Neutrality Studies

China's silence in the first weeks on Iran was not a mistake. Beijing is highly strategic in its approach to the latest US war of aggression, and it's quite surprising what's behind the reasoning. Today I'm talking again to Mr. Sheng Zhang, a Chinese West-Asia expert who explains the driving rationale behind China's approach to the Iran War.

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The US War of Aggression against Iran is escalating into a scenario worse then Vietnam... within 3 weeks! The level of damage done to US facilities in the region is unprecedented and Iran will never allow those assets back. What's next for an empire drunk on imagenary military power? I'm speaking to Stas Krapivnik for an update on the war.

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For decades Israel pretended to be an innocent country established after the horrors of the holocaust for the protection of the Jews. Turns out, it was all a lie. The zionist project is much older and has little to do with the wishes of the Jews when it was established. Inherently a christian doctrine, Zionism was always a plan to resettle the jews of Europe even against their will and to dominate West Asia in the process. Today, prof. Jeffrey Sachs and prof. Yakov Rabkin are discussing the past and the future of a racist settler-colonial political project that has become so violent in the past decade that the entire world now sees it for what it is. An irredeemable political sin.

Pascal's Links:

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Yakov's Links:

Yakov's travelogue of Iran: https://yakovrabkin.ca/israel-and-zionism/jews-in-iran-a-travelogue/

Books in English on Israel, Zionism and Judaism by Yakov M. Rabkin

Zionism Decoded in 101 Quotes

[https://www.amazon.com/Zionism-Decoded-101-Quotes-TRACTION/dp/1771864125/

The Iran War is increasing the speed of western decline that began 4 years ago with the intensification of the Russia-Ukraine Proxy War. How did that happen? How could the US-Europe alliance miscalculate this grossly?

I sat down with Emeritus Professor Richard Sakwa to test the hardest claims around this war: folly or strategy, proxy war or direct clash, exclusion or security failure, peace process or staged theater. The talk moves from NATO expansion and Ukrainian neutrality to Europe’s crisis, Russia’s place in the post-Cold War order, and the shrinking space for real diplomacy.

Links:

Richard's Book as ebook or paperback: https://www.amazon.com/Russo-Ukrainian-War-Follies-Empire/dp/B0FTGNL2J9

Richard's Book from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Russo-Ukrainian-War-Follies-Empire/dp/B0FTGNL2J9

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction

00:00:15 Follies of empire

00:08:37 Proxy war and Europe’s decline

00:13:03 Russia excluded from the West

00:17:50 Security logic and war models

00:24:25 Neutrality buried in Ukraine

00:35:38 Nuclear risk and false diplomacy

00:45:07 Paths to peace and the UN

A recent study in the academic Lancet journal shows that between 1971 and 2021, more than half a million people died　PER YEAR due to US and EU sanctions. This meassmurder is something we need to talk about. Reza Majdzadeh has been involved in sanctions research from a public health perspective for decades. He is a Professor at the University of Essex and a public health expert with experience in Iran and at the WHO.

Links:

Article: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(25)00278-5/fulltext

The article that outlines 500k dead per year: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(25)00278-5/fulltext

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction and guest

00:01:20 Lancet findings on sanctions

00:07:30 Death toll and personal loss

00:10:45 Banking and supply chain breakdown

00:20:13 Resilience and local production

00:28:12 The myth of smart sanctions

00:30:57 Monitoring health during sanctions

00:38:39 Early warning before deaths

00:42:12 Final appeal and closing

I open with the hardest questions in this talk: did the Iran war come from one president or from a whole system, and did Washington follow Israel or share the same goal from the start? I sit down with Dr. Michael Brenner, emeritus professor of international affairs at the University of Pittsburgh, for a sharp and unsettling look at empire, elite consensus, and the road to Iran.

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction

00:00:38 American power and the road to Iran

00:08:53 Channel note and Substack

00:09:10 Trump and the long elite consensus

00:20:23 Israel and US strategic overlap

00:31:54 Western racism and imperial culture

00:48:06 Collapse of limits in Western politics

00:53:14 Trump and the Iran war endgame

From regime change to permanent conflict, the war on Iran is not an exception and not an accident. The dark forces of violence in Washington once again won out, but the victory of the warmongers might not be what it seems. While militarism, neoconservative strategy, evangelical fundamentalism, and, most of all, an unwavering alignment with Israel have pushed the United States from one confrontation to the next, the war-making capacity of the US is waning, and the signal this sends to us "allies" across the globe is not what Washington would like it to be. My guest today is again, Dr. David Gibbs from the University of Arizona.

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Dr. David Gibbs: https://dgibbs.arizona.edu

Is Munich signalling a transatlantic break, or a tighter lockstep? Well.... Slogans of “European autonomy” are clearly just a cover for deeper NATO integration.

Today I’m joined by researcher and writer Nell Bonilla, who runs the Substack Worldlines and is developing a “bunker state” framework to describe a shift from public welfare planning to permanent securitization. We use Munich 2026 as a window into burden shifting, elite unity behind staged disagreement, and the pressure campaign toolbox used against states like Iran.

Links:

Nell Bonilla Substack (Worldlines): https://themindness.substack.com

NachDenkSeiten: https://www.nachdenkseiten.de

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction and topic setup

00:01:33 Bunker state framework

00:04:51 Munich as synchronization ritual

00:09:04 Open burden shifting and integration

00:17:01 Russia China and elite cohesion

00:24:23 Feudalism to capitalism roots

00:37:10 No reverse gear after the Cold War

00:48:04 Iran and non-kinetic warfare tools

00:57:01 Building alternatives and closing remarks

Regime change in Iran, Kremlin threat perception, trust collapse in diplomacy, Europe boxed into living with Russia or fighting it. I sit down again with Dr. Rein Müllerson, an Estonian academic and former advisor to Mikhail Gorbachev, to map the logic he sees behind Iran, Ukraine, NATO expansion, and a US divide and rule playbook.

Links:

Russia in Global Affairs: https://eng.globalaffairs.ru/

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction and setup

00:00:21 Iran war and Russia’s reading of it

00:05:13 Kremlin stakes and regime change fears

00:06:20 Oil shock and military depletion effects

00:13:43 Diplomacy as cover and trust collapse

00:21:20 Divide and rule thesis and article frame

00:22:02 Russia and NATO integration rejection

00:31:04 Ukraine as proxy and neutrality bargain

00:48:42 Europe facing Russia or war

00:55:48 Where to find the article and closing remarks

Tehran under bombardment, Iran’s leverage in the Gulf, and the price of ending the war all come up fast. I’m joined again by Professor Seyed Marandi in Tehran, and we talk through the strikes, the Strait of Hormuz, US military assets, and the hard question of what “victory” would even mean.

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Timestamps:

00:00:00 Introduction and Tehran update

00:05:42 Hormuz pressure and Gulf escalation

00:10:04 End conditions and compensation

00:14:39 Evangelical politics and holy war claims

00:19:58 Ground invasion and regional proxy risks

00:24:36 Carrier groups and naval escalation

00:28:42 Gulf neutrality and regional order reset

00:33:00 War sustainability and bombing limits

00:35:44 Diplomacy channels and distrust of deals