Hi YouTube, this is Professor Jiang again. I am in Toronto. I'm still trying to recover from the jet lag and the time difference. As everyone knows, it seems this war in the Middle East is blowing up. And it seems that even though the United States has yet to declare war on Iran, it will probably happen in the next couple of days with the United States bombing Iran. So today I'm going to share with you my impressions, my analysis of what's happening in the Middle East. And I hope that this video will help you. This discussion will be clarifying and illuminating for many of you. So it's very clear what the U.S. intention is, because we've seen what the United States has done to Iraq, Libya and Syria. They call it regime change, but it's really the destruction of the society, the destruction of the capacity as a people to be a nation. To work collectively.
Geo-Strategy Update: US-Iran War Incoming
Source-synced transcript for the compressed reading. Spans keep the original chronology, timestamps, and audit trail behind the public interpretation.
And the most clear example, of course, is Iraq. In 2003, before the Americans invaded, it was a fairly well -functioning society. Yeah, I mean, there were sanctions that impoverished the people. But overall, I mean, it was a fairly stable society in the Middle East. The United States goes in, over for Saddam Hussein. And at that time, you had a lot of people. A lot of people who welcome this transition and this change. And they believe that the Americans will implement democracy, which was their stated mission. And it will lead to a more prosperous Iraq. But very soon afterwards, the Americans implement a policy called debauchification, which is to remove anyone from the Ba 'athist party from government, from the military, from the police. And the problem with this is these are the elite of society. When you remove the elite from society, from the pillars of power, society ceases to function properly. And that's exactly what happened.
It led to massive sectarian violence that continues even today in Iraq. So I can't believe that anyone is stupid to not know the consequences of this policy of debauchification. And so when the American slave regime changed, in the Middle East, think of Iraq 2003 and what happened afterwards. So the question now is, how will the Americans move forward? Well, the American strategy in the Middle East, it's been in place for the past 20 years. And regime change requires three pillars. The first pillar is decapitation of the leadership. Just remove the entire leadership. Second is revolutionary intent. And you do that through economic sabotage, right? Through sanctions, by destroying infrastructure that allows people to live normal lives, which includes water supply, electricity. And the third pillar of the strategy is to foment sectarian violence, to divide and conquer the people, to take advantage of the fact that within these societies, there are these minorities of people who have traditionally been suppressed.
You give them a promise of a better life. So in Iraq 2003, you have the Kurds, but you also had the Shiites. Iran, there are tons and tons of minorities who are discontent with the way things are right now. So that's the American strategy moving forward. And if we want to clarify or simplify the strategy, we can use a metaphor, okay? Americans, to win wars in the Middle East, they use bombs. They use propaganda. And they use money, okay? Bombs is basically, you have these fighter jets going in to destroy any military opposition. Propaganda is CNN, BBC, New York Times, to create the impression that this is being done in the name of democracy and prosperity and peace. And then money in that you are financing a lot of the opposition groups. You're financing a lot of the internal dissent which will overthrow the regime.
So this strategy, bombs, propaganda, money, it's also being implemented right now in Iran. And in fact, you can make the argument that this has been going on secretly underground for many years now. Personally, I think the strategy won't work. First of all, bombs don't really work with the geography of Iran. Remember, Iran, it is a mountainous terrain. So it's a huge, huge country. It's three times the size of Iraq. So I'm not convinced that airstrikes will do any real lasting damage to the infrastructure of Iran. Propaganda, New York Times, CNN, BBC, have absolutely no credibility today. Not even among Western domestic audiences. They'll have even less credibility in Iran. And then you have money. And I don't know how effective money will be. Because at the end of the day, what differentiates Iran from, say, Libya, Syria, and Iraq is the people in Iran consider themselves Persians. In other words, they consider themselves heirs to a brilliant, creative civilization that's been around for 5,000 years.
And I can't oversee it enough. How that would energize and motivate the people to resist and to unite together. Also, what's really important is the Iranians saw exactly what happened to the Iraqis. This once vibrant, harmonious, brilliant nation was destroyed by American sanctions and American airstrikes. So I don't think that the Americans have a compelling case to make before the Iranian people. So another way of saying this is that even though it seems the Americans have the military advantage, they are still the greatest military in human history. The problem, though, is the Iranians have much more strategic flexibility. And what I mean by that is the Americans, to overfall this regime, need to decapitate the leadership. They need to create internal dissent, a revolution. And they need to rally the religious minorities against the regime in Tehran. And that's really the main strategy moving forward. And really, the only...
Oh, this is my son, Chris, by the way. And that's the only real path to victory for the Americans. Whereas the Iranians have much more strategic flexibility. So, in other words, America and its allies in the Middle East have major strategic vulnerabilities. For example, let's take Saudi Arabia. Well, Saudi Arabia has two vulnerable resources that the Iranians at any time can strike at through their proxies, the Houthis, right? You have the desalination plants, which is the only source of fresh water for Saudi Arabia. If you knock out the desalination plants in Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabia loses all its fresh water in two weeks' time. And there's no way of replenishing that fresh water. Then, of course, you have the oil fields, which are extremely vulnerable to rocket attacks. So, Saudi Arabia, the main U.S. ally of Arab nations in the Middle East, it's extremely vulnerable to Iranian attacks. Then you have the Strait of Hormuz, which controls a great deal of the world's trade.
If Iran closes that off, then that cuts off not just oil to East Asia, but it cuts off revenue for American allies like Oman, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar. And the last strategic vulnerability is you have all sorts of American bases throughout the Middle East. Especially in Kuwait, especially in Saudi Arabia, Qatar. And these are legitimate military targets if America declares war on Iran. So, another way of saying this is Americans, their ability to inflict pain on Iran, we know it's predictable, and we know that the Iranians can sustain it because this sanctions regime has been going on for the past few decades. But the Iranians' ability to inflict pain on American allies, as well as the American military, as well as American consumers, well, they're not really predictable. And ultimately, you can make the argument that because America is not, the
American people are not in favor of this war, then it's less likely that American consumers will be able to sustain and absorb high oil prices and inflation that this war would inevitably cause. So, I would say the main advantage going into this war, just from a geopolitical, analytical perspective, I would say it's very much in favor of the Iranians. This does not mean that the Americans and Israelis will not be able to inflict tremendous damage on the nation. I mean, if America and Israel continues its bombing campaign, which I suspect it will for the next few months, then we will see tremendous damage and economic loss within Iran. But ultimately, war is not decided by resources, weapons, or technology. It's really decided by a people's willingness to fight and die for what they believe in. And I think when it comes to this question, then I think the Iranians have a huge advantage over the Americans.
Also, let's not forget that the Iranians have been studying... Sorry, sorry. Sorry. The Americans have been studying the American strategy in the Middle East for the past 20 years. And I'm pretty sure they developed counterstrategies against an American attack. And I think the main counterstrategy is the idea of decentralization. You've got these different militias, different cells embedded in different parts of Iran. So even though America and Israel, they may be able to decapitate the leadership, they may be able to knock out the central leadership in Tehran, they won't be able to occupy the country. And unless they're able to occupy the country and install a military regime that's to their liking, then this war is not won. Then Iran is still a functioning threat to American Middle East interests. Okay. Having gone through some broad analysis, let's look at questions that viewers have been asking on my Discord server. So the first big question is, will nuclear weapons be used in this war at any point?
And my intuition tells me it won't be for many, many reasons. The first major reason is, this is huge. It's a huge taboo against the use of nuclear weapons. If America were to detonate a nuke, America would lose all credibility, all authority among its allies and among the world. And we have to remember, this war is being fought to reestablish American credibility and authority in the world. Putin's invasion of Ukraine did a great deal of damage to Americans' reputation and the war in Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is to reestablish the idea that America is still the global hegemon, that it is still a unipolar world. And so by detonating a nuke, it shows the desperation, anxiety, and quite honestly, incompetence of the American military. So for that reason, I don't think America will use nukes. Also, even though Putin has not publicly
stated that he will retaliate if America will use a nuke against Iran, he hasn't done this publicly because it's not to his advantage to state it publicly. But I'm sure that through back channels, through intermediaries, Putin has made this very clear to the Americans. Putin will tolerate an American invasion of Iran, but he will not tolerate nuclear weapons being used in this war. So I think we can discount the use of nukes in this war. We would have to reach a very high point in the escalation ladder for even nukes to be considered in this war. So I think that for the purpose of analysis, let's discount the possibility of nukes. Second question is, what are unknowns going into this war? Well, I think there are three big unknowns. The first big unknown is, what happens if the Americans kill the Supreme Leader of Iran? This would trigger a secession crisis. His son is supposed
to take over in the case of the death of the Ayatollah, but he's extremely unpopular and he's not that competent. So I'm not sure if the death of the Supreme Leader, the assassination of the Supreme Leader, what that would do to the dynamic of this war. But I would assume that this would be a huge advantage for the Americans and the Israelis. So I think that's a big question. Will they be able to assassinate the Supreme Leader? That's the first big question. Second big question is, what will Putin's response be? And I think, as we know, Putin has withdrawn a lot of his Russian advisors from Iran. And Putin has stayed pretty quiet in the matter. And so what he intends, what he will do, we just don't know right now. And I think that's the intention. I think Putin wants to be the power broker behind the scenes. And I think, in many ways, he's setting up a trap for America.
Because there's really one scenario in which America loses this war. Really badly. If America were to send in ground troops, it would lose this war. And the reason why is the idea of sunk cost fallacy. So if America were to send in the Marines and a ground invasion, we're going to expect the American military would just bulldoze all opposition. It would establish beachheads. It would establish foreign operating bases throughout the interior of Iran. And at this point, everyone's cheering on. Like, look how great the American military is. There's a surge of patriotism in America. The American media, CNN, New York Times, they are just praising the American military to the sky. And it would seem a repeat of Operation Desert Storm in 2003. The problem, though, is the American military does not have the depth, the strategic depth, the resources, the supply lines, in order to sustain this attack.
And what would happen very quickly is this massive blitzkrieg, shock and awe, or whatever you call it, in Iran, would get bogged down really quickly. And at this point, it would be very easy for the underground militias, these cell groups, to strike at supply lines for the Americans. And it would become very quickly almost an impossible war to win for the American military. But at the same time, they've invested so much. And they're so close to Tehran, right? They're so close to taking over the capital. So they can't give up. It's sunk cost fallacy. And sunk cost fallacy is such a powerful force in geopolitics. And so the Americans are kind of stuck there. And then they're just forced to... It's a black hole for them. They're just forced to throw in resources, that they don't have. And this might trigger... Well, this will definitely trigger protests across America, which may lead to a civil war.
So remember, it's impossible for any nation in this world to defeat America. Just impossible. Even if the entire world were to get together and attack America, the world would still lose. The only way to defeat America is by causing a civil war, a revolution in America, that would damage the regime so much that America would be forced to retreat from its obligations in the world. Okay? So my question then is, does Putin understand this? And he set up conditions in a way to create this outcome. And my thinking is, yes. Putin... This is Putin's plan moving forward. And Putin will be working behind the scenes in order to create a situation where America is forced to invade Iran with ground forces. These ground forces will seem to be really quickly establish supremacy in Iran, but they get bogged down. And then Trump, the Americans, may be forced to have a draft. And this
will lead to Vietnam War protests and conflicts across America, which may in the end trigger an American civil war. So that's Putin and Russia. But again, we don't know exactly what they will do. But if I'm right about Putin, then I think he will very much be the master manipulator behind the scenes. The third great unknown is China. China and Iran have very strong economic ties. China gets a third to half its oil from Iran. If Iran were to fall and America were to control the oil supply, then the Chinese economy would be in a lot of trouble. Due politically, this would be very, very bad for China. So China is a great unknown. What will China's response be? My prediction is we will not hear from China in this conflict that much. In fact, we can sort of discount China from this war. And there are reasons why. The first major reason is China doesn't really have a grand geopolitical strategy.
It doesn't really understand its place in the world. It doesn't have a theory to explain its place in the world. So remember, previously I discussed the Heartland thesis, the Mackender thesis, where both America and Britain need to stop a hegemon emerging to unite the Eurasian continent. Because if a land power would emerge, maybe Germany, maybe Russia, were able to unite Europe and Asia together, then that would destroy America and Britain's capacity to control global trade. You're going to have railways connect Eurasia and you really don't have to trade for the seas anymore. So that's how America and Britain sees the world. Russia understands that it is extremely vulnerable to invasions. It's been invaded by multiple nations in its history, which has caused tremendous death and destruction within Russia. So Russia needs to be on the offensive if it is to maintain its territorial integrity. But when we go to China, China doesn't really care about the rest of the world.
For China, what's important is to maintain its territorial integrity by not participating in the world. China built the Great Wall. The purpose of the Great Wall was to prevent outsiders from coming to China, but also prevent insiders from leaving China. So for China, its main priority is to maintain its territorial integrity. And what it understands is the only way for the Communist Party to fall in China is if it were to engage itself in an external geopolitical conflict that has no way of extracting itself from. That's why China is not going to get involved in this war in the Middle East. And at the end of the day, if the United States conquers Iran and forces China to pay twice, three, four times as much for oil, then China will just absorb the cost. Because for China, what's really important is to maintain the stability of the regime.
Geopolitics doesn't really matter. So I would say these are the three big questions that we can watch out for. Will the Americans be able to kill the Supreme Leader? Because that is definitely on the agenda. And they're investing a lot of resources to ensure this possibility. And I'm not sure if it will happen, but if it does happen, then consequences for Iran will be quite there. Another known is Russia, what Putin will do. I think it will be almost impossible to truly gauge his intentions and strategy moving forward. Another known is China. Will China participate in this conflict on the side of Iran? My guess, my prediction is, if there's participation, it'll be much more, it'll be very limited. So China will supply supplies, armaments, weapons, but it will not intervene on behalf of Iran to the degree that Iran would really want. So one last thing I want to
talk about is, some of you have been curious as to how I've been able to so accurately predict the contours of this war. And so the quick answer to this is, I use a new analytical model called game theory. And game theory is something that I will discuss in greater detail over the next few months as I analyze this war even more. And game theory, it's not a secret. I mean, it's not something that's impossible to learn. My hope as we move along is to teach everyone the ability to use game theory to analyze geopolitics in order to anticipate events and to prepare for events. So that's it for my first analysis of this war. I'm hoping to make more updates as this war progresses. And so there's lots of things I can't really talk about on YouTube because I'll be banned or I'll be censored. So as some of you know, I had a German video.
I made a video on the history of Germany. And that's been banned in Germany by YouTube because it was flagged by certain users who found some material within the video extremely controversial. So I need to be really careful about what I say in order to avoid YouTube censorship. I'll probably at some point move to Rumble where I'll be more free to discuss what I really think about the world. So please watch out for that. I'll make an announcement if I move on to Rumble. But the big announcement is I've set up a Discord server as some of you know. This Discord server will allow us to engage as a community. And what I'm hoping to do at some point is set up a time where we can have question and answer where you can ask me anything and I'll tell you how my thought process works and guide you through the process of developing a game theory mindset so you can for yourself analyze global events using game theory.
So the link to my Discord server called Predictive History it's in the description. So please click on that and please join the server the Discord server. And very quickly we'll set up like an hour live stream where I'll answer some questions that you have posted on the Discord server. I apologize if I'm not responding to your messages. I have two young boys who are running around the park right now and I have to watch them. And they're very active. And they're something from jet lag. So I'm taking them out on strolls to the parks every single day. So I'm usually not at home. I don't have internet access outside my parents' house. So I apologize if I'm not responding to you in real time to your queries and to your messages. I am extremely thankful and grateful for the community that we're developing right now.
And I hope to build on this community. Because as some of you have pointed out the world is moving to a very dark place. And the only way to survive and to anticipate and to prepare for the chaos that this new world will bring about is to come together as a community and to help each other out and to have solidarity. So please join the Discord server and I will see everyone on Discord. So goodbye.