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Col. Macgregor to Tucker: Biden admin is driving the US into an ‘Armageddon’ war in Middle East

The Daily Knight
Oct 28, 2023
8 min read

The Daily Knight

‘It's going to be very difficult for Russia and Turkey not to also come into this fight against us because they will not tolerate the sort of collective punishment that Israel plans for Gaza,’ the retired colonel said.

Decorated combat veteran Colonel Douglas Macgregor has warned that Biden administration officials are driving the United States into an “Armageddon” war that risks a military conflagration with Iran, Turkey, Russia, and others in order to defend and help facilitate an Israeli war crime that is unacceptable to the world and most Americans.

“It looks like the chosen destination is indeed Armageddon,” the military scholar and author told Tucker Carlson on his latest Twitter/X program.

The former Fox News flagship host opened the interview with a recent television clip of Republican U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina threatening Iran with bomb strikes against its oil refineries if its allied militant group in Lebanon, Hezbollah, “launches a massive attack on Israel” from the north in response to Israel’s fiercest-ever assault on the heavily populated Gaza Strip.

“Iran, if you escalate this war, we’re coming for you,” Graham asserted.

Israel’s continued bombardment of the enclave is in response to an unprecedented October 7 attack by the militant Islamist group Hamas, which governs the strip and is designated a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States, the European Union, Canada, the UK, Australia, Japan, Egypt and Paraguay.

According to Israeli authorities, the militants killed 1,400 people, including civilians and children, with Human Rights Watch verifying videos revealing cold, deliberate murders (war crimes) during the attack. Israeli citizens are still facing missile bombardments and terrified that far worse may be endured as the conflict escalates and some larger, radical Islamist forces might join Hamas in attempting to destroy their nation.

In another interview on London Real, Macgregor made it clear he shares the view that Hamas is a terrorist organization that has to be eliminated.

“Everyone who had looked at what Hamas did agrees that Hamas has to be eradicated. I haven’t run into anybody who disagrees with that. That includes, for instance, King Abdullah of Jordan. General Sisi in Egypt feels the same way, even Mr. Erdoğan, who has changed his view, spoke against Hamas initially. I don’t think anyone disputes that,” Macgregor said.

However, he added, “The problem is that campaign to eradicate Hamas has rapidly turned into a campaign to effectively eradicate the whole Gaza population and that’s not going down well in the rest of the region … so whatever moral ground the Israelis have is eroding quickly.”

Macgregor indicated that his criticisms include serious concern for what will happen to Israel as a result of the U.S. and Israel response to the Hamas attack. He stated in the London Real interview, “My greatest concern at this stage is that Israel will be destroyed.”

On the Gaza side, Hamas health ministry authorities report a much larger 7,028 individuals killed by Israeli military air strikes since October 7, including 2,913 children and 1,709 women. Additionally, OCHA reported about 1,600 people missing and presumed to be trapped or dead under the rubble, with 1.4 million having been displaced within the sealed-off 141 square mile region that has been under a tightened Israeli blockade since 2007.

As Palestinians in the West Bank protest the Gaza bombardment, Israeli soldiers have reportedly killed 102 and injured 1,889. Israel reports two deaths and 14 injuries of their own personnel in these two occupied territories.

On October 9, Israel cut off water, food, fuel, and other resources to this enclosed population of over 2 million people, stating these measures would remain in place until the around 200 hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 were returned. Human rights and military experts have said that these actions by Israel, along with their bombing of civilian areas in Gaza, are classified as “collective punishment,” a war crime under international law. Other commentators, such as Jewish Voice for Peace, call these measures genocide.

Macgregor explained that if such a scenario that Graham threatens plays out, in all likelihood, we will be faced with a “global war.” Should the United States enter this conflict as a “co-belligerent” with Israel, “it’s going to be very difficult for Russia and Turkey not to also come into this fight against us because they will not tolerate the sort of collective punishment that Israel plans for Gaza.”

Furthermore, the combat veteran from the first Iraq war went on to explain that Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other decision-makers at the top in the U.S. government seem to be under a misconception believing the disparity between American military capacities and those of their potential adversaries are similar to what they were in the early 1990s.

“We are not the power we were in 1991,” Macgregor assessed. Additionally, “you have to look at the arsenal of missiles that Iran possesses, and they can reach out 1,200 miles with great precision, [delivering] very high explosive conventional warheads that would do enormous damage, destroying whole city blocks in places like Haifa [and] Tel Aviv.”

If the U.S. bombed Iran, Macgregor said “all of the bases that we have in Iraq and Syria … would be targeted and this time they would target them accurately and this destruction would be wholesale.”

He also warned that terrorist attacks at home “potentially worse than 911” could become manifest, stating there are “many Hezbollah agents inside the United States.”

Furthermore, if the Israelis go into Gaza, and Hezbollah intervenes in the north, triggering an American attack upon Iran, “we will end up in a fight with Russia. Russia will not sit by quietly and watch Iran destroyed by the United States air and naval power in the region,” he said.

This would make American aircraft carriers and other warships in the eastern Mediterranean, carrying many thousands of U.S. soldiers, “vulnerable to the Kinzhal missiles and other missiles, cruise missiles and hypersonic missiles that the Russians have.”

“And I doubt seriously at that point that the Turks would be able to stay out,” Macgregor continued. The Turks are “the de facto leaders of the Sunni Muslim world. They have the largest armed forces in the region. They are in close proximity to Israel. They could move forces south through Syria very rapidly” and unimpeded.

Macgregor: ‘I encourage Americans everywhere to listen to King Abdullah of Jordan’s speech’

What is pivotal here, again, is “the issue of collective punishment,” the retired colonel reaffirmed. He criticized Blinken for stating Israel and the U.S. were going to do “whatever it takes” to destroy Hamas in clear disregard for international law that demands the protection of innocent civilians in armed conflict. And understanding the likely response from neighboring nations, this policy from the neoconservative–dominated Biden administration indicates a clear intention for igniting a regional and even global war.

Macgregor went on to “encourage Americans everywhere to listen to King Abdullah of Jordan’s speech in Cairo from several days ago.” While condemning the violence against all civilians in Gaza, the West Bank and Israel, the monarch “goes on to point out that collective punishment meted out to 2 million people is unacceptable, both under international law and for humanitarian reasons. That’s the problem.”

Addressing the crisis, Abdullah said specifically, “I am outraged and grieved by those acts of violence waged against innocent civilians in Gaza, in the West Bank and Israel. The relentless bombing campaign underway in Gaza, as we speak, is cruel and unconscionable on every level. It is collective punishment of a besieged and helpless people. It is a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law. It is a war crime.”

“Yet, the deeper the crisis cuts, of cruelty, the less the world seems to care. Anyone else attacking civilian infrastructure and deliberately starving an entire population of food, water, electricity, and basic necessities would be condemned. Accountability would be enforced immediately, unequivocally,” he proposed. “But not in Gaza.”

He went on to warn of the “catastrophic” dangers of the selective application of international law, which treats the lives of some human beings as more valuable than others, based on race, religion, and borders. And he laid out priorities for the Peace Summit to end the hostilities, deliver humanitarian aid to the civilians in Gaza, and affirm the “unequivocal rejection” of forced or internal displacement of Palestinians, which he said is a war crime and “a red line for all of us.”

“Today, Israel is literally starving civilians in Gaza,” Abdullah said. “But for decades, Palestinians have been starved of hope, of freedom and a future, because when the bombs stop falling, Israel is never held accountable. The injustices of occupation continue, and the world walks away” (full transcript).

Macgregor told Carlson that in America’s “effort to stand at Israel’s side and help protect Israel, we have taken a different route and cast moral turpitude to the side.”

“How do you help one [Israel] without committing a war crime against the other [the Palestinians]? This is the problem with collective punishment. This is the problem with annihilating Gaza and trying to sweep out its population,” he said. “That’s unacceptable to us as Americans.”

Israel committing collective punishment ‘unacceptable’ to Americans; resulting war could threaten the existence of the Jewish state

Furthermore, as Israeli leaders throughout the years have generally had the expansion of their borders “to the whole of Palestine” as an objective, involving “the general evacuation” of the Arab population, even under “brutal compulsion,” Macgregor reminded Carlson that “the Israelis would like to push the population [of Gaza] out” into Egypt, which remains a war crime.

“And as Americans see more destruction, and more and more film footage and photographs come out of Gaza showing children, women, old men dying, being killed, the support for Israel is going to erode,” the retired colonel warned. “And at the same time, the anger and hatred inside the region, which already dislikes Israel, is going to be phenomenal.”

These dynamics are already taking hold as shown by the Egyptian government that, while a major recipient of American foreign aid, “has been a good strategic partner for Israel.” But because of the public outcry in their nation over the Gaza bombardment, “at least 100,000 Egyptian troops have been moved towards the border with Gaza,” recognizing that “they may have to engage the Israelis” since no one else will protect these over 2 million civilians in the enclave.

Should this happen, with Egypt attacking from the south and Hezbollah from the north, drawing in all these other powers, including the U.S., this regional war will commence not only hurting America economically and physically, “but could threaten the very existence of Israel.”

Though the U.S. wants to protect Israel, “we may not be able to do that if this war runs out of control. And let’s be frank: historically, wars run out of control. They move in directions you never anticipated. So if you think you can plot this route forward, as Lindsey Graham thinks, you’re crazy. Once this is unleashed, it’s not manageable anymore,” Macgregor said.

Conflict could lead to WWIII, with a strengthened Russia unafraid to engage a weakened U.S.

Macgregor also noted that contrary to media reports, “Opinion in Israel is divided. Anyone who thinks everyone in Israel is behind this is wrong. There are people out there who are willing to mediate. There are people who will cooperate with them under those circumstances inside the Muslim/Arab world.”

Calling out the blunt reality of the current situation, he added, “You know, at some points someone in Israel has to say if we cannot kill everyone, we have to live with everyone whether we like it or not.”

Calling for a “cooling off period” in the conflict in an effort to bring about peace, Macgregor was encouraged by an offer earlier this week from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey to mediate the dispute between Israel and Hamas.

“His willingness to mediate is a bright light in an otherwise very dark sky. And we should look to that because we don’t want the regional war. It will destroy us economically,” he said. “Russia is more powerful militarily than it’s been since the 80s, and it’s poised to enter on the side of Iran. We should all give that some serious thought.”

“And anybody who thinks that [foreign decision makers] are going to say, ‘Oh, no, we’re afraid of America, we’re not going to risk that,’ they’re wrong. They are not afraid to risk attacking Israel for fear of coming into confrontation with us. We are not the power we were in 1991, and they know that. And economically, our position is very fragile.”