India & Pakistan at War? | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS - The Team House

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
I'm hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics.
I'm here with Andy Milburn. Colonel Andy Milburn retired A right,
you told me I gotta prefer to you as colonel,

(00:21):
So yeah, I'm to meet you con tacos.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Thanks for joining us. Do it's a favorite.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Don't forget to like and subscribe if you're listening to
an audio rated five stars, and check out our Patreon
Patreon dot com. Slash the Team House all right, Plugs
out of the Way, and Andy Milburn's book When the
Tempest Gather. There's link is in the description. Uh Andy,
how are you first and foremost?

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Yeah, I'm doing great good here and READD Saudi Arabia.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Beautiful, Sonny. I think it's probably very sunny.

Speaker 3 (00:55):
READD honey, very healthy. It's no alcohol, oh good on
a compound. There's no way to get into trouble here.
So I'm doing very well.

Speaker 4 (01:06):
Thanks.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
Almost almost like prison, but nicer, far nicer. Yeah, and
you're getting paid, so it could be it could actually
be prison.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
All right. So a lot happened last night.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
Uh India hit back on Pakistan and retaliation for the
attack in Kashmir that killed twenty six people Islamish India
saying it was Islamis militants in Kashmir. India hit Pakistan

(01:38):
controlled Kashmir, and they also hit like Pakistan proper. They
say it's all like militant groups, infrastructure and stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
As far as we know right now, nine people have died.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
I'm sure it's more Pakistan saying that they've shot down
th read. It goes from three or five aircraft jets,
you know, fourth generation plus fighters and drones. I don't
know if that's been confirmed. They have been since their retaliation,

(02:10):
been trading artillery. So what the fuck is gonna happen? Andy,
I mean, is this gonna spiral out of control?

Speaker 3 (02:19):
Yeah? Put on my plate. Well, actually, I don't think
it will. Dan. I'll get back to this. So just
you know a little bit of background, and you know,
I know, we we're not supposed to insert ourselves into
the story. Dan, you want us about that all the time.

Speaker 2 (02:34):
I never warned you.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
But I'm actually very you know. I mean, I've been
to Shrinika three or four times, so I'm probably one
of the few Americans who has been there, and I'm
old enough to have been there before it was blocked
off to tourists, and when there is a as a
teenager twice and just love the most beautiful area in

(02:55):
the foothills of the Himalayas, it's just extraordinary. The people
there are wonderful too, you know. And needless to say,
of course, it's very sad that it has been such
a bony contention between India and Pakistan, going back as
we talked about to the nineteen forty nine partition. I'm sorry,

(03:17):
forty seven partition. I was thinking of the birth of
I was thinking of forty eight, forty nine birth of Israel,
forty seven partition between the two countries. So his what
I am seeing right now, Dean, I could be absolutely wrong,
and there's a lot of speculation in twitter Land, But

(03:38):
what I'm saying is this that both countries are actually,
despite the usual Bellako statements, both countries are kind of
playing according to unwritten rules. All right, Yes, to your point,
the tit for tat, the strikes have straight out of

(03:59):
Kashmire into areas of Pakistan. But if you look at
what the targets are, and you look at some of
the photographs from the media aerial photographs, it does seem
as though India is making an effort to avoid collateral damage,

(04:21):
and who knows whether the reports of civilians being killed
or true or not, But when you look at the photographs,
it is individual houses or compounds that have been struck.
And I think probably most of our listeners are aware
of the problems that India has had with homegrown Pakistan

(04:42):
or Pakistan supporting terrorist organizations, allegedly supporting terrorist organizations like
Lashka Our l T, Lashka Our Tayib. Right, hopefully I
haven't mispronounced that l T and Jayshl Muhammat and those
are two. And Lashka LT is the organization that launched

(05:03):
the two thousand and eight Bomboy Mumbai raid that resulted
in several hundred dead civilians. And that was there's actually
a movie about that that I talked about. It was
a very well planned raid and it was by all
accounts commanded and controlled from led by lat in Pakistan.

(05:28):
And then you know, India has there's been a number
of attacks since then, and there have been a number
of clashes since in twenty sixteen and in twenty nineteen
and again now and you know, everyone is worried that
here are two nuclear powers apparently on the verge of war.
But let's look at a couple of things. Okay, So

(05:50):
I talked about the fact that these strikes seemed to
be quite limited, and Pakistan, for its part, has hit
targets in Kashmir. Pakistan is talking about now is striking
into India. Certainly has the capability to do that as
quite a missile array, and India of course has the

(06:12):
ability to return that. But so far the targeting has
been quite specific. And the other thing is kind of interestingly,
so the Pakistani's reported that they've shot down between three
to five Indian jets and a Heron drone. The Indians
are clearly, I mean not clearly they've they they're admitting

(06:34):
they've lost aircraft. Although the photographs that are appearing on
Twitter are from they're not recent, they're from last year
or back in twenty nineteen. But you safe to say
that the Indians lost aircraft. Those aircraft actually crashed in India,
raising speculation that they were you know, these were accidents,
but it's entirely possible that Pakistan shot them down. The

(06:57):
Indians haven't actually been flying over Pakistani air base. And
when I talk about their attempts to limit actions. They've
been hoisting, launching, lofting missiles from the Indian side of
the border towards Pakistan. And so they may have been
you know, intercepted in the air over but certainly they

(07:17):
crashed in Indian territory. So I will pause, Sarah case
you have any questions. So maybe I'm just being overly optimistic,
but I don't see this going down the path to war.
You know, they're neither country stands to gain from this.
It is true that Modi, who's the you know, the

(07:40):
the Indian premiere, he stands to gain. He's got a
tremendous he was in the past tremendously popular in India.
But there has been some dissatisfaction, dissatisfaction recently with them,
not just over ethnic tensions, over a plateauing economy, which
may not be entirely his fault, that he's getting blamed

(08:00):
for that. And so he does benefit by rattling sabers
at Pakistan, which he's happy to do from time to time,
but it certainly doesn't benefit him to go to war
and night. And you know, certainly, although the populations of
both countries have been brought up in this atmosphere of
I would say hatred. That's a strong word, but near

(08:23):
enough towards the other country. And although both countries went
to war, you know, fifty years goinge a very bloody
campaign over what became Bangladesh was then East Pakistan. Again,
the you know, the undercarrent of the real undercurrent of feeling.

(08:44):
If you're to look at reflections of India and Pakistan
social media, it's not hey, let's go to war, let's
bash him. It is a real concern that they will
go to war. And I think that the leaders will
we'll pay attention to that.

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Speaker 2 (11:21):
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Speaker 3 (11:23):
So and then, you know, last we talked about Believe
It's in nineteen ninety eight, there was perhaps that both
countries came closest to the brank of fallout a full
war since they had been since seventy one, and there
was an open talk about nuclear preemption, both countries using

(11:46):
nuclear weapons against the other. And apparently, you know, I
only know this for sure on the Pakistani side, that
there is a policy of preemptive strike. In other words,
if they suspect that the other country is prepared to
or threatening to then they are authorized within their own
kind of strategic doctrine to strike first with nuclear weapons,

(12:08):
which is obviously concerning sure.

Speaker 1 (12:12):
Yeah, and also giving command and control over to generals
and stuff sounds a bit wiley coyote.

Speaker 2 (12:19):
It sounds a bit nuts to me.

Speaker 3 (12:21):
Yeah, it's more of a danger really on on the
Pakistani side. So, you know, one thing, and I would
say US foreign policy has consistently falling short honestly when
it's come to Pakistan. And I know there's a large
audience out there who is going to be horrified by

(12:43):
me saying this because we all remember that the pakistanis
supported or the ISI at least supported the Taliban in Afghanistan.
I mean, that is no secret. They supported the Taliban,
but not necessarily, you know, not al Qaeda. And I
think that's an important distinction. And needless to say, we

(13:06):
created a lot of the problems in Afghanistan to my opinion,
you know, with with the Taliban, and when when we
were always trying to get Pakistan outside, we didn't we
didn't recognize two things that the Pakistani security forces themselves
were taking heavy casualties from UH from islamisists in in

(13:27):
what they called the tribal provinces, you know, the border
adjacent with Afghanistan. That was number one. Number two is
that they supported the Taliban as a bulwark against India,
and we the United States never really kind of recognized that.
We during the Cold War, we wanted we courted both countries.

(13:53):
And then of course when the Russians invaded Afghanistan, we
were all in on in Afghanistan and we were we
with the full collaboration with the ISI, with the Pakistani
intelligence services, were supporting the Mujaheden. Of course, many of
whom became most of whom, you know, it was the
Pashtun fighters who subsequently became the Taliban, and of course

(14:18):
the Arab fighters with the Summer ben Laden were a
subset of that and became Al Qaeda. And there was
a natural partnership that we that occurred under our noses,
and in fact, arguably we helped forge We also were
the ones who were supporting, you know, the Pakistanis on
condition that they supported the muja Hiden. So we created

(14:40):
that bond between the ISI and the Taliban, and then
subsequently turned around and played Pakistan for having that bond,
you know, I mean, look the Pakistan is not blameless,
of course, but I'm just saying that our own strategy
towards Pakistan has been has been at the very least confusing.
And so one other thing that is I think really

(15:05):
concerning that Pakistan is obviously the threat of nuclear wars
is concerning both countries. But the question of water rights,
the the I believe it's called the Indus Indus River Agreement.
Someone will correct me, I'm sure in their comments, but

(15:26):
the basically they they're you know, both countries were Pakistan
is dependent on India to some extent for water supplies,
and now India is threatening to dam up its reservoirs
and create a huge amount of silt, making the water

(15:46):
that reaches Pakistan problematic, difficult to drink, and that is
going to be difficult to use. That that is going
to be a significant issue too. So there are things
that both countries or India can do in particular to
herd Pakistan that don't necessarily involve firing missiles and just
go on generating this tension between them and Yes, Pakistan,

(16:12):
you know, I've may sound quite supportive at Pakistan, but
there's no doubt about it that there are extremist groups
who have safe haven in Pakistan, and I mentioned two
of them, Led and On JSHL Muhammad, and both of
those groups have conducted terrorist attacks, not just the Mumbai

(16:35):
two thousand and eight attacks, but consistently conducted attacks not
just an in Trinegar but in India too, killing Indian civilians.
And so when India strikes into Pakistan, this was the
same in twenty nineteen, it always claims, and I think
with some justification, that it is going after these particular bases.

Speaker 1 (16:56):
Yeah, understandably, So I would think just bring it back
to the ISI. Pakistan is SI, I mean because some
you mean, the hot most high profile terrorist was found living,
you know, in the west point of Pakistan. You don't
think there was any I I help in terms of

(17:18):
like getting uh Os bin Lan.

Speaker 3 (17:23):
I look, you know, I'm I'm sure that there was
collaboration at that stage, but and and you've got to
remember that by then there was again I'm not I
know you're not.

Speaker 2 (17:35):
I know you're not yet. I'm just saying, like dummy
would ask.

Speaker 3 (17:38):
That we, you know, we the United States, and take
an ice from the Pakistani point of view, Okay, and
I have uh you know, I had one friend. I
actually went through the War College with Marinko War College
as a Pakistani general, so I you know, I I
I was able to see things a little bit from
that side, and we had a very very transactional or

(18:01):
hard relationship with the Pakistanis. There were times when we
fired into Pakistan. Yeah, I mean you're probably aware of this.
There were at times when Pakistani soldiers were held hit
by US artsery fire, and I know, we're going to
get people popping up saying well there was a reason
for that, Yes, I know, but the way that it
was projected in Pakistan was US aggression and the United

(18:24):
States is very, very unpopular among the Pakistani population. A
lot of that is due to propaganda. A lot of
it is perception of US policy being anti Pakistani or
anti Muslim. I understand that, and a lot of it
is propagated not by necessarily by the government, but by
organizations in the media within Pakistan. So yes, I have

(18:50):
no doubt that. Of course Issama bin Laden couldn't have
lived there for so long without some complicit help by
the by the Pakistani government. I'm just saying that we,
the US, are not blameless in creating that very fraud
relationship with Pakistan.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
Yeah, I feel like we're not blameless in any fraud
relationships we have all over the world, right like we
always This takes to the tango, really, I mean, just
a little bit more of what's going on, Like right
now on the ground, they're tanks moving towards the Indian
Pakistani tanks moving towards the Indian border. I'm sure that
could be just more saber rattling, just Pakistan showing that

(19:32):
they are, you know, serious about this and they're not
backing down. Do you think Pakistan retaliates maybe a tick
for table.

Speaker 3 (19:43):
So you're saying there's there's tanks moving towards the border
on the Pakistani side.

Speaker 6 (19:47):
Correct, on the Pakistani side, Yeah, the Indian side, there
is a state it's Rajastan, which is the the closest
to Pakistan, and they gone on high alert there and
closed the airports.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
But I don't know, you know that there hasn't been
signed of movements unless I'm missing this large movement of
ground forces towards that. But there has been fighting already
along the line of control in Trinigar, which is the
you know, the essentially the front line between the two countries,

(20:25):
and you know, there's kind of an agreement that what
happens in Trinigar stays in Trinigar. So I think that
both countries are going to be quite eager to keep
it there. But yeah, there's been exchanges of artillery. There
have been casualties on both sides.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
Not you know, not.

Speaker 3 (20:43):
Yet direct infantry fighting, but certainly artillery rates.

Speaker 1 (20:50):
Do you see there being a chance where Pakistan like
sounds like a couple dozen ballistic missiles into India.

Speaker 3 (20:58):
Ah, well that you know, that would be definitely an escalation.
I mean, yeah, you know, so Pakistan could portray it
as not being an escalation, having said, hey, look the
Indians have already struck Pakistani soil, but the Indians are
making it very clear that when we did that, it
was going after these specific terrorist targets. Notice they haven't

(21:23):
struck the Pakistani military in Pakistan, and that is an
important distinction to both sides. So for Pakistan to go after, say,
Indian military targets in India definitely an escalation. And that
is when it's certainly going to be concerning deep because Modi,
as you you know, you're probably aware is he's populist,

(21:45):
he's a nationalist. Remember you know the problems the Canadians
have had with him over assassinating Sikh activists in Canada,
and the Indians just didn't back down on that. You know,
it's basically hate. Who gives a shit whether you disagree
with it or not. I mean, it was very clear
that they did that, so you know, and it's he's

(22:07):
not going to want to lose face. So a civical
tell you know. The pakistanis though, will understand this too,
and it's going to be you know that they're both
playing brinksmanship because they're both playing to our home audience.
And it may be. It may be and I'm not
saying necessarily true that on the Pakistani side, you know

(22:29):
where the military is concerned, because you know that what's
what's the saying that Pakistan and in most countries, you know,
most democratic countries you have, they'll have a military. But
in Pakistan it's a case of the military having a country.

(22:51):
And you know, there's some truth in that. I mean,
no civilian government in Pakistan has survived without support of
the military. But my point is the strength there may
be that is they don't have to play to a
civilian population to get re elected. And you know, I
and Pakistani military is as aggressive as though maybe sounding

(23:15):
certainly don't want to plunge their country into war. And
just a reminder for everyone, India is far bigger than Pakistan, right, So,
I mean it would be a tremendously bloody, costly, pointless
war for both countries, but Pakistan would be liable to
emerge from this the worst.

Speaker 1 (23:35):
So what are like, what's the international community in like
the US, I guess more doing to like kind of
pull these guys back and like, you know, talk a
little bit more since and have everybody just relax a
little bit.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Yeah, that's the other concerning thing. So normally, you know,
previously and not always with a great deal of effectiveness,
but the United States has stepped up to the plate
to try and mediate and in nineteen seventy one it
was Kissinger who did make a determined effort to try
and prevent that war, but he was distracted obviously by

(24:10):
other things such as Vietnam, the invasion of Cambodia, relations
with China. But you know, in more recent years, yeah,
it's been the United States. It's kind of led the
the charge on trying to negotiate and calm things down.
I haven't really seen that. You know, there's been a

(24:33):
little bit of a you know, Rubio has he's he's
commented about it. Yeah, and he's he India's briefed him,
he said, But that doesn't seem to be a very
concerted effort to try and diffuse the crisis. And it's

(24:55):
really it's not clear whether the United States has he
appetite or opacity to do so. And I know the
President said it's a shame, you know, they've been fighting
for many, many decades. But that's not quite the same
as as reaching out to both leaders and saying, hey,
knolk it off.

Speaker 1 (25:12):
Yeah, I know you're not a like, you know, you
didn't work in the State Department, really, But what happens
when there's no ambassadors.

Speaker 2 (25:20):
To both countries, Like who's who's.

Speaker 1 (25:23):
Kind of taking the lead on this, because yeah, right,
you could talk to the Secretary of State blah blah blah,
but like who's doing like the on the ground.

Speaker 3 (25:29):
Stuff, Well, no one's doing it right now, nobody. It's
just not Yeah, I don't know where we stand with
regard to ambassadors to India and Pakistan. I know you
had Who's.

Speaker 2 (25:40):
Getting one last time? Louis Rita.

Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yeah, what what did he have to say on that?

Speaker 2 (25:47):
He said, I mean Lewis got a bless him. I
love Lewis.

Speaker 1 (25:50):
He's got a bit of a pessimistic view on stuff.
He says, no one's doing anything. Really, because I asked
him about like what's this like? See what like look too,
like what a CIA station or a state or an
embassy is like doing. He's like, listen, they're talking to
the context, but there really probably isn't much direction.

Speaker 3 (26:10):
Yeah, I mean I think he's I think he's absolutely right,
but I honestly I think India and Pakistan I am
going to sort this out. You know, India has said,
again with some justification and I'm playing the straight down
the middle, that it strikes were focused and measured and
non escalatory, you know, pointing out that it hasn't struck

(26:30):
the Pakistan military, economic, or civilian targets, but what it
calls known terror camps. And I think that's a fair statement.
And you know, Pakistan could respond whether a retaliatory strike
with I mean, Pakistan's got a large diverse arsenal of
cruise and ballistic missiles which you could fire into India

(26:52):
without requiring jets to cross the border. It could do that,
but it hasn't done that yet. And I think it's
because despite all the heat rhetoric, Pakistan's likely to choose
the scale and nature of its response with a lot
of care and doing, you know, enough to applicate its
own populace by saying, look what we're doing and restore
a modicum of deterrence, but without escalating the crisis. I mean,

(27:18):
I think beneath the rhetoric, that's what you see from
both the countries.

Speaker 2 (27:23):
Yeah, I mean, I guess that's a good that's a
great thing.

Speaker 3 (27:25):
Yeah, I mean, you know, and just looking in Twitter land,
the Indian armies already declaring kind of victories, saying justice
is served.

Speaker 1 (27:39):
So that's the thing, Like how does it play that
their populous right, like at least someone people have to
save face. And I mean, I guess it does make
sense that India it was more of a measured kind
of retaliation.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
It took you know, three weeks.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
Right, they didn't start shooting missiles into Pakistan or Pakistan Kashmir,
you know, a couple of days after So yeah, I
hope it could just be like a you know, proportional
on each side and like, you know, let's just go
back to like really, actually we still hate each other,
but let's not kill each other.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Yeah, I mean, I do believe that's what we're gonna see.
And you know, I hope I'm not I'm not proven incorrect.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
What's funny is Lewis last last week actually said that
he's read, he's had they've had weather models and reports
done surveys that if Pakistan and India had a nuclear
exchange of just twenty five percent of their arsenal it
depending on the winds and stuff like that, it could
have like seriously fuck up not only the world, but

(28:43):
like the United States. I mean because we live here
so we care about it more, I guess, but it
could really like kill crops in the United States. Costs
millions of people to die in the US because it'll
get all the way to the West coast from from
where India and Pakistan are, which is you know, insane
to actually think about. Hopefully, like you said, and I'm

(29:04):
trusting you, it doesn't go down and watch once we
sign off here, it's going to be pacising, you know,
shoots twenty fucking ballistic missiles into India knock out Wood.

Speaker 3 (29:13):
I hope it doesn't, but no, I mean I put
money on it. I think we're going to see the
escalation of the next few days, which is good because
there's you know, that's what the world needs more of,
right is the escalation?

Speaker 2 (29:27):
Yeah? Absolutely? When is your Andy?

Speaker 1 (29:32):
If you guys don't know, Andy's writing a new book
about the conflict in the war going on in Gaza,
When is that coming out?

Speaker 2 (29:41):
Do you have any idea?

Speaker 3 (29:43):
Yeah, it's going to come out towards the end of
this year. I know that sounds a little bit vague,
but okay, that's my publisher can can tell me. And
it is, you know, honestly, I mean, it's been a
tough book to write, as you can imagine. I spent
considerable time in Israel, and I mean all over, and

(30:04):
you know, I wanted to be you know, I paused
because that fair doesn't seem quite the right term. But
I wanted to I wanted to be absolutely accurate. I
wanted to tell absolutely accurate story from both sides. You know,
why why did this happen? Why was Hamas able to
conduct these attacks? But why did Hamas plan the attacks?

(30:26):
You know? What was some of the background to this
and not not all of this has been in the papers,
by the way, And you know, so I found I
was very fortunate in that I had a number of
contacts who are not trying to be mysterious, you know,
who I can't name in the book, but who had

(30:46):
a tremendous amount of knowledge about the background from from
both you know, points of view, and so yes, you
know what, how did Hamas plan the attacks? Was the
detail that went into these planning? How did they prepare for?
And some of this is astonishing material, it really is.

(31:07):
And then you know why why was Israel lolled into
the sense of complacency? And you know, we talked a
lot about it being an intelligence failure, but it was
really a failure of imagination, you know, because the intelligence
was there. Admittedly a lot of the collection methods had
been had been steadily shut down because of partly because

(31:29):
of policy and partly because of complacency, but the you know,
the science was certainly there. Why were they ignored? And
perhaps more importantly, you know, as an operations guy, I'm
not an intel guy, and so I know enough as
an operations guy. You don't rely on intel to give
you an early warning because very simply stated, all all

(31:51):
successful attacks rely on surprise, right, So you're always you've
always got to be on your guard. And there was
an entire division, the guards, a division that was focused
on containing Gaza, and a number of missteps both you know,
again policy intelligence and the operational side, and then you know,

(32:14):
the attacks themselves. The performance of the IDEA from responding
to those attacks were quite I think the we're part
of the most shocking, not the most shocking, but were
part of the the impact of the story to the
Israeli public, for whom the IDEF had always been this
kind of iconic institution. To find out how seriously they failed,

(32:40):
not just in the lead up to the attacks, but
on the day of the attacks, and then subsequently in
a number of ways, and really in a realization that
they had kind of a two tier army. They had
an army that was technologically very savvy, very good, considered
itself very good at targeting, had some very good units,

(33:03):
and yet the rank and file, the quality of the
rank and file, the you know, the regular infantry units
had plummeted considerably and that's you know, I'm jumping a
little bit into the book here, but look at the
huge number of casualties of civilian casualties in Gaza, and
there are a number of complex reasons for that, but

(33:24):
one of the reasons is simply that the you know,
the IDEAF couldn't trust their infantry to go in and do,
for instance, what we did in Fallujah. I mean, I
was going to say, you probably remember Flujah. You were
a kid then, but you know, having formed my way
through Fallujah, we made mistakes. We made a lot of mistakes,

(33:44):
but we didn't We didn't annihilate everything in our path.
We had to go in and clear buildings time after
time after time. And anyone who pushes back on that,
I would challenge that is not the way that the
IDEF approached you know, they, as you saw it was
kind of a scorched dirt policy. They would flat places,

(34:05):
very very heavy reliance on fire support. And that's kind
of what you do when you have second rate infantry,
is you have Yeah, I'm not saying they had to
do that. I'm saying that's what you find yourself doing.
The very few, you know, SECT for the special operations
units who as I said, were very good. The very

(34:26):
very few incidents where soldiers had to go into a
building and clear rooms the way we did Influjah. And
by the way, I don't advocate that at all, you know,
I mean there are smarter ways to do that. You
can do it now with drones, you can do it
with unmanned vehicles. But it but certainly, you know, there's say,
there's a lot of a lot of parts to this story,

(34:47):
and that's been one of the hardest parts about about
making this much more than just a narrative of massacre
and reaction, you know, a story really about why it
happened and why it happened the way that it did
without becoming too analytical at the same time, keeping the

(35:10):
narrative going, it's been it's been a Challenge's tested my
limited writing skills too, it's really limits.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. It sounds like it's
going to be a very interesting story because we just
it's just we're in un data with stuff. So it's
really good to like kind of hone in and why
why it happened and what was the reasoning behind it.
Idf like in terms of like second second rate infantry
is it just because they're all conscripts and not all

(35:40):
professional soldiers.

Speaker 3 (35:42):
It's a number of number of reasons. So you know,
you have to Matt, have to remember the that you
know back in and I heard this time and time again.
You know, the last time that Israel was surprised so
badly was in nineteen seventy three, in fact, almost to
the day, the years before, in the Omkepul War. But

(36:03):
the triumph of that war from an Israeli standpoint was
that the IDF recovered and did so incredibly quickly. I mean,
the majority of their casualties in that war were in
the first forty eight seventy two hours, and they mobilized
a huge number of reservists through them into the line
and they performed admirably. That was not the case in

(36:27):
this case. As you were probably seeing a lot of
the investigations now coming out, So this isn't just Andy
Milburn talking about what happened on seven October. It's raally
investigations are revealing it again and again that the IDEA
failed to protect civilian communities for a number of reasons,
you know, not having a quick reaction force, not you know,

(36:50):
not being aggressive enough there were kibbutzers where the army
waited outside while the inhabitants were being slaughtered. I mean,
this is, this is almost incomprehensible. A beach as sold
where Hamas fighters, a small group of them, by the way,
eight of them stormed ashore and killed something like twenty

(37:12):
civilians and sekeen beach. And there was a patrol and
it's Raeli patrol who didn't even engage them, you know,
I mean it's why not, well, who knows? Who knows?
You know, lack of initiative, lack of aggression, lack of courage.
I mean, I'm going to get villified to saying this.
I don't know, I don't know the answer. But you

(37:33):
can if you doubt what I'm saying, you can read
the investigations in the Israeli papers about what happened. Now,
don't get me wrong. There were lots of incidents of
where individuals and units showed great courage on the day,
but there was a total breakdown of command and control,
you know. And this is and a lot of commanders

(37:55):
who just seemed to lack the initiative or aggression to
do what they were supposed to do. And that is
why partly the story of why so many civilians died
on the day, and it's, you know, to these really
public it's it's a hugely shunking revelation.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
Yeah yeah, I mean I'm really looking forward to this book.

Speaker 2 (38:16):
I love an advanced copy. Please, thank you.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
Oh yeah, we'll just get me on the get me
on your show, the Team House.

Speaker 1 (38:23):
I'll try, I'll figure it. I'll talk to somebody. We
could probably fit you in.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
I know, it's the kind of the second tier podcast
in your repertoire.

Speaker 1 (38:32):
Absolutely, yeah, a little side project, the Team House. Okay,
So Indian Pakistan are not going to trade nuclear weapons,
which is always a plus. I feel like that's good hopefully.

Speaker 3 (38:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (38:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (38:49):
So the only other things that I would talk about
its just in passing, you know, while all this is
going on, all right, and you know how I feel
about Russia's peace ovituals. But Russia against stunked Kiev with
four blasting missiles and one hundred and forty drones overnight
is last night or the night before. I'm losing track
on sminows ahead of you guys, So it must have

(39:10):
been the night before, and you know, Zanitsky's called for
the stronger sanctions on Russia to pave the wave to diplomacy,
and I don't know if anyone's going to listen to him.
And you know, there is going to be a supposedly
three day ceasefire. The Russians have said in commemoration of

(39:33):
what they call Victory Day, what we call Victory in
Europe Day, which is nine May. And so we'll see
you know where that goes.

Speaker 1 (39:42):
Yeah, no shit, because they don't want fucking some Ukrainian
drone blowing up the fucking.

Speaker 3 (39:47):
Dais and in Furnas you know, Ukraine has attacked Moscow
with drones for the third executive night, which is quite
a you know, you.

Speaker 2 (39:54):
Know, bomb the SBU. That's what I'm aiming for.

Speaker 3 (39:58):
But in Firnas too when you look at yes, undoubtedly
I am sure that somebody strikes in the Moscow have
killed civilians. But at the same time, these Ukrainian strikes
in the Moscow are very clearly deliberately aimed at at
military or political command and control type targets. But certainly

(40:22):
they must have a quite an effect on Russian morale,
you know, hitting hitting the capitol, and they seem to
enrage Putin, which is a good thing.

Speaker 1 (40:34):
There is some word that Putin was thinking about not
going to the parade.

Speaker 3 (40:40):
Well, he has always been extremely paranoid about his personal safety,
I mean incredibly so. You know, even during COVID he
was terrified of capturing COVID and it resulting in his demise.
And yes, he makes himself a very very hard target
and doesn't announce his appearances and sometimes simply doesn't appear.

(41:02):
Who knows.

Speaker 1 (41:03):
I mean, listen, that's gotta be a propaganda win for
the Ukrainians if he's not even showing up, if he
doesn't show up, even if he's contemplating it, they should
be projecting this everywhere and everywhere and all.

Speaker 3 (41:15):
But I mean, but you're right, d But in the end,
the one thing and then this is a very complex question.
We'd have to get russianologists on to talk about it.
But it's it's really difficult to determine how how shoddy

(41:37):
or bad, you know, what effect it has on the
war or policy or anything. To show the Russians what
a shitty government they have. They I mean, they know it.
You know, look at the slaughter in Ukraine. Look at
how many soldiers they are losing every day. I mean,
it's just phenomenal. They are, they are losing. They're losing

(42:00):
as many soldiers just in Ukraine, and you can look
this up. I know I keep saying that, but I'm
very careful with my statistics. They're losing as many soldiers
as the combined Allied armies lost in Normandy every day, right,
much smaller force, and so it's just staggering. And yet

(42:22):
you don't hear about things like fraggings, right, of soldiers
rebelling or shooting their officers. It's just an extraordinary atmosphere.
And I think it's partly cultural historical that they are
just inured to suffering. And it's a very you know,
it's a very sad comment, but it really the effect.

(42:45):
So I guess what I'm saying is, whether you're talking
soldiers or civilians, that doesn't seem to be a correlation
between low morale and affecting policy. You know, it was
even it was even better in Soviet days, arguably because
you remember the end of the Afghan War in part
was brought about by pressure on Gorbachov from within his

(43:06):
party and notably by a group of or a political
lobbying group formed by mothers of soldiers in Afghanistan, and
the war was extremely unpopular, and yet the Russians suffered
what fifteen thousand killed, you know, that's that's a few

(43:27):
days in Ukraine. I mean, it's a couple of weeks
in Ukraine, without exaggeration, and they but that made it,
the afghan that made it. That put enough pressure on
Gorbachev and of course he was dealing with a ton
of other things by nineteen eighty nine. The leaders but
to pull that up, and you just don't see that

(43:48):
in modern day Russia.

Speaker 2 (43:49):
Not at all at all.

Speaker 3 (43:52):
So the only incredible as we you know, wrap up
what's going on with the the Truman you know, another
F eighteen overboard. Yeah, you know, I know that. I
saw that meme on if that meme of the cat
pushing the Oh no, the Chinese broadcasters saying, you know,

(44:14):
the the Americans throw their aeroplanes in the water when
they're done with So so what'sn't I think the CEO
of the Truman was relieved, right, so that he's got
he was relieved because they had.

Speaker 2 (44:29):
Wasn't he relieved? Yeah? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (44:33):
Yeah, So so this is a new CEO. I think
his name is Hill, and I feel for him, because
what seems to be going on. I mean, you can't
point to necessarily a bad leadership. I mean they lost
one f eighteen to it was shot down by another ship, right, yeah,
and then they lost one the other day, which was yeah,

(44:55):
which was clearly I don't know, I mean it was
just with bad training bad I mean, it was just
clearly incompetence right where they just pushed it overboard.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
Yeah, and well, you know there's also talk that it
was avoiding trying to avoid a missile or a drone
or something. When the second Yeah, the second one is
supposedly it was swerving to miss on them.

Speaker 3 (45:18):
No, it's been toad.

Speaker 2 (45:20):
No, all right, whatever's when.

Speaker 3 (45:23):
The investigation comes out. I think that's a piece.

Speaker 2 (45:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (45:27):
So the third one, but this seems to be a
tangacle failure, right, I mean it was a catapult, Yeah
it was. It wasn't catapult hit hard enough of the deck.
I guess, which I get. I suppose does get back
to procedures and maintenance and all those things. That gets
back so certainly, yeah, but it's not it's not covering
the Navy with glory out there.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
I mean, listen, ever since we've lost like how many
drones since when we started hitting Hufie's in March fifteenth,
you know, twenty drones twenty eight and Q.

Speaker 3 (45:57):
Nine's thirty million bucks apiece.

Speaker 1 (45:59):
Yeah, and three super hornets that are sixty million bucks
apiece and yeah, and still the Houthis were able to
hit Bengorian Airport and stuff like that.

Speaker 3 (46:12):
Yeah, not even not even a superpower, and they got right,
they got one through one of the most sophisticated anti
missile systems in the wall missile defense systems.

Speaker 1 (46:23):
Yeah, and there's some But it was funny because Trump
announced that some kind of ceasefire between US and the Houthis,
and uh literally once he announced it, about an hour later,
they were still trying to hit ships and in the
Red Sea, our ships in the Red Sea, like our
military ships.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
So I don't know where we go from that.

Speaker 3 (46:42):
Yeah, I mean hard to tell, he determined, and EF yes, supposedly.
Actually it was a Truman, wasn't it that? They Yeah,
so I guess the Truman has had some lock at least.

Speaker 2 (46:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
Also at the same pace, like how much does it cost?
How much is an SM six fucking missile costs compared
to you know, thirty thousand dollar drones. You know, fourth
I think it's four and a half million dollars.

Speaker 3 (47:05):
Well, yeah, so, I mean, you know, blisting missile defense.
I mean, I'm sorry, drone defending against drones is a
very une financially unequal fight. I mean, you just have
to gain that. For instance, in Israel with the iron
Dome system and you Patriots system in against you know,

(47:28):
we've used Patriots, the Saudi's have used Patriots, and each
one of those projectiles is what a million bucks? And
again you're dealing with a drone that, at the most
costs a few thousand dollars.

Speaker 1 (47:40):
Yeah, so there we go. What else you got, Andy, anything?

Speaker 3 (47:45):
No, that is all D and I and you. The
audience will be very relieved to hear. Guys, don't don't
back in a few days.

Speaker 1 (47:55):
Yeah, we'll be back over the weekend with the full crew. Guys,
don't forget to check out Andy's book, When the Tempest
Gathers incredible book, Andy's writings and everything. Links will be
in the description if you want. Andy Milliburn links will
be in a description. Mick Moulroy of course, Jason Lynes,
any and all info of our hosts. The links are
in the description. My links are not in the description.

(48:16):
I want you to find me.

Speaker 3 (48:19):
Do us.

Speaker 1 (48:20):
What I do want, what I do need and would
very much appreciate is going to patreon dot com slash
the Teamhouse. You get ad free versions and early access
to both eyes On and Team and the Teamhouse. If
you join at our ten dollars level, we will send
you a patch as well. You get all those other
benefits plus the patch, and you just helped support the

(48:40):
show and we appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
Thanks you, Andy, this is great.

Speaker 3 (48:45):
Thank you Bye everyone, good night.

Speaker 4 (48:49):
Hey guys, it's Jack.

Speaker 5 (48:50):
I just want to talk to you for a moment
about how you can support the show. If you've been
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(49:13):
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(49:33):
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Speaker 4 (49:42):
So we really appreciate all of you guys.

Speaker 5 (49:44):
There's going to be a link down in the description
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(50:05):
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India & Pakistan at War? | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}India & Pakistan at War? | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS