CIA Caught Inside Venezuela Trying to Kill Maduro, Russia Captures 86 cities since Sept

Summary

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Redacted News – Episode Summary

Episode Title: CIA Caught Inside Venezuela Trying to Kill Maduro, Russia Captures 86 cities since Sept
Hosts: Clayton & Natali Morris
Date: December 2, 2025
Key Guests: Colonel Douglas MacGregor, Judge Andrew Napolitano

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Overview

This episode of Redacted News dives into major global developments that the hosts believe are systemically misreported or underplayed by mainstream outlets. The central themes include:

• Russia’s advances in Ukraine and the Western media narrative
• US and CIA activity in Venezuela, including regime change plots against Nicolas Maduro
• The US employing AI-driven kill chain technology in Gaza—how it works and potential for domestic deployment
• The legality and morality of recent military operations, focusing on alleged war crimes linked to high-level US officials

Throughout, the conversation is marked by skepticism of official narratives, a focus on sovereignty and legality, and a warning against government power overreach.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Russia’s Advances vs. Misinformation in Western Media

Timestamps: [04:43] – [17:52]

• Media Misinformation:

  • Clayton discusses media figures (e.g., General Jack Keane) presenting the narrative that Russia is stalling/losing in Ukraine.
    • "This is why so many people are misinformed." – Clayton [06:24]

• Russia’s Real Gains:

  • Report: Russia captured 86 settlements in five weeks, surrounding Ukrainian forces.
  • Colonel Douglas MacGregor:
    • Ukraine’s military is "at a terminal point," with enormous casualties, high desertion rates (~300,000 cases), and mass surrenders.
      • "The Russians have never had as a goal the conquest of Ukraine... They were only interested in the territory... populated with Russian speakers." – MacGregor [09:34]

• Europe’s Fragmenting Alliances:

  • NATO is "disintegrating" amid economic woes, public anger (notably in Germany), and the military-industrial complex benefitting at the expense of common people.
    • "People that are in power right now in NATO are really enemies of peace..." – MacGregor [13:53]

• Peace Prospects:

  • High-level US envoys in Moscow try for optics of peace but are unlikely to shift Russia’s bottom line, which remains clear and non-negotiable.
    • "Putin wants good optics... I don’t think there’s going to be any meat on it." – MacGregor [17:52]

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2. The US, CIA, and Regime Change in Venezuela

Timestamps: [24:59] – [32:39]

• CIA/US Special Forces Plots:

  • Reports surface of recent failed US attempts to kill or capture Maduro.
  • CIA and Pentagon have a history of regime change efforts; their motives are primarily to secure Venezuelan resources (oil, lithium, minerals) and break alliances with Cuba and other regional actors.
    • "We have always wanted to replace the government in Venezuela with a government that would do what we want." – MacGregor [26:09]

• "Clown Show" Nature of the Operations:

  • Failures have become public, showing dysfunction in US covert manipulation.
  • US plans to stage an invasion with 15,000 troops as a ‘stabilization force’ are met with skepticism.
    • "These people [Venezuelans] are not going to roll over for us." – MacGregor [27:24]

• Drug Trade Narrative as Pretext:

  • Data shows less than 4% of global cocaine comes from Venezuela; most to Africa/Europe—not the US.
    • Fentanyl (major US overdose threat) comes predominantly via Mexico, raising questions about focus on Venezuela.
      • "This is not about drugs. This is about resources and oil." – MacGregor [31:18]

• Risk of Regional Blowback:

  • Intervention could unify Latin American countries against US incursion, not just “bring democracy” as sold to American audiences.

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3. Military Chain of Command and War Crimes

Timestamps: [32:39] – [41:00], [62:55] – [78:41]

• Mechanics of Obeying/Refusing Orders:

  • Discussion on military ethics: what constitutes an illegal order, the difficulty and consequences for low-level soldiers in refusing, and the ultimate responsibility of commanding officers.
    • "The fish rots from the head. Don’t crush the poor people down at the bottom level... go after the people at the top who issued the illegal order." – MacGregor [38:59]

• Recent US Strike Allegations:

  • Secretary of War Pete Hegseth accused of ordering a kill strike on shipwrecked civilians (narco-boat incident off Venezuela).
  • Hegseth’s public statements are contradictory—he both claims to have personally observed all specifics and then cites the "fog of war."
    • "Now I saw everything. Now there’s the fog of war." – Clayton [64:42]

• Legal Analysis – Judge Napolitano:

  • Killing unarmed crew in international waters is, by law and treaty, piracy and a war crime.
  • “Narco terrorist” is a political label with no legal authority.
    • "It’s a war crime to attack the boats, period. And again, a war crime to kill the survivors..." – Judge Napolitano [66:00]
    • "If you really wanted to go after the drugs, you would of course be looking at multiple other countries... Don’t lie to us. We’re not idiots." – Clayton [75:17]
  • Responsibility climbs the chain: all who knowingly comply with illegal orders are prosecutable, with Judge predicting forced resignations and possible war crimes charges.

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4. AI Surveillance and Kill Chains – Palantir in Gaza

Timestamps: [45:10] – [57:56]

• System Details:

  • US pays Palantir for AI-driven "kill chain" tech harnessing satellite, drone, phone, and social data to accelerate and "optimize" targeting.
  • Not just finding terrorists, the AI leverages vast personal data (including social media) to manufacture targets—guilt by association (e.g., family ties to Hamas).
    • "It’s an AI-powered kill chain... not just identifies targets, it manufactures them." – Natalie [45:14]

• Potential for Domestic Use:

  • Hosts warn that the “terrorist” label can be weaponized against Americans, as definitions of "domestic terrorist" expand. AI kill chain infrastructure, currently tested abroad, can be easily turned inward.
    • "If you don’t think this technology is going to be pointing at you... you are on drugs." – Natalie [45:12]

• No-Bid Contracts and Corporate-Government Collusion:

  • Palantir repeatedly receives no-bid contracts, reflecting its origins as a de facto government tech arm.
    • "That’s not a government contract. That’s an order." – Natalie [55:39]

• Audience and Host Reactions:

  • The segment features comparisons to science fiction dystopias (Terminator, 1984) and highlights erosion of Constitutional privacy and due process rights.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Russia and NATO:

  • "NATO is disintegrating. We’re trying to maintain this facade that such an alliance actually exists that is meaningful." – MacGregor [13:02]

• On Venezuela:

  • "It’s turning into a clown show. The fact that we’re here talking about it, it’s public knowledge, and that we know it’s failed is not a good thing." – MacGregor [26:04]
  • "This business of mentioning fentanyl, which comes overwhelmingly, almost 100% out of Mexico and kills hundreds of thousands of Americans, that's a different kettle of fish... This is not about drugs. This is about resources and oil." – MacGregor [31:18]

• On Kill Chains and Surveillance:

  • "It’s an AI powered kill chain. That’s what it is. They’re already running practice... It manufactures targets." – Natalie [45:12]

• On War Crimes:

  • "It’s a war crime to attack the boats, period... Even if they’re doing what he says they’re doing, which is transporting illegal drugs." – Judge Napolitano [66:00]
  • "You have a duty to rescue the shipwrecked even if you caused the shipwreck." – Judge Napolitano [73:55]

• On US Policy Drift:

  • "If you don’t care [about NATO], these people are capable of stupid actions... Putin made the statement... we can change from this special military operation... to war, real war." – MacGregor [19:29]

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Important Timestamps

• Opening/Main Stories Teased: [02:21]
• Russia/Ukraine Narrative: [04:43]–[17:52]
• NATO & European Turmoil: [12:25]–[17:52]
• Venezuela & CIA Ops: [24:59]–[32:39]
• Military Ethics & Orders: [32:39]–[41:00]
• AI Surveillance in Gaza: [45:10]–[57:56]
• War Crime Allegations (Venezuela strike): [62:55]–[78:41]

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Final Thoughts

The episode provides a critical lens on official US and NATO narratives, characterizing Western policy as self-serving, ethically questionable, and often illegal under international law. The hosts and guests urge vigilance against unchecked state power, the creep of military tech at home, and the manipulation of truth through both corporate/state media and bureaucracy. Listeners are left with a sense of urgency regarding not only foreign policy but also the potential domestic consequences of AI surveillance and expanding definitions of "threats" and "terrorism."

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Transcript

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[Clayton Morris]

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[Clayton Morris]

It is time to wake up. On this show, we cover the stories the mainstream media won't touch. Live from the Rocky Mountains, welcome to Redacted with Natalie and Clayton Morris. Are you ready? Lets get uncomfortable.

[Natalie]

All right. You may not have heard that we are back in action. So what we're going to talk about today is continuing to escalate war In Venezuela, the CIA's involvement in the drug trade. If you don't know this, I don't know where you've been. But we're going to continue to point it out and scream it from the rooftops. And until it is absolutely common knowledge, the CIA is the center point of the drug trade, the global drug trade. We're also going to talk about Russia continuing to advance on the front lines as US Envoy goes to Russia today. Will we see anything else there now? Also, the US Is pioneering AI surveillance through Palantir in Gaza. If you don't think that this is going to be turned on you, I don't know what. But we're going to show you exactly what they're doing. Because it's manufacturing targets. They say it's streamlined kills. Okay. Hold on to your butts for that. And then war crimes, question mark. What's that about, Clayton?

[Clayton Morris]

Well, okay. You don't know what that's about?

[Natalie]

Well, I do know. I would like to tell everyone, act in.

[Clayton Morris]

No. So, yes, Pete Hegseth, the secretary of War, of course, reportedly ordering those second strikes. Does this amount to a war crime? He answered those questions today inside of the White House in a Cabinet meeting. We're gonna talk about that with Judge Andrew Napolitano a little bit later in the show. So we got a lot of news to get to on this Tuesday, but all the sound is now good. We're all good on sound. What didn't they hear? Just the. Did they hear the new open?

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Just the.

[Clayton Morris]

They just didn't hear your initial open. They caught you, like, shortly into the. Into the intro.

[Natalie]

But the music, lovely music on the open was there. Just want to make sure.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Yeah, because that's.

[Clayton Morris]

That's coming out of a different. That's coming out of a different channel.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Because. Because I have to shut the audio.

[Clayton Morris]

Off to start the show because otherwise, like, it can sometimes draw audio from, like, 30 seconds before I hit the live button.

[Natalie]

So in case Clayton and I are bickering before the show goes live, sometimes.

[Clayton Morris]

It'S usually me complaining about everything. So that's what's usually going on.

[Natalie]

I don't know if anyone caught that, like, annoyed little quip that he just gave me. So I'm on alert, darling. If we're going to do it, we're going to do it in public.

[Clayton Morris]

Welcome in, everyone. Glad to have my wife back on the show. She was off yesterday. Great to have her back. Thrilled to have.

[Natalie]

We often use the line from Mr.

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[Natalie]

All right, we're doing this. Get into it.

[Clayton Morris]

Let's get into it.

[Natalie]

We're not going to fight in front of the children. Okay? We have a lot to do. Our country is fighting with other people. We don't need any more of that.

[Clayton Morris]

That's right. All right, we've got a lot of news to get to, a very busy show for you on this Tuesday, so let's get into it. But first, look, Cyber Monday might be over, but the cyber savings are still rolling along. And this is the one deal you do not want to miss. Cybercrime always spikes around the holidays, especially right after the Black Friday. Cyber Monday. This is the last thing any of us need right now. Dealing with hackers, scams, identity theft. That's why we use Webroot. Webroot Total protection is an all in one security solution built for families, real families. Whether it's just you, you know, or you want to protect your kids, your seniors, multiple devices in your home, you get real time antivirus protection. All a smart firewall, password manager, identity monitoring, up to a million dollars in identity theft, expense reimbursement, even a VPN with connections in over 80 locations. There's a dark web monitoring, credit alerts, cloud backup that works. The best part, it's lightweight, lightning fast, and doesn't interrupt you with annoying pop ups. So protect yourself and your family this holiday season. With 75% off of Webroot total [e-mail] redacted. That's 75% off, but only with our exclusive [e-mail] redacted again, 75% off web webroot.com/redacted. Well, if you listen to the likes of those generals and military class that are paid to go on to Fox News or MSNBC or cnn, they're on the payroll, of course, and they certainly love, they certainly love war. Well, you'd certainly learn that Russia is collapsing or losing badly on the battlefield, running out of weapons, running out of fuel, running out of time. Here's just a few examples over the past few days. General Jack Keane, who you see there on your screen, former Army Vice Chief of staff. Well, on October 25th, he said that Russia has completely stalled in their military advances over the past year and sustained massive casualties. And just a few days ago, he said, we're far from this war ending. Russia hasn't changed its goals, but advances are not possible to defeat Ukraine. So advances are not possible by Russia to defeat Ukraine. Okay. Again, this is like a paid guy who's on Fox News payroll on television telling you the truth about Russia. Okay? This is why so many people are misinformed. Here is General Christopher Cavoli, active US Army General, not retired as of November 2025, supreme ally commander of Europe in NATO. In a Senate hearing, he said that Russia's ground forces have decreasing quality overall and isolated areas of strength, but no momentum, no broad momentum. He described 2025 advances as not like Pearl harbor, emphasizing slow progress due to unanticipated high losses. So basically, Ukraine's innovations in drones and defenses are just stopping the Russians in their track. No momentum at all, huh? But how's this for momentum? A new report out this week shows just how much momentum Russia actually does have. In just the past five weeks, Russia has now captured 86 villages or settlements, call them towns, villages, cities, 86 of them in the past five weeks. And you can see it's not just in one little area. It's all over the map, completely surrounding Ukrainian forces, 86 of them. Just. You can see the Ukrainian defenses just melting away. And a few hours ago, Trump's team just arrived for peace talks in Moscow. Jared Kushner has now joined the ranks, and they are in Moscow this evening. We want to bring in Colonel Douglas MacGregor now to talk all about this. Where do things stand with these TV generals who are making money telling us that Russia is losing this war? General, I know you got a good laugh out of that. Good to see you.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Well, it's nice to see you. I love your fireplace. I can feel toasty warm just watching it. Really good.

[Clayton Morris]

Love the Omni.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Are you under snow right now?

[Clayton Morris]

We have a little snow. We have a snow warning, a heavy snow warning right now, actually, here in the Rocky Mountains.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

So I was going to say, yeah, it's about time for you to be hit hard. Well, speaking of being hit hard, anybody that listens to this stuff is probably being hit very hard over the head and needs to wake up. Percroft capture and effectively the collapse of the Ukrainian front in and around Peroft is the death knell of the Ukrainian Army. Ukrainians have been taking horrendous casualties. Thousands and thousands, thousands of Ukrainian troops are surrendering. And what we're learning is that large numbers of these troops have had maybe a week in uniform before they were sent to the front. So, unsurprisingly, large numbers of them are simply surrendering because they know they're going to be annihilated. The Russians have never had as a goal the conquest of Ukraine and its territory. They were only interested in the territory in Ukraine that was historically Russian and populated with Russian speakers. So once they captured most of that, they established a strategic defense. And our brilliant leaders in NATO advised the Ukrainians to throw themselves against these defenses and these are not defenses like the ones that we saw, say, in Normandy. You're talking about a very complex integration of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platforms with multiple strike platforms on the ground, in the air, at sea. We're talking about rocket artillery, missiles of all kinds, as well as conventional artillery, all the way down to mortars. And they have the gift of precision, which 25, 30 years ago they didn't have. They have it now. And so they have been able to annihilate hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian troops. The war is tactically and on the battlefield, I would argue, strategically lost. But as long as the Russians do not advance to the Dnieper river, which I think is now imminent, people are going to continue to insist that the Russians are losing and ineffective or can't do the job. Right now, the Russian casualties and losses are probably in the realm of 130, 140,000 total. Ukrainians are now up to 1.8 million. This is no contest. I It's tragic that we don't get the truth. We're not alone. Most of the Europeans aren't being told the truth. But in Washington, D.C. in the Globalist governmental environment, it is the narrative that is rewarded, not the truth. And the narrative doesn't have to be true. It just has to be repeated often and sound convincing, and that's what you've got. But this, this war is effectively now at a terminal point. And I think that's why you see, in an act of desperation, frankly, Witkoff and Kushner, neither of whom are credentialed members of the State Department or the administration, rushing over to Moscow to try and rescue the situation for Trump. What Donald Trump was is an optic wants, is an optical illusion. He wants an event that shows him as having contributed to peace breaking out all over. I think it's going to be tough to get it. I'm sure the Russians will try to oblige because they would like nothing better than for this war to be over. But unfortunately, the Europeans and the Zelensky government itself don't seem to be willing to cooperate. So I don't know that we can expect much to come out of it.

[Natalie]

Let's talk more about our other favorite impotent power structure, NATO. We've talked about how the United States is sort of cosplaying that they have a role in peace, even though as they continue to send Ukrainians to their death. Although let me ask this in a two part question. Ukrainian prosecutors say they have over 300,000 desertion cases, which may mean that this advance for Russia does not come at the expense of human life. So what's your take on that? And what's your take on the fact that the US is skipping the NATO meeting next weekend? Because that is equally pointless.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Yeah, it is. NATO is disintegrating. We're trying to maintain this facade that such an alliance actually exists that is meaningful. But if you look at Berlin right now and Germany, Germany is like a volcano that is beginning to erupt. The anger, the frustration, the hatred that the population feels for the government in Berlin cannot be overstated. And the right nationalist right in Germany is growing by leaps and bounds and is being joined, interestingly enough, by the far left nationalists. So I think it's only a matter of time until Manz is gone. And of course, in an effort to create the illusion that they are doing something that is going to change the outcome in Ukraine, they're now spending like drunken sailors on the military industrial base in the hopes that this will persuade people there's something real about it. Situation in Paris is not a whole lot better. Starmer in London is about to go under. All you have to do is look at the true state of the economies. The economies are in desperate condition. So the facade is crumbling. And it makes good sense not to bother going to this NATO meeting because you're not going to get anything out of it. People that are in power right now in NATO are really enemies of peace because they know the outbreak of peace, the admission of failure, means the end of this globalist elites tenure in power. So that's a foregone conclusion.

[Natalie]

But how do you pull back their military industrial complex which now has sold the European people expanded military budget? This idea that they can now build an economy based on weaponry, this idea that now they need a surveillance state. The people of Europe are still going to continue to lose even if NATO's role here is absolutely unnecessary.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Well, a couple of things to keep in mind is just spending money doesn't produce military power. I know Americans don't understand that. Americans think that the Department of Defense is sort of a giant Walmart. You walk in and you pick stuff off the shelf, you pay for it and instantly you have military power. It takes time to build military power. You have to have a lot of trained manpower when you go on the ground. And that's really what we're talking about because you're dealing with a continental power in Russia. And it's a continental power like no other. As has been demonstrated throughout its history, they field enormous forces. And these forces are actually today Very, very good. They have a lot of trained manpower that is competently led, well equipped and well organized. But it takes time to do that. When you build a formation, a battalion of, say, 6, 700, a brigade of, say, 4 to 5 to 6,000, it takes a long time for those soldiers to live together, to work together, to train together, to become effective, to become comfortable with the weaponry that they've been given. It takes on average about 10 years to build an army. So stop and consider that the Germans had almost no army at all at the beginning of this war. So they're looking at seven or eight years before they see anything of value really emerge. And what they're trying to do is take factories that once built automobiles and say, okay, now you're going to build military equipment. Maybe you're going to build armored fighting vehicles or something else. Well, that's not a long term solution to the German economic problem. Military equipment has very limited utility in the sense that there's no salvage value unless you can sell it to somebody else after you're through with it. And when you do that, you're not going to get much back from your initial investment. In other words, what the Europeans need, what the Germans in particular need, is to rebuild a functioning commercial economy with a scientific industrial base that can sustain the standard of living. That's something you cannot do with this military power. All they'll do is sink themselves deeper into debt and destroy the living standards of the Germans. The Germans know that. They're figuring it out. That's why Germany right now is, is a pot on the fire and it's bubbling over. And it's only a matter of time until Merits and his friends are gone.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah, yeah. I keep focusing on Germany. Very, very important. I also want to focus on this 28 point peace plan. So we saw Kushner, we saw Witkoff there. Putin has said it's worth looking at this 28 point plan framework here. Do you think there's any meat on that bone and do you think we'll see anything substantive from these quote, unquote peace talks?

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

The Russians have made very clear what their bottom line requirements are. Everybody knows that those are not going to change. So if anything comes out of this 28 point plan that has become a 19 point plan, that's probably going to become an 11 point plan. It either looks a lot like what Putin has been saying for months or years, or it's just going to be kicked to the curb. Keep something in mind. Putin and Lavrov both understand what Trump wants. He Wants good optics. He wants the optical illusion that he has been the creator of peace and goodwill and so forth. They want to help him, they'll be happy to throw him a bone. I don't think there's going to be any meat on it. I don't think it's going to be very meaningful. But at this stage, they're willing to toss him a bone to get this thing over with. The problem is President Trump should be the leader of NATO. He's not. He abdicated his responsibility as the leader of NATO when he said, okay, fine, will sell you whatever equipment you have. You may not see it for 2, 3, 4, 5 years, but if you want to buy it and continue this war in Ukraine, you may do so. Well, that was a serious mistake because that essentially gave license to the Europeans to ignore us and to do whatever they wanted. Germany is going to be the first to leave NATO. Once this government changes, that's the end of NATO for Germany, then it's going to leave the eu. Germany leads the eu. That's the end of the eu. That's not going to be meaningful either. Everybody knows that in the globalist camp. So the effort right now is to prevent that from happening. I don't know that President Trump understands that. And it may be that he's reached a conclusion. He doesn't care. But the problem with that is, if you don't care, these people are capable of stupid actions. And that's why Putin made the statement earlier today, in fact, I think a few hours ago, excuse me, saying, look, if you are stupid enough to challenge us to go to war, we can change from this special military opera operation with very limited objectives to war, real war. We have the manpower. We can replace our losses. We can field the forces. We have the missiles. We have the artillery, ammunition. We have the capabilities we need. And we will crush you. He's right. Europeans can't compete in this. We don't want to. What President Trump has failed to do as the President of the United States and the leader of NATO is to say, damn it, we don't want a war with Russia. That's not in our interest. It's not in yours. So shut up, sit down and listen. We are going to make peace with Russia. We're going to put something on the table, and you're going to sign up for it. Because if you don't, you will face Russia on your own. They can't do that.

[Clayton Morris]

Well said. We've got more news to talk about with the colonel when we come back after a quick break. We're going to talk about Venezuela. The CIA and special forces already being called out as pushing for a regime change. Capture or killing of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. 15,000Americans already readying for some kind of land invasion or otherwise. We don't know what's going to come from the Trump administration. We're going to talk with the colonel about that in a moment.

[Natalie]

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[Clayton Morris]

Well, now to Venezuela. New unconfirmed reports today that the that the CIA and US Special Forces were outed trying to basically capture or kill Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro. All of this comes as the United States military now according to the latest numbers, has 15,000 troops in the region. 11 battleships probably. That's very, very low and conservative number that we're hearing about. Colonel Douglas MacGregor, host of the National Conversation, joins us again here on the show to talk about the latest developments. First of all, Colonel, good to see you. Let's talk about The CIA piece of this first, we know from our own reporting and confirmation here on this show that CIA has been actively involved in regime change operations there for many, many years. This is not a surprise at all. And we also know that the US Special Forces have been there and in fact clashing with the CIA in years past. I can confirm on this show that members of the US Special Forces were killed in these clashes as a result of what the CIA did to them. So this is not new, but what is your take on this going after Maduro in the past 48 hours?

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Well, it's turning into a clown show. The fact that we're here talking about it, it's public knowledge, and that we know it's failed is not a good thing. This is the sort of thing that if it is even remotely effective, nobody knows about it. Clayton. Unfortunately, we failed at this task so many times. This goes back to Hugo Chavez. We have always wanted to replace the government in Venezuela with a government that would do what we want. And what do we want from the government of Venezuela? Well, not only do we want access to the numerous resources, the oil, the gas, the gold mines, the emeralds, lithium, rare earths and the rest of it, we want them to stop supporting or assisting other nations in the region, especially Cuba, that's very dependent on lots of cheap energy just to survive. Cuba is on its last legs, incidentally. It's really in poverty and suffering terribly. And we have people in the administration that think this is wonderful timing because not only could they bring down the regime in Venezuela, they could bring down the regime in Cuba and potentially in other states. I think they're delusional. But this is not unusual inside the Beltway in Washington. And right now the whole idea is that you launch a coup, you replace Maduro at the top. Now, Maduro is not stupid. He doesn't sleep in the same place every night. He doesn't use the same phone. He moves around frequently. He's surrounded by very fine bodyguards, some of whom are Russian, some of whom are Cuban, some of whom are other kinds of mercenaries. The Russians have helped the Venezuelans a great deal and the Russians have been paid in gold for it. People don't understand that. The Chinese are a little less enthusiastic because Maduro owes them a lot of money and hasn't paid them. I guess my point is the theory is that we can rush into Venezuela, we can install this new government, and then the thousands of troops that you're mentioning, most of whom are sitting up in Puerto Rico, can be brought in as A stabilization force to maintain peace and order while the country changes governments and that this new government will induce loyalty to itself and to us. I think it's a very, very slender read from which to suspend any military plans because I'm not sure any of that is attainable. And this is the big problem. I spoke recently with someone who spent nine years of his life down in Venezuela. He's an intelligence officer. And he said, doug, these people are not going to roll over for us. They don't. They may not necessarily all love Maduro, but they're not going to accept somebody shoved down their throats. And they're increasingly gaining support from all of their neighbors, even Colombia. The Colombians don't particularly like Venezuela, but the Colombians and the Brazilians and others are all willing to pitch in and help. Which means that, let's assume we get ashore, the marines take the airport right on the coast very quickly, and then we start flying in troops, and those troops then start spreading around, preparing to go to Caracas. And then we start losing people. The question is, how many Americans in uniform can you lose before someone on the hill or someone in the media finally says, wait a minute, you know, we didn't sign up for this. This is turning into a disaster. What do you need for a disaster? One Chinook helicopter, one, uh, 60, who knows how many carrying troops that suddenly are shot out of the air. Can we identify all the air and missile defenses? Can we identify the placement of all the radars? Can we find all the strike weapons that can be aimed at the ships at sea? In other words, what's the tolerance for casualties and losses in Washington? I don't think it's very great, Clayton.

[Clayton Morris]

Well, let's ask our. Just real quick. Let's ask our audience right now and we'll come back to it at the end of this segment. How many of you would support Americans being killed in Venezuela? We'll just ask our chat room. We're live on rumble and YouTube and X.

[Natalie]

Just for the purpose of.

[Clayton Morris]

For the purpose of regime change. It doesn't matter. Really doesn't matter. Right? Regime change, a new government deposing Maduro.

[Natalie]

Well, it matters what they're selling us. They're selling us an idea that you're saving some nice suburban mom from her son drug overdosing.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

That's right.

[Natalie]

That's what I mean. It's so far fetched. It's so stupid that I don't know who would.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Look, Natalie, you're right. All you have to do is go on the website for The Drug Enforcement Agency, read the reports that are posted there. They'll tell you that less than 4% of the, quote, unquote, drugs, that's cocaine and other things, come out of Venezuela. And by the way, most of it ends up in Africa or Europe. Now, I'm not saying we shouldn't care at all, but what I'm trying to say is this business of mentioning fentanyl, which comes overwhelmingly, practically 100% out of Mexico and kills hundreds of thousands of American citizens, that's a different kettle of fish. The question should be, if it's coming out of Mexico, what are we doing about it? Why are we sailing all the way down to the Caribbean Basin to deal with Venezuela? Well, that's because this is not about drugs. This is about resources and oil.

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[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

And also we want to exclude China, Russia, Iran, or anybody else we don't like from doing business in the Western Hemisphere. We've never had much competition in the Western Hemisphere. All of a sudden, we have to compete. We don't want to compete. We want to enjoy the spoils as the, as the major power. This is going to backfire on us. People that would normally not have paid any attention to Russia or China or anybody else are now going to turn around and say, we'd much rather do business with you than the Americans who invade our countries. So this is a dumb idea. I see no upside. I think President Trump should go public tomorrow morning. He should announce and say, look, I've reconsidered all of this. I had a good conversation this morning with President Maduro. I think we've come to a solution. We are going to stand down and there will be no military intervention in Venezuela. And by the way, I'll have some new, new names for announcement next week as new Secretaries of Defense and Secretaries of State and new people for the NSC staff. That's what he should do. And that's what JFK did after the Bay of Pigs and after the Cuban Missile Crisis. That's what Eisenhower did, said, the hell with Korea, I'm out. No. And that's what we should do, but I don't think he will.

[Natalie]

Now, last time we spoke to you, just before the Thanksgiving break, we talked about, Philip asked this question. We're bombing people we don't know are guilty of anything. Why are there not mechanisms inside the military saying, no, we're not gonna do this. We don't know who these people are. It's unethical. And you had mentioned that there is sort of a chain of command for this There is a way. Well, then the next day, Democrats said something similar, and the President called it treason. And it became this whole thing. Right. My gosh, the President's threatening us. But what was at the heart of the conversation was something we had talked about in earnest, is like, maybe we shouldn't. Maybe we should not just follow orders to kill like Nazis. So can you respond to that? What are the mechanisms under which someone inside the military can say we need to stop killing civilians without any proof of guilt?

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Well, the first point I think we need to mention is that those Democrats that made this little video, we're not concerned with that at all. They were simply trying to undermine the authority of the commander in chief, who happens to be Trump, because they hate Trump.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

It's not political points.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah, yeah.

[Natalie]

Let's distance ourselves from them. We have. We're asking this question sincerely.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Yes. Yeah. And right now, we need to understand the following. I know from personal experience in the army, and it's not limited to the army, the Marines go through this. Everybody does. You go through hundreds of hours routinely every year where you discuss the law of war, what is legal and what is not legal. People understand the definition of an illegal order because they understand what the law of war means. You do not shoot prisoners. You do not mistreat prisoners. You do not harm prisoners. You protect them. You do not kill civilians if you know that they are there and you can avoid doing so. You don't fire. You don't do those things. Now, we all know that, even under the best of circumstances. And by the way, I've said this before, and I mean this, the Russians have done this very well, even under the best of circumstances. You're still going to kill some civilians who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But it's not something that should ever be deliberate. Now, and the Russians have avoided that. And they've been accused of terrible things they're not guilty of. Ukrainians, on the other hand, have done terrible things, both to prisoners as well as to civilians that are Russians inside Ukraine. Now, as far as we're concerned, what this. What we've just seen with this recent incident is the following. Allegedly. And I say allegedly because I don't have all the facts. The Admiral of the fleet who is in charge down there, whoever he is, received an order from allegedly, the Secretary of Defense, or, excuse me, Secretary of War. And the Secretary of War was. Was asked specifically, I guess there are two people that were not killed in the latest strike, and they're hanging on to the. The vessel, and he said, killed them all, supposedly. We don't want any survivors. We're at war. These are narco terrorists and so forth. The admiral then complied. Allegedly, that order went down the line. Now, are there people in that chain of command who know that this is an illegal order? I'm sure there are. It was illegal. The admiral could have done a number of different things. I've seen this, by the way. Not in this exact setting, but the admiral could have said, sir, that's. Technically speaking, that's a violation of the law of war. And then if he received a direct verbal order from the Secretary of War to execute and do it, he could do one of two things. He could say, sir, I cannot do that. My conscience won't permit me to do so. And by the way, it was Frederick the Great of Prussia back in the 1700s who established the rule that if your conscience will not permit you to execute an order, then you can retire or leave the service without prejudice. We do have a similar tradition as a result of von Steuben, who founded the army. But my point is, the admiral could have also said, sir, I will execute this order on. On. Under duress, and I will send forward a notification that I executed this order over my objections and over my view that this is not legal. He could have done that. I don't know what he did. Apparently, at least from the reports we're getting, he didn't do anything. Right. And when you're at the lower level, you get down to the sergeant, the sergeant first class, the boatswain's mate, or somebody who's down there where the rubber meets the road. Let me tell you something. You may not want to do something like that, but you're scared. You're worried, and you're afraid. If I don't do this, that's it for me. I'll be out of the service. They could put me in jail, punish me under the uniform code of military justice. Say, I refuse to direct verbal order. Then what does my family do back home? Are they going to eat? Are they going to be cared for? And this is something that I don't think people understand. The human beings in uniform at the lowest levels, they have to make the final judgment. And they're very reluctant to do things that are illegal. They don't want to. But if they're given an order like that, they stop and thinking. Look, I'm. I'm a little man down here. Yeah. This is an enormous machine called the United States Navy or the Special Operations Forces. Or the army or the Marines or whatever. They'll crush me. Even if I. Even if I refuse to do this, will anybody defend me? Will I get a fair hearing in a court of law? Let me tell you, there's no certainty when you go into court, whether you're in the military or not, that you're really going to get a fair hearing. I know everybody believes that you may have a shot at it, but I've seen this in action, and I testified on behalf of soldiers that were wrongly accused. And fortunately, I was a senior officer, and they had to. They had to pay attention to me, because if I hadn't gone in there and testified for them, some of those people would have ended up in jail, and they could have been there for a long time. All I'm trying to tell you is the. The fish rots from the head. Don't crush the poor people down at the bottom level. You know, you could admonish them for whatever they did. You can reprimand them or something. You go after the people at the top who issued the illegal order. They must be dealt with.

[Clayton Morris]

Do you think this Admiral, Admiral Bradley, Secretary of War Hegseth, what should happen to them?

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

I think that if the admiral unhesitatingly agreed and obeyed the order and issued it should be removed pending court martial. And I think Secretary Hagseth should be suspended immediately from his position as Secretary of Defense, pending an investigation. I didn't say they should be punished because I don't know all the facts. I don't know actually what went down. All I know is what you know, which is what's being reported through the media. And you and I and Natalie know enough about the media to exercise a certain amount of restraint when it comes to wholeheartedly embracing whatever they say. But in the meantime, those actions, as a minimum, should be taken.

[Clayton Morris]

Right.

[Natalie]

Thank you for explaining that in practical terms, because for those of us who've never sat in a room like that, who've never taken commands that way, it would be easy to judge, and we need that context. So I appreciate.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah. Especially for the guys just pressing the drone button or whatever, like the little guy, you know, who's a 21 year old, who's just following, you know, down the line. I totally understand that.

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[Clayton Morris]

Colonel, thank you so much as always. We hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. And if we don't get to see you beforehand, I hope you have a wonderful Christmas as well. Thank you so much. Colonel.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Keep the fires burning there in the fireplace. Stay well.

[Clayton Morris]

We will. It's going to get cold. Thank you, Colonel. Merry Christmas to you. Thanks so much.

[Natalie]

All right, speaking of pressing buttons to kill people, we're going to tell you how Palantir and the US Government is making that easy in Gaza. If you don't think it's something that's going to come here to the United States, well, I'm going to lay out exactly how that could happen. So hold on to your butts. But first.

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[Natalie]

Butts, but I'm telling you, it's a Jurassic park line.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Is it?

[Clayton Morris]

Okay. Well, did you know that the US life expectancy peaked at 78 years old back in 2014? That's horrible. And global life expectancy is declining for the first time in 30 years because people are aging faster than ever before.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

More.

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[Natalie]

Well, the US is paying Palantir to track and target Palestinians in Gaza, according to new report that we can corroborate with official military sources. If you don't think this technology is going to be pointing at you, or at least that they don't want to, you are on drugs. And I'm going to show you exactly what it can do and why you should be worried about it. And we are unwitting complicit, unwittingly complicit because we're paying for it and allowing our government to do it right before our very eyes. What this is, is an AI. Let me say this right. I don't want to, I don't want to mess this up. It's an AI powered kill chain. That's what it is. They're already running Practice. It's not just a terrorist filter, although that's how they're selling it to us. It's a system that back tests whether or not you are killable through your social media. Not just your movement, not just what you've bought, not just where you've been, where you've driven, but also your social media profile. It not only identifies targets, it manufactures them. Here's the report from 972 magazine showing that the US military has been operating out of a massive warehouse in southern Israel just north of the Gaza City Strip since October. We know this because CENTCOM themselves told us the official line here when the US military announced this is that they are bringing together stakeholders, a word I really don't like, in order to implement the ceasefire. Well, what does that mean exactly? Who are all the stakeholders in the ceasefire? It's not Palestinians, that much I can tell you. It's anyone who's allied with Israel in order to implement the ceasefire. Now, when Israel violates the ceasefire, no problem. But what they're looking for is continued justification to violate the ceasefire. Now what they're doing is using this AI technology and surveillance to, in the words of the military, shrink the kill chain. Here is a test run that they did just a few weeks ago or a few months ago in July. They are doing this with a Palantir Software called Me Maven. What it does is pull data together from satellites, drones intercepted phone calls, messages, text messages. They can read basically the entire footprint of Gaza. And then it does what they call, this is Palantir's own term, optimizes the kill chain. How do we know that this is built by Palantir? We know that because last year the United States government put out this contract saying that they are specific specifically hiring Palantir to do that. Note here, it says this is a one bid solicited. So that means they didn't really put this out. They asked Palantir to build exactly this. No other contractor was offered the job. But what does that mean, optimize the kill chain? Well, you know, we know from many government reports, including the reports of Bradley Manning, how the government just goes out and under the Obama years and willy nilly killed all suspects and targets, and they labeled any boy over 12 an acceptable military target. Even if they were civilians. They didn't have to justify it. They could just say, yeah, sure, that guy, let's kill him, let's kill him. In, in the video that was launched by Sergeant Manning, it was the United States military firing on someone who had a camera, a Reuters reporter, that looks like a gun. Let's just kill him. So what they're saying here is we can do a lot less willy nilly killing. We can optimize the kill chain. Well, what are they going to use in order to justify this kill chain faster? It means they see a target, they run an AI search for any justification to kill that target. So say someone walking down the street. Right? Okay, let's take a look at him, scan his face. What has he said on the Internet? Oh, he's been critical of Netanyahu. Fire that. That's essentially how this works practically. Right? They can highlight justifications to kill in real time, not just based on movement history and association. It can also be based on social media history. They do this using a data miner. This is a startup that the United States has used before to access platforms like Twitter. So again, this is risk intelligence. So for now, they're saying, oh, you know, we're just looking for Hamas. That's it. That's all we're doing. But reports are not only that they're looking for Hamas, they're looking for any association with Hamas. Even is Bob's your uncle, right? Is your uncle Hamas? You're killable. There's according to reports, they're saying the criteria is not whether a person is Hamas, but also whether a person has Their relatives tied to Hamas. So 972 is reporting that they are also targeting anyone, anyone with relative ties to Hamas. I mean, who knows, you know how that can affect you. This is guilt by association. You don't even have to be a terrorist. That basically justifies killing everyone in Gaza, like these two who were killed on Monday. On Monday, Israel claimed that they had targeted two Palestinian terrorists in Gaza that had violated the ceasefire agreement. Here's how they put it. They posed an immediate threat. Can we go back? Immediate threat. Can we go back to those two boys, please? Backwards? Those are the two threat. These two boys, aged 11 and 8, their father's in a wheelchair. They were collecting firewood on the wrong side of the yellow line. And that's why Israel fired. According to Israeli reports, the Times of Israel, again, these two were hunting for firewood. So how that is a threat to an immediate threat to IDF soldiers, I'm not sure. Now, if Israel has this identity tracking software, wouldn't it have been able to save these two and know these two don't have a WhatsApp? They are not posting on any social media about that. That little boy's eight. So how can we in AI real time, Is it because maybe he has a cousin who they have been able to target as Hamas? We don't know. Or, or the, the scarier question would be, is this what comes of this software? Were they identified as. As targets, as association? This, of course is one of many problems of using this software that it doesn't know morality, it only knows inputs and outputs. If the target switched from, say. Now here's where it could apply to us, because the Trump administration has already said that we have identified domestic terrorists which are not a thing. There shouldn't. There's constitutionally no such thing as domestic terrorists because then the government could use it to any opposition. Right? And so we know that. We've talked to Judge Knapp about it several times. So as the government expands this idea of domestic terrorists, then the kill chain stays the same. Okay, we're using this only to target Hamas and terrorists. But now we have this idea, this false idea of domestic terrorists that could be used on us. What we think, what we say, we think we can say anything right now because it's a free country. But if you were to take a compilation of your social media feed or your private messages, does that then mark you as an acceptable target? And we saw that happen, in fact, during BLM riots in 2020. Now this creates a permanent AI driven enemy list that never expires. Palantir has already lobbied the use of this in the United States. This means not just optimizing the kill chain, it also means automating the propaganda chain. Because as you expand what is unacceptable thought, then you, you sort of, it acts as a dragnet of who is put in it. It expands who they need to track and what. So that's why this is gen. This is genuinely dystopian. Let me know what you think.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

I want to say.

[Clayton Morris]

Go ahead really quick. That I think the story just puts you on the potential next week's anti Semite of the week list.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

So congratulations.

[Natalie]

Oh, well, yeah, I've been mostly ignored by those groups.

[Clayton Morris]

I want to say a couple of things. This Data Miner company is interesting because we've, I think we've covered them before here on the show, but they bought a company a while ago, I think last year or so called Threat Connect. Remember that?

[Natalie]

No, I don't.

[Clayton Morris]

So Data Miner bought Threat Connect and they've received like hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from all sorts of different sources. And this Threat Connect software and information, this AI stuff that they bought to fold into Data Miner basically aggregates your social media, looks at all of it and then as you pointed out, gives us like a threat assessment level. It quantifies like, oh, she's said these eight things against Hamas, or she's pro. She said these eight things. So then it, I'd love to see that chart. Like how do you quantify this? Who's the quantifier in chief at, over at Data Miner, who's telling us? You've, you've released these many videos on this, you reach this threshold and therefore then you're put into this sort of dragnet.

[Natalie]

Well, look, we are very narrowly protected by the Constitution right now. I'm allowed to hate whoever I want. I can support whoever I want as long as I don't go off and fight, you know, for, I don't know, the Taliban or whatever. I mean, the United States, those are the only, I think there's only one example of the United States revoking an American passport. But for the most part, I can sit here and hate and love whoever I want. But if those expressions are aggregated on social media and the Trump administration is able to sell this idea of domestic terrorists, then you can see where this is going straight to 1984. This is Terminator, Terminator level scan your face scan and target.

[Clayton Morris]

Well, a lot of people in the chat room are saying, yes, Skynet is, is real. Skynet is here absolutely because like when you watch Terminator, which we did a few weeks ago for the first time, that our kids never saw it and they were like, whoa. And like, this is more relevant today than ever before. The idea of Skynet with Palantir and drone surveillance. We covered it yesterday in the uk, what the UK government is doing. But the other thing you pointed out in the story, which I found interesting, which is the, is the no bid contract. So because Palantir is basically an arm of the CIA, it's an arm of darpa, it's an arm of the intelligence community. I mean, it's received its, basically its marching orders and funding from that. So there's no, like, no big contracts. No one else can compete with this. It's just Palantir because we created them. That's the whole purpose of having this company.

[Natalie]

That's not a government contract. That's an order.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Right.

[Natalie]

You've ordered that software. It's. You didn't put it out for general bidding. And in fact, this is the second, second time just on redacted. We've covered a no bid contract for Palantir. We did that just a few weeks ago. It would be interesting to go back through all of the Palantir contracts and see how they had no competition. So it's just the United States government saying, you come here, build me this, build me this, build me this. Right. It's happening. It's real. It's not a conspiracy that, you know. Yes, it is. Conspiracy theorists, conspiracy knowers, we love it because it's real.

[Clayton Morris]

Well, and also one of the conspiracy theories, you know, it's like, oh, that it's going to come home to the United States or it's going to be here. That's just a conspiracy theory because it's only meant for overseas threats, which is laughable. I mean, it's laughable. Just look at how they're.

[Natalie]

Ever heard of Edward Snowden, how they're not going to track us.

[Clayton Morris]

I mean, just look at also Fara, you know, all of these things and having to. Or the. Was it. What is the carve out for the warrant. Warrantless wiretapping in the United States and then that new carve out that's been added in. And of course, people like Matt Gates and others trying to get it removed so that the FBI can't just like blanket Americans in all of this. So, yeah, we're losing our constitutional ability to protect ourselves and privacy in this, in this country because the governments are going around the Constitution. Yeah, that's exactly how this is operating.

[Natalie]

I mean, I think that one of the things that we need to scream about the most, there's so many, right? And it's hard. War in Russia, killing civilians. War in Gaza, killing civil war civilians. Now we're Venezuela, we're busy. We got a lot to be outraged about. But if the United States government is using the words domestic terrorists, you can see what they have in store for you. Again, that should not be a thing. There is no such thing as domestic terrorists because giving the government that power means that any anti government group can be labeled a domestic terrorist and locked up. That is the basis for 1984 level living. So I mean, this is one thing that, you know, I know I keep saying it every time we have someone on there's no such thing. We can't have. The government can't label us terrorists. They are going to continue to try. So either you're awake to it or you're not.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Well, and also it goes to like.

[Clayton Morris]

Where, you know, like right now it's, it's, they're saying Hamas or whatever, but even if you say Palestine, they consider that Hamas. So it's like what level of life words where they going to turn into.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Mean something that they, they don't in.

[Clayton Morris]

Order to keep going deeper and deeper. And the thing is like people are already being deported for saying that. Free Palestine.

[Natalie]

Yeah, right.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah. And now we have of course, the big travel bans. The Homeland Security chief, Christy Gnome, you know, saying that she wants to have a full travel ban on every damn country. Those are her words. You know, anybody who's bringing killers, leeches into the United States. So of course, putting everyone in this database and being able to monitor them. And Palantir has supreme authority on this. And as people are pointing out in the chat room, J.D. vance, of course, you know, taking money from Peter Thiel. So you see where all this is going. They're all like these cozy bedfellows inside the Trump administration with this. All right, we've got more news to talk about. Speaking of the Trump administration, we're going to talk about Secretary of War and were there war crimes carried out in the Caribbean against these narco traffic boat, these narco boats off of the coast of Venezuela? Judge Andrew Napolitano is going to join us to talk about all of that and whether this rises to the level of, of, of international war crimes? And will there be any sort of a tribunal, any sort of arrests and can this happen even at the state level? We'll talk to him about that.

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[Clayton Morris]

Well, did the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, commit a war crime when he allegedly ordered the secondary strike on shipwrecked civilians? They destroyed the boat. And then according to reports from the Washington Post, the Intercept, and others that said that Hegseth ordered there to be another strike to kill those in the water. Now, initially, the White House denied that Hegseth was even aware of the attack at all. Then that kind of fell apart. They had to kind of backtrack on that when video emerged from Fox News showing Hegseth live on television, admitting that he watched the whole thing live. Watch.

[Natalie]

So the President is sending a message to other cartels, right?

[Clayton Morris]

A very clear one, I can tell you. That was definitely not artificial intelligence.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

I watched it live.

[Clayton Morris]

We knew exactly who was in that boat. We knew exactly what they were doing, and we knew exactly who. Who they represented. And that was Trend Aragua, a narco terrorist organization designated by the United States trying to poison our country with illicit Drugs. Ok. So knew exactly who was on the boat, knew everything about it, watched it live, no problems in seeing it at all. So that was then. This is now. Today, Hegseth was asked about it during the president's cabinet meeting. Here he was. His response said, you know, this whole story is just fake news. Watch. Proud to do it. So you didn't see any survivors? To be clear, after that first strike, I did not personally see survivors, but I stand because the thing was on fire.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

It was exploded in fire smoke.

[Clayton Morris]

You can't see anything. You got digital. This is called the fog of war. This is what you and the press don't understand. You sit in your air conditioned offices or up on Capitol Hill and you nitpick and you plant fake stories in.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

The Washington Post about kill everybody phrases.

[Clayton Morris]

On anonymous sources, not based in anything.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Not based in any truth at all.

[Clayton Morris]

And then you want to throw up really irresponsible terms about American heroes, about the judgment that they made. I wrote a whole book on this topic because of what politicians and the press does to war fighters. President so now I saw everything. Now there's the fog of war. And we couldn't see anything because it was all smoky and fiery. And, you know, he said digital at one point. I don't know what that meant. Anyway, we wanted to ask Judge Andrew Napolitano about this, the host of Judging Freedom, who knows more about the law than just about anyone I know. And to help us wrangle this question, is this a war crime? Judge, great to see you. Welcome back to the show.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

Oh, it's a pleasure to be here. I'm smiling a little bit because I think your audience knows that. But the show on which he appeared, Fox and Friends, was from time to time hosted by him, by you and by me. I mean, as Yogi Berra said when learned the mayor of Dublin was a Jew. Only in America.

[Clayton Morris]

I mean, this is just, it's crazy.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

Too much.

[Clayton Morris]

But yeah, it's got to feel weird, right? I mean, so here we are talking about someone that we used to work with. But you know, the news is the news and trying to sift through the I have no agenda on this.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

Unfortunately for him and for the people in the boats who are dead, he has directed the military to engage in war crimes. Now you are asking me, so we are clear, if it is a war crime that he ordered, if he did order the killing of the two survivors, the short answer is yes. The longer answer is it's a war crime to attack the boats, period. And again, a war Crime to kill the survivors, the boats and the people on them, even if they're doing what he says they're doing, which is transporting illegal drugs. A, they're in international waters. B, they are speedboats with a maximum distance of 50 to 60 miles. C, they're 1500 miles from the United States. Does the United States have the legal ability to stop a boat in international waters? Absolutely not. It would need to wait until these boats reached what the US Claims, which is the most that any country claims the 12 mile limit. Some countries claim 2, some countries claim 3, some countries claim 12. I'll give you the 12. But outside that 12 mile limit, stopping a boat on the high seas is an act of piracy. That's not me. That's three treaties that the United States has signed. If the Defense Department, which is not engaged in law enforcement, but if it is because the President told them to be, is convinced that these people are transporting drugs to the United States, they must wait until those drugs get into international waters and then stop the boats. If the boats engage in violence during the act of stopping, then of course the people doing the stopping, whether it's the Navy or the Coast Guard, can engage in violence back. But waging war using instruments of war in international waters against people who are not engaged in violence is a federal crime. If a crime from the state in which it was ordered. So I don't know where Pete Hegseth was. Probably Virginia, which is where the Pentagon is at the time he issued these orders. It gives rise to prosecution in the United States. There's no statute of limitations for murder. It gives prosecution. Rise to prosecution in the countries where the victims are from. And it gives rise to prosecution in international courts in the Hague. These are not even close calls.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

When there's no.

[Clayton Morris]

There's no ambiguity at all. Like you're not on the fence about this at all.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

No, no, there's no ambiguity. If they had weapons and they were shooting at the drones or the missiles or the helicopters that were following them, that would be a different story. But where there is no weaponry being waged at the United States, the United States has no legal authority to kill, no matter what the President calls them. I mean, this phrase, narco terrorists, Clayton, is a political phrase. It's not a legal phrase. There's no definition of it or use of it in American law. Simply labeling people by a word that sounds terrible. Admittedly, it does sound terrible. Narco terrorist, labeling them. That does not create any additional extra constitutional authority for the President to authorize the kills.

[Clayton Morris]

Well, that's what I was going to ask you. I mean, because we're, we were, we were boogeymen scared into this Trend Aragua. And I'll admit I maybe fell for it in the run up to the election. Trend Aragua, they're everywhere. They're taking over apartment complexes. Turns out, not really, but in one particular area of Aurora, Colorado. But it wasn't like an epidemic. Really wanted to look at the Mexican drug cartels. Maybe that's a totally different issue you should be looking at. But Trende Arago was suddenly like everywhere. It's everywhere. They're coming to your house tonight. And I'll admit I kind of fell for it. And so by that law, by this idea that they're not. Why wouldn't we just have ICE grabbing their machine guns, going right down the street and just shooting at all of these Trend guys right in the head. Wouldn't it be the same thing as bombing their boats in the water?

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

Yes, it would be the same thing. I mean, if the police in Chicago or Denver or Newark witness a major drug transaction, can they kill the distributor? Of course not. Their job is to arrest the person, seize and secure the evidence and bring that person and the evidence to prosecutors for. For prosecution. The same as the principle on the seas, except when you're in international waters, you have no authority to stop anybody for any reason unless they are firing at you. Then of course you can fire back. I was both laudatory and critical of the six members of Congress who made that famous or infamous, depending upon which side of the fence you're on tape in which they said you have a duty to disobey illegal orders. That is a correct and accurate statement of the law. The reason I was critical of them is when they were pressed on talk shows, after they made that, they back down, well, what is an illegal order? Have you seen any illegal orders? They know damn well that an order to kill unarmed civilians is an illegal order for everybody involved. The Secretary of defense, the admiral, to whomever the admiral communicated it and whoever pulled the trigger. I know it's not a trigger, it's a button, but I'll use that phrase. Whoever actually pulled the trigger, all of those people are implicated now in war crimes so long as they knew they were killing unarmed, non violent civilians.

[Clayton Morris]

So you heard Hegseth there say that he initially he watched the whole thing live. He saw it clearly. He knew everybody on the boat. He knew everything. And then you heard him today during the cabinet meeting saying, you know, it was foggy, there's A lot of burning going on. I probably didn't see it. I didn't see. I did not see civilians.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

I'm disappointed. And when I discussed this on air at Newsmax, I started by saying, it gives me no pleasure to accuse someone that I worked with several days a week for eight years, that I socialized with, whose now wife was actually my boss for a while at Fox. It gives me no joy to call him a war criminal, but the acts in which he engaged are clearly war crimes. And that answer he gave at the Cabinet meeting was a non answer that did nothing but attack the press for asking a question he didn't want to answer. However, when our friends and former colleagues at Fox and friends asked him that question, he said, oh, yes, I watched the whole thing and I knew what I was doing. So which is it, Mr. Secretary, under.

[Clayton Morris]

The Department of Defense law of War manual. And go to section 18. Specifically talks about members of the military saying no to these, to these orders, having the ability to not, not move forward with illegal orders. But it also says specifically not firing upon shipwrecked individuals would be considered a war violation, a war crime. It's literally written in the law of war manual at the Pentagon. You cannot get more specific than that.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

That is a manual. Whose job it is Pete's, Peg, Seth's to enforce. He must know what's in there. Not only may you not shoot at the shipwrecked, but you have a duty to rescue the shipwrecked even if you caused the shipwreck. That is as clear as day. Secretary Hegseth knew that. The Admiral must have known that the SEAL Team 6 that actually followed the boat and pressed the buttons that caused the death of everybody on it first once and then second time, must have known that as well. They all violated basic principles of the laws of war. They all violated federal law. And as I said, depending upon the state in which the Secretary and the Admiral were located at the time that made these decisions, they violated state law as well. This, this is not anything that's political. This is life and death. And innocent people, legally innocent, are being killed so that the administration can show how tough it is on drugs. Tough on drugs? Why did the President just pardon the biggest distributor of cocaine in the modern era today?

[Clayton Morris]

Right. It makes no sense. Well, you know, and I think we've. We've cut through the bullshit and the propaganda on this show that these people are no threat to the United States. If you really wanted to go after the drugs, you would of course be looking at multiple other Countries, but thousands of miles away, these people are not getting into the United States, and if anything, that we are facilitating it through our own CIA. So don't lie to us. We're not idiots. We. We can see right through this bs. But the, you know, Fox News audience, cnn, they all buy it because they're being. We're being told that they're an imminent threat to the United States. So under that idea, they're an imminent threat to the United States. President Trump has given the authority to his secretary of war to protect the national sovereignty of the United States. That's what they will say. Is there any legal merit to that at all?

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

No, there's no legal merit to it at all. First of all, it's a law enforcement issue. And the military, under an 1876 law, but still valid law today, been enforced many times, is prohibited from engaging in law enforcement. And again, as I said, the president can label these people whatever, whatever he wants. His labeling of them does not give him authority to do something that the Constitution prohibits. The Constitution allows killing only under two circumstances. One, where Congress has declared war and our military is legally shooting at or attempting to kill the military of the country with which we are engaged in war. Two, where there's been due process, basically, a fair jury trial with its attendant constitutional protections result in guilt and the death penalty lawfully imposed. Those are the only circumstances under which the government can kill. The president deciding on his own without a declaration of war, on his own without any due process that somebody is deserving of death. Well, that's what kings of England did. It's one of the reasons we have a Constitution, to prevent that from ever happening.

[Colonel Douglas MacGregor]

Right.

[Clayton Morris]

I mean, you can look at the list of grievances in the bottom of the Declaration of Independence, for crying out loud, and it points out exactly those things which we don't stand for. I'll get you out of here on this. Judge, I know you got to run, but I want to talk real quick just about who would adjudicate this? I mean, where would this. Who's going to bring charges up on for war crimes? Like, is it the Hague?

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

I think that Congress is going to engage in very aggressive investigations. I think Secretary Hegseth will be forced out of office, and his successor will file war crimes charges against everybody in the chain of command. As for Pete himself, he could be prosecuted. I don't know. That would really be up to the Department of Justice or. Or a state in which he was located. Like I said, Virginia. The statute of limitations on these things for murder. There's no, there's no statute of limitations. The president could pardon him. That, of course, does not relieve him from international prosecution in the Hague, if he should ever go there, or prosecution in the courts of countries who's from which the victims came.

[Clayton Morris]

Yeah, it seems like these guys can skirt around all this stuff and that's why they, you know, people can continue to get away with this stuff, unfortunately. Judge Andrew Napolitano, always great to see you. Thank you so much, my friend, for, for joining us on a difficult subject.

[Judge Andrew Napolitano]

For sure, it is a difficult subject, especially since we know the person involved. But thank you, Clayton. Give my best to Natalie and to your beautiful family.

[Clayton Morris]

Thank you so much, Judge. Always great to see you and thanks to all of you for being a part of our show today. We really appreciate it. Thanks for subscribing. Thanks for signing for our daily newsletter. You can get that by going to redacted.inc is the place to go. Just click on that. It'll be in your inbox first thing in the morning. We cover about four or five of the big stories, stories of the day, no bs, no propaganda, and delivered to your inbox when you wake up over your cup of coffee. Redacted.inc is the place to go. So that's going to do it for us today. Thank you guys so much for joining us. And we'll be back here tomorrow at 4pm Eastern live. Have a great night everyone.

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