https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rTlI_Qwd1I Glenn Diesen 2026-03-09 Prof. Xueqin Jiang discusses the wider consequences of the war against Iran: The US empire commits suicide, Israel increasingly becomes a theocracy, Gulf States collapse, Iran rebuilds as a regional power, instability spreads to East Asia, Europe's relevance continues to collapse as it fails to adjust to the new world, Russia will escalate in a big way, and China will fail to preserve the rules of the old world order that made it so prosperous. Prof. Jiang is the host of the popular educational channel Predictive History: https://www.youtube.com/@PredictiveHistory Follow Prof. Glenn Diesen: Substack: https://glenndiesen.substack.com/ X/Twitter: https://x.com/Glenn_Diesen Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/glenndiesen --- # 00:00 # Glenn Diesen: Welcome back. We are joined today by Professor Jang who uses historical patterns and game theory to predict the direction of geopolitics. And uh professor Jang is famous for many things among some predicting the return of Trump and also uh the war against Iran now a second war that is. U so thank you for coming back on the program. >> Thanks Glenn. >> how how do you make sense of this war though uh against Iran? I mean how how do you measure how this war is developing in terms of uh where the successes or failures are # 00:40 # Jiang Xueqin: >> right? Um so first of all Trump has failed to articulate a purpose and a strategy for this war. at first, it was about uranium enrichment in Iran and the fear that Iran would develop a nuclear weapon. In fact, in Trump's state of the of the union address he said that he would never allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon and both chambers of congress that both the Democrats and Republicans rose to cheer and applaud. It was really the first time that Congress demonstrated any unity during that speech. It was a extremely political speech. but the problem with that is that the Omani foreign minister a few hours before the Americans and Israeli struck tan told um us that the Iranians had already agreed to zero uranian enrichment even for civilian purposes. So the idea that um Trump needs to prevent a nuclear weapon um that doesn't hold. Is this a pretext? And they tried different many different excuses. And then finally, Rubio said this. Rubio basically said, look, we had to attack because Israel was going to attack first. And then the Iranians would retaliate against both the Israelis and us. So to defend ourselves, we had to preempt Israel and attack first. So they're struggling for a narrative. They're struggling to explain to the American people why this is happening. They're also struggling to contain a fallout because after the Americans and Israeli struck Iranians, the Iranians start to bombard US bases in the GCC and they close off the Strait of Hormuz and this is doing tremendous damage to the global economy. So oil right now it's um approaching $120 a barrel, $110 a barrel, I'm not quite sure. Okay, but this is double from a week ago. And remember that the Strait of Hormuz delivers most of this oil to the Asian economies of Pakistan, India, China, South Korea and Japan. Japan relies on 75% of its oil from the sort of hummus. So in about 7 to 8 months, Prime Minister Takayachi has informed her cabinet that Japan will be out of oil. and Japan is you know a a a manufacturing powerhouse. So this war has been a disaster and even today Trump has failed to articulate why the Americans are doing this, what the purpose is and what the um offramp is. And what we're seeing day by day is pretty rapid escalation. In fact, I think the second day or the third day into this war, there were rumors of ground troops. yesterday, there's rumors that the 82nd Airborne Division of of the American army was given deployment orders, meaning that meaning it is possible Americans will choose to air-drop the soldiers into the middle of Iran. For what purpose? We don't know. There's talk of the Americans seizing Car Island, which is the oil depart of of Iran, uh, and which accounts for 90% of Iranian uh, oil exports. Um, there's talk of the Americans uh, funding proxies. Um, there's talk of using tactical nuclear weapons. There's talk of a national draft to find 500,000 soldiers for ground invasion of Iran. So, this war is completely out of control. And it is complete unclear what the Americans hope to accomplish with this war. # 04:40 # Glenn Diesen: >> Yeah, the narrative I think was very poorly planned, even worse than the war has been planned because it began as you said with nuclear weapons, then moved over to ballistic missiles. Then as apparently they wanted to help protesters, then it was about the oil that they should be taken out of the hands of Iranians. Then Trump mentioned Iran might take over the Middle East unless... you know... so we had to go in and as you said the Israel thing was interesting because if the argument is that Israel will attack Iran then Iran will retaliate against Israel and the United States. So they had to go in first then they're essentially admitting that they're fighting Israel's war but they can't say that either. So, so the you the ability to find that narrative is uh was kind of poor compared to other wars. Other usually have one narrative all the media they they organize around it and everyone obediently repeats the same talking points. It's hasn't been done well. But this is a war of attrition though to a large extent that is both sides seeking... well both there's many... all sides seeking to exhaust each other but this is in terms of weapons ammunition um but it's also spilling into energy and yeah water if you will or just general economics how do you see who would exhaust whom first # 06:00 # Jiang Xueqin: >> right so I think Iran is trying to fight a war of attrition where it is putting pressure um on the global economy on the GCC nations because Iran believes that uh the GCC nations especially Saudi Arabia uh Qatar and UAE can apply pressure on Trump to end this war as quickly as possible by closing off the Strait of Hormuz Iran is trying to pressure the Southeast Asian economies of China, Japan and South Korea to press apply pressure on Trump to end this war as soon as possible. So the Iranians are fighting a war of attrition. Unfortunately, the Americans are fighting a war of destruction. So even though they haven't said the purpose, it is clear from what is happening on the ground that the Americans and the Israelis are intent aren't complete and utter destruction of the government's capacity to deliver basic services to its people. What I mean by that is that uh they yesterday struck a dissalination plant in Iran. Um it and you know so you're denying fresh water to the civilian population. That is a war crime. Then the Americans struck oil facilities in Tehran. these are these are civilian oil facilities so that citizens in Tehran can drive their cars. And if you look at footage from Iran, it is the apocalypse. It there's acid rain. the entire sky is black and these people have to grieve that ear. So they're they will develop cancer, they'll have birth defects, it's almost like chemical warfare. So if you are just saying this a war of attrition, that makes no sense. A war of attrition means when you embargo Iran economically, why are you targeting civilians? You know, in the first day of the war, a tomahawk tomahawk missile hit a school in southern Iran and killed about 170 school girls. These are this is an elementary school. 170 school girls were killed in that. this war, the way it's being constructed, the way it's being fought, seems to me that the Americans are first and foremost focused on the destruction of Iran as opposed to regime change. # 08:30 # Glenn Diesen: >> Yeah. Well, I guess that's a good description that Iran is fighting a war of attrition. So time will be on their side while the US is well seeking to destroy the country with its yeah 90 million people inside. So this is quite problematic but the Iranians of course is limited what they can do to to the United States. they can of course hit their [military] bases but it seems that Iran is obviously prioritizing going after the Gulf States because that's a good way of creating some pain for the US-led alliance. How vulnerable do you see them being here though? # 09:00 # Jiang Xueqin: Yeah. So, the Gulf States are the great vulnerability of the American Empire because Israel, it has an eschatology [plan for the end times]. Unfortunately, religiously zealots have taken over the state of Israel. So they're perfectly okay to die for what they believe in. They can live in bomb shelters for years and years. That's how strong their faith is. And Israel was designed as an extremely resilient, extremely creative society. So, Israel will emerge from this war intact and probably even stronger. But the Gulf States are different. The Gulf States are basically mirages [illusions]. 50 years ago, these were just deserts, right? and for most of human history, the Arabian Peninsula was not that inhabited because it didn't have access to fresh water. it didn't have much agricultural um output and so it cannot sustain um um a large population and most were desert nomads engaged in trade. But Pax Americana changed all that because Pax Americana needed oil to fund its empire and it could offer protection to the Gulf States. So they developed really rapidly. So cities where maybe tens of thousands of people before now are in the millions. And one striking example is Dubai. you know, you go to Dubai, it's just skyscraper after skyscraper. It is a very glitzy city and it it's trying to be the financial capital of um the Middle East and there are thousands of extremely wealthy individuals who've transferred their savings to Dubai because they believe that uh it's safe, it's comfortable, lots of good Michelin restaurants, lots of good five-star hotels... and they are not taxed. But this image of Dubai as a financial hub is now shattered by this war and they'll never recover from this. In fact, we're already hearing rumors of millionaires just fleeing with with their wealth. Now they're going to Singapore. Now they're going to um uh Southeast Asia. A bigger problem is this. A bigger problem is that because the Strait of Hormuz is closed, their oil economies have collapsed. they can no longer sell the oil and they shut down their their oil production facilities. What people don't recognize is that the Strait of Hormuz takes GCC oil to to Asia but then it brings back food. The GCC imports 80 to 90% of its food supply. So the rumor is, Dubai will run out of food in about a week's time. Then there's the issue of fresh water where the greatest vulnerability is actually desalination plants. So the GCC nations... desalination plants provide about 60% of all their water needs and so if these desalination plants are destroyed then they run out of water in one or two weeks and this means the entire destruction of the GCC desalination plants will be the nuclear option for Iran and so I don't think they would use it very lightly but there's really no coming back from what's happening. I mean for the longest time the GCC had a reputation for being safe, for being extremely wealthy and now that mirage, that illusion, has been shattered and once the illusion is shattered you can't ever uh resurrect it again. # 12:40 # Glenn Diesen: No, I very much agree. Well, the Gulf States not just um are not just dependent on energy but the finance the real estate market which is propped up by all the experts. But what you're also describing though is um that is the this small monarchies selling the oils in in dollar and the US in return offering protection. This was also the petro dollar system that replaced Breton Woods once they closed the gold window. So how what do you see being the possible consequences for the global economy? # 13:20 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Right. So what Iran wants to do is basically kick the US out of the Middle East for a lot of reasons and the main advantage is that once the US leaves Iran will be able to control the Strait of Hormuz. Therefore, it will control trade access for the entire world and and so the Gulf states will bas basically become client states of the Iranians rather than Americans and that oil money now will be able to finance the rebuilding of Iran. So, so that's the end goal, or the endgame for the Iranians. The problem with empire is the hubris. And so another way of saying this is the empire would rather destroy the world than surrender its power. Right? So the idea that the Americans will just leave the Middle East peacefully is just wishful thinking. Everyone's saying that you know this war can only lead to the defeat of America. So America should just admit defeat right now, and then go home and let Israel and Iran settle whatever problems that they have. like the Middle East is not America's problem. But again, the problem is that America is addicted to the petro dollar. Leaving the Middle East would destroy the petro dollar. And if the petro dollar is destroyed, it would collapse the American economy as well. So America has 40 trillion dollars in debt. and this debt is a Ponzi scheme. Like the American economy is sustained by a Ponzi scheme. And so the Gulf States, what they do is they sell the oil, get petro dollars, and then they recycle it back into the American economy mainly by investing into AI, into data centers, which is now the main engine of growth for the American economy. So the Gulf States were to stop investing in America, the AI financial bubble would burst, and with it the entire American economy. America would suffer a much greater depression than the 1930s. That's how dire the situation is for America right now. # 15:30 # Glenn Diesen: But the United States though, they must have known that this would be a disaster. I mean they many of the top military people in the United States warned in advance that they would have limited weapons. they would have a limited ability to go on for too long, which of course could explain why they instead going for burning down Iran if they can't... if time is essentially on Iran's side. but there have been war games in the past where they show that they they couldn't pull this off. I mean, you had god knows how many American presidents who wanted to attack Iran. but they always knew that yeah, that's not a good idea. so how do you make sense of this? cuz that was my one... when when they were building up to this war, sending more and more um military hardware to the region... My main reason for thinking this might not happen was uh it would simply be too crazy. The likelihood of success, the amount of things that could go wrong. I mean, it just indicated that this they can't possibly go down this path. So why I guess, why did they? they do have informed people in the United States? I you know, we know. So, how do you make sense of this? # 16:40 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Right. So, again, you I agree with you in that this war doesn't make any sense. It's not rational and everyone everyone knows that America is going to lose this war. The problem is that when empires are in decline, this is just the way they behave, haha. And um there's just the historical record, it's pretty overwhelming in that when empires decline, they lash out against the world. They start these stupid wars. They can't possibly win. They overextend themselves and the collapse is terrible for the world. And America very much is an empire in decline. Look at things such as the collapse of the family. Look at things such as the collapse of the currency. Currency debasement in in America is just a tremendous problem. The US dollar is no longer worth as much as it was like 10 years ago. the political polarization America... Congress just cannot function properly. The president has so much power nowadays, because congress has basically decided to just not do anything, to avoid any political responsibility, and so it's destroying the checks and balance systems of the US constitution. The economic depression in America is great. Young people feel as though there's absolutely no hope in the world. They're refusing to have families. They're refusing to invest in the future. They gamble all the time. And so America is really the end of empire at this point. And so what they do is, they go and start wars, in order to distract people's attentions, in order to prove to the world that they still "have it" you know, they're still the bully in a playground and they can still beat up every other kid even though they're old and they're weak and they're handicapped. and so, you know we're talking about Iran, but like look at what was happening before Iran, right? Trump um kidnapped the president of Venezuela which went against international law. Trump deployed his navy in the Caribbean and started to bomb drug boats which is against international law. Trump was threatening to annex Greenland. He was threatening to uh invade Canada. Um he was threatening to attack Mexico. Right now he's embargoing Cuba. And people people don't even recognize this is happening because there's so much going on in the world. But Cuba was dependent on Venezuela oil. That was its energy supply. And now that Venezuela has fallen to the Americans, the Americans have embargoed Cuba. And so now people don't have access to electricity and they're actually people are starving in Cuba. So this is an empire in decline. It just lashes out against the world. It attacks everyone. and Iran is just the most current iteration of this anger and this hubris. But this hubris made the Americans underestimate the capacity of Iran. They went in thinking that once they decapitate the regime, then the government would fall. And what the Americans didn't recognize was the resilience and resolve of the Iranian people. # 20:00 # Glenn Diesen: Well, about this imperial decline, it reminds me of something that Emanuel Todd, the the French scholar, argued because, again, he predicted the collapse of the Soviet Union already in the 70s by looking at these different social variables, but he also predicted the US empire was heading towards, well, a similar fate, already in the in the early 2000s. and he described essentially what you did this uh strange he called it micro militarism this brutal use of military force in an effort to show power when it's obviously draining so it is an interesting development but you you mentioned that the Americans are losing as if it's a given how do you... why do you assess this? is this the mainly the focus on on the military hardware at their disposal or is it the lack of a clear objective? I guess regime change will be very hard without the ground troops, # 21:00 # Jiang Xueqin: >> right? Um so America right now has several disadvantages. the first major disadvantage is the lack of political will and that just means the lack of a of a strategy, the lack of a purpose. it cannot unify the American people in order to make the sacrifice necessary to win this war. In fact, most Americans are against this war. Right before the war started, uh 70 to 80% Americans voice their disapproval of a possible war with Iran. usually when a war starts, people rally behind the flag, but not in this case. Most Americans are still against the war. So the first issue is, the lack of political will. But if you look at the Iranians, they believe that this is a struggle of life and death. So they set aside the political differences and they've committed to winning this war. Okay. So that's the first factor, political will. The second factor is this manufacturing capacity. So these past 30-40 years, America went from a manufacturing-based economy to a financial-based economy and they export their manufacturing capacity to China. Now when you fight a war, what really matters is your capacity to produce ammunition to replenish your your ammunition logistics and America doesn't have manufacturing capacity to fight a long war. in fact what's happening already is that America is cannibalizing ammunitions from other parts of the world. So they are now transferring ammunitions from South Korea over to the Middle East which is stupid to do because now you've basically opened more flanks open more vulnerabilities throughout the world. so manufacturing capacity is a very important factor. On the other hand, Iran uses drones and ballistic missiles. And we know that Iran is able to manufacture about 500 drones a day. And quite honestly, you only need to have like 10 drones to hit their targets in the Middle East uh every single day in order for the GCC to cry uncle [America], right? So manufacturing capacity is a very important factor as well. And um the third um factor is that America is hamstring by a lot of political considerations. So because they lack political will, they do not want to take too many casualties. Right? So Trump has said that six Americans have died in this war so far. There's absolutely no way this is true. we are we are having hearing rumors that there are a lot of casualties being flown to Germany to try to disguise the fact that in the Middle East many Americans are dying. but this tells us that America has actually no appetite uh to sustain any casualties. If you refuse to have any casualties, how are you going to fight a war? Right? On the other hand, the Iranians um are very eschatological. they are very religious. They are Shia Muslim and they're not afraid to die. Um in fact they believe it is the highest honor to marty yourself for the higher good and the clear example of this is the Ayatollah Kamayat who was killed in the first day of strikes and you know he could have gone to Moscow and he could have hid his bunker but instead he chose to go go to his office and carry on with his life because he's 86 years old and he does not want to die afraid of Americans and so he set the example that is galvanizing ing the Iranian people. Just look at some social media footage from Iran. The Iranian people are now extremely uh energetic, extremely galvanized and they will fight this war to the bitter end. # 24:55 # Glenn Diesen: >> Yeah. Know I was in Tran last year and I was also a bit um well that's one thing that really stood out the the culture of martyrdom. the way they would put the martyrs pictures on the walls at many places. The it this is um you know an important variable beyond the material variables if you want to assess how a country would actually fight and the whole idea of you know killing Kamini and now everything will fall into place. I mean his son has taken over now and uh it has to be pointed out that the Americans killed his father, his mother, they killed his wife, they killed his sister and they killed his son. I mean the idea as Trump said we will pick the next guy and he will have to be acceptable to us. He has to be more favorable to America and accommodating and more moderate. It it doesn't make any sense how how can you you know burn down the country and uh again just if you look at a new leader slaughter his whole family and then assume that they will just fall in line. If you look at the culture in Iran again the martyrdom culture which is strong you know you can say among Shiites in general this was always crazy but for somehow this seem to have been the assumption. But how do you see though the possibility of this war spreading? Because they of course they're attacking US bases which you know covers a lot of country. So you have US proxies being used such as Kurds which could then trigger a civil war in a country of 90 million people. There's now um I mean the American and British media especially they're up in arms that Russia is giving intelligence to Iran to try to you know make Trump push harder against Russia in Ukraine. Even though this... also a dangerous path. I'm not sure if what to what extent China would get get involved. I mean, do you see a pathway here from it being coming a proper regional war or or a world war? How do you see this? # 27:00 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Well, first of all, I don't think there's an off ramp for this war. I think it's very hard to de deescalate. Um the idea that the Americans will just give up their uh petro dollar and the American bases and just go home is just absurd. That is not how empires behave. Also, Israel because it wants to achieve the greater Israel project is heavily invested in creating a regional conflration to create as much havoc as possible so that that they uh could destroy the region and then be the only one left standing. Okay. And so what Israel wants to do is drag everyone into the war including Turkey, including Saudi Arabia, basically the entire Middle East. And so during the first couple of days, there was reporting that an Iranian drone had struck a Saudi Aramico oil facility. And so Aramco closed down all it energy production. But then later reporting came out to reveal that actually the drone came from Lebanon. So it didn't come from the east east, it came from the west which meant Israel. Tucker Carlson on his TV show uh sorry on on his show said that he had received information from the Qataris that they they had arrested two Mossad agents and they suspected these Mossad agents of trying to sabotage um the uh Qatar or facilities in order to create a false flag. So the Israelis are heavily invested in trying to create as much conflict between the GCC and Iran as possible. And now there's talk of uh Turkey coming in as as well. Um recently there was a drone attack from Iran against Azaran and Azar Bzan was very angry about this and even fought the possibility of sending in ground troops against Iran. But then it was later discovered that this was probably a false flag um of of the Israelis. So the Israelis are in are heavily interested in spreading this war as far as possible and creating as much destruction as possible and they want this war to continue for as long as possible because they have nuclear weapons. So Iranians the Iranians are not going to hit them too hard. the Iranians are going to hit the GCC much harder. And so it's just for the Iranian for the Israelis they just have to endure, right? Right? It's a war of attrition and then once Saudi Arabia is destroyed, once a GCS is destroyed, then Israel will be the only power left standing. So that so that is Israel's intention. Other nations will eventually have to be drawn in as well. So one wild card is Pakistan. So during the 12-day war, Pakistan um uh supported Iran. But after that, a few months after that, Saudi Arabia signed a mutual defense path with Pakistan. So if Saudi Arabia is attacked, Pakistan must come to its aid. And we know that Pakistan has nuclear weapons. So it is very likely that at some point Saudi Arabia will join this war on behalf of the Americans. because the animosity between Saudi Arabia and Iran go way back. Iran is a theocracy. Saudi Arabia is a monarchy and they see each other as her as as heretical, okay, as against Islam. The Iranians hate Saudi Arabia because Saudi Arabia is the home of Mecca and Medina, the two holiest sites in the Islamic world. At the same time, they host a lot of American soldiers. These are infidels in the eyes of Iranians. And so, the Iranians are heavily interested in trying to topple the Saudi regime. and they're going to apply pressure to cause uprisings throughout the the GGC. And I believe that at some point the Saudi uh government will decide to enter this war. And if they enter this war, then Pakistan is obligated to enter this war as well. If the Americans were to launch a ground invasion, it would make sense to attack from multiple vectors. And one vector would be from Pakistan. Another vector of course would be from Iraq. The last vector would be from Azar Bjan. They would also try to cease the Strait of Hormuz as possible in order to maintain global trade. So in the short term we can expect the entire Middle East to be engulfed in this war at um at some point. In the long term eventually the Southeast Asian economies will have to intervene. So South Korea and Japan are extremely reliant on oil from the Strait of Hormuz. In fact, they would basically starve to death if it were not from this oil from uh the Strait of Hormuz. But there's a wild card and that's North Korea. So, if you're in North Korea and you are analyzing the situation, you recognize that now is the perfect opportunity to threaten South Korea because Americans are distracted in the Middle East and the South Koreans don't have access to the oil they need to protect themselves against the North Koreans. So just threaten South Korea and then the Americans are forced to direct their attention back to Southeast Asia and Japan is forced to come into this conflict as as well. And the North Koreans aren't doing this to start to start a war. That would be suicidal. They're doing this to extort as much as possible from South Korea and Japan. and so I expect that to happen as well. The Western Hemisphere will not be quiet this time because while this is happening, Trump is still intent on toppling the Cuban government. so it's possible two weeks from now um while this war is still raging, Trump attacks Cuba or Mexico or Colombia. It is complete insanity. but this is, again, unfortunately this is the way an empire behaves as it declines. # 33:10 # Glenn Diesen: So uh yeah, what you're describing is uh more or less a suicide or death of empire at least. Uh but um after this war is over, of course there's no going back to the way things were. So how do you see the wider change to the Middle East as a region? # 33:30 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Well, I think the GCC is done for. I don't think it's possible to come back from what's happening. and after this war is done, I think that Israel emerges as a dominant power in um the Middle East. It achieves the greater Israel project The Iranians will not lose this war. They will maintain their sovereignty, but this war is going to destroy a lot of their infrastructure and they'll have to rebuild. Fortunately, they will be able to control the Strait of Hormuz so they'll have the financing necessary to rebuild their nation. And I think that, after this war, the Iranians will actually come out much stronger than before. They will control the Strait of Hormuz. They will have a more vibrant coherent national identity and they will have upgraded a lot of their military capacity. So maybe after this war they're destroyed but they'll rebuild and they'll come out much stronger and this will lead to in the long term region re regional conflict between Iran and Israel and in eschatology in Islamic and in Jewish and in Christian eschatology this conflict between Iran and Israel and this is a long-term thing right but it is often referred to as the war of Gog and Magog when the entire world attacks Israel. Okay. So um but before that happens, Israel will achieve the greater Israel project and it would create something called Pax Judeica. So imagine that the center of gravity um basically transfers from Washington DC to Jerusalem. Why? Because at this point in history Israel controls all global trade. it's already built the Bengurian canal which cuts through uh Gaza and replaces the the Suez Canal. it is the technological and financial center of the Middle East because the GCC has been destroyed and so and so whatever oil money there is is put invested into Israel. you know um the Indian prime prime minister Modi visited Netanyahu before the war struck out before the war began and it was a very pleasant meeting and the reason why is that in order to build Paka Israel need to import millions and millions of cheap laborers and India is the best source of cheap laborers for for Israel. So I think that that is what they have in mind. you know a lot of technological companies in United States, Google, Nvidia, Oracle... they are they will probably move to Jerusalem and help build the technological center of the world, create an AI surveillance state. So these past few decades um they create this surveillance model in Gaza and then they'll just scale it out to include the entire Middle East. so that's what I see happening in the short in the short term, this war will be devastating. In the midterm, Israel will achieve the greater Israel project and create Pax Judeica. And long term, um, Israel will face the world in in in a global conflict. # 36:50 # Glenn Diesen: But to what extent would Israel be in a position or to to project this kind of power? Because after this war, there would be a seemingly a very diminished US presence in at least ability to project power in the Middle East. Turkey is also growing more concerned about Israel. indeed the Israelis also have a very tough rhetoric about Turkey and especially Erdogan. And with the war as well, the the amount of destruction that will be levied against the Israelis, the economic complications, the demographic problems, as many settlers might be simply leaving. Um I mean it's not a big country. What is this like 8 million people now? 7-8. Uh how how how would they be able to I guess sustain themselves in this region once all of these things begin to kick in. Also political instability one could put add to the list I guess. Yeah. # 37:55 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Yeah. So I think um let's talk political instability because Israel is notorious for political divisions, right? It's almost impossible to get people to agree on anything. Israelis argue all the time. But this war is going to have a traumatic traumatic effect on Israeli society. the democracy is going to have to give way to a theocracy. the religious zealots are going to gain greater control over Israeli society and whatever is left of an open cosmopolitan democratic society will wither away. Basically, Jerusalem will replace Tel Aviv as the heart and center of Israeli society. so, that's point one. Point two is that people severely underestimate Israel because it is a small, uh, nation in a desert with very few resources. But the real wealth of Israel is the Jewish diaspora spread all around the world. they are extremely well educated. they are technologically savvy and they are extremely united like they believe in the greater greater Israel project. So it's possible for Israel to draw on basically unlimited financing on the most advanced technology on um on political support from all over the Jewish uh diaspora. And I think that once this war is over, Israel will have no competitor in the Middle East, meaning that Saudi Arabia will probably be destroyed and Turkey will be severely weakened in the process. I'll be honest with you, I have very little um hope for Turkey. It has suffered a great deal under Erdogan. If you go back and looked at how Erdogan came to power and how he cemented power, um, I believe it was in the 20 what year was it 2018? Uh, coup. Um, and anyway, my my point is that Turkey is an extremely corrupt and oified society. That is a paper tiger. And if Turkey were to enter this war, you'd be surprised by how badly it it does. So, so Israel in other words doesn't have a regional competitor. Iran will be a competitor in the future, but that is in the future. # 40:20 # Glenn Diesen: >> the coup attempt in 2016, I think this was very clear. Uh well, it's not the first time they have this every now and then that it the stability um might be quite fragile. But you have covered very well the Middle East, how the US is impacted, how this could spread to East Asia, Israel could become a theocracy, Iran a even more confident regional power. How about Europe? The Americans "liberated" us from the Nordstream pipeline by blowing it up [2022-09-26]. European leaders recently congratulated themselves for "liberating" themselves from Russian energy and gas and oil, And um now of course we have also been cut off from uh energy from the Middle East and all of this with the backdrop of the United States seeking to pivot away from Europe. So how does this debacle in the Middle East with the war in Iran impact the Europeans? # 41:30 # Jiang Xueqin: Well, it's... haha... I mean like... Europe is completely hopeless. It's a hopeless situation. you know, for the past 20 years, America screwed over Europe. So these wars in the Middle East created millions of refugees who then went to Europe. and I don't know what the Europeans were thinking allowing these millions of refugees to come into the society when they didn't have the capacity to absorb these millions of refugees. Right? So, Angela Merkel, the chancellor of Germany, famously said, "We can do it." ["Wir schaffen das."] No, you can't. and time has shown that these millions of refugees have put a tremendous strain on the social cohesion on the capacity of the state to govern Europe. So there's tremendous political fissures within Europe at this point and so that's why you see the rise of these right-wing parties throughout Europe. But the main problem as you point out is the economy. So Europe suffers from an aging population ["Omas gegen Rechts"]. So the population itself is not no longer as dynamic as it used to be. Before, the German model was very good. It was this: buy cheap Russian energy, make really good German cars, subcontract the labor to Poland, and then sell extremely expensive German cars to China. It was a great model for Germany. But then when Trump came into office, Germany lost access to the China market. And then when you have this war break out, Germany could no longer buy cheap Russian energy. And as you point out, the Europeans then pivoted to the Middle East, primarily Qatar. And now Qatar has basically shut down all LNG production. And so Europe is completely screwed in the process. And Macron [President of France] has talked about sending an aircraft carrier to the Middle East. What's that going to do? I mean, send an aircraft carrier so that the Iranians can sink it with ballistic missiles? I mean, what's the point of that? And still, at this time, the Europeans are still talking about drafting young men to go die in the trenches of Ukraine in in 2029. So, the Europeans, the European elite have their head in the sand. They absolutely no idea what's going on. They have absolutely no solution to the multiple crises that they face. And... Europe is a dumpster fire. I hate to say this, but it's a dumpster fire. # 44:10 # Glenn Diesen: Well, it's... hard to disagree with with that assessment, but uh no, things are going from bad to worse. I think the the the reason why Europe went from this immense optimism to now just crash you can say hubris and all this, which is all correct. I think it was the post cold war order though it became ideal for the Europeans that is the United States were you know declared a unipolar moment the the role of the Europeans in this world was well let's have a collective hedgeimonyy of the political west standing on these two legs of the US and the EU hoping that Europe would be an equal partner to the United States and not only would the political west dominate the world but it would be a "force for good" because Not only would it prevent great power rivalry but also by dominating the liberal democratic west would be able to elevate the role of liberal democratic values, humanitarian ideals. So again it's um it's almost like a civilizing mission that dominance is a and sovereign inequality is a force for good in the world. The world will thank us for dominating. So this is the benign hedgeimon. It's very appealing if you're a politician and you say we dominate and the world will love us for it. So now that of course this is falling falling apart. I guess a bit of a mirage like the Gulf States were relying on there's no no clarity what to do and there's no political imagination because they they outsourced all strategic thinking to the US for the for 80 years and now the US is essentially well pulling out its knives for the Europeans. They they've done this as you said uh over the past 20 years but they did it did it more covertly now they're quite open about their contempt for Europe. So no no, I think Europe is done but what does this mean for the wider world order because this idea of a you know the international distribution being focused around US global primacy legitimized then by liberal democratic values. This world order the post cold war world order of liberal hedgemony is gone. uh so the US is not dominant anymore and liberal democratic values I mean no one really thinks this is what the western powers are that these are their objectives in foreign policy it's a thin ve which has been tossed away so what is the new world order then from your perspective what will follow this u # 46:35 # Jiang Xueqin: >> right so there will be three major trends that follow from this okay the first major trend is de-industrialization. because you now have access to cheap energy. So you need to make your economy much more balanced before we have the growth of urban centers which um engage in the knowledge economy which engage in AI, in EV, in solar panels... right but all that but all of that requires access to cheap energy which is what the Middle East provided but now that the Middle East is going to be destroyed or be engulfed in war for the next 10 20 years you have to de-industrialize you have to focus more on um self-sufficiency. Okay, so that's the first trend, de-industrialization. Second major trend is mercantalism. Okay, and what I mean by that is that the global order is dead. And so what you need to do is basically focus on local trade or creating your own supply networks, spirits of influence. Okay. And the third uh major trend which is most troubling is remilitarization because Pax Americana is dead. and Pax Judeica is not interested in protecting you from big bad bullies. Okay? So it's either you rearm as soon as possible and defend yourself or you will be or you'll be eaten alive by a wolf. Right? So I think in um East Asia the the first nation to recognize the changing world order because has no choice in the matter is Japan. I think that they brought in partnersh because she appealed to the young and she has the charisma to galvanize the young to make make this make the sacrifices necessary in order to de-industrialize remilitarize and create a self-sufficient economic system. So I think that Japan will actually suffer in the beginning, but they will actually be in the forefront of global change and nations that absolutely refuse to make these three necessary changes will be the most likely to suffer. And quite honestly, I have very little hope for my own country, which is China. I think that, because of these changes, Japan will start to emerge as the local hegemon while China is still stuck to the old global order. Um but in a short term what this means is that the United States and China will have a repulse month. Okay. So even this war has started uh Trump will still visit Beijing uh March 31st at the end of this month for a three-day state visit. And I think that people will be surprised by how friendly and productive this meeting will be. And in fact actually this year there are scheduled three major summits between China and the United States. And so I think that both nations are working towards a reproachment in order to repair the global order. But there's no saving the global order. It's dying. And so if you omit this reality and commit to revamping society, de-industrialization, remilitarization, and moving towards a self-sufficient economy, then you are much more likely to weather the storm that is coming. # 49:50 # Glenn Diesen: >> You say that China's stuck in the old world order and one can see why. Um well with 40 years of uh unprecedented u prosperity and growth in human history one can see why one would want to at all cost keep this world going even though it already went away. It's not that unlike the Europeans though because then you know the 90s you know was a rebirth of Europe or you know thought together with the US was the center of the world. I remember having books at university which were with the title why the 21st century belongs to Europe. I mean this was kind of the me mentality. I thought that was also always a bit ridiculous. But anyways, there was reason for optimism it seemed. So that's why they also cling on to a world order which is dying which is why they're not able to to adjust to the new world. One place though where there's a lot of pressure to readjust to the new order is Russia. the spokesperson Pescov he was he made a comment now recently saying that we have lost what uh well we have all lost what we call international law so the system is essentially dying if not dead and I think what really shook them was the decapitation strike on Iran because this is you know the desperate act of a dying empire and why wouldn't they do the same towards Russia indeed they've been attacking their nuclear deterrent very openly. I would say they there was a I think this is likely that they tried to assassinate Putin at Valdai with this attack at least you know is a theory and again why why wouldn't they go for a decapitation strike against Russia this is what many are thinking look what they did done to Iran there's no rules so why then is Russia doing this slow war of attrition and also they did this at expense of their deterrent that is they allow the Americans and the Europeans to openly, you know, launch missiles deep into Russia. You can have a German chancellor sitting on stage saying, "Oh, yes, we imposed untold casualties on the Russians." I mean, this there's so much pressure now on the Kremlin to drop this whatever they've done the past four years. And why not do like the Iranians? Time to, you know, bring some pain to the Europeans because Europeans for the past four years said, "Why should the war be limited to Ukraine? Why not also extend it to Russia?" Well, why shouldn't the Russians bring it to Europe? This is what I see as the direction which is uh well terrifying because uh this is um a you know recipe for much larger war. I was wondering how do you see this the Russian component here because you know they're also one of the great powers # 52:40 # Jiang Xueqin: >> right so what so I look look I personally think that of all the world leaders Vladimir Putin is the only one only one of a grand strategy uh he's a very capable leader and he sees the big picture he he plays chess and so what he's waiting for is a US ground invasion of Iran that's what he's waiting for Because once the United States sends in ground troops, then the United States is all in. It can extrocate itself from the situation. At any point, the United States can stop this air campaign and said, "You know what? We killed the Ayatollah. We destroyed uh the Iranian nuclear threat. So, we're going to go home, guys. Goodbye." Okay. But once the United States sends in ground troops, then it's locked in to this Iran quagmire for 5 to 10 years, and there's no escaping. It'll be like another Vietnam, right? This gives Putin and Russia the perfect opportunity to move towards Odessa which is the real goal and the end goal of this war in Ukraine because once they have Odessa then they have basically achieved all their major military objectives and so what's going to happen is the Europeans will have no choice but to defend Odessa to the last European and that's where the next major conflict will be the siege of of Odessa And if the siege of a desert were to happen, the Europeans would exhaust themselves defending against the Russian attack. the Russians have perfected drone artillery warfare in the trenches of Ukraine. And that's a perfect combination if you are to uh besiege Odessa. And so the Europeans, they may be fresh, but they will be inexperienced. And so they will make a lot of mistakes. They will lose a lot of casualties. And this war will eventually become so unpopular back in Europe that the population would revolt against the governments. Okay? So remember this is a time of nuclear war. So you can't actually destroy each other's military. What you what you can do is put so much stress and pain on the political system that the citizens ultimately rebel and overthrow the the political system and impose a new system that is much more friendly towards Russia. So that I think is the grand plan that Putin has and it's going to work. # 55:00 # Glenn Diesen: >> Well, as uh I think it's the Chinese who say "we live in interesting times". So... thank you very much. # "May you live in interesting times" # is an English expression # that is claimed to be a translation of a traditional Chinese curse. # The expression is ironic: "interesting" times are usually times of trouble. # https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_you_live_in_interesting_times >> It's much too interesting. >> Well, thank you for taking the time and um yeah, it's uh as as you began saying this war against Iran, it's hard to believe that they went through with this given all the risks. But this is... I always make the point this is going to be the the greatest catastrophe is this illusion of escalation control. The assumption that they can control all the variables, decide how it ends, who's allowed to participate, how they contribute. I mean, this is really... the same as with the Russians in Ukraine. The this assumption of escalation control, this is what's going to kill us effectively, though. # 55:50 # Jiang Xueqin: >> Well, I will say this. I made this prediction two years ago the United States would invade Iran. I've been saying for two years consistently that this would happen. The moment that it happened, I was shocked and bewildered and I couldn't sleep because I was like, why would they do this? So yeah, I sympathize with what you're feeling.