David Rutherford Show: Europe Prepares for War? NATO & EU Push Toward a Hot Conflict With Russia

Summary

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Podcast Summary: The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show – David Rutherford Show: Europe Prepares for War? NATO & EU Push Toward a Hot Conflict With Russia

Date: December 5, 2025
Host: David Rutherford (with co-host Jordy)
Network: iHeartPodcasts

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Overview

In this episode, David Rutherford and co-host Jordy discuss mounting tensions between Europe, NATO, and Russia as peace talks with Ukraine have collapsed. They explore acceleration toward a potential “hot war” involving NATO/EU and Russia, delve into European leaders’ rhetoric and strategy, and analyze military, energy, and economic dimensions. Later, the show covers the FBI’s arrest in the January 6th pipe bomber case and Michael Burry’s exit from the stock market, raising concerns about the viability of index-driven investing.

Rutherford adopts a skeptical tone toward European and U.S. political leadership, often challenging the logic and honesty behind their intentions and strategies, and expresses deep concern about the cost in human lives should the conflict escalate.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Breakdown of Ukraine Peace Talks

• [11:14] Rutherford recaps the breakdown of peace talks, referencing a proposed "28 step plan" that included guaranteed security for Ukraine but would see Russia keep control over occupied territory.
• European leaders, aligning behind Zelensky, push back on any U.S.-led resolution that doesn't favor European interests.

"By all measures, the peace talks have basically completely broken down."
—David Rutherford [10:40]

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2. Europe's Push for Escalation and Rhetoric from NATO/EU

• [12:12] Guest expert Mr. Kuhn previously predicted escalation to full-blown kinetic engagement in eastern Europe, possibly involving Poland, Baltics, and direct confrontation with Russia.
• Rutherford notes comments from Mark Root (NATO’s head) and several EU leaders, who stress increased defense investments and support for Ukraine, as the U.S. public and government grow weary of the war.

"We must continue to provide Ukraine with the tools to defend its sovereignty and achieve a lasting resolution." —NATO representative (clip), played by Jordy [14:09]

"My gut tells me the inevitability of a hot war with Russia and the European Union is... I'm going to put that at 85% right now."
—David Rutherford [30:09]

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3. Funding and Military Support Dynamics

• [14:28] Discussion of NATO funding reveals the U.S. accounts for a large share, but European leaders are stepping up investment as U.S. support wavers (NATO common budget $13.6B since 2021; U.S. share $2.2B).
• [19:32] U.S. direct aid to Ukraine exceeds $120 billion.
• The EU pursues long-term funding, including controversial plans to seize Russian assets in Belgium for military spending—a move seen as both illegal and provocative.

"We're going to take your— all your cash, all your money that you've parked in European banks. We're going to take it, use it to go to war with you. ... If that doesn't scream attacking Russian sovereignty, I don't know what does."
—David Rutherford [27:52]

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4. Europe’s Energy Dilemma & the War's Economics

• [21:15] Ursula von der Leyen claims Europe is overcoming its dependence on Russian energy, but Rutherford is skeptical, calling the renewables narrative “a load of...”
• Jordy and Rutherford agree that European economies have been hamstrung by their own climate policies, increasing vulnerability and costs.

"It's just, it doesn't make any sense. It's more gaslighting the European people." —David Rutherford [23:16]

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5. Military Readiness – Numbers, Equipment, Willingness

• Rutherford and Jordy analyze NATO, EU, and Russian military strength:
  • Europe (excluding US) has around 2.5 million active military, 3 million reserves, but contributions are fragmented.
  • Russia has over 1.3 million active, 2 million+ reserves, 12,500 tanks, and a significant artillery/air advantage.
  • Questioning the will of both European and American populations to fight for Ukraine, citing street interviews and low recruitment enthusiasm.

"You will not get American troops to go to war in Eastern Europe against Russia. I promise you that. ... No way will we do World War III in Europe again.”
—David Rutherford [39:08]

"[European leaders] are ramping this thing up. That's going to cost untold scale of human life. Young men are going to go into those trenches and die at mass scale again."
—David Rutherford [49:10]

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6. Macro-Analysis: War of Attrition and Historical Parallels

• Rutherford expresses deep concern Europe is not prepared for a “war of attrition,” warning modern warfare would devastate populations and economies.
• Cites Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Sudan as examples of conflicts with massive cost and questionable strategic return for the West.

"If you're willing to sacrifice your own people like that and burn through young men... I feel like the war of attrition works." —Jordy [47:07]

"This will be the last great war of manpower. That's what this will be, right? This will drag on for five to ten years... kill millions of people. Could bring in— it could turn into a world war for sure, which could kill billions, could go nuclear for sure." —David Rutherford [47:19]

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7. January 6th Pipe Bomber Arrest

• [57:48] The FBI announces the arrest of a suspect after nearly five years.
• Rutherford is skeptical, noting the case made progress only after a new investigative team was assigned.
• Raises concerns about past FBI involvement, potential informants present on January 6th, and transparency failures regarding released footage and evidence.
• Suggests with renewed oversight, many other cases could be rapidly "solved" or clarified.

"You took out an old team, you put in a new team and the case was potentially solved. What that screams to me is how many other cases could you do that to?"
—David Rutherford [62:36]

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8. Shortage of Federal Lawyers & Call for Legal Recruits

• Civil rights legal capacity at DOJ has halved; Stephen Miller makes an open call for more lawyers and deportation judges.
• The depletion is attributed to personnel leaving due to objections over new priorities and “political ideologies.”

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9. Michael Burry Leaves the Market: Analysis of Index Fund Bubble

• Rutherford discusses famed investor Michael Burry’s exit, citing concerns that the U.S. stock market is now dominated by index funds and algorithmic passive flows, subverting traditional price discovery.
• Reads at length from a widely shared social media thread, emphasizing that $15.4 trillion is now passively invested and fundamental research no longer drives investment flows.
• Encourages listeners to critically re-evaluate their financial holdings, consult with advisors, and not follow market “herd” mentality.

“My estimation of value in securities is not now and has not been for some time in sync with the markets... This is not a crash prediction. This is a death certificate.”
—Michael Burry (quoted by Rutherford), [66:20]

"The marginal buyer of American equities is no longer an analyst with conviction... it is a target date fund receiving its biweekly paycheck allocation. The buyer has no opinion. The buyer will never sell."
—Michael Burry (quoted by Rutherford), [67:12]

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10. Conclusions & Final Thoughts

• Rutherford concludes that Europe is likely heading toward further escalation and a potentially catastrophic conflict with Russia.
• Listeners are urged to stay informed, think independently, and pressure their representatives to avoid repeating the errors of past, costly wars.

"My summary in that is this is going to continue to go on. There’s not going to be peace. ... I think they’re just trying to figure out how to push it into a kinetic hot war with Russia in the European Union and NATO involving us.”
—David Rutherford [51:17]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "Give me one historical war or conflict that has ever been run off renewables. … It's more gaslighting the European people."
  [23:16]

• "What’s it for? Their image. … just send the young men to die because I don’t want to look bad in this negotiation or something. Like, what is that?"
  —Jordy [49:31]

• "If we go into this, you’re not going to support the other side, right? And India’s like hell no..."
  [38:22]

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Key Timestamps for Important Segments

| Time | Topic/Content | |-----------|---------------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:36 | Start of Ukraine/EU/NATO/Russia peace talks breakdown | | 11:14 | Detailed breakdown of failed peace proposal | | 14:09 | NATO official’s statement on support for Ukraine | | 19:32 | U.S./NATO contributions – financial breakdown by Jordy | | 21:15 | Von der Leyen's statements on energy independence | | 26:27 | Legal and economic controversy: seizing Russian state assets | | 30:09 | Rutherford’s forecast: “85% chance” of hot war | | 35:08 | Macron warns of U.S. betraying Ukraine (leaked call) | | 43:10-47:45| Military hardware and personnel breakdown – NATO vs. Russia | | 57:48 | FBI arrests January 6th pipe bomber years later | | 64:16 | DOJ legal staff exodus, Miller's call for lawyers | | 65:37 | Michael Burry's stock market “death certificate” analysis | | 71:44 | Reflection: market herd mentality and advice for listeners |

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Tone and Style

• Rutherford maintains a skeptical, sometimes cynical, but urgent tone.
• Frequently calls out perceived hypocrisy or manipulation by U.S./EU/NATO leadership.
• Candid, informal exchanges with Jordy help break down complex topics.
• Blunt warnings about war, casualties, and economic crisis underscore the seriousness of the discussion.

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Summary

This episode is a sobering deep dive into the rapidly shifting geopolitics between Europe, Russia, and NATO over Ukraine, with special attention to economic and military factors and a recurring fear of sleepwalking into disastrous war. The hosts alternate between hard-hitting criticism, dark humor, and sincere appeals for listener vigilance. Major takeaways include skepticism of European and U.S. policy, vast disparities in military and economic readiness, and a call to avoid the mistakes of previous conflicts.

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For further information, listeners are encouraged to follow "The David Rutherford Show" for ongoing updates, and to keep an eye out for next week's major investigative stories.

Transcript

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[David Rutherford]

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[David Rutherford]

Ukrainian peace talks break down. The EU is fired up.

January 6th. Bomber is snatched by the FBI. Stephen Miller wants more lawyers. And Michael Berry is leaving the market this week on the David Rutherford Show.

All right, what's up, everybody? I'm so fired up that you're here with us. Welcome back to the David Rutherford show. We are beyond blessed. Our numbers keep going up on YouTube. They keep going up on our X feed video. Show them how. What it looks like, Jordy. Show them what it looks like. That's right. With the sound effect. With the sound effect.

[Jordy]

It's the same chart as the AI Company stock price projections. Just up and to the right just.

[David Rutherford]

In seven, man. Let's, let's, let's weight that market in an astronomically destabilized position. I love it.

[Jordy]

They can't lose money, dude. It's impossible.

[David Rutherford]

Yeah, exactly. Oh, dude, I. I had a phone call with a guy this morning about a story we're gonna. We're hope he'll want to break it with us. And it's. It's about some SEC and FINRA shenanigans going on with a particular stock. And, man, I was just riveted for an hour on the phone with this guy telling me this story. And he's former Green Beret, so it was like, it was awesome. And, and, man, Jordy, when I was just listening to what this guy has put together, I was just like, I was catching flies. I dropped. I dropped my daughter off at school, and then I'm, you know, I'm in the parent lane, and I'm like going, you know, what the fuck? You know, like, I'm like, people are Looking at like, who's the crazy guy talking to himself in the car? Right. Get home. Yeah. And it was just. It staggered. So, just so you all know, we are working on some big stories. That's not the only one. Some really interesting things. Next week, we're releasing probably our two most significant stories that we've had by far. I am so excited for these. You all are going to love them. Make sure that you're ready for Monday and Wednesday, those releases. Again, we can't thank you enough for how much support you've been giving us. Always. If you could subscribe, like, and share, you know, the deal that helps us in the algorithm to get in front of people. We're just super stoked for all that. All right, we've got a ton coming up for you today when we talk about Ukraine. But before we do, I just want to talk to you a little bit about one of our great partners. So excited that we can have them as a sponsor. I absolutely love this place. I got a good friend of mine who's on the board who says this is one of the best colleges in the country by far. And it really is just an honor to have to be able to represent Hill Hillsdale College. You know, when you look at. And we're going to talk about this coming up, you know, you look at the world today, and you look about what's going on Ukraine and Russia. You look about what's going on in the Middle east and all these different places, you really kind of get back to that space where you're like, God, what we have here in America is. Is pretty unbelievable and phenomenal, you know? You know, there's a lot of confusion in the world today. It can be very difficult to find what is true and what is clear. What is a democracy, what is a technocracy, what is an oligarchy, what is communism? You know? But it's critical for you to, as an American citizen, to really understand what America is and where it comes from. And so there is a new Hillsdale College miniseries on colonial America. Now, this thing offers an incredible reminder that the first Americans were searching for the same things. You know, they believe that. That faith and reason revealed God's design for the world, and that understanding became the foundation of their courage and their pursuits of freedom. Waging war against the Brits. Right. It's a stirring look at the ideas that still hold us together today. And there are definitely some people out there that want to tear those down. And so to order to really, you know, invest in your development of your patriotic understanding of this country, I highly recommend, and you know, you go to Hillsdale College and look these courses up, because I'm willing to bet, like, how many of you understand, like how many Americans organize local governments to rule and protect themselves. Have you ever known that? What about, did you ever understand why America has been a land where virtue can lead to peace and prosperity? Right? That's the deed. That's the value to be virtuous. And then also, most of us know that the Declaration of Independence, that it marked the beginning of America as an independent nation. But I'm telling you, in this Hillsdale course, it focuses on the forging of the American character that made the revolution possible and why it's more important than ever to remember and reclaim that character today. Right? You have to understand as an American, it's part of your duty, it's part of your honor to understand where you come from, not just in the Continental Congress, but really understand the in depth approaches of this, this evolution of the American virtue and value system that became America, that still exists today. And if I'm telling you what I would recommend, if you're in a place where you're struggling to believe in America, go take this course at Hillsdale. Right? This college miniseries is completely free. Right. It's easy to access. And I want to add that Hillsdale offers more than 40 other free online courses, including a course on C.S. lewis, the stories from the book of Genesis, the rise and fall of the Roman Republic. I know Jordi and I think about Rome probably once every hour. And you can learn more about it from your free online course at Hillsdale and you can go even deeper on the American foundation in the Constitution. Remember, this is all free. That's why I love Hillsdale as a, as a partner. Not only are they developing the best curriculum in the world, but they're offering it for free for you to deepen your convictions in America. Right? This course is absolutely stunning. You're going to learn a ton of new stuff. All you got to do right now is go to Hillsdale Edu David to enroll. There is no cost and it's easy to get started. That's Hillsdale. Edu David to enroll. It is free. Hooyah, Hillsdale. Way to make America. Keep America strong. All right, this week has been trippy last. You know, I did some reviews of last week and stuff, and it was the peace talks. Well, we're at the end of the next week of this, and by all measures, the peace talks have basically completely broken down.

Many different Facets have come to play. Last show, I read you. The 28, 28 step. Not last show, but two shows. Go. The 28America's 28 plan, step, plan for peace. That was really, I mean the main components was guaranteed security for both nominated membership and Russia essentially controls the land it has taken. Obviously there was a response from the European contingency who was directly behind Zelensky Minsky's delivery of this. They're pretty adamant that the United States does not have the final say in all of this. To the point where we have now this week seen what I believe is exactly what our friend.

Mr. Kuhn was talking about before when we had him on, where he said, hey, it's highly probable that this thing is moving towards a full blown kinetic engagement in Eastern, Eastern Europe, Ukraine, Poland, some of the Baltics against Russia and NATO in the European Union. Now why do I say that, Jordy? Why don't we bring up Mark Root, who's the head of NATO. The comments that he has been making. Basically what's taking place is I think the European Union, led by the German Chancellor, Prime Minister of England, prime Minister of France.

Basically are all coming together and saying, hey, we're not going to do this. We're going to keep pushing this thing forward. Obviously the their military industrial complex is being delivered or enhanced. Their agenda of pushing NATO as far east as possible is being forwarded. And so I just want to go through a bunch of videos that really kind of caught my eye this week. All right, so go ahead, Jordan, play Mr. Roots, this press or a little clip.

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[David Rutherford]

Achieve a lasting resolution.

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[David Rutherford]

You know what's interesting about that is he's basically saying that, you know, he's pushing back because there was a couple back and forth. He came out, made these statements and then immediately they were following up with this idea that because you got to fund this, right? That's the great challenge, right? NATO's funding for its military and this military alliance is not great, because the vast majority of that. Jordi, will you look up how much America has funded NATO over the last four years, if you can get that data? So when you think about NATO funding, I mean, by far in particular Ukrainian war, America has been footing the bill for this and vastly outstretching what NATO has done. And now with Trump in office, he has come forward many times and said, listen, if they're not willing to really, truly negotiate peace, we're not going to provide what we've been providing anymore. This is just not good for us. It's not good for our economy, it's not good for our taxpayers. Plus, I think the American public is absolutely exhausted with supporting this war, in particular, with all the variables that we've seen. Right. And those variables are most particular. NATO and the European Union want this to continue.

I would say.

Ukraine is, is not in the strategic position they profess. And I, we've got a video coming up here in a little bit after that, and that Russia is now pushing back and saying, listen, you guys know what the deal is. We're not giving back. We, we want peace. We do. We 100% do not want to go to war with Europe. He said that multiple interviews over the last couple weeks, and then he always follows up. But if NATO continues to threaten and continues to push, and if they push the envelope, in particular, if they do allow Ukraine to become a NATO country which only can be ratified if the United States agrees, and I don't that President Trump and his cabinet are going to allow that to happen in any way, shape or form. But the other fact that you saw this week, too, even with Witkoff and.

Ivanka's husband, Jared Kushner over there for talks, they were forced to wait multiple times while Russia engaged in other talks with other delegates from China and other places. We saw Putin go and meet with Modi of India. We've seen a lot of basically Russia saying, you know, I, the sense I get is I don't believe that Russia believes that the US has any control or influence on the European Union and, and, and NATO. All right, so how much has. Has the U.S. contributed to NATO over the last four years?

[Jordy]

Looks like the total is about 2.2 billion of. Is the U.S. direct share approximately in.

[David Rutherford]

NATO spending on just overall operations?

[Jordy]

Overall operations. I think the total NATO common budget, it says, was 13.6 billion. The U.S. direct share is 2.2 billion since 2021.

[David Rutherford]

Since 20. And that's annually. 2.2 annually.

[Jordy]

No, that's a total.

[David Rutherford]

Oh, total okay. All right. And then would you pull up now, would you pull up how much money the US has spent on supporting Ukraine?

[Jordy]

Yes.

[David Rutherford]

All right, so you have that. And now the other aspect of this that you're seeing too is Ursula van van der Leyen, who's the head of the European Union, who came out with this, because obviously if the US Pulls out and reduces its contributions economically, militaristically, intelligence support, ground operations support, training, all of that, then you're in big trouble, right? Because now the European Union and they've committed to try and raise $500 billion in the next couple years for its strategic defense initiatives. And meanwhile, all of these countries have a profound economic burden. And so I found it fascinating, right, as Mark Root and a bunch of the other prime ministers are, are slow dripping their populations into preparing them for this conflict that I think they want and they believe is coming regardless or want it to come. And a whole nother story is whether or not you're going to get your populations to fight in this. And I'm going to talk about military assets here in a second.

All right, what has the US given Ukraine?

[Jordy]

Total direct aid is 116 to 121 billion. So call it 120 billion.

[David Rutherford]

Okay, so you look at the NATO 2.2 billion over the last few years, and then 100 and what was it? 120 billion. 120 billion of your tax dollars have gone to this meat grinder of a war, right? You either, you forwarded against it that just. You need to know how much spending has invested. Well, so what they figure is they need money, the European Union, because chances are if they continue to push this, they push that NATO, that Ukraine joins either the eu, because I don't think the US Will allow NATO to Ukraine to join NATO. So they'll join the European Union. What then activates other treaties underneath that? Then they can come to their defense and begin kinetic operations, which Keir Starmer has said, Mark Cohn has said, the head of Germany, Germany has said. So why don't you play Ms. Ursula's comments? Because what they're talking about doing is seizing assets, Russian assets in particular in Belgium, seizing Russian assets to pay, right, for the arming, to pay for the operational buildup of the European Union and NATO forces should the United States not participate. So let's hear what old Ursula had to say from 26% to 2% today. I always knew that we could deliver.

Real quickly for me, Jordy, so what she's talking about, and this is correct, I didn't set that up properly. I apologize. What she's talking about, obviously, the number one thing that drives any war effort is what? It's energy. You have to have energy. If you don't have energy, you're not waging a war, period. You need gas. You need gas for tanks, you need gas for logistics, you need gas for this. You need gas to transport weapons and people and airplanes and all of this. That would have to come down for kinetic war against Russia. Well, guess what? European Union has been.

Buying Russian gas through the entire war because they need it. Because if you look at Germany, they've shut down a tremendous amount of their energy production as well as other countries. And, you know, they buy it through ghost entities or other, other countries that are basically buying Russian fuel and then selling that fuel to the European Union. So this is what she's talking about. She's gonna. Their whole goal is we are gonna prepare to go to war, potentially go to war with Russia by getting rid of Russian oil. So go for it. With results.

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[David Rutherford]

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[David Rutherford]

REpower EU kept us safe winter after winter. It kept the lights on in Europe's schools and hospitals. It kept homes warm across the Union. So this is a true European success. It's, it's, it's a load of is what she's saying. Basically, it's ridiculous because give me one historical war or conflict that has ever been run off renewables. It's just, it's, it's outlandish at best. Right? It's just, it doesn't make any sense. It's more gaslighting the European people. All right, now the other aspect, their energy costs too.

[Jordy]

Sorry, that's important to say. Europe, European energy costs for households went.

[David Rutherford]

Through the roof 100%. They've had an energy crisis because the whole climate change fiasco and shutting down nuclear power plants, shutting down coal production, shutting down. I mean, they've basically crippled themselves and forced themselves to be able to have to use Russian, Russian oil. So it's just comical at best. All right. The other aspect that they're saying is, all right, we're not going to use their oil, and we're not. And so, and we don't have the funds because our economies are in the toilet. It. So what we're going to do is we're going to take these Russian assets that are in all these places, in particular in Belgium, and we're going to use these assets to pay for the war effort for Ukraine. And then afterwards, we're going to force, once we win the war, we're going to force Russia to pay back these assets. Well, there were multiple people in, in, in these areas, Brussels and these other places that were like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. These go against the treaties that we have in place in Europe to protect these types of funds. There's a legal issue in here. And they basically shut Ms. Ursula down for the first few days when this came out, saying, we're not going to do this, we're not going to do this. Because Putin then responded and said, hey, listen, he basically gave a warning. If you do this, we will seek rationale. Re. Re retribution in indefinite circumstances. Right? So whatever that means. So, hey, we're going to take, we're going to take your. All your cash, all your money that you've parked in European banks. We're going to take it, use it to go to war with you. And then, and what's, you know, so Putin's like, well, if you do that, I'm not going to be happy. It's going to be ugly for you. Then they come back and say, see, he's going to kill all of Europe. He's threatening Europe's sovereignty. That's what is so comical about this. And it's like they think people are, are essentially just.

Ignorant to the sequence of what this stuff is going. So this guy who I found interesting because initially he was like, nope, we're not doing this. Then he, obviously, he got the phone call or a phone call or some pressure, whatever, and then he came out and he said this. So listen to this cat.

Well, I'm looking forward to the discussion on the immobilized assets, not the frozen assets. There's a big difference. The sovereign assets, there's the idea of confiscating them to give them to Ukraine. I'm looking for the legal basis for this decision. This is not a very. This, not a detail. Even during the Second World War, immobilized assets were never touched. So this is a very important step. If you would like to take it. We have three demands. I want the full mutualization of the risk, because there is a big risk we will suffer from enormous claims. So if you want to do this, we will have to do this all together. We want guarantees if the money has to be paid back, that every member states will chip in. The consequences cannot only be for Belgium. And the third demand is that every country who has immobilized assets moves together with us, because we are the only ones. Eurocle is the only financial institution that offers the windfall profits to Ukraine. We know that there are vast amounts of Russian money in other countries who have always been silent about this. If we move, we must move all together. That's European solidarity. If these three demands were quite reasonable, I think are met, then we could go forward. If not, I will do everything in my power at the European level, also at the national level, politically and legally to stop this decision.

So old boy there comes out and says, you know what? Hey, if you guys want to do this, then you got to put skin in the game. You got to basically take the assets that you're incurring profit on that are parked in your banks, these massive quantities of Russian assets from wherever you want to talk about, whether it's oligarchs or the government or whatever it is. And we're going to, like, all of you are going to contribute at the same time. Basically all of your countries are going to, you know, collectively say, hey, hey, Vladimir, you know, up yours, bud. We're taking your money and we're going to finance with your money to take you down. I don't know about you, but if that doesn't scream attacking Russian sovereignty, I don't know what does. And then think about what that does in any future treaties around the world where you're going to operate and you're going to, you're going to use your capital and invest it in foreign countries, put it in their bank. That basically makes the entire European Union.

Off, takes them offline for that type of investment and says, well, oh, wait, wait, if I invest and put my money in European banks or bonds or whatever markets, and then somehow they get pissed at me and then stop and then freeze my assets. Why the hell am I going to do this? Ultimately, what comes out of that, it drives people towards parking their assets in other places, I. E. The BRICS group, right? Then they'll be open for business and say, oh, park your money right here. Park your. We won't ever do that to you. It's never going to happen.

[Jordy]

Well, the US did this to Russia too. We, we took some of Russians at Russia's assets, we kicked them out of the swift system, all of this. And the world had the exact reaction you just said is, which is move towards the brick system. Because, I mean, imagine if I just hear my neighbor down the street, my bank just took all their money because they hated them, right? I'm thinking about taking my money out of that bank because.

[David Rutherford]

Like, am I.

[Jordy]

Gonna make you mad someday? And my money's gone. You know.

[David Rutherford]

That'S what these morons are doing. And again, that's why my gut tells me the inevitability of a hot war with Russia and the European Union is. Is. I mean, I'm going to put that at 85% right now, is what I think. Yeah, that high. Because the rhetoric this week, last week, it was like, hey, don't leave us out of the game. Like, let us. Let us play. Let us be involved. Let us, you know, grandstand and say, you know, we actually have power in all this. And the US And Russia are basically like a F off. Little, little people. Get out of here. We're not listening to you. Right?

And that's what at stake. So what does European Union do? They're like, all right, we got a billion people. We got, you know, we got 500 million, 500 billion in GDP and all this stuff. And, you know, to hell with all you. We're going to do this ourselves. We're going to break this down ourselves, which they've done.

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[David Rutherford]

What you can do for me now is just is pull up the Marcone piece right there because obviously there was a leaked conversation that came out.

And I don't this isn't what he's putting up, but basically Marcone has come out with a bunch of nasty things. One saying that the US is essentially betraying the European Union. They're acting unilaterally. This one that Mauro Naval put out. Will you read the headlines there for me on that one?

[Jordy]

Yep. Macron warns the US could betray Ukraine Europe fears Secret Deal on Territory In a leaked call between European leaders, Emmanuel Macron reportedly warned there is a possibility that the US Will betray Ukraine on the issue of territory without clarity on security guarantees. It's a stunning statement, not just for its bluntness, but for what it could for what it signals a deep fracture in trust between Europe and Washington.

[David Rutherford]

Yeah, I mean, so that alone just proves that Marcone and the rest of these, these.

Juvenile diplomats. Right, Because I, I don't. Again, I don't get the sense that they want peace if this thing is about land. Russia is not gonna sacrifice a million plus of its citizens, of its young men, and then give that back in some peace assurance. They're not gonna give up what they fought for. That's not the way this works. It never has worked this way. It never was. So the fact that European Union's like, no, no, no, we can raise the army and bring them into NATO, then they have to fight all of us, and then we can win. They just keep upping the stakes, and that's what it is. All right. For Kier Starmer, the English pm, because his, his idea of what this is, is just feels delusional at best. All right, play it.

Mr. Speaker, we're united in wanting a ceasefire and a permanent end to the horrendous suffering that this war has brought to Ukraine. I have always said our aim must be a just and lasting peace. And both of those words, Mr. Speaker, are important, just and lasting. So, Mr. Speaker, I welcome the continued efforts of the United States to end the war and stop the killing. The initial draft of the 28 point plan included points that were not acceptable, but also some very important elements that will be essential for a just and lasting peace. For example, it sets out steps on security guarantees from the US and partners. This is very significant. And the discussions in Geneva took important steps forward. With progress between the US And Ukraine on an updated peace framework. I can reassure the House that work is ongoing to refine this plan.

Mr. Speaker, we're clear about the fundamental principles here. That Ukraine's sovereignty must be maintained, that Ukraine should be able to defend herself in future, and that matters about Ukraine and its future must be determined by Ukraine. Right. All right. You know, so you listen to this and he's basically saying, the 28 point plan, we're not doing it because you got to give back land. Right. Ukraine must remain sovereign. Ukraine is Ukraine. And Zelensky's come out multiple times. You know, we're not giving up any of the land. So that. Just that the Naito, the, the Russian assets and given up like these are all no go things for Vladimir Putin and what's taking place. So it's, it's kind of ridiculous to me. All right, so the thing that I, I just, I, I want to just give you a little heads up on, right? Because I believe the, the, the, the premonition that I'm having is this is going to lead to a kinetic hot war, right? And the only way they're going to ever be able to do this if they include us in this type of thing. But you also got to remember in this time right now, now, right, Putin's not just sitting around letting all the deals be done over there. He just solidified big deals with China, China support. He solidified. He was just in India. So that'll be like, hey, if, if we go into this, you're not going to support the other side, right? And India's like hell no. What? We're not going to get mad. We're, we don't need them, right? We'll just, they'll, their economies will collapse, they'll lose all these people, they'll go into destruction Mode and the dollar will probably be collapsed because they're 38 trillion. No, we've got this. You're good. You have our assurances we won't, we won't participate. You're good, right? And so what you have to begin to understand if the US, if someone in the us I don't know who it is or what it is, says we are going into a hot war with the Russians in Ukraine. You will see the biggest revolt in human. In, in US history. You will not get American troops to go to war in, over, in, in the, in the Eastern Europe against Russia. I promise you that it will not happen. No way will we do World War III in Europe again. It's just not going to happen. I promise you on the street. Yeah, right, dude. I mean it's ridiculous. All right, so here we go. Manpower. So active personnel across Europe, Europe soldiers is 2.5 million with reserves adding another 3 million. Equipment modernizations, emphasis on TAC tanks. EU's total is about 6,000.

Aircraft. 4,500 fixed wing naval assets. 1200.

Fragmentation 178 weapons types Missile drone focus.

Annually there are product annual production of 720 to 700 plus ballistic and cruise missiles annually outpaces Europe's interceptor output by 1.5 to 2 times prompting initiatives the European sky shield for integrated defense NATO EU integration. 84,000 U.S. troops remain stationed in Europe but initiatives like like PESCO and the EU rapid deployment capacity 5,000 troops by 2025. All right, here's a greater analysis. All right. Active military personnel, right? This is bodies into the trenches because that's what you have to think about all the videos that you've seen of those drones dropping videos on those poor soldiers, both on the Ukrainian side and the Russian side, just dying over and over in this meat grinder. 1.5. Some people are saying 2, some people are saying 1 million, whatever it is, a tragic, massive loss of human life in this. All right, so France, ready for this? 203,000 people in France with 40,000 reserve. Germany, 183,000 with 34,000 reserves. Greece, 142,000. Italy, 165,000. The Netherlands 41,000. Norway, 23,000. Poland, 202,000. Portugal, 25, 000.

Romania 69. Russia, one point. I'm not gonna do that. They're Spain, 124, 000. Sweden, 24, 000. Ukraine, 900, whatever. UK 184, 000 with 37, 000 reserve. Okay, so all in all, you're looking, you know, are all those countries going to throw their youth at this? I don't know. I don't see a lot of these other countries, like, banging on their desk that were in fully support of this. So the question is, even if they, the major countries say, yeah, we're going to war, are you going to have those other smaller countries like Italy or Norway or whatever say, yeah, here's our young men, let's throw them into this meat grinder too. I don't know.

[Jordy]

Plus, the total was. I didn't add it up exactly, but the total sounded like roughly a million. Ish.

[David Rutherford]

Ish.

[Jordy]

Total. Ish. Right.

[David Rutherford]

Yeah, yeah, A little. Maybe a little over that.

[Jordy]

A little over. Well, more people have died than that already in the war.

[David Rutherford]

That's right, that's right, that's right. With reserves.

Yeah. Now, I, I saw a statistic the other day here. It says Russia has 1.32 million active duty and another 2 million in reserves. So Russia, you're, you're staring at. And they could conscript, script, you know, they got 150 million people. So, you know, if they had to, you could probably have a 10 million man army right now. Here's the other thing, like, and I don't know if you've seen them, but the man on the street interviews with young people on the streets of England or, you know, in London or on the streets of Paris or on the streets of Denmark or, you know, Germany or whatever. And they ask, you know, would you go to war for Europe and Ukraine? And the answers are hilarious areas. And it's not just the immigrants saying, hell no. It's the locals being like, no, I'm not. I'm not going to war over there. That's not what we're going to do. Because why? I think what everybody imagines it's going to be the Nebraska corn Husker kid or the Alabama high school dropout or who. Or, you know, the Florida Orlando, you know, kid working at McDonald's are all going to like, sign on the. Let's go fight for Ukrainian freedom against the bad Russians. Right, right. It just, it, it's an illusion. Then you get into the.

Armored vehicles. Tanks and armored vehicles. All right, you ready?

[Jordy]

Yep.

[David Rutherford]

How many tanks do you think Germany has? Or, or France?

[Jordy]

Oh, I have. I don't even know what.

[David Rutherford]

Take a guess. 10,222.

[Jordy]

Uh oh. Oh, no.

[David Rutherford]

Guess how many tanks.

The UK has. 500, 227. Okay, guess how many tanks Russia has.

[Jordy]

10,000.

[David Rutherford]

12,566.

With 30,000 armored vehicles. All right. Okay, let's go. Aircraft.

Let's do, let's do attack helicopters. Right? Let's do that. Helicopter. All right, so France, how many you.

[Jordy]

Think I'm gonna be less optimistic this time?

[David Rutherford]

20 attack helicopters.

69. 69. Germany. How many attack helicopters in Germany?

[Jordy]

42, 55.

[David Rutherford]

Okay, let's go down to the U.K. how many attack helicopters does the U.K. have?

[Jordy]

38.

[David Rutherford]

50. All right. How many attack helicopters does Russia have?

[Jordy]

A thousand.

[David Rutherford]

559.

[Jordy]

All right.

[David Rutherford]

All right.

Key ballistics. Oh, my God.

[Jordy]

This math isn't great.

[David Rutherford]

Cruise missiles.

It's not even like, missile systems are hilarious. I'm not even going to get into that.

[Jordy]

So they have like 10x the people and 10x the equipment.

[David Rutherford]

Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it's absolutely staggering.

[Jordy]

So they could just. War of attrition, this thing, basically.

[David Rutherford]

That's what it is. Yeah, that's what it is. Yeah, that's what it is. It's. It's the war of attrition. Right. And, and we've seen that multiple times in the 20th century. World War I and World War II. And what ultimately came of. What came of World War I.

[Jordy]

World War II.

[David Rutherford]

World War II. Right. So, so we're going to go into. And then what happened economically to all those parties that were involved, involved, that's.

[Jordy]

The real care shut down. And I mean, if you're willing to sacrifice your own people like that and burn through young men, I mean, you tell me. You know better than me, but I feel like the war of attrition works.

[David Rutherford]

Oh, that's the whole pretense of it. Yeah, that's the whole thing. That's the whole game is how many human beings can you throw at the magnet? And we're not at a place where we've got, you know, infinite supplies of autonomous drones. This will be the last, last great war of, of manpower. That's what this will be, right? This will drag on for five to 10 years or whatever it is. Kill, you know.

Depending upon how it bigs, it'll kill millions of people. Could bring in. It could turn into a world war for sure, which could kill billions, could go nuclear for sure. So it's like, that's. What's that, that's what these people are playing with right now instead of just being like, hey, that's it, you know, here's the deal. You keep the land, you give us promises, nobody joins NATO. You can have some security forces. They, I mean, you have, they said you could have 600,000 in a military. You know, we'll, we'll open up, we'll do business, we'll help. We'll be, you know, rehabilitate Ukrainian. With all these financial support, rebuild the whole place. Like, yeah, easy day, dude. Nope.

[Jordy]

What takes me off is that from what it sounds like these European leaders, they're living in this weird fantasy world of, of shoulds. Like, well, Ukraine should have its sovereignty and we shouldn't, we should not, you know, give Russia anything. And it's all these like, ideals and ideas and I just don't understand what kind of fantasy world people are living in. It's. This is reality. This is a war. Right? There's no like, well, this is the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do. No, people are gonna freaking die if we don't come to an agreement here. Like, it's. You're in the world of practice. That's it. You're in the world of practicality, idealism, thing.

[David Rutherford]

Yeah. No, and that's, that's what these people who will never step foot on the front lines are, are basically ramping this thing up. That's going to cost, you know, in untold scale of, of, of, of human life. Young men are going to go into those trenches and die at mass scale again.

[Jordy]

And what's it for?

[David Rutherford]

Their image.

[Jordy]

Their image or something. They're trying to protect how they look to people because they don't want to give up land because that means they're supporting Russia. So that way anyway, just send the, send the young men to die because I don't want to look bad in this negotiation or something. Like, what is that?

[David Rutherford]

That. I mean, you can, you can evaluate all major conflicts throughout human history, in particular the last 30 years. You know, I, I, I think the overwhelming and, and a report, a, a final conclusive report of the war in Afghanistan we just sub put out. Scott Horton posted it today. I'm going to try and read it over the weekend, maybe cover it next week a little bit, but I'm gonna, and basically he read the report and said, oh, here's what we gained from going to war in Afghanistan for 20 plus years. Nada. Zero. No, it only put us in debt. Massive loss of life. We gained nothing from it. No strategic advantage, no.

Rare earth mineral advantage, no strategic positioning in the region. Nothing. We gained nothing from it. So, but I'll cover that out. And so did we gain anything from Iraq? Did we gain any from the first Gulf War? Did we gain anything from the regime change in, in Libya? Did we, I mean, there's open slave markets in Libya now. How about the Sudan or any of these other places? What are the actual benefits to global stabilization and, and the benefits to the American taxpayer and the American person? Like, what are the benefits? If you can prove to me these are the benefits, they are.

Yeah. All right, let's move on to the next one. So that, that I just, my summary in that is this, this is going to continue to go on. There's not going to be peace. It's not going to happen. And the European Union is going to continue to ramp up. The NATO rhetoric is going to ramp and I think they're just trying to figure out how to push it into a kinetic hot war with Russia in the European Union and NATO involving us.

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[David Rutherford]

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[David Rutherford]

Okay. So, I mean, I know that was a long, long segment on Russia and Ukraine, but it's really critical again that you understand this stuff so you can put it into context that you can really be able to make a solid decision on what you think your representatives and your president should do, because it's gonna come down to that eventually. I really believe that. You know, and.

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Investigation. Uh, they were. They captured who they believe is the main Susan aspect in the January 6th pipe bomber who placed two pipe bombs around buildings where the vice president was the Democratic national headquarters during January 6, the night before and which has been covered really well by an organization called what was it, Revolt or Revolver News. Adam Beatty covered that all during. So you go back and look at his coverage on that recently there was. The blaze had identified. They thought it was a capital police woman. Probably get a defamation lawsuit against them now. But here was the other interesting. And would you play the clip from John Solomon and him breaking this? And we'll talk about it after this mentioned. I think it was just before Thanksgiving on your show. I thought there would be an arrest this week. They were zeroing in on a gentleman whom they arrested this morning in Northern Virginia. And the way this case was cracked was about a month or six weeks ago, Bongino, who was the lead on it and Patel decided to take the old agents off the case and put a new team on it. Now, there was a little resistance, as there always is in the FBI to any form of change, but the new team came in, they applied some new ideas and new technologies and some of the evidence that was sitting right in front of them with fresh eyes was followed. And it was able to be led to this gentleman who they arrested a little bit ago. We. We don't know much about his ideology or his intentions or his motives yet. And one of the things that FBI officials stress with me this morning is that this is really the beginning, the arrest is the beginning of trying to understand how this operation was conducted, who's behind it, whether there are more conspirators or whether this is a lone wolf still. All of that to be determined. But a really extraordinary effort by almost five years later with a fresh set of eyes and a different approach. The FBI that couldn't solve the case for four and a half years solves it very much like the way the Charlie Kirk investigation occurred in the. In the first few hours, there were a lot of FBI agents, old gu. All right, so, you know, basically when I hear that, what I, I see is that you had a case that they weren't going to solve. They didn't want to know. The Biden administration didn't want to know who was solving the case, who was working on it. It was stable. I firmly believe that there was a major role from the FBI in the January 6th fiasco. Remember, we had Clay Higgins ask Christopher Ray, how many plainclothes informants or undercover agents did you have in? And he said, I can't talk about that. I can't. And Higgins Law, he's like, the answer should be none. What are you talking about? And later he came out, Higgins gave a statement that over, I think it was like 200 and 200 plus.

Informants or agents were in the crowd on January6. Obviously, we have the Ray Epps fiasco. We have the bullhorn guy on the top of the scaffolding. Some of the other guys who broke the windows and confronted. You know, there's a bunch of great documentaries that outline the footage that was released. We still haven't gotten all of the footage from that day released. In particular, like Beatty in his analysis of the. In particular J6 bomber. Like the, the frame rate of the, of the video for the guy that or whoever, this guy maybe, and Brian Cole was his name. We know nothing about him. I haven't seen anything yet. And, and you know, they had messed with the frame rates, right? This is 2001 camera systems. And they were doing like, you know, one frame per five seconds or something crazy. It was, it was so. It was such a joke, right? This is the Democratic, you know, headquarters and they're using video technology from the 1980s. It's just a joke. Anyways, the, the flip side of this that I think was related to really impressive is that you, you, you took out an old team, you brought in, you put in a new team and the case was potentially solved. What that screams to me is how many other cases could you do that to? Could you go back to the Whitmer kidnapping case, which we know, you know, out of the people that received depositions, indictments, whatever, like, like three fourths of them were informants of the FBI. They actually fed these guys the plan, the whole thing, the explosives, the. The whole thing thing. How. How about all of the Russia gate cases or whatever it is? How many different cases has the FBI been working on that if we were to take off, take out the old people and put in a new group, that they would be solved pretty quickly. Now I think the other problem that we're definitely facing and is what, you know, I think we've seen. There was a great interview with.

What'S Darmy. I forget what her name is. She was, she's in. Running the civil rights department of the Department of Justice. And in a big interview that she gave, I think it was with Tucker last year or the beginning of the term, she was saying that like they had like 400 lawyers and as soon as she came into office, half of them left, like quit. 200 plus attorneys quit out of the civil rights division. And these people had been there for 20, 30 years, right? Nobody leaves these jobs. But they left because of, you know, they didn't want to be called out on what their discrepancies or inefficiencies or the political ideologies were playing a role in their Caseloads. Well, as a result, I think of a complete lack of a number of lawyers to prosecute these with investigators. We have a lack of investigators, a lack of lawyers. Stephen Miller came out this week too, and basically put out a call, call to everybody saying, hey, we need lawyers. Come and join the fight.

This, he said, calling all patriotic loaders. Remote and part time positions available. And this was put out by homeland security. Thank you for putting that up. And if you're a legal professor, join the department of justice as a deportation judge to preside over cases and determine whether an alien must stay or leave the nation. So not only are you going to get this flood of attorneys for deportation cases, but hopefully you get them for all these other, you know, investigative opportunities to prosecute these cases on these bigger, these bigger RICO or conspiratorial cases. All right.

So the last thing I want to address.

Excuse me, is Michael, the famous Michael Berry, if you remember the.

What was the movie big short about the 2008 Big Short. Right. And who was it that played him? It was a Batman.

Christian Bale. Right. So awesome. Sitting in his room waiting for it to drop, playing things, going. That's. He's my favorite character in that movie. Well, obviously he, you know, made it billions of dollars from shorting that whole thing. Well, he just posted.

Basically saying, I am out of going. I am leaving the, the, the stock market because of. Well, let me just, let me, let me just read to you. What, it's up. You're gonna pull it up. All right. Yeah, yeah.

[Jordy]

Cassandra unchained, dude. Let's see.

[David Rutherford]

So in his final investor letter, he contained one sentence that should terrify every fund. Menor capital banker and policymaker. And this, and I'm, I'm quoting this guy, Shankara. Asim Pereira. It's. He posted this.

He said, quote, my estimation of value in securities is not now and has not been for some time in sync with the markets. This is not a crash prediction. This is a death certificate. The numbers nobody will tell you. Passive index funds now control 52% of all U.S. fund assets. $15.4 trillion. Let me repeat that. Passive index funds now control 52% of all U. S fund assets. $15.4trillion. BlackRock, Vanguard and State street collectively manage $25 trillion of those assets. They, they own dominant stakes in virtually every public company in America. America. They analyze nothing. Every dollar falling into an S P 500 ETF automatically allocates 35 cents to 7 stocks. Not because someone studied the balance sheet, because that is their index Weight. The algorithm cannot read an earnings report. The algorithm cannot process overvaluation. The algorithm simply replicates the death spiral. Passive buying increases prices. Higher prices increase index weights. Higher weights attract more passive buying. The feed depth loop operates completely independent of whether any business or worth what the market claims. The marginal buyer of American equities is no longer an analyst with conviction prediction. It is a target date fund receiving its bi weekly paycheck allocation. The buyer has no opinion. The buyer will never sell. The consequence, price discovery. The mechanism has allocated capital for two centuries, has been structurally disabled. The most successful short seller in modern history looked and this is after. That's the end of the quote. The most successful short seller modern history looked at these numbers and concluded the fundamental analysis no longer converts to returns. He did not predict collapse. He diagnosed something worse. The market still exists. The marker no longer thinks. And, and, and posted a story on Substack that he wrote. You can find that.

If you want under at.

Shanaka 86.

Yeah. Anyways.

So now I always know what people say, obviously.

You know, and I think we should probably bring Bryce back on to kind of analyze that a little bit for sure. Do you go out and sell all your ETFs? Hell no. You don't do that. Right. Do you go out and.

Put all your money in gold or put it all in Bitcoin? Probably not. Bitcoin's not doing great right now either. Although Jordy would disagree with me. He thinks it's good. Is always the stance. But what I am saying is that when you. There's something that I believe is true in this and that when you wait 40% of your market return in seven stocks that are affiliated with AI you know, it doesn't make sense. It doesn't, it doesn't work. Right. There has to be a back to a place where, you know, it's. It's more of a. The market's moving from one company to another, investing in companies that have strong, strong balance sheets, that are making good returns, that are in growth trajectory, that are developing foreign markets. Right. There's a greater extent of the market that, that has disappeared like he says. And are, you know, I know other economists that believe that as well too. So what do you do as an investor? I think you take a step back, you call your financial advisor. You get their analysis of what's taking place and what's happening. Is there a potential.

Downturn, recession, depression on the horizon and, and have a legit conversation with your financial advisor or whomever. You follow.

Their financial advice and really look at, at what this guy's saying. Obviously he's super smart, but again it's just one man's opinion. And I think you need to do the deep dive yourself.

[Jordy]

I think that's the big message that he says.

[David Rutherford]

Is this George?

[Jordy]

Yeah, yeah, I was gonna say I think the big message is that he's not telling you to do anything right now. At least my take from it. I think he is saying that you need to think for yourself. You need to start thinking and analyzing this for yourself because the market, a free market, will think accurately because of the price discovery mechanism you talked about. It'll figure out where to put value itself, invisible hand, all of that. But what he's trying to say is that we have stopped thinking in the market because of these automated flows, automated ETFs and things like that. And so just do your research, think for yourself, talk to your financial advisor and don't blindly believe the, the, the traditional wisdom I think is what he's saying.

[David Rutherford]

Amen to that. Amen to that. All right, that's it man week. And review a lot. Again. I'm going to continue to keep my eyes on this and I once again my, my mission is to bring some bigger, more significant content text to these things that are taking place in the world. Not to be.

So one sided or to see a simple tweet and then go down that rabbit hole but as I just did in that one case. But I thought it was fascinating that that guy who shorted the, the last collapse is, is, is giving.

A heads up. We'll say that.

Again next week. I got, we got two huge bangers that we're going to drop. These are the biggest two stories I think we've ever covered. Don't miss out on those again if you enjoy it like subscribe and follow. Obviously you can follow the show on all social media. It's at David Rutherford show except on X. It's at D Rutherford show. You can follow me on X at Team Frog Logic and on Instagram at Team Frog Logic where I post motivational ideas, I repost the show. You can always find it there. Links to the audio. Truly grateful for iHeartMedia Premier Network and and and the Clay and Buck Sexton Clay Travis Buck Sexton podcast network that we're under. Totally grateful for you guys as we're. This is the final show of our, our third quarter now right that we've been in.

And just really feeling beyond blessed that we have this opportunity to bring you uh, the world the way we see it. To try and be that flashbang of truth for you. We just love you so much. Thank you. Thank you, Jordy. Many thanks to my. My beautiful wife and family and. And thank you to Christ the Almighty. Christ is king. Hoo. Yahoo.

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