← MOATS with George Galloway
MOATS with George Galloway
TRUMPED | Day 79 | The Don’s failed Beijing mission | Back to war on Iran | Ebola in the Congo
01:58:25
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- [00:01]
George Galloway
Podbean, your message amplified.
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Scott Ritter
Ready to share your message with the world? Start your podcast journey with Podbean.
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George Galloway
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Scott Ritter
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- [00:21]
George Galloway
Launch your podcast on Podbean today. A plan in and a ning a nin and ah translation available after this. And Donald Trump is humiliated in China, not least because the wind kept blowing and demolishing his comb. Over 500 drones are fired at Moscow and surrounding districts, most of them shot down, but four people killed by those that got through and all of them civilians and even civilian airliners were targeted. Targeted at Hosko's airport. We've got plenty to say about all of these things. Mind you, there's always Greater Manchester. It's all coming up after this very short break. Stay tuned.
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Scott Ritter
You are listening to the mother of all talk shows podcast with George Galloway.
- [01:29]
George Galloway
A plain in and an ingin in an A mele means a plain one and an onion one as well. And E is my native language. I don't speak like that on TV because not many would understand me, but everybody in the Dundee east constituency certainly would, or it used to be called Dundee East. I began my life in full time frontline politics in Dundee east in a by election in 1973, which is longer ago than I care to remember. And there's another one coming up very fast. The local member of the Westminster Parliament has just been elected to the Scottish Parliament, is resigning his parliamentary seat and that would leave me the opportunity of a homecoming. I'll be interested. You can answer on a postcard or any way that you please, whether I should go back to speaking like I used to speak. I was born and raised in the city of Dundee. Should I finish my political parliamentary career there? A lot of my friends want me to run for Greater Manchester for mayor instead. But that would require Andy Burnham to be elected in the Makerfield constituency and I don't think that he is going to be. I think that Andy Burnham, the great white hope, though he ain't no heavyweight bruv, is going to end his parliamentary career in a cavernous counting hole in Mackerfield around 3am in the morning, whenever that by election is called, mind you, the very presence of not one but three potential rivals for the Labour leadership and therefore the British Prime Ministership has apparently, according to the paper of record and the journalist of record, Dan Hodges of the Mill on Sunday, apparently Sirkir has confounded in France. He's Got friends that he is preparing a timetable for his departure as the British Prime Minister. I don't drink alcohol, but I'll be celebrating wildly. And in fact the pubs in Britain will be drunk dry on the day that this dry bulk of a man, Keir Starmer, is finally removed. Not that his replacement in the short term will be any better, but at least it will be a change. A change from the robotic monotony of the block of wood that is Keir Starmer that has led us in to so much trouble, spectacularly failed on so many fronts. On the Ukraine war front, Britain has become the number one belligerent in the world. Imagine a Labour government. Harold Wilson, when he was Labour Prime Minister, refused all of LBJ's entreaties to send British forces to the war against Vietnam. But Keir Starmer is driving the war in Ukraine, blocking the United States from forcing a peace agreement on the thief of Kiev, Volodymyr Zelensky, whose wife is apparently imminently to be charged with grand larceny with large scale corruption. Well, his other wife, his office wife, Yermak, his number two in the Ukrainian government, is in prison this evening on $3.1 million of bail, facing charges of $10 million in corrupt practices. His friends of course have got the bail money but they can't transfer it because they'll have to prove where they got it. They'll have to prove its legal provenance and that they cannot do because it's all the proceeds of theft. Why am I going on about this? Ukraine is a far off land of which many of you care little. Well, because you're paying for it. All these millions are just used in this monologue. All those tens of millions are just adumbrated, were all paid for by you. It's your money that these people are stealing. Even if you don't care about the blood, don't you care about the treasure, your own treasure? Keir Starmer stole the money from our old age pensioners cold weather payments and gave it directly to these thieves. So that's just one of the reasons what I'll be celebrating, albeit in non alcoholic form, when Keir Starmer finally lays out his timetable for his resignation. But there are many others. The man, the human rights lawyer, Keir Starmer, who said that Israel had the right to cut off food, water, electricity and medicine from the internationally recognized as occupied territory of the Gaza Strip, shows how much he knows about the law, apart from anything called morality. Those words will chase him, haunt him all the way to his political grave. And they'll haunt all of his acolytes who backed him in saying so, who backed him in practice in doing so, who supported Israel all of their political lives in including the aforementioned, currently Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham. He is a long standing member of the Labor Friends of Israel. How can that be? How is it possible that after all the blood, all the starvation, all the malnutrition and hunger and death and disease, the horsemen of the apocalypse who have ridden hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to their deaths, women and children predominantly, how can you still be a Labor Friends of Israel? Well, it's too late now, you see, because they're steeped in blood. So far none can tell whether it is bloodier to go on or to go o'. Er. I learned Shakespeare in a Dundee senior secondary school. I should have made more use of it, but I prefer to go and work in the Michelin tar factory instead. But Shakespeare had it right. When you're in the middle of a river of blood, should you go on or should you go back? Which is the more damning? And that's where Andy Burnham, Wesley Streeting, Mad Ed Miliband et al. Angela Rayner, the lady runner. That's no lady. That's Angela Rayner. Her and the others are all inveterate supporters of the European settler state, the apartheid state, the murderous genocidal state of Israel. And there ain't no getting away from that. But that's not the only reason I'll be celebrating either. It's an article of faith with me that the Labour Party has become such a distortion of even its name, let alone its declared historical purpose, that it constitutes the biggest roadblock of all of the other parties in Britain to the recovery of our national interest, the recovery of our national fortune. Our country has gone to the dogs under Labour in every single sense of the term. And we are determined that Labour must be destroyed. So our tactics are dictated by that. Of course we fight elections to win, but if we can't win, we seek to help Labour lose. And that's what we'll be doing in the Maccafield by election. That's what we'll be doing in other contests still to come. But enough about Dundee. Enough about Broughty Ferry and Arbroath, as Dundee east is now called. My sister lives in the constituency, so I'd have somewhere to live in the course of the campaign. My 92 year old mother still lives in the city and albeit on the west side. So I'll stay with my sister, Ma, if you don't mind. The Truth is that there are bigger fish to fry than the Arbroath and Broughty Ferry by election. Sorry to say I'm one of those. Unrolled unfolded the combover collapsed in Beijing. It was the most humiliating visit ever made anywhere by any American president in history. And it didn't start well. When Xi Jinping refused to come to the airport to receive on the red carpet, which was acrylic just like Donald Trump's hair, he refused to come and greet him at the airport. I knew then that China was going to use this visit to make some important points, the most important of which is the existential superiority of the Chinese economic and political system. Is there a direct flight, by the way, from China to Dundee? If I was the mp, there definitely would be. But the existential superiority of China's system compared to the American system. China, where the police don't even carry guns, the United States, where it isn't safe to go to school, to go to a shopping mall, to go to a cinema for fear of automatic gunfire raining down on you from the balcony or in the school corridor. The economic soaring, soaring success of the Chinese economic system compared to the ailing, failing, fading, infrastructurally crumbling United States economy. And everyone can see it. Even an idiot like Donald Trump can see it. You've only got to look at the bridges, you've only got to look at the highways, you've only got to look at the high speed railways. You've only got to look at the economic buzz, not just in the top tier cities, but top two, top three. I was in a top three tier city recently and is like the future. So you can imagine what the top tier cities are like. And if Donald Trump couldn't see because the wind had demolished his combover, the business people who were on his flight definitely could see the effortless superiority of China over the United States of America. Anyway, Trump came cap in hand and the cap went back empty. The cap was made in China anyway. Even though it said MAGA on it, even though it said Make America great again inside the hat it said made in China. They went home empty handed. Nothing on Taiwan, nothing on Iran, nothing on China's relationship with Russia and to the Ukraine war, nothing on tariffs, nothing on Boeing jets, 500 of which were floated to be ordered by China, only 150 of which were not ordered by China, but spoken of as an aspiration for the Chinese Civic fleet. China builds its own airliners nowadays, don't you see? So what did Donald Trump do as he slunk Like a thief in the night out of Beijing, he went home and threatened genocide against the people of Iran. How else do you describe a statement on truth social media this afternoon that the clock is ticking for the people of Iran? They, they, the Iranians, 93 millions of them had better act quick or there will be nothing left of them. Which part of that war crime threat did the international legal system fail to pick up? Of course, the fact that it's only braggadocio, the fact that it's just wind. And did I tell you about being downwind of Donald Trump? Apparently in China with all that foreign food, you know, having to lay off the burgers and tuck into the 35 course banquets in Beijing. Downwind was a terrible place to be by all accounts. And I've spoken to people who were there and downwind. So he's now threatening the people of Iran with the genocidal ending of their civilization again. How's that going to work out? Well, Scott Ritter will tell us very shortly. But the truth is the United States is past its best. The United States is a shuffling overweight heavyweight, but too heavyweight. The United States is, I don't know. George Chuvalo, in the twilight years of his boxing career, still knows how to put the shape up roughly, but is unable of delivering the kind of blows that they still dream of, that they still talk about. But what about the Ukraine war? To his credit, Donald Trump keeps saying that he wants to end the war between NATO and Russia. Problem is he either can't or won't do anything to actually bring that about. He could, as I said on the last show, end the Ukraine war with one phone call to his mate sitting next to him on the plane, Elon Musk. Switch off the Starlink, why don't you, son? And that would be the end of the Ukraine war. But he has not done so, and there's no reason to believe that he will do so. Indeed, the critic Brian Belatic believes that Trump doesn't want to end the Ukraine war. He just wants the Europeans to fight it for him. And there are many pieces of evidence that lead to that conclusion. The situation overnight in Russia has heaped still more pressure on the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. I've said to you now three times in the last three shows, the only pressure that Vladimir Putin is under in Russia is not pressure to give up the special military operation, but pressure to damn well accelerate it, to compound it, to galvanize it, to make the blows harder and better than the blows struck so far. If that was true, When I last spoke to you a couple of days ago, how much more true is it today? Last night, NATO for it was they fired 500 drones at Moscow. Most of them, of course, were shot down very spectacularly so. But some of them got through. One hit, Moscow's airport. Civilian airliners were endangered by a NATO strike on Moscow airport. Four people were killed in strikes on high rise residential buildings. No pretense of military targeting, murder of civilians in their sleep in the night. What kind of pressure is Vladimir Putin under now? Because it's self evident that the emaciated wreck that is Ukraine with the president's wife and his office wife, the latter under arrest, the former about to be arrested, the wreckage that is Ukraine could not possibly be mounting that kind of attack on the Russian state in its capital city. People ask in Moscow, they've asked me, as if I can answer, how come there's trains arriving hourly in Kiev carrying celebrities, highly paid celebrities paid for being there, carrying Western government leaders, even heads of state, hourly in Kiev when Moscow airport is on fire under drone bombardment? How come the Ukrainians are safe enough to amass hundreds of thousands of people for a rock concert when the people of Moscow can't go to bed without wondering if they'll be alive in the morning? Why is there a train still moving in Ukraine? Why is there a bridge still standing in Ukraine? Why is there a green screen on which Zelensky will be appearing next in front of you for more money?
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Scott Ritter
Why?
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George Galloway
That's the question that is asked in Moscow. It's a question that just got much sharper overnight. Those 500 drones, the Russian people say will have to turn out to be the most expensive drones in history. The one and only Scott Ritter on this coming up right now. It is the mother of all talk shows. Stay tuned.
- [22:56]
Scott Ritter
You are listening to the mother of all talk shows podcast with George Galloway.
- [23:05]
George Galloway
Here's the poll this evening. Who won the Beijing presidential showdown? Not since Rocky Marciano fought. What was his name? I forgot. I was going to say Jack Bodell, but he was much worse than Jack Bodle. Oh, come back to me. Who won the Beijing presidential showdown between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping? Of course. Yes or no? That poll doesn't make sense, at least as it's written on my screen. I'll give them a moment to rewrite it. But any case, when the poll is properly worded, you can vote on telegram T me, George Galloway, on my x, on the YouTube community poll on the YouTube stream, or if you're one of the Advanced Guard on Patreon.com/forward/George Galloway, if you want to call the show, it's toll free in the US and Canada, plus 1-844-944-33444. It's free of charge in Britain and Ireland. 0-808-19655. And the international number for all the rest of you is 00442 039. Yeah, Trump or Xi is the missing words in the poll. Who won the Beijing presidential showdown, Trump or Xi? Not a lot of people think Trump so far and 25,000 people have voted. Make sure you get your opinion in. Well, there's nothing. Scott Ritter, former Marine Corps intelligence officer and later arms inspector for the United nations, with whom I have worked for more than 20 years. And it's 21 years today since my appearance in the US Senate. Perhaps we'll find time to talk about that later. But Scott Ritter has forgotten more about war and the politics of war, the morality of war, than today's US Politicians have ever known. That's why he's indispensable, literally indispensable. Scott Ritter, welcome back to the mother of all talk shows. It's difficult to know where to start. Can we start in the Gulf where Donald Trump just threatened the existential wipeout of 93 million Iranians? I made the point earlier that it doesn't make it less of a war crime that he's not actually able to carry that out and that it is mere braggadocio. Do you share that view?
- [25:55]
Scott Ritter
Absolutely. First, I think, I think the name you were looking for is Joe Wolcott and for Rocky Marciano.
- [26:02]
George Galloway
No, it was, and it was, or Joe Lewis also somebody even. No, they were great fighters. It was some, some pudding. It'll come back to me, Scott. I, I never normally.
- [26:15]
Scott Ritter
But the best comparison would of course be, would be George Galloway and Norm Coleman. That was a knockout. I mean, it was a, just a pitiful knockout. So maybe that's a more apt comparison. Is George Galloway vs. Norm Coleman, United States Senate, more up to date?
- [26:31]
George Galloway
Yeah, 21 years ago.
- [26:33]
Scott Ritter
Sorry, I just. Look, I, I look at that video in amazement for several reasons. One, your mastery of the English language continues to intimidate me. I, I'm a, I'm a Marine who barely can speak American English. And you, and you just went up there and you were a swordsman. You literally sliced and diced him. Two, it was amazing how handsome you were back then, George. I mean, you're still a good looking guy, but you, you cut the, you cut quite the, uh, the Scene So, you know, all things
- [27:08]
George Galloway
I'm going the way of all flesh. Scott
- [27:12]
Scott Ritter
Me too. But the dancer, I apologize for the levity because now we're going to get serious. It is a, it is a, of course, a, a war crime, a crime against humanity, a violation of international humanitarian law to articulate a threat against a people, to articulate a threat of genocide. You know, and you're right, it doesn't matter that the president can't carry it out. It, what matters is that, you know, this is the kind of thought process that crosses his mind. You know, the, Sergei Lavrov have said for some time now that, you know, the United States government, this goes back to arguments he articulated during the, the, the, the presidency of Joe Biden that the United States is agreement incapable. We are incapable of agreements. But for Joe Biden, it was just because, you know, we, we had taken a stance against Russia that made it impossible for us to have negotiated settlements with Russia. With Donald Trump, it's just, he's a liar, a cheat, a thief. He's, he's a man who has no honored integrity. I mean, you talk about the showdown in China when he reached over to open up and peek into Xi Jinping's notebook, which was clearly a setup to test the integrity of a man who failed the test egregiously. It proves that China can't trust him and nobody can trust him. He is agreement incapable. And it's, this is why he has to articulate these threats, because he doesn't know how to conduct diplomacy in the normal way. I, again, I'm not claiming to have anything over anybody, but, you know, the solution to this problem that exists between the United States and Iran is so easily solved if one simply just applies themselves to the problem. And it can be solved in a way that addresses Donald Trump's biggest problem, which isn't the national security of the United States or of the region, but his political problems here at home. How to spin defeat into a political victory? There is a path for Donald Trump in this direction primarily because the American public is so stupid that they won't understand that it's just a fraud, a sham, a put on to begin with because they voted for a man who literally is a fraud, a sham, a put on indeed.
- [29:30]
George Galloway
By the way, it was Don Cockel, the horizontal chump that Marciano demolished. I told you he was worse than any of those that we, we mentioned. But talking of mismatches, here we have in Russia, nuclear armed, hypersonically armed superpower being confronted on the face of it with conventional armed force, albeit 27 countries are involved in the aggression against the Russian people of the east of Ukraine to start with, and now the people of Russia itself. I said earlier and the last time I spoke to people in Moscow about this, about pressure on Putin, everybody said the only pressure on Putin is why the hell he doesn't finish this once and for all now so that our sons don't have to go and fight it again in 10 or 15 years time. After a 500 drone broadside overnight hitting the airport, killing civilians in high rise flats, the truth is Russia's going to have to take the kid gloves off, isn't it?
- [31:02]
Scott Ritter
Well, this is the big discussion that's taking place now. I think we do need to understand that, you know, this conflict between Russia and Ukraine isn't just a conflict between Russia and Ukraine. It's a conflict between Russia and the collective West. Which means that Vladimir Putin's strategic approach to managing this conflict goes far beyond simply fighting a war of attrition on the, you know, on the battlefield against the Ukrainian slash Western military. He has taken into account the geopolitics of the region of the, of the world. He has to take into account the, the economies of the world and the Russian economy. Most importantly, you know, so everything has to be managed, which means he's very pragmatic and he has a path to victory, toward victory. He has defined what victory is and he has said that we will achieve this, this, this victory. He's not looking at the calendar because the way he had managed this problem never once did any of these issues, which are admittedly politically embarrassing at times for Russian leadership, but they never manifested themselves in an existential fashion, meaning Russia never really had a real reason to deviate its course. Vladimir Putin's shoulders are big enough to handle, you know, Zelensky telling bad jokes and people in the Twitter sphere saying that Russia's weak. Putin knows exactly who he is, what he is and in where he is and where he's going. And I think when you and I were there in October, you know, that was the, that was the reality. That reality has changed, unfortunately. You know, the today we have Europe providing Ukraine with long range strike capacity, the very kind of capacity that Russia put the United States on notice in January of 2022. Russia will not tolerate at all. That is, they said we will not allow NATO missiles on Ukrainian soil that can strike into the Russian depth. Well, today we have NATO missiles on Ukrainian soil striking into the Russian depth. The Flamingo, the FP5 is a British made missile using German guidance equipment brought to their target by American and NATO intelligence. Without this, Ukraine would not have this weapon. Ukraine's other weapons are using corridors that go through Poland into the Baltic so they could strike in the vicinity of St. Petersburg or through Kazakhstan so it can strike into the strategic depth. In November, I spoke with a member of the State Duma on a committee that deals with, you know, energy infrastructure security in the face of the drone threat. And at that time he said that the drone attacks were little more than political nuisance, that, you know, they had a dramatic explosion, but at the end of the day, the Russians were able to contain the damage, repair the damage and get the unit in question back up to speed. So there was never really a major disruption in Russia's number one breadwinner, which is their energy infrastructure. Today that has changed. By some estimates, up to 20% of Russia's export potential has been damaged to the point that it's not being brought back up to speed. If Ukrainians continue to do this, we are talking about economic damage of an existential nature. This is why this past victory day was different than any other victory day I've ever seen. The tone was much darker. You know, the, the Russian government put the Ukrainians and the west on notice that if drones struck Moscow, Kiev would disappear. But now I believe that those threats still exist. And the reason why I believe that is, you know, we have what I call, you know, we have the Karagan of doctrine. Sergei Karaganov is a noted political scientist, a longtime advisor to Vladimir Putin. In 2023 and speaking about the war, he said that it's time for Russia to strike Europe directly and that Russia should use its nuclear arsenal to send the message to Europe that you're playing with fire. He said he didn't believe that the United States would trade Boston for Posnan, meaning that if Russia put a nuclear weapon into Posen, a polar city, that the United States wouldn't do anything, wouldn't commit suicide. Over this point, Vladimir Putin responded, that's not my doctrine. I don't agree with Sergei Karaganov. That was in 2023. In 2024, though, Vladimir Putin brought Sergei Cardiganovin to advise on how to reformulate Russia's strategic posture. Nuclear deterrence posture. And in 2025, Russia issued a new nuclear doctrine that said the following. If nuclear armed states provide conventional strike capacity to a non nuclear state and use that to strike the strategic depth of Russia, Russia will have to use nuclear weapons preemptively against that threat. That is the exact scenario that exists today. The exact scenario. The Caragon of doctrine is alive and well and living and breathing. And if Europe doesn't understand how close they are to receiving a Russian nuclear weapon, they need to reformulate this. This is as serious as it gets. Read the Russian nuclear doctrine promulgated in the fall of 2025, and then read the lead up to it and understand what I'm talking about is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We are in a very dangerous situation. Ukraine is playing, you know, there's the old Top Gun movie, I, I cite the original where, you know, Maverick gets chewed out by the commander of the air group. Son, your mouth is writing checks your body can't cash. Well, here it's time to tell the world that Ukraine is writing checks that NATO and the United States can't cash. That Russia will execute its doctrine. They may not start off with nuclear weapons. In fact, I believe they won't. But you know, the Ereshnik missile has only been used singly. But it is known based upon what the Russians have said and what intelligence implies, that if you use a massive erectionist, let's just call it a regiment's worth, three battalions, three missiles each, nine missiles striking bank of the district of Kiev. It will cease to exist. And the damage that will be done will mimic that of a nuclear weapon. And that's the fate that awaits Ukraine. That is the fate that awaits Germany, England, France, all of Europe. And also, we need to also point out that two days ago Russia put 1,500 plus drones in the air over Ukraine. The reason why we're able to do that is Russia is producing over a thousand drones a day that they've never used more than 600 of them. Normal rate of expenditures, 250 to 300 a day. That means they're banking away over 500 drones a day. They've been doing that now for more than two years. 500 times 600 gives you a hell of a lot of drones. Russia will be able to blacken the skies of Europe for three straight months with drones that Europe can't shoot down. This is the direction this conflict is going. And it's stupid because Vladimir Putin didn't go for the kill. You know, you've spoken to the people that are frustrated. Why doesn't he go for the kill? Because that's not who he is and that's not what Russia is. Russia is not the United States. Russia doesn't, you know, do the things we do, but we have backed Russia into a corner so that it is now an existential question of survival. If Russia fails to take action, it's not embarrassing, it's fatal. And so Russia will take action. And I think it's going to be sooner rather than later. We have the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum convening in two weeks time in St. Petersburg. And I can tell you that's a huge form. You, you know what I'm talking about. It's bigger than the World Economic Forum. More, you know, it's more important to tell the truth. If Ukraine puts a drone into that form or threatens to put a drone in that form, it's lights out for Ukraine and lights out for Europe. And the world needs to wake up to this fact. But sadly, the one power that could do something about this, the United States, is governed by a madman, a narcissist who functions as a cult of personality, not as a chief executive. You know your poll, you know, yes, it's tongue in cheek who won the fight. But it's also reflective of the fact that Donald Trump has no respect of anybody in the world. He's not only agreement incapable, he's respect incapable. Nobody respects this man. And to be frank, getting back to your original question about Iran, nobody fears this man. Iran doesn't fear him. Iran knows the following. And it has been briefed to China and Russia that if the United States attacks, the United Arab Emirates will cease to exist as a viable nation state. It's all over for the uae. Kuwait may go that way. Bahrain may they go that way. But at a minimum, the United Arab Emirates will be erased from the planet. They will have no fresh water, no ability to generate power, and they'll have no ability to generate, to generate gas or oil.
- [39:38]
George Galloway
Be bankrupt.
- [39:38]
Scott Ritter
They'll be thirsty and they'll be baking in 54 degree temperature because there's no air conditioning. That's the end of two of the greatest cities in the Middle East, Abu Dhabi and Dubai. They'll be gone, depopulated, along with the rest of that nation. And that's the fate of all other Gulf Arab states. If they want to play this game, Iran is done playing games. They're done playing the game of escalation management. They will no longer match the escalation of others. If they are attacked, they're coming in with the knockout blow. They this has been articulated by people that you respect, like me, Professor Morandi has, has said these words and others have said these words as well. And Israel too will pay a very heavy price. So American leadership is needed now more than ever. But we don't have a Leader in Washington D.C. we have a narcissist, a child, a manchild who thinks that, you know, spouting threats of genocide somehow makes him a great man and makes America a great nation. It just shows the world actually how, you know, meek, mild and totally inconsequential the United States is. We like to brag that we are the exceptional nation that the world can't live without us. Well, I will tell you right now, the world damn well could live without us because all we bring to the world today is trouble with a capital T.
- [40:51]
George Galloway
Finally, Scott, on China, I'm right Amantad that he went with his Made in China cap out, but he came back empty handed. He achieved nothing except the further confirmation of all the things you've just said about himself personally and by extension the United States. Is that recognized in the US how are people viewing the summit?
- [41:25]
Scott Ritter
Well, again, here's the problem, George, that the American people are as ignorant as the day is long about the world we live in. I mean, here we are, one of the most powerful nations in the world and we're populated people that know nothing about the world we live in. Nothing. The average American couldn't spell China, let alone point it out on a map. They couldn't tell you what the top four cities in China are, what their populations are and what they produce. We know nothing about China except that just about everything that's on our shelves today says Made in China. And we are prisoners because of our consumption, you know, economy to China. But we don't even recognize that. You know, one of the humiliating things is when he talks about he brought the greatest minds in the world, the greatest men, the greatest powers, and he named them off. They were sitting down at a, there was a young lady sitting there and I can't remember her name, but she's the glass lady. She's the lady that at 15 years, what age, got kicked out of school, ended up having to work as a glass grinder. And then she was just innovative. Her parents lost their job, she had to step up. So she came up with a small business plan. She brought in her family, they started making glass. And then as things went on, she started bidding for bigger and bigger jobs. You know, everybody who has an iPhone today with this touch glass up here, that's her. She cornered the market. She invented this. She made this happen. She's doing that. That's one of the greatest people in the world today. Donald Trump doesn't even know her. Name, doesn't know what she did and doesn't realize that when he brings American computer specialists, their computers don't work without her glass. Nothing works without what's inside. Nothing will work at all without the rare earth minerals that China now is holding back from the United States. Permanent magnets to make all of our weapons work, make everything work. China corners that market. You know, Donald Trump didn't get any inroads in that. He humiliated himself. 200 Boeing aircraft, he said, you know, we're going to sell. Well, I don't know. The last time Boeing talked to China about it was supposed to be 500, but we screwed that up with sanctions, tariffs, etc. And Boeing, you know, in China went and bought Airbuses from France. Now, I haven't checked the latest in the list of Chinese aviation companies, but I don't imagine there's a. There's companies out there saying, we still need some airplanes and we'll take some Boeings. President Trump talked about contracts about 200. Boeing still doesn't know what he's talking about. There are no contracts. Trump has conversations with himself. He invents conversations. He invents facts. And Xi Jinping just has to sit there and look at him saying, what the hell are you doing? I mean, it had to be the greatest relief in the world to see Donald Trump get on an airplane and leave, because now they can get down to the serious business of managing the world, which, by the way, begins in a couple of days when the other great leader of the world shows up in China, Vladimir Putin. You know, Xi Jinping didn't go out to meet Donald Trump when he came off the airplane. I could put the last dollar in my bank account on the fact that Xi Jinping will be there to greet Vladimir Putin because they respect each other, they treasure each other's opinions, and they work in on the same side. Sadly, the United States is a friend to nobody. We're an embarrassment to everybody. And Russia and China have no choice but to come together, despite all of our efforts to split them apart. We're not going to split them apart. Russia and China are joined. One, because they're neighbors. We tend to forget that fact. Two, because they have common interests that just are naturally occurring, that is derived from that neighbor status. But three, because we have driven them together with our irresponsible policies, our irrational action. We've driven Russia and China together to the point now that they have no choice but to work in collusion against the United States because we are the enemy. I hate to Say, this is an American, George. But we're the bad guys. We're not the good guys. We don't bring anything good to this world today. Nothing. Nothing. I challenge anybody to tell me what we do that's good in the world today.
- [45:16]
Sean Ryan
We have.
- [45:16]
Scott Ritter
You know, Donald Trump likes to think of himself as the man of gold, the Midas touch. But you do know that the Midas touch was a curse, that everything he touched died. Because when you turn it to gold, it loses life. Donald Trump doesn't recognize that everything he touches dies. And the Russians and the Chinese know that.
- [45:35]
George Galloway
And all that glisters is not gold, of course. And much of the glitter of the Trump presidency was never gold and looks distinctly lacking in lustre. Today, I make one sojourn, if I may test your patience. Most people on this side of the Atlantic have no idea what's happening in Kentucky, where a single congressman in a small part of a small state of Kentucky has found himself at the center of the most extraordinary election there's ever been in the United States, where foreign interests, Israeli interests, let's call a spade a spade. Israeli interests have poured tens of millions of dollars, unprecedented, into an election in a tiny area to beat a guy called Thomas Massie, who. Who he. Much of the world is asking, can you educate us what this is all about?
- [46:56]
Scott Ritter
Well, the beauty of being from a small congressional district in Kentucky is that there aren't many monied interests that are. Are pursuing you. You don't have big manufacturing plants, pharmaceuticals aren't going in there. Nothing. You just have people, American people. And it's. It's very interesting how when the American people are able to converse directly with a representative, how the representative suddenly finds a conscience because he becomes the representative of the people. The American people are good people. I know I said that they're ignorant people, and they are. I wish we'd be smarter. But we are good people. We are fundamentally good people. You take a look at what we do every day. Getting up, going to work, caring for our family, caring for our loved ones. We work harder than just about anybody out there, which is sort of frustrating because we don't show much for it. But we work very hard and we love our family and we want to do the right thing. Americans want to do the right thing. And they elected a representative, Thomas Massie, who said, I will represent you in Congress. And he did, and he doesn't play the game. So when he gets to Congress and he sees genocide taking place in Israel because he hasn't taken AIPAC money He's not going to close his eyes when he gets to Congress. He sees waste, fraud and abuse. He's going to call it out because that's what his constituency demands of him, to call out this waste, fraud. And Bruce, he's not there to play the big games of the corrupt politicians. He's there to represent the people of the United States of America in his little congressional district of Kentucky. And he does a damn good job. But because of this, he has become, because it's so. It's the exception to so much of what goes on in Washington, D.C. he stands out and he has become symbolic of the conscience of America, that when Thomas Massie speaks, people listen because they realize this is a man without corruption, without vice, of the normal congressional type. I mean, they are doing things right now, George, that are just unbelievable. They are attacking this man personally. You know, they're going after the memory of his dead wife.
- [48:56]
Farhad
They're.
- [48:57]
Scott Ritter
They're attacking, you know, I mean, this just shows you how scumbag these people are. You know, Thomas Massey is a good man, an honorable man. Is he a perfect man? No man on this planet is perfect. That is just 100 absolute guarantee. But he is a good man and he is a good representative of the people of Kentucky and he would be a great representative of the people of the United States if he ever elevated himself to that direction. But they're trying to destroy him because they can't have a voice of conscience standing up and speaking out. Especially now that people are listening to Thomas Massie. You know, there's that old EF Hunting commercial. Back in the late 1970s and 80s, when EF Hutton speaks, everybody listens. When Thomas Massie speaks, everybody listens. And that's what makes him dangerous.
- [49:46]
George Galloway
Scott Ritter, as always, a tour de force, a tour of the horizon. More. Much obliged to you, sir, and hope to see you soon. That was Scott Ritter, former Marine Corps intelligence officer, former UN Weapons inspector, and an absolute master of the issues of war. Let me take a quick break, then it's your calls right up to the break. Stay tuned.
- [50:17]
Scott Ritter
You are listening to the mother of all talk shows podcast. Podcast with George Galloway.
- [50:25]
George Galloway
War, War everywhere. And my God, what war leaders. We have nobody. What a set of Looney Tunes in charge of Europe's destiny. And that destiny being as fraught as just adumbrated by the great Scott Ritter. Who won the Beijing presidential showdown? Trip Trump or G? 30,000 people have voted and there ain't many calling it for you, Donny. Let's go to Durham in England. Where Richard wants to talk about war. What is it good for, Richard? Absolutely nothing.
- [51:04]
Richard
Good evening, George.
- [51:05]
Caller from Los Angeles
Nice to speak to you again. Health and strength to you and your team. I want to get your opinion on a thought exercise, a little bit of a background. I'll try and be quick. And then the question. So, here in the uk, we are fortunate enough to be able to vote for a leader. However, in the vast majority of cases, the candidates we are presented with end up demonstrating immorality, reincarnate, case example, sending our own brave and respectable military forces into conflicts that swathes of the British public disagree with. So the question is, do you think it would be wisdom or folly to have a social political mechanism enshrined in law that would empower the public to veto such decisions, or at least to gather the public opinion data and publish it globally?
- [52:12]
George Galloway
Yeah, I'm strongly in favor of more, not less, referenda and on issues that our government finds central to their very being. I know that I would win the referendum campaign. If we had a referendum on giving money to Zelenskyy, for example, I know that I would win that campaign. If we had a referendum on supporting genocide in Gaza, I know that I would win the argument in that referendum campaign. So I argue for more democracy, not less, and more direct democracy, not less. And we're a long way from that, Richard. We've only got the democracy that we currently have got, and we have to use it to try and bring about change. Now, we did that a week past Thursday in the local elections and we have gotten rid of the British Prime Minister. Sure, he hasn't yet fallen on his sword, but everyone knows that he is about to. Of course, he'll not be replaced by anyone markedly better, but the very act of getting rid of your Prime Minister by popular pressure and by the use of the vote is bound to have some attritional effect on the next person's determination to continue the policies of the last guy. That goes without saying, given that politicians, by and large, overwhelmingly, in my experience, and I've been doing it a long time, are interested only in their own position, in their own place in the power structure. And ever younger, they retire and take their place in the boardrooms, the revolving door, and seek to financially profit. That's quite a big change, even in my time in politics. As I said the other day, once upon a time, an elderly Prime Minister would retire to the Cotswolds and write a memoir that would sell decently, but not spectacularly, because there would only be politics in it. The Art of Government in it. God knows what kind of memoirs we're going to get out of Keir Starmer. Perhaps not out of Keir Starmer, but out of the people who write his biographies. We are definitely going to learn some fairly lurid and spectacular stuff. I can say no more than that. So we have a shrunken political class, a more openly avaricious political class, a lower class political class than the one even in my time, never mind in British politics before that. So yes, we should not go to war without the express permission of the British people. We should not be supporting other people's wars without the express support of the British people. Thanks Richard in Durham for allowing me time to say that. Now, thanks to our donors who regularly go on to Moats tv. That's our website, leave us a pound or two or a dollar or a euro. And this week those names up in lights are Jim Hamilton, George H. Gil, Raviv, Marie A. Coughlin and Akbar Fala. Please do become a Moats donor tonight. We depend on you. Farhad is in Manchester and wants to talk talk about the Iran deal. Farhad, welcome back. What would you like to say?
- [56:31]
Farhad
Hello sir, how are you today?
- [56:35]
George Galloway
By the grace of God. Good, go ahead sir.
- [56:41]
Farhad
It was a while that I was not able to watch your show because of my exams and my study, but I still started to come back to watch your show from last Wednesday and when I saw that you were mentioning that donate and everything as respect, I just wanted to mention that I donated as well and it's not a showcase of your welcome sir, it's not a showcase of me, it's just. I wanted to say that I respect what you're saying and I respect your show. You are like a educator of politics to me as well as I respect my educators at university. Previous times when we started to have conversation, every time you were asking me about football and Manchester team. Just to let you know sir, I'm not a fan of of football. My favorite sport is volleyball since I've been a volleyball player myself and I see it much more interesting when I can spike the ball on one third of the opponent court rather than shooting the ball in a very large goal in football. Anyway, that's enough of sugar from me and sweetness. I wanted to speak about this back and forward ping pong conversation between Iran and United States of negotiations and making a deal. And just today morning I was accidentally watching Iranian News channel and to be honest with you George, before I had this complaint about my government and their media TV that they're not explaining everything in a detailed and expanded way to the people. And maybe that was in my point of view that was one of the reasons that people had a lot of questions with no answers. But apparently they are changing a little bit and they giving more details. So what I heard was the TV news was quoting that United States is offering 25 the release of 25% of the Iranian assets and they will let one only one side of nuclear
- [59:31]
Caller from Los Angeles
sites
- [59:31]
Farhad
of Iranian Tehran and everything like that. And they were saying that these kind of offers were taking place before any war starts between Iran and United States from Iran's side, which United States is offering now after this kind of aggression happened. And they were explaining that this kind of deal and offering will not make any Iranian patriotic person satisfied, which I agree with. The other thing I wanted to say, sir, is I can see the level of conscience in Iranian people inside country is growing rapidly, whereas because I cannot see the same here in the Western or American side, for instance.
- [60:29]
George Galloway
No, well look, that's of course the case. Our countries are lost, we have no cohesion, we have little pride left in our countries. Whilst the Iranians who we've been pounding and murdering have rallied and have purpose that they didn't have before and have a unity that they didn't have before. That growth in consciousness that you identify is testified by my very dear friend, Chairman Hoz Hussein Shafai. He just arrived in Iran. I'm sure he'll be broadcasting from Iran very shortly as soon as he recovers from the ordeals of the journey. And I hope some of those will be here on the mother of all talk shows. Thanks, Farhad. Comments on YouTube. You can scan the QR code right now and keep it clean. I'll read them out if I can. Sharif. Art. George, can you bring any clarity on the huge explosion in Israel Saturday night, please? Followed by today an alleged attack on a UAE nuclear plant. I can't on either, except to record that they both happened. There is speculation that by accident Israel detonated a nuclear device inside its own country. I can't confirm that. The footage. I didn't see footage, but the photographs of it look distinctly ominous. And the Israeli state's action thereafter of not allowing ambulances, medics, etc. To go to the scene make it an intriguing event. And I know nothing about an Iranian attack on a UAE nuclear plant. If it happened, and if it was Iran that did it, then it will be connected to the role that the UAE has played in the slaughter of so many innocents in Iran and the Destruction of so much of Iran's infrastructure and development. Fix in man says Israel was allowed in Eurovision and Russia was barred because Russia invaded a white country. Well, Israel was admitted to the Eurovision Song Contest even though they're not in Europe. Russia was banned from the Eurovision Song Contest because it was held to have invaded one country. Israel, which has invaded multiple countries, continues to be a welcome participant in the Eurovision Song Contest. Last night, Britain came last, didn't get any votes from the Ukraine, which is repayment in kind of all the largesse that we have given them. But Israel came in second place. So a country that caused the boycott of the Eurovision by five European countries managed to get enough votes to be the second placed country after Denmark. It goes without saying that I did not watch the Eurovision Song Contest, but then I never did. I thought about an alternative to the Eurovision Song Contest, though. It would be something, wouldn't it, if all the good countries, all the countries that reject the genocide, reject the waging of wars of aggression, the people who reject racism and apartheid, shouldn't we have an alternative Eurovision Song Contest? If anybody wants to join me, I'm ready to play my part in organizing it. Health First 23 says the Trump team binned all gifts from China before boarding the return flight. Apparently, but they brought back luxury jumbo from Qatar. Well, as soon as they land, they'll have to buy all kinds of replacement Chinese material. 1e615p says Trump's toupee is made in China. It's souffle never rises twice. Uzi, 1 millimeter. Great name. Says Rainer. Stabbed Corbyn in the back as well. Just a ladder pooling careerist and user. Someone 2024. Mr. Galloway, what do you think about you brokering an interview between Tucker Carlson and Professor Said Mohammad Morandi? I think it would do a great service to humanity. While I'm not in a position to tell Tucker Carlson who he should have on his show, I can and do make suggestions. I'm a little surprised if he hasn't already interviewed Professor Morandi. But look, I'm eight minutes late in taking a short break. And after it, I have got a superstar in China for you, Shaun Ryan. Coming up after this,
- [66:27]
Scott Ritter
You are listening to the Mother of All Toys talk Shows podcast with George Galloway.
- [66:35]
George Galloway
Well, Sean Ryan is the author of the Split, a brilliant book. I've got it on my bedside table right now. Finding the Opportunities in China's Economy in the New World Order. But he's a talking head of great note. He has been consulted by many of the world's biggest companies, and at least for a time, was frequently on Western television. But not quite so often nowadays because, well, his truth doesn't quite fit. Shawn Randall is always welcome on the mother of all talk shows. Sean, welcome. Great to see you again. Now we are asking the question, who won the Beijing presidential showdown? Your views on that, please?
- [67:23]
Sean Ryan
Well, it's great to be here, George. I think this summit was important because it was a great time for Xi and Trump to come together and say a lot of platitudes, you know, and try to ease some of the tension that has been taking place between the US and China over the last eight years since Trump started the trade war in 2018. But here's the thing, George. Trump doesn't have any credibility right now. So he said a lot of platitudes, but he also did that in 2017 when he first visited Beijing. And a month later, what did he do? He started the trade war. So while he said a lot of nice things about Xi Jinping as a friend, while he said a lot of things as he likes the Chinese people, he doesn't have any credibility in China and by extension the United States government doesn't have any credibility here. So it's very clear to everybody on the ground he here that China won the summit. Why? Because China threw a few carrots to Trump. They decided that they would buy some soybeans, some oil, some LNG and even 200 Boeings. But here's the thing, George. China bought 350 Airbus jets in the last year alone. So this is not a big win by Trump. Basically everything that China bought again is easily consumable. LNG oil, soybeans. These are things that will be consumed in the next three to six months. And these were things that China was buying before the trade war even started. So just to placate Trump, throw him a few bones, she decided to buy a few items. But it's very clear that China won the summit because they're able to buy products from other countries, they're able to build their own indigenous innovation, they're to able, they don't need the H200 chips from Nvidia. Why would China buy inferior chips to use on their AI learning models, language models, while the United States like Anthropic and Claude use the Blackwell 300 BS. So clearly China won, George.
- [69:26]
George Galloway
Well, right from the beginning, Sean, when Xi Jinping didn't go to the airport, to Xi Jinping's failure to be tugged by Donald Trump's famous wrestling handshake and the very demeanor of the two leaders, most people certainly me, thought that it was slightly embarrassing for the United States. It was a pupil at the feet of a master. Am I going too far on that?
- [70:04]
Sean Ryan
I think the handshake, you're correct. I think Vice President Han Jung met with Trump at the airport. That's very similar to Chinese protocol when Xi Jinping was the vice president. He met Obama at the airport back in, I think it was 2008, 2009 era. So I wouldn't see that as a snub of Trump. But I think it's very clear that China feels that it has the upper hand in the trade war. It's benefiting from Iran. And here's two other cool little tid points. The day that Trump arrived in China, most of the state run media was actually saying that Xi Jinping met with the Tajikistan president. They were giving fairly small writing in the media that he was meeting Trump. It was kind of like it was just another head of state visiting China. Now, even though Trump said this was maybe the greatest, biggest summit of all time, we. Well, actually China right now is all getting prepared to meet with Putin from Russia, who's coming on the 18th. So for the Chinese, Trump is just another long line of world leaders, from the President of Spain to the prime ministers or presidents of Canada, uk, France, Germany, who have all made the pilgrimage to China in the last two, three months and to what the Chinese feel is paying homage to Xi Jinping and the Chinese government. Because it's quite clear that China is winning economically around the world. Now, when you just look at the trade war, just think about it, right? Scotty Bessant said that China had deuces and that America had the upper hand. But you have to name me one thing that the Americans have that the Chinese can't make themselves or buy elsewhere, right? So instead of buying American oil, they've been buying it from Canada. Instead of buying American beef, they've been buying it from Australia. Instead of buying American soybeans, they've been buying it from Brazil. It's only semiconductors again, that America has the lead over China. But here's the thing, George. It would be crazy to think that the Chinese would ever be willing to buy inferior H200 Nvidia chips, because that would mean that China would always be behind the United States in technology and building their AI tech stack. And now I want to use that word, credibility, which I said at the beginning. Here's the thing. China will never buy American technology again, full stop, because they can't trust what the Americans might do. Trump, two years from now, a few months from now, maybe even tomorrow, might change his mind and say, okay, we let you buy the H200 chips now, but we're now going to slap again the export controls because we want to contain China. So China would be crazy to give up its, you know, indigenous innovation to buy American technology because we've dealt with almost a decade of crippling sanctions and export controls on China. So from a matter of national security, they're going to continue to invest tens of billions or hundreds of billions of dollars on indigenous innovation. George?
- [73:05]
George Galloway
Yeah, I mean, it's slightly surprising to me, given the achievements of the Chinese economy, which I see with my own eyes, that this question of chips hasn't yet been resolved. Why is that?
- [73:20]
Sean Ryan
Well, it takes a while to come up with good chips. Okay? I mean, it was, you have to remember 2014, I wrote the book End of Copycat China where I predicted that China would become an innovation powerhouse. At the time, Silicon Valley made fun of me. They said that Chinese can't innovate. They can only steal, they can only copycat. And that's because of either Confucianism and sort of a bigoted Confucian attack, or because of communism, an ideological bigoted attack. The communist people can't innovate. So whatever it is, you know, the Americans have always underestimated the ability of Chinese to innovate. So let me give some other more hardcore examples. Just last year, Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, who has just booed in Arizona for a commencement speech, talk about AI. He said the Chinese were two, three years behind America on AI. Sam Altman, the founder of OpenAI Chat GPT, said China was 10 years behind. And then what happened? The Chinese, literally two weeks later, launched Deep Seek. Now, Deep Seek, a lot of people say, I'm not a quantitative expert, but a lot of people say that China's eight months behind the United States now on lms. That's not that big of a difference, especially when you consider, consider the fact that China has installed 3.9 terawatts of electricity, while the United States only has 1.3 terawatts of electricity. So access to steady electricity is important for being able to run these models at a fast basis. So it's almost parity when you include the hardware infrastructure in China. Now when it comes to chips, it's much more difficult. China's probably, you know, six to 18 months behind, maybe even longer. But here's the reality, George. Just like all those People who laughed at me 10 years ago saying China would become an innovation nation. All those people who laughed at me a year and a half ago who said China could never catch up with lms. We're going to be laughing at them in three years when Huawei, you know, Capcom and other Chinese tech players move up the value chain and are as good, if not better than America on chips. And here's the thing, they will get there. It's a do or die situation for China now in the short term, even if their chips are inferior. Again, China is going to buy to not buy too many Nvidia chips. They're going to focus on indigenous innovation because America's weaponized technology. And here's the thing, it's not just China that wants to buy Chinese chips now. It's other countries, it's Malaysia, it's Saudi Arabia, it's uae. Because the whole global south, I prefer to call it the global majority has seen how Biden and Trump weaponized technology attacked the Russians and are now attacking Chinese. And they're scared that if they don't vassalize themselves to D.C. that maybe in three years they're going to get sanctioned and have export control slapped on them and they won't be able to build up their own technology sector. So the key, George, is that the global majority is going to start buying Chinese chips even if they're inferior. Because right now it's very clear to the world that you can trust Beijing more than you can trust DC Beijing simply isn't as warlike as the Americans are at this stage.
- [76:45]
George Galloway
Well, I don't know how Deep Seek is even eight months behind. I'm a daily communicant with Deep Seek. My wife's jealous. I'm talking with Deepseek quite intimately, actually, so often. But they've not just weaponized technology, they've weaponized their currency. How is China viewing its holding of American currency in the form of debt and other instruments?
- [77:20]
Sean Ryan
Well, that's a great question. So the problem is that the United States has weaponized technology and the greenback, and it's going to backfire on the United States. That's why gold prices have skyrocketed over the last four or five years, over $4,000. But importantly, you're seeing that countries are looking to come up with different reserve currencies and the renminbi or the yawn is is going to become one of them. Now, let's be clear. The US Dollar will maintain supremacy over the next five years. But it's very clear that China is reducing its US dollar holdings. They've dropped from 1.4 trillion to about 680 billion in T bills right now. 40% of cross border trade with China is actually now conducted in the rmb. I expect that many countries are going to continue to do more swaps with China, currency swaps, and that maybe 5 to 10% of their national reserves will be in the R and B. It's going to be a slow process, but over the next 20, 30 years it's very clear that the greenback is going to run into some difficulties. And it's not just governments, it's also wealthy people. I think a lot of wealthy people have seen how Russians who had nothing to do with Putin's invasion of Ukraine, who just, you know, own sports clubs and we're living in the uk, how they had their assets confiscated or forced to sell. And so I think a lot of Chinese, a lot of people from Emirates, a lot of Russians, a lot of people from around the world are putting their personal money into other currencies in the US Dollar because they don't want to get sanctioned. You know, even Marco Rubio has said, the Secretary of State that in five years America is not going to be able to sanction as easily because everybody are moving out of the US dollar system. So China has created an alternative to Swift, which is the global financial trading system for the US dollar. It's called SIPs. And SIPs is booming right now because individuals, companies and governments want to de risk from the United States. You know, we've had eight, nine years at least a really bad leadership in the United States where we've lost price prestige, we've lost standing, we've lost credibility, we've lost trust from our allies. And so the United States is in a steady decline. It's going to be, it's almost ineluctable. I don't know if you can change it at this stage right now because of how bad both Biden and Trump were.
- [79:50]
George Galloway
Ineluctable indeed. At least let's hope so. If you think like me. Finally the T word, Taiwan, did it come up? Did Trump give any commitments on ending weapons sales to Taiwan? How did the visit recently of the KMT to mainland China, how did that go?
- [80:15]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, that's great. I'm glad you picked up on the kmt. The opposition party's Chairman Zhang visited China recently and that's why I'm not particularly nervous about army conflict in Taiwan. Yes, it's true that the United States sold $25 billion worth of weapons to Taiwan last week. But that's actually down from the 40 billion that President Lai from the DPP wanted. The KMT, the opposition party, pushed hard against that in Parliament and lowered it down to 25 billion. But the key is relations probably are the best I've ever seen between the CPI and the KMT in the 29 years that I've been living in Mainland China. So Chairwoman Zhang recently visited China for the first time as the Chairwoman, she traveled around for about a week. She actually met with Xi Jinping himself and she herself has reiterated the One China policy. So I do not expect that China is going to launch any armed conflict in the next four, four and a half years. They're going to wait and see if the KMT win the next presidential election and then push for a peaceful integration. Even Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, has said he thinks that China wants peaceful reunification. That's not going to happen while President Lai and the DPP are in charge. But that could very well happen when the KMT is in charge. Now what is China going to do to get this? Well, China's already rolled out subsidies for Taiwanese if they want to move and live, work, get health care or educate themselves in Fujian Province, that's a province closest to Taiwan. And this is follows a well worn playbook that China does whenever there's any ethnic or nationalistic type tension. Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong. What they do is they throw billions and billions of dollars creating economic opportunities. And they've done that in Tibet and in Xinjiang. And I know you've been to Xinjiang. I've been all over Xinjiang. The people in those two provinces are probably the most optimistic of consumers in China today, contrary to what D.C. and a lot of think tanks say where they're being oppressed. But actually the government is viewed as a positive in Tibet and in Xinjiang for creating educational, medical and just general economic welfare. Now in Hong Kong, China has been trying to do the same with the Greater Bay initiative where they integrate Hong Kong, Guangdong, Shenzhen and that sort of lower Pearl River Delta that is starting to pay dividends. It's a bit harder in Hong Kong because people there started off wealthier. They also come from a Christian background, a lot of them. So it's harder to make them like the godless quote unquote cpc. But you're starting to see in Hong Kong it's becoming electric again. You know, Hong Kong is better now than any time I've ever seen Hong Kong. There's great opportunities. It's sizzling, it's less racist it's less elitist. And so Hong Kong is starting to get animal spirits because the government's done a good job. And I think, George, this is what China is going to do with Taiwan. If Taiwan were to peacefully reunify with the mainland, you could expect that there will be tons of and tons of economic carrots doled out to the business elite and the everyday people in Taiwan to embrace the cpc. It's not going to happen in the next year or two, but it could happen if Chairwoman Jung or the KMT win the next presidential election. I'm not worried about armed conflict in the U.S. unless the U.S. tries to start a proxy war, which I think is what they did in Ukraine. But President Xi himself said, I'm not stupid. I'm not going to get into a proxy war in Taiwan. I'm not going to get embroiled like Russia did in Ukraine.
- [84:03]
George Galloway
I can testify to the brilliant, sizzling description you gave of Hong Kong. We spend a lot of time there and that animal spirit is evident. Hong Kong started out, as you say, as much wealthier than the places in China that have been dragged up, places like Xinjiang, places like Tibet. But I think there's going to be no stopping Hong Kong. It is quite electric and Hong Kong has a wonderful future. If I had any money, I'd be investing it in Hong Kong. Sean, what about you?
- [84:46]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, Hong Kong might be the best city in the world to live in right now. In 2025, it was the largest IPO market through the first five and a half months of 2026. It also was largest IPO market. You're starting to see real estate prices are starting to go up again as more mainlanders especially come in and buy homes. Rents are starting to go up as Chinese tourists start coming back into Hong Kong. And it's absolutely electric, business wise. You know, there's still some weakness in real estate, but like I said, it's getting better. What I like about it, it doesn't have the same Internet issues that mainland China has. You know, I hope that the government in China rethinks some of the Internet policies here because it slows down productivity, you know, and as Chinese companies start going abroad and becoming global players, unless they have access to some of the international websites and tools, it's going to be hard for them to grow and market now. Again, I think you have to balance national security risks, which I think the Chinese government is smart to balance the national security risks of an open Internet, but they have to balance that with the productivity. I don't know where the line is, but I hope that the government thinkers are thinking about this. But until then, Hong Kong is the best of the west and best of the east, and it's just absolutely wonderful. I was thinking about buying a home there and spending more, more time there than I normally do, which is usually once a month anyway.
- [86:15]
George Galloway
Yeah, ditto. If I could afford a home there, I definitely would buy it. East is east, west is west, and never the twain shall meet. But actually, the twin meets in Hong Kong, doesn't it?
- [86:30]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, it's fabulous. It's a great city. And that's why you see people like Stephen Roach, who's a lecturer at Yale and who is the former Morgan Stanley Asia head. He, he wrote a couple years ago that Hong Kong is dead. Hong Kong is absolutely not dead, Roach. Like too many of the China hawks, China haters. China think tankers, you know, they're just not really on the ground in China. They're not on the ground in Hong Kong, so they don't understand what's happening. Even China's economy, I'm more optimistic about it now than any time in the last seven, eight years. It's starting to feel like 2017 again. Wealthy Chinese, the top 10% of the country. Sorry, are starting to spend more money again on premium items. They're doing a lot of tourism. You see, the inbound tourists are unbelievable in China as China has gone visa free for dozens of countries. You see British, Canadians, Thais, Filipinos, South Koreans are all flooding China. You know, I'll say a secret. You and I and your family had a nice lunch in Shen Tianda a few months ago in Shanghai. That area now is just full of foreigners because they're coming in now. That's a big boom for the economy, but there's still room to grow. 0.7% of China's GDP is inbound tourism, while in Europe, it's 10, typically 1 to 3%. I think it's going to hit one and a half, 2% for China in the next three years as more people come and visit China and see it's safe, it's wonderful and it's cheap.
- [88:04]
George Galloway
Let's have lunch again soon. Sean Ryan, the master of all things China. If only the US Government had paid more attention to him than Scott Besant. It's the mother of all talk shows. Thanks, Sean, for joining us. Let me take a break. Then it's your calls all the way up to Gayatri's Roundup. Stay tuned.
- [88:31]
Scott Ritter
You are listening to the mother of all talk shows. Podcast with George Galloway.
- [88:39]
George Galloway
Well, you've got 10 minutes still to vote. Who won the Beijing presidential showdown? Rocky Marciano or Don Cockle? Xi Jinping or Donald Trump? Do let me know. 30,000 people have voted and I'll close the poll in around 10 minutes. Let's go to Glasgow. Who wouldn't? My heart belongs to it. Where Jim wants to talk about British support for Israel. Welcome, Jim.
- [89:09]
Jim
Thanks, George. George, I'd like to ask you a straightforward question. Given your vast political experience, particularly in Westminster. Forgive me if I'm covering all ground here, but at the moment I just feel embarrassed to be British. And my question is, why does the British state, the British establishment, successive governments, continue to support the lunatic and out of control state of Israel? Is it because Britain's a vassal state and it's scared to go against American foreign policy in the Middle East? Is it because the Zionist lobby has now penetrated Westminster? We know it's penetrated Washington and that's been well covered by the likes of John Mearsheimer. But given the number of MPs, as you mentioned earlier, that are members of Labour, Friends of Israel, Conservative Friends of Israel. George, could you provide some informed insights, some clarification, because I just can't see the justification either morally, politically or strategically.
- [90:13]
George Galloway
Well, it's a brilliant question, Jim, and eloquently put, and I only wish I had an answer better than the one I will give, which would be all of the above. It's all of these things and more. There's an X factor there that neither you nor I understand. If I put it this way. Donald Trump has wrecked his presidency. Keir Starmer has wrecked his premiership and Little Macron has in part wrecked his presidency. Merz has wrecked his Chancellorship on, amongst other things, and in some of these cases, predominantly their unlimited support for Israel. Financial, military, diplomatic, in terms of shilling for them, all over the place, from Eurovision to the pages of their state influenced media, they have wrecked their political careers, MPs by the dozen. I mean, Rachel Reeves said last year that progressive supporters of Israel like herself have to state clearly, I am a Zionist. Why? You're the Chancellor of the Exchequer, you're the British Finance Minister. Why do you have to state you are a Zionist? Indeed, nobody did in Britain until the 1980s, they were all supporters of Israel and in the case of Suez in 1956, secret collaborators with Israel. But they didn't feel the need, as Rachel Reeves has, to say, I am a Zionist. Why? I mean, would you stand up and say, I am a Hindu, I am A Hindutva supporter. I support the political system in Timbuktu. Why do you have to do it about Israel? Why can't you at least treat everything on its merits on a case by case basis? You could support Israel in the 1973 war, for example, but oppose what it's doing in Gaza and meaningfully oppose. Oppose it and from the beginning impose it. But they can't and I don't really know why. Let's go through seriatim, the options that you listed. It's undoubtedly the case that Israel is our bastard child. We gave birth to it. We made the Balfour Declaration which made it happen, even though nobody consulted the British people before it was made. Nobody consulted the Jewish people before it was made. As a matter of fact, if they had, the vast majority of Jews in the world in 1917 would have opposed the Zionism that was implied in the Balfour Declaration. So we gave birth to it, even though they then in a patricidal way began murdering us when we didn't go fast enough to give them more than they already had. They murdered our soldiers, they murdered our civil servants, they murdered our envoy, Lord Moyne, Churchill's envoy, they tried to murder Churchill himself while he was at war with Adolf Hitler. They tried to murder the Foreign Secretary, they set off a bomb in the Foreign Office in London when they murdered our soldiers. They then booby trapped their bodies, hanged them from orange trees in Jaffa. Booby trapped so that anyone cutting them down would themselves be murdered. So it's not immediately clear why we have whitewashed that. I mean, there's people still alive today who were alive when that happened. My mother for one was alive when that happened. And yet it is memory hold completely. In the British political class, the British media class, nobody remembers it. And if they do, nobody mentions it. It's of course true that they have bribed politicians and the political class, but as I've said so often before, I mean, how cheap are you? I mean, when I see the numbers that are quoted, admittedly there will be other numbers that are bigger, but let's assume they're at least in some relationship, the one to the other. The official money that they've had, I could raise it for them amongst Britain's Muslim population in an afternoon, I could out fundraise the money that the Israel lobby gives British politicians two to three times easily. There's 2 million Muslims in Britain. There's 200,000 Jews. The Jewish community is wealthy, but the Muslim community is more wealthy and disproportionately so. Is it money? Yes. But can that really be all there is? And then there's the issue of compromise, which is a real one, I'm sorry to say. See, the difference is when Israel gives them the small money, they make sure it's on video. When a visitor to Israel, whether a student union official or a member of Parliament, goes to Israel and meets ahow, shall I put it, a free love kibbutznik with her tumbling hair who's unaccountably attracted to you, no one can quite understand why, but she tumbles into your bed, they've got it on video. And even more so, if your lover turns out to be gay and you are seduced and filmed in gay sex practices or child sex practices, then your goose is cooked. That compromise will hold you a prisoner forevermore. Is it that? Or is it all of these things? I wish I truly knew. It doesn't serve our national interest, our strategic interest. It's not political, popular with the public, and yet all, all you mentioned Labor, Friends of Israel, Conservative Friends of Israel, but there's also a Liberal Democrat, Friends of Israel, there's also a Reform Friends of Israel, there's also an SNP Friends of Israel, So they're all in it together and it's not quite clear why. Thanks for the call. Anita in Suffolk wants to talk about democratic process with regard to war. Anita, welcome.
- [99:02]
Richard
Thank you, George. I'm very pleased to talk to you for the first time. Now, I just wanted to ask you regarding the democratic process. We have two to elect our MPs and they are the voice and they supposed to present the will of the people of their constituency and. But when they get to parliament and they're having voting on things, if they're lucky, and it just isn't done in an underhand way, but when they actually get to vote on a bill or something like, for example, Keir Starmer, I think, has avoided many things without going through and getting like Trump is going, doing his own thing and keeping things secret, because it's,
- [99:54]
George Galloway
Oh, my goodness, we lost Anita. Such an interesting caller and such an interesting point that she was in the middle of making. And it is undoubtedly the case that democracy ain't what it used to be. Even in my time in Parliament, from the 1980s until the year before last, I was in Parliament, elected seven times, and I can tell you that the democratic rights that we had at the beginning were not the same as the democratic rights at the end. And that's the members of Parliament, never mind the members of the public people are being Arrested in Britain for retweeting somebody. I mean, what if it was a mistake? What have you pressed? Retweet by mistake. You're being arrested by several multiple police officers for the crime of retweeting somebody else's words. Boyle. If your house gets burgled, your car gets tanned, your child gets assaulted, you cannot get a police officer for love or money. Even if you're well known as I am and was when being told by the Metropolitan Police, here's a crime number, there's nothing we can do for you, but if you retweet the wrong thing, you will have a visit. Toot sweet by multiple police officers. Do call again next time, Anita. Big drum roll for tonight's top donors. Thank you if you've made any kind of donors donation. But a huge thanks to Giuliani Gustafson, Harjit Gruel, Mn big Clinton Scott and a big hello to one of our best supporters, George J. Ashkar Jr. Who's back on the wall of fame this week thanks to his weekly donations. Please scan the QR code now to join the Moats Club and give us a pound, a dollar or a euro. I mean, you can't really be expecting me to give you my best for two whole hours. If I was a busker, you'd throw me a pound in my can, wouldn't you? If my wife went round with my hat, you'd give me a euro, wouldn't you? Or a dollar. But that's what I'm doing here. Nobody's paying me to do this. I'm giving you my best of my voice and my mind. It's worth it, right? John in Los Angeles wants to say a thing or two about Moats. John, most welcome.
- [103:05]
Jim
Thank you very much.
- [103:06]
Caller from Los Angeles
George, great to talk to you.
- [103:12]
Jim
My reason, my.
- [103:13]
Caller from Los Angeles
For my call, I always come up with more stuff that.
- [103:17]
George Galloway
The main thing is.
- [103:20]
Caller from Los Angeles
What do you think about Nigel Farage?
- [103:26]
Jim
Personally, I don't trust the guy. I want to know what you thought about him.
- [103:32]
Caller from Los Angeles
And the other question I wanted to have is what do you think about
- [103:37]
George Galloway
moving to Russia for a long term? Well, there's a lot of Americans have done that. I know, I know several of them in the Roman Catholic community. Traditional values they found home in Russia and they're very, very happy. I mean, we move around basically. So moving to one place is not immediately attractive. We're in Hong Kong, we're in Shanghai, we're in Indonesia, we're in Kuala Lumpur, we're in Moscow, we're in St. Petersburg. It's Peripatetic life, but at this moment in time, a very good one. But on Najal Faraj. I know Nigel Farage very well, only too well. And I can tell you that I don't think there is a person alive in the world today who trusts Nigel Farage. I think he'd have to concede that the man is a deceiver. The man is inherently completely untrustworthy. Says one thing, does another, preaches one thing, practices another. Who has been grifting for decades and now has cashed in by his own admission, belated admission, he didn't register gift of £5 million. That's six to $7 million. He failed to register it when it was unmasked. He lied about its purpose, claiming it was for his security, but now claiming it was a gift, a reward for his decades of fighting for Brexit. If you believe that, I've got a bridge in London I could sell you going cheap. He got £5 million from a guy who lives in Thailand under an assumed name, and a guy, moreover, who supported some of the murkiest politicians in the world, never mind in Britain. And then, apparently unconnected, Nigel Farage paid 1.4 million pounds in cash for a home. And none of us were any the wiser about the dodgy Thai takeaway. Who would trust such a man? Certainly not his erstwhile comrades, certainly not all the men and women that he's left like a trail of debris over the course of his political lifetime. If you believe that Nigel Faraj is about to retire, or he's coming back from Retaro, or Nigel Faraj is going to be the Prime Minister, or he doesn't want to be the Prime Minister, or do, if he shakes your hand, count your fingers to see that he hasn't nicked any. He's a fake nationalist.
- [107:28]
Caller from Los Angeles
He.
- [107:29]
George Galloway
He claims to be different from the others in the ruling elite, but he is, in truth, exactly the same as them. He was against the Ukraine war until somebody made it worth his while to be Ukraine and Zelenskyy's biggest supporter. He was against Israel, in fact, according to his school friends. Well, he doesn't like Jews, to say the least. But now he's Netanyahu's biggest supporter. Somebody made it worth his while. That's all you have to do with Nigel. For 80 pounds sterling, he made a video wishing somebody a happy birthday and chanting victory to the IRA at the end of the video. Truly, I'm not making that up. Up the rah. He said for £80. If that's what you'll do for £80. Just think what he'll do for £5 million. John. Thanks for the opportunity, Rachel. Rachel Thompson 9324 says this is a class war. Everyone versus the oligarchs. And the oligarchs have won. Well, there's no final victory, Rachel, and there's no final defeat. Adam Owen6226 says we chicken Donald is full of farts and lies. We tackle Chicken Donald G Wag says the man who has attacked five countries this year wants to dictate who has nuclear weapons. And 217 Truthseeker says, I remember when sending himars was Putin's red line. Since then, tanks, long range missiles and F16s. TruthSearcher6450 sends 20 British pounds to the show. Thank you very much. Stay where you are, George. This country has lost its marbles. Maybe you're right. Here's a legend on the land though. It's Tommy in Glasgow. Hail, hail Tommy. Champions again.
- [109:53]
Caller from Los Angeles
Champions again. I hope you're doing well, brother.
- [110:01]
George Galloway
By the grace of God. Good, thank you.
- [110:03]
Caller from Los Angeles
Alhamdulillah. Yes, Just for the point of the conversation, would say up there are three. A charge up there. Up there are. Here we go. Allow me. Dr. John.
- [110:20]
George Galloway
Taught me all the songs. He taught me all the songs. Once upon a time. Long time ago.
- [110:26]
Caller from Los Angeles
Anyway, George, I, I, yeah, celebrating. I'm still in celebration mode.
- [110:34]
George Galloway
Yeah.
- [110:35]
Caller from Los Angeles
Just a point of order. As well as giving 10 million to the Dire Huns, as we call the Jambo brokenhearteds, he gave 2.9 million to the illegal Zionist entity to fund their genocide and massacre of Palestinian innocent women, men and children. Bloom for you. So in particular, I was very happy that we done them up with a kept yesterday. Particularly when you saw the amount of disgraceful time wasted in cheating. And then lo and behold, when the Celtic fans celebrate and such happiness and joy say no, you're banned in the game because there's 30 seconds that disappeared. Well, for the eight minutes were added and another 10 minutes plus for the time wasting that they tried to use. And it was a beautiful master class given the bold Martin O' Neill, when with 1820 minutes to go, he went to a 3, 5, 2, brought in Srirachi, brought on the bold Callum Osmond and destroyed them piecemeal. And it was a joy to watch for the fact that Tony Bloom was there in attendance. Celtic have now won 56 titles, a World record breaking feat, ahead of our old rivals glasgow sevco. That's 40 years ago. I had to be there, George. Don't normally go to the slopes of Celtic park, but yesterday I had to make that exception because as you get older. I'm 54 now, George. I was there when I was 14 at Love Street. These moments don't come along. And for me, I was fated. Just had to turn up, take a place in history. Yesterday I was there for the taking. I listened to a clip of Billy McNeil, the late great Billy McNeil, from. From Billy McNeil to Marston. And you, you know, B. Neil said, keep fighting. This was in the centenary season when defeated Hearts 2 1. Until yesterday was my favorite Hearts game, where we came back in the semi, finally said play the last minute and Celtic have been derailed all over Scotland. Oh, they're not a great team, but that's the same people who hate Celtic. That's the same people who last year were saying they're only winning because it's a bad league. How this league Scotland have been competitive. They rode their luck right up until last week when they got a couple of injuries. Celtic have been hampered by terrible injuries all season to your key players. Yet still we carried on. And a sign of greatness has never given up. Never given up to. The fight is done. Alan McGregor. God bless you. Martin Hill. God bless you. And the final punch was given against his Zionist, Tony Bloom. And he went home in tears. We all the rest of them but a ball. Martin.
- [113:15]
George Galloway
Martin o'. Neill. Martin o' Neill made the Bloom wither and die. And never was it more richly deserved. That was the legend Tommy in Glasgow. Translation will be supplied in subtitles when Gayatri gets run to it. But speaking of her, the woman without whom the news wouldn't be the news, here's Gayatri.
- [113:44]
Gayatri
What's rattling Gayatri so Macron was last week in Africa, in Kenya for the French Africa Summit, also called the Africa Forward Summit. And we were wondering, of course, why he is making this new entry into Africa in the east, whereas most of the francophone countries are in the west. And it made me think that actually there is one last francophone country in the east, and that is Djibouti, who gained its independence from France only in 1977. But Djibouti is actually a very important country in the Horn of Africa because it's by the Red Sea. And even though it only has a population of just over 1 million, its leaders, they call it. They call their country, their geography is their main national resource being located by the Red Sea between the Arabian Peninsula in the southwest Yemen and The Horn of Africa in the Strait of Baby, which is translated as the Gate of Tears. It is so crucial. Djibouti has become a very focused point since the Strait of Hormuz has been in turmoil in the Iran U. S Israel war. A lot of focus has come into the Ban Al Mandeb Strait and Djibouti which with this tiny population, a tiny country, host not just France, military based, the U.S. italy, Japan and China. The only one for China though. So we haven't really.
- [115:34]
George Galloway
They're hedging their bet.
- [115:35]
Gayatri
We haven't really gone into this. Right on the eastern side is the Strait of Hormuz and then on the southwestern tip is the Baba Mandeb which is at its tightest. It's only 30 kilometers and 12% of global trade, global maritime trade goes through it every day. So it's like I said before, the Strait of Malacca, the Baba Mandeb is not insignificant and Djibouti is holding, is having quite a holding point on it. You know that in 2017 they changed. They charged the US 65 million a year for the military base. France 30 million, China 20 million and Italy and Japan about 3 million a year. What do you think?
- [116:27]
George Galloway
People don't pay attention to these countries and these parts of the world because they've always been able to take them for granted.
- [116:35]
Gayatri
For granted, yes.
- [116:36]
George Galloway
Always been able to colonize them, enslave them, dominate them, if necessary, invade them. But now that the tectonic plates are shifting, these places, place names, names of their leaders and so on will have to be learned by everyone. Everyone will have to be able to pronounce places like the Bab El Mandeb. Well, it's been marvellous for us. Don't forget our podcast, which is absolutely flying. If you haven't downloaded it yet, do it now on that QR code. We are in the top 10 for politics in Albania, Jamaica, Uruguay and Montenegro and top 30 for politics in Kuwait, Nigeria, Serbia and Venezuela. When you've checked out our podcast, don't forget to rate it and leave a review. Well, it's been marvelous for us, Hope it was for you and if it was, then join us again. I want to say farewell to to Martin o'. Neil. I want to say farewell to Casemiro. We will never forget you, ever. Good night.
- [118:22]
Farhad
Sa.
- [118:50]
George Galloway
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Scott Ritter
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George Galloway
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George Galloway
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George Galloway
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Gayatri
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George Galloway
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