreign policy is going in the right direction. Whereas even the American people who generally don't pay attention to foreign policy see what's going on and they say that our foreign policy is going into a negative direction. And what we see here as we're watching all of this is this isn't just a negative direction. This is either incompetence or by design. I think it's by design. By the way, according to Joe Biden, that's your opinion. The media doesn't feel that way. And the media represents what proportion of this country? No, it's a joke. It's a joke, Tim. He said that the day to the media. He was yelling at reporters. Yes, yes. It's like, so it's like your opinion, not according to the media. It's like... If I get a chance to kick the media, I'm happy to do so. Well, so that's why it was funny because that's what he did. Now, apparently, and this is another very significant turn of events, is that over the last few months, gradually, it's been okay now for the media, the Operation Mockingbird media, if you will, yes, to question the president, to criticize him and to question or at least raise thoughts about his mental competence. This is something they were hiding for two and a half years. Even it's even been discussed on The View, which I find... That's like cotton kettle right there. So that's a different story. No, I find that absolutely remarkable that they were willing to even bring it up. What did they say, Tim? From the bit that I saw, it was basically, oh, he's actually really sharp, yada, yada, yada. But they raised the topic. That's my point. Somebody... They did. So, Tim, does Whoopi Goldberg, does she have like an obsession with Chewbacca on Star Wars or something? I have no information about Whoopi Goldberg. As far as I'm concerned, every time I hear the name, I laugh just because Whoopi Cushion in the UK is a big thing. And her pronouncements sound similar. Tying this up in a boat here, again, a lot of this is happening, and this includes the media at this point, because the world inside and outside the US sees the Biden presidency as, well, let's just say the substitute teacher, the weak link, the time to strike, if you will. And again, like you all were saying, Afghanistan was the signal. Afghanistan was the way for the Biden administration to say, all right, we stink, it's open season on us. Or, hey, we made this happen, so it's open season on the rest of the world. It's also cumulative. The more and more fronts that they're engaged in, right now, what would the US have to bring to bear if they're busy with Ukraine, with Israel, with all kinds of situations, with the Houthis? How much do they have if there's a real issue where we need American troops? Less and less. And plus, they have to look like men are women, and they have to look like women are men. Yeah. Why don't I ask a question about Kamala? I don't know if she's a woman. But getting back to this issue of people being, nations around the world, leadership around the world, being essentially, if you will, jazzed about the idea of they've got another eight or nine or ten months to really take advantage for sure, assuming their assumption, their assumption being that Biden won't be reelected, but if he gets reelected, of course, the timeline changes. It's important to think about two things. The first one is that at the core of all, this is the core of Iran, at the core of the Houthis is Iran, at the core of the Ukraine-Russian war, there's Russia. But behind both of them is China. China is actively playing all this. And of course, China, the second piece of this is China, President Xi, Emperor Xi, really, in November 17th, 16th, 17th in San Francisco, explicitly told President Biden that Taiwan is China's and the United States needs to keep its hand off it, and that they're going to settle this issue in the near term. He didn't give a date, but he said he's going to settle it. Yep. Look, in the great strategic game, it's always worth just stepping back and thinking about who needs what and who wants what. China has one huge weakness, which is their energy, their lack of energy sources. America has one huge strength, even with it not being pumped at the moment, in that we have massive oil reserves and gas reserves. China does not, but just to its north, only a few thousand miles in a barely inhabited region, Russia has enormous energy resources that eventually China is almost going to have to go for if they're going to maintain their posture as a leading nation of the world, which I'm still not convinced they are. They're coming out of the Dark Ages, but only slowly, and they still have Dark Age rulers. At some stage, though, they're going to go north. They have to. And I think Putin's aware of that. And the only thing that I think stops them is China or the Emperor Xi, you're quite right, actually knows that Putin would use nukes if he needed to. Yeah, well, Putin is handling it very smart. The other thing, too, that I remember about China is China's net importer of food as well. I think Putin has really handled the China relationship very smart, because he's got the oil. They have a strategic counterweight to the United States, and he's doing his thing. And he was crowing in the interview, and he said, they're doing economic sanctions against me, and I have one of the fastest growing economies in the world. And I'm now number one in Europe. Because they didn't have Reagan guys thinking about how to do it. Margaret Thatcher and Reagan were masters of this. So let me say this as part of what Tim just said. The reason I do believe that the Russians are serious about the potential use of nuclear weapons is because they almost used them at least twice during the Cold War. And one of them is well-documented called War Scare. My late friend, Dr. Peter Pryor, wrote a book about it. And they were literally ready to launch on us on something they perceived as us doing something that was going to stimulate a war, something called Able Archer. So 1983. So they were ready to launch. Just saying. Let's get to Iran, though. And Iran is another one. Iran is obviously a smaller nation. They would probably lose to us in a direct conflict. We've been fighting, as many have said, a proxy war against Russia with Ukraine. Now Iran decided to initiate, or possibly maybe we were involved in initiating this, a proxy war between the two of us while Israel and Hamas are fighting. And, of course, other terrorist groups are getting involved. Again, what would it take to turn this around besides a new president? I mean, Iran, again, probably knows it only has nine, ten months to go to do what it wants to do or do what it has to do. But where's the end game for them? And what happens when somebody takes over for Biden when this happens in January of 2025? Firm handling. I mean, Trump played some masterful moves. Whether you like him or not, he handled foreign policy extremely well. My particular favorite was that he was at a state dinner with President Xi and over the chocolate pudding, he turned around and said, oh, by the way, I just launched a whole load of cruise missiles in to slap the Iranian stations in Syria. You send a firm message. Guess what? The Iranians went quiet. You know, the Chinese backed off of it. It all worked. It's all a case of a strong defense is essential to keeping the peace. There is a problem here, and it is worrisome, and that is that there are very few people, if you will, drooling around Washington, D.C. right now in or out of office who have the credibility to hold the conversation with the Iranians. And the conversation is, you love him or hate him, Henry Kissinger nailed it back 25 years ago, talking about, at the time, North Korea getting nuclear weapons. And what Kissinger said and what needs to be said now to the Iranians is someone needs to sit down with the leadership and say, look, you no longer get a chance to be immature. There's a limit to how immature you can be. You have to act like an adult because you have nuclear weapons, and that makes you very dangerous. And if you stop acting like an adult at a certain point, the world will put an end to you. We can't have people with nuclear weapons not being serious. And so you are now stepping into a bounded range of actions. And the problem is no one in the United States right now can make that argument, and we're not a credible body to make that argument. So we're generating a huge problem here because, as Tim mentioned, it's almost a certainty that they have nuclear weapons or disassembled nuclear weapons sitting someplace in a bunker someplace. Well, I think a very big question that needs to be considered right now is that, I mean, Israel's a little busy with the Hamas situation, a little bit. But the emerging reality right now is that if Israel made a move against Iran, America would almost certainly have to either go along or not stop it. Because if America's the one getting engaged by Iran, and Israel goes in and beats up Iran, what's your point? Israel, if they go in and beat up Iran, there's going to be a world war. That's what's going to happen. If Israel happens to be the aggressor in any of these occasions, not the defender, there will be a world war. And frankly, again, if you look at it this way, I don't believe that this particular administration has the tools, the huevos, or anything else to stop that sort of thing. Well, and arguably Israel, the level of striking that would need to take place to put Iran at least temporarily off the table, arguably Iran doesn't have that capability right now. They don't have the assets. This is another signal that the Biden administration is saying to the rest, or giving to the rest of the world. The idea is, hey, we're pretty weak. We're not doing well in a proxy war against Russia. We're not doing well in a proxy war against Iran. And on top of all that, we're going to publicly nut back our major ally in the Middle East. We're going to tell them when they can fight, where they can fight, and when they have to cease fire. The one bright spot in the Middle East, as far as I'm concerned, is that at least the leadership of Israel, I beg their pardon, unlike the leadership of this country, can walk and chew gum. That's out of necessity, though, at this point. It doesn't matter. I don't believe our leadership can at the moment. I think that's, you know, almost literally. Well, you know, there seems to be another piece of this, too, is that the de facto running of this whole process is being run by, you know, it's more or less what the papers all say, is in fact is being run by Jake Sullivan and his immediate staff at the White House, the National Security Council. The problem with that, of course, is that staff has a very narrow perspective on the world and a very narrow set of experiences. They are not equipped. I mean, I'll just flat out, I find it very hard to imagine that they're equipped. If someone were to walk in, somebody from the Pentagon were to walk in with a full-blown, integrated plan, they're not the guys who are going to be able to evaluate it accurately and say, I like that, I like that, I don't like that. They don't have that experience. Well, there is a huge amount of the childishness of Biden's foreign policy. Well, speaking of that, so Pete, what is more intelligent, a Bucky's brisket sandwich or what's his name? I'm curious. I mean, you know, Ben Rhodes was also not as bright as he... I think Ben was smarter than a brisket sandwich, maybe, but I don't know about Jake Sullivan, so I don't know. They're both meatheads. They're both meatheads. There you go. That's true. That's the commonality, yeah. You're listening to and watching Thought to Action, a presentation of Project Sentinel. I'm Chris Cordani, your moderator. We have Tim Wilson, Tony Schafer, Jay Homnick, and Pete O'Brien, all at Project Sentinel with us. Our website is projectsentinel.com. Check us out over there. Let's tie this up in a little bit. We do have to sign off. I want to continue these conversations because foreign policy and the way things are around the world is at a critical mass. Not only, again, what we see on the surface, the conflicts and the problems around the world, but what's beneath the surface as well. What we're seeing is, again, you saw the BRICS nations and the attempts to de-dollarize the world. You're looking at other different ways, like the United Nations trying to find ways to undermine the U.S. First off, we're doing a very good job ourselves under this administration, but undermining Israel in that respect is also undermining the U.S. because generally, and correct me if I'm wrong, gentlemen, the United Nations General Assembly seems to see Israel as a Middle Eastern extension of the United States. That's why they want to pounce, and they know they can't. I think it's a legitimate argument that says that from the perspective of a lot of people, Israel is, if you will, the kingdom of Jerusalem. It's the outpost of Western Europe, of the Western world in the Middle East. As such, it's just rejected by them. They say it shouldn't be there. So I believe that the most direct evidence that the U.N. is not on the side of Western civilization is the fact that UNRWA was penetrated to upwards of 10 percent, and I think they were playing for the other team. I think that's why nobody asked questions about where all that aid and everything else was going that was given to them. It was translated. The data center, Hamas data center, was underneath the UNRWA? Yeah. So there's no surprise that... And they didn't know. They didn't know. They had no idea. They had no idea. They had no idea. Yeah, no idea. I'm sure they had no idea. And again, this all boils down to the idea that, hey, they believe they can do this. Yeah, of course. And that has to change now. Again, if we believe it's by design, then that could be a very different situation than if we believe that this is by, or let's say, a result of incompetence. I guess that's how we want to put this together. So where are your thoughts on this? What can be fixed if it's A, by design, and B, or B, by incompetence? Well, Chris, I want to ask you a question, and the group, I guess, too. Why is it that we consider lethal actions against every other nation on the planet except the UN when the UN does something to take the other side? We keep them around for a few laps. No, I'm serious. I mean, these people engaged in direct material and operational support to include even participating with Hamas on the day of attack. So why should they be immune of our righteous anger? I'm just asking. They killed quite a few of them, not intentionally, officially. But the UN bureaucracy has been, by a whole host of people, including Tim's late bride, God love her, the UN bureaucracy is just inordinately corrupt. Absolutely. From personal experience as well, deploying as a blue beret in the field and what have you, it's not just the central bureaucracy. Proud bureaucrats, wherever they go, they're hugely wasteful, they're totally inefficient, and, as you mentioned, utterly corrupt. And guess what? They're child molesters. I agree, but, Jay, my point being is that that when another nation crosses the line and engages, I mean, you're Jewish, so this is where I don't understand why the Jewish folks aren't with us or maybe demanding that, hey, maybe the UN needs to be examined by the fact that they're no longer playing as a neutral party and they may need to be treated as an adversary. I think they've been saying that for a long time. Well, then why aren't we, you know, because, again, how does someone permit missiles, missile after missile, to be built inside of the Gaza Strip and fired off into the Israeli homeland? Absolutely, absolutely. Can I just add into that? For a long, long time, while my late wife was looking at oil for food, which was an example of massive UN corruption, one of the things that came clear was that people were in the United States for the money, not no other real reason. And what they became aware of was that they could run any program they wanted, vote any way they wanted. Very often votes were 191 to 2 or 191 to 1 against America, especially on budgeting. And then you get every UN organization now has an office where else apart from New York? Oh, Washington, D.C., because federal funds flow through there. How much do we pay the UN every year? How much does the United States give to the UN every year? Nobody will tell us. Nobody knows. That's right. Too much of it. Too much anyway. And that's a point you bring up, too. These UN, we'll say ambassadors or how you want to put them, diplomats. That's a better word because that's what they are. They're they're basically functioning as lobbyists in Washington, D.C. That's what's going on right now. Absolutely. But we can't stop it. Well, we could stop it, but it's not going to happen. But also, Chris, it's not just the diplomats and the ambassadors and what have you. It's the bureaucrats. And bear in mind, the large chunk of Turtle Bay is not people representing their countries, supposedly. The Chinese happen to run two complete floors of Turtle Bay. But, you know, it's supposed to be an international organization staffed internationally where they represent the United Nations, which should mean they represent good and right. And if any if I know one thing about the United Nations, after following my wife for 20 years and 20 years experience of my own before that, they are a disgusting, dishonest, corrupt bunch. Yes. And there's a simple solution to the whole problem. You just have to tow the cars in Manhattan. Yep. But you're not allowed to because State Department. You think Kamala Harris should be our ambassador to the U.N.? I think so. Yes, she would. Every speech she gives, she turned every diplomat and ambassador's brains into scrambled eggs. I think that would be a good distraction. That's right. Provided the headquarters is moved to Beijing. Oh, she can stay there. I think I'd move to Tehran. I'd be fine with that. I'd be fine with that. I wouldn't mind seeing Keklin Kamara and Winnie the Pooh hang out together every once in a while. That would be kind of fun to watch. Chris, I think you misunderstand that the issue of Kamala Harris is the issue that seems to be something that we have to internalize. Because we internalize it, we must understand that when we internalize something, the issue becomes something that we have actually recognized is important. And when we recognize that we've internalized something that's important, we then understand that we have to then accept that importance of internalization is something we must all grasp and recognize. Tony, that was brilliant. What you're saying is the only person that makes Joe Biden look mentally competent is his vice president. On that note, I want to thank all of you for tuning in and viewing or listening to us. You can join us for our next few conversations. Check us out on our YouTube channel or Rumble channel, Project Sentinel, our website, projectsentinel.com. You can find our media appearances and The Hard Truth with Tony Schaefer, the radio show Offshoot as well. And we can discuss more issues together right here on Thought to Action. Again, thank you very much for watching and listening. For our crew, Tim Wilson, Tony Schaefer, Jay Homnick, Pete O'Brien, and yours truly, Chris Cordeni, the moderator. Well, thank you very much for viewing and stay informed.