President Trump Arrives In The Middle East

From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead. Hi, everyone. I'm Brian Kilmi. Welcome to the latest minutes of the show.

We got a busy hour coming your way with me in Studio's General Stanley McChrystal's brand new book out on character, choices that define life. A couple of things that are going on: the president of the United States is on board, popped on Air Force One, made his first trip. He chose Saudi Arabia to be his first stop. All the popping circumstances happened pretty much by prime time, five in the morning Eastern time, up until nine.

So we were up early doing Fox and Friends covering the president's formal trip. He's got his delegations with him, and also, my goodness, look at the business people that have made the trip. Sam Altman, we have Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jane Frazier, the Citigroup CEO, the IBM CEO, Amazon CEO, Nvidia's CEO.

So they're looking to do big deals, and Saudi Arabia's got a lot of money.

Next stop is the UAE, excuse me, is Qatar, then the UAE. In between, there might be a stop for the president in Turkey where he's going to look to. If Vladimir Putin is going to show up to a meeting that he called, which is supposed to be a direct talk with President Zelensky, who says, I'm going to be there. In the backdrop of this, we're getting word from a post on X that Benjamin Netanyahu says there's talk now about releasing the other 23 hostages in Gaza. And if not, President the Prime Minister said, We're going back into Gaza to get him out ourselves.

So there's a deadline everywhere, let alone the other subplot to the region is Iran's nuclear program. We've already had four rounds of talks. How long does it take to say, yes, I will dismantle my nuclear program?

Well, General Stanley McCrystal is a perfect person to talk about all this. Oh, last thing, just came across, 830. When it comes to the consumer price index, it rose just 2.3%. They expected 2.4%, so the market should not be upset by this because inflation is a little less than predicted. General, welcome back.

Always great to see you. Pleasure to be here, Brian. Thanks for having me. What a time for news. It's unbelievable.

There's like six major stories going on. There are. Do you follow it as much as you used to when you were in uniform? Probably not as much as I used to, but on the other hand, I'm a little broader than I used to be because I tended to, when I was in uniform, I tended to focus on the things that were in my lane. Keeping yourself alive and your troops alive.

Exactly. Right. And how different has it been since?

Well, it's been fun because I get to I never thought about business before, except in very general terms. And I pay attention to that, a number of things, so it's a lot of fun. When you're a general, you have said, especially someone with you who's got such knowledge of the globe and leaders, that's a sought-after skill, those contacts. I know General Petraeus and others have used that. Have you used that too?

Some of your contacts and knowledge, especially the Middle East? I think a bit. I think more I've used the leadership part of what I learned and dealing with people and how organizations work, because that's what really interests me. Because you like people. You like to, you're commanding people.

I do. Just real quick, on Saudi Arabia, that country has changed a lot since 9-11, don't you think? I think it has, and I think it's changing dramatically. And I think we tend to have a view of what it was a few years ago because it's hard to catch up.

So I think it's moving in the right direction. That's my opinion. And we'll see where it ends up. Right. Do you understand when people want to invest there, would you be hesitant, do you think, for America to strengthen relations there business-wise?

No, I think we need to strengthen relations almost everywhere. There are some limitations. I think Saudi Arabia is a good one. We traditionally had a great relationship with them, then we let it get rocky. I think making it strong again is in our interest and theirs.

What about the rest of the region? When you see the Gulf states seem to come together, there seems to be one nation that's giving most people the problems, and it's Iran. It's the same problem since 1979, right? You were probably in high school at the time. No, I was a young Special Forces first lieutenant when they actually took the embassy.

And it was like a gut punch because I was in Thailand serving in Special Forces. When the failed rescue attempt in April of 1980 occurred. And I remember a Thai officer came to me and he said, How can you let this happen? And I said, Well, you know, military operations are tough and they fail. He goes, You're the United States.

They're just a run. And it was one of those moments where you sort of step back and take an out-of-body. look at yourself and our nation. And you thought then we have to actually focus on building up our military. And that became the focus of the country because we're still in that Vietnam mindset, right?

I call it the Vietnam draft.

So, do you remember when the draft stopped? I think it was 1973 or 1974. I was at West Point. And so when I got into active service in 1976 as a lieutenant, we still had some draftees, but most of the Army was already transitioning to all volunteer. And from when I entered, West Point in 72, then as a commissioned officer in 76, the Army got better every year.

But what you really noticed was about 1980. You know, it took a while for the Vietnam hangover. The Army made some good decisions about managing leaders differently and some new equipment and focus. Then about 1980, I went in early 81 to Korea for a year, and I spent a year on the DMZ, came back in the early spring of 82, and it was like the Army was a different place. It was like I'd left like how what do you think a number of things occurred.

One was that Army recruiting suddenly got a lot better.

Now, part of that was because The Vietnam period was over, but part of it was the economy was in a tough period, and that helped. There were a number of decisions. But suddenly, instead of having to fight to get every soldier to re-enlist, we had boards where they had to compete to re-enlist.

So the quality of the force just started rising. And from about 1982, literally through the first Gulf War, you could watch the US Army get better every year. Do you was there some doubt when you went to a volunteer force that we wouldn't have a good force? Was there was there a school of thought that people were worried about that? I didn't pay much attention to it.

Because you were in. Because you're in the academy. Yeah, and I was a young guy, and I was just, you know, I thought it was great. And of course, the soldiers that I got to work with were extraordinary throughout my career.

So I can't talk badly about the volunteer force, except that I think what it did is it. It caused part of America to serve. And it didn't cause the rest of America to serve. And I think that's a challenge.

So, which you still say, you talk about service, there should be some type of service, whatever. State or military. I think everybody should do something. And I think once you start putting it into the system, people just get used to it. Hey, do you start in college yet?

No, I'm going to wait a year. I'm going to do my service this year and the next year. And then other people say I'm continuing to do that. General Stanley Crystal's here. His new book is out this week.

It's on character, the choices that define a life. Just a quick thing about what's happening in Israel. I've not talked to you since October 7th, but as I talked to Douglas Murray, And write his book, and read his book, he says one of the biggest shocks of his life. was on october seventh and october eighth the protests against Israel. And what has happened on college campuses across the country.

And I can't get my head around it. If you remember 9-11, you're in the military at that time, was no pro. Islamic extremist attitude in our country? And if not, it would be rounded up and isolated. What's happened?

Yeah. I went over to Israel a couple of months after October seventh and I went down to Kibbutz Bay Rio went On the edge of the friends, but um I got to see many of the old military because I had a lot of military and intelligence friends in the Israeli services, so I got to. to talk to all of them. And the shock that was in Israel could not be overstated. It was like going back to 9-11.

People don't understand what a traumatic event psychologically that was for the United States. And as we get further away from it, I'm afraid younger generations don't always appreciate it. The same thing with after October 7th. The frustration that I felt among the Israelis, and I got to spend time with the Golani Brigade, who had just come out of their first month in combat in Gaza. Having said that, I will tell you, my view is also there's two sides to every story.

And if you look at the state of Gaza for decades really since Hamas took over two thousand five, two thousand six. If you and I were young men in Gaza, There's every likelihood that we would have joined Tomas. Because you're in a situation where you don't have political or other opportunity.

So I think it's really important we understand the horrific acts and not support what happened on October 7th. But we appreciate things happen for a reason and and we can't Ignore that. See, I feel differently. Is that the money that flowed into there, the opportunities that they had, and Hamas that they elected when Condoleezza Rice said, let's go have elections, they overwhelmingly won. They assassinated the Fatah in the streets, the other government.

They just annihilated other Palestinians and then took over and treated everybody like thugs. And these guys have that terrorist mindset that you personally fought against for the longest time. I don't know. Unless I was indoctrinated, I can't see that the other side to that, especially if I had a chance to walk in Israel. A lot of them worked in Israel.

They had a chance to walk around and see they were treated in many respects with respect. They had a job. They had a living. When people are digging tunnels instead of building roads, I would say, I got a little problem with where the money's going. Wouldn't you say that?

I think it's complicated. And to be honest, if, again, if we were young men in Gaza. I think our view might be different. They have no foreign policy. They essentially had no economic opportunity.

There was foreign aid coming in. There were a lot of limitations. They had an unfortunate election and they had And they elected Hamas. Every country has unfortunate elections and elect That's 70% of the vote, I think. Yeah, exactly.

But You have to understand the dynamics. It's if you and I lived in the South before the Civil War, we probably would have joined the Confederate Army. You follow the life journey that you experience and the people around you, and we can't ignore that factor. And so, for years, the dynamic of Gaza. had created a dynamic that had a pretty predictable outcome.

Yeah, when you're giving Gaza and then you use the money to send rockets into Israel and you wonder why Israel says we got to make sure to reinforce that border, I don't yeah, I don't I personally don't see it, especially because there's so many they have so many Palestinians had so many allies in the region. Yeah, they don't want to take them in, but they have the support. Correct? You and I could argue either side of this case. Really effectively and emotionally.

And I could Make a pretty good case for either side. And that's what makes this so hard because it's not two evil sides trying to destroy. The other. And in fact, both of them have a point to make, and they both want the same land. They wo b they both want um as much opportunity for their people as they can have.

And it's just that the latest part is not true. Do you think the Hamas wants the best opportunity for their people? I don't think they care at all about the Palestinian people, do you?

Well, there are leaders and there are groups in every population that are problematic. Hamas, in my view, is completely problematic. But when you have a very extreme group, Al-Qaeda was, even the Taliban are in Afghanistan. But if you take the entire population, it doesn't mean that there isn't a reason that extremist groups get traction. There often is.

Because I guess they're not happy. Also, that when you use religion as a reason to kill people and you rejoice over the killing, I just thought there's a right and wrong there. I think there should be do you do you feel as though we've we've backed the right side? Do you think we should be backing Hamas? I don't think there's.

A clean one on this. My Time was spent in Israel. Obviously, my emotion has been with the Israeli forces, and so. They're more on the surface like me, so I'm sort of. uh reflexively postured to support them.

But because I think this is such a complicated issue, I'm a believer in a two-state solution. I think that that's the only realistic Be happy to. But I mean, they have no interest in a two-state solution. Hamas doesn't want one. Yeah, I mean, they got so close.

We were all optimistic two decades ago. In reality now it seems very far away, but that's what makes it so tragic. I think you've got two groups that aren't evil. That are trying to wrestle over something that's impossible to divide. You can't cut the baby in half.

I just don't, I mean, you fight him for, you've fought him for 30 years, but. The Islamic extremist attitude is evil. You don't think that? You don't think you don't believe that? Let well, let me put it this way.

And I've described this to people before: the best forces that I led when I had the counter-terrorist forces, SEALs, Delta Force Rangers, and whatnot. and the best Al Qaeda. operatives were very similar personalities. They were very patriotic people. They were team face to want to be a part of a team.

They were willing to sacrifice. They were courageous. They were remarkably the same. except that they had a different life journey and they Got a different jersey and joined it. You get indoctrinated.

We indoctrinate ourselves. We indoctrinate our military and people. We think we indoctrinate them in the right things. We think that the Islamic extremists indoctrinate their people in the wrong things. Those are views.

And and obviously you know where where I believe. But I respect the fact that just because I believe something Does it make them wrong? Right. Okay. We're going to come back.

I want to talk more about your book. We have the hour. Gentleman Crystal's here. His new book is on character, choices at the final life. He was just on the daily show last night where he just captured the audience, walked right in, took it over like you were Robin Williams in his prime.

Unbelievable. Back in a moment. Politics, current events, and news that affects you. Brian's got a lot more to say. Stay with Brian Kilmead.

I'm Emily Campagno, host of the Fox True Crime Podcast. This week, author Deb Miller-Landau joins me to discuss the murder-for-hire case of socialite Lita McClinton as detailed in her book, A Devil Went Down to Georgia. Listen and follow now at FoxtrueCrime.com. The more you listen, the more you'll know. It's Brian Killmead.

Hey, welcome back everybody. With me right now is Channel Stanley McChrystal, who's book on character, choices that define a life.

So General, I know you're about leadership. Why did you think this is the right time to write about character?

Well, Brian, call me Stan, please, because we've known each other a long time. I think any time, of course, is a good time to write about character. I hit a point in my life where. I had been educated in it, I had been trained to think about it, But I hadn't thought enough about it. In the last fifteen years since I left uniform, I focused a lot more on those questions that really, almost philosophical in nature.

And I found out that as I tried to refine my thinking, they all intersected on character. Because character is central. It's sort of the beginning and the end. It's the essence of who we are. I also think that it's a moment when our nation doesn't prioritize character like we could.

And I think like we did in the past.

Now, granted, there's always been periods in American history where character is missing, and there's always been. people who didn't display it. But I think there was a general belief that character mattered a lot. I think we've normalized now. People can violate norms or ignore traditional character And we accept that politicians will look into a camera and lie to us.

And we will accept it and we'll say, well, they're just politicians. That's not a good dynamic. I think that we are often thoughtlessly Selfish. I describe to people: when you get your baggage after a flight, you go up to the carousel and people cry. crowd the carousel.

Nobody else can see what's coming out. Nobody can get up there. And nobody is doing that intentionally to be a jerk. They just stop thinking. They're just...

Almost. Yeah, exactly. And we've got that so accepted in our.

Society now. That we've all become almost cynical about it. I think we need to step back, we need to think about character, each of us individually. We need to talk about it in the nation. We need to like on programs like this.

We need to demand it, demand it from the people who we buy. Buy products from the people who we give celebrity to, the people we vote for, the people we follow. We need to demand it and of ourselves. And we have the ability to do that. It's entirely within our power.

And you think individualies can be collective after a while. Exactly. You write: a character is your choice. Right. So that's everyone has a choice.

But first you have to define what the right thing to do is. And that a lot of times comes from family, right, and mentors.

So a lot of people say, you know, I thought I was acting a good character, but I made it, you know, obviously in retrospect, maybe I wasn't. Yeah, I think you do need to think about it. I think some education and study, but you're right, most of it comes from our parents or our peers or people that are good examples in our society. But then we have to really focus on those and pressure test those ideas. Gotcha.

Listen, go out and pick up the general's book. He's going to be here a while longer, but it's called On Character, Choices That Define a Life. We'll talk about more about that in a moment. If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmead.

All right, we are back. General McChrystal is with us now, General Stanley McChrystal, author of a brand new book on character choices that define a life. Uh so Jen, what I find uh most intriguing about you is that You leave a military, the way you left is ridiculous. I took it worse than you did, and you're over it. But you go to study, you would think that you should write a book on leadership.

You actually wrote a book, but you studied it first. You go into character, you study character. You believe that life is non-stop learning, correct?

So when people say, Well, I'm a leader, I've had this success, you could still you could still be learning. I've still got a lot left to learn, unfortunately. What did you get in researching this book on character?

Well, I started to look more toward philosophy. You know, we all studied some philosophy in high school and college, but I didn't pay much attention. I w I actually went back to the ancient philosophers and they were s pretty smart guys. And what it did was it made me think about Sort of why I do what I do. If you go to Marcus Aurelius, and he basically says, do the right thing.

Not because it advantages you. Not even because it will give you respect from others. Just do it because it's the right thing. and if I look at historical figures who shown great strength, in very difficult times. They seem to follow a North Star that is Pretty basic, and that's my argument for character now.

So, can you give me some examples? Give us Marcus Aurelius. Who else followed their North Star? I think if we go to Abraham Lincoln. He followed his North Star.

He said when he came into the presidency, My goal is to save the Union, my priority. is to save the union. And he had to do some very difficult things, fight the biggest war in American history to date. He had to he he actually suspended habeas corpus for a period. And of course, now we're going through that question again.

He was prepared to make a deal to let the South keep slavery if it would keep them in the Union. Those were all really difficult. Compromises. You could argue they're wrong. Because the right thing to do is, of course, not have slave to release the slaves, but he had to time it in order to be successful.

That's exactly right. I mean, you could argue that they're wrong, particularly in the sweep of history, because he was an abolitionist in his heart. But he thought that the most important thing was to be Was to save the Union, first and foremost. I would argue that the most important thing in leadership today is character. It's not what your policies are, your politics, or any of your celebrity.

because those things are all transitory. in the critical moment What we need is people with real strength. Real maturity. Think of Brand new President Kennedy at the Bay of Pigs. He accepts responsibility for a problem he really didn't cause.

He inherited. Then it gets to the Cuban Missile Crisis and we see the character arise. Not a perfect solution, but But a pretty darn good solution. You know, it's so interesting that you bring up Lincoln because that is not the easy example to make. Because if you say to yourself everything, what's the right thing to do?

You know, Frederick Douglass is out there, and there are these fine people waiting for you to free the slaves. And you go, well, I'm just going to do the right thing. And then all hell would have broken loose. The North would have fractured because the North wasn't ready to accept that they were fighting to free the slaves. They weren't ready to accept blacks fighting amongst them and alongside them.

So that's a tough example that you brought up. It's very tough. Think of Franklin Roosevelt. He knew that we would have to enter the war against the Axis powers. And he started actions Lindley's, but he couldn't get the American people on board until after Pearl Harbor.

So he was m mature. He was wise in waiting and maneuvering, but that's a difficult decision. How about this? If you play into some of the conspiracy theories that he knew Pearl Harbor was coming in some way, shape, or form, he knew to save the world and to stop Hitler, America would have to get involved, but America wasn't there yet. If he allowed that to happen, is that the same thing in a way that Lincoln had to do?

maybe do the wrong thing in order to do the right. Yeah, I It's always tricky, and I don't think that that was true. But you probably have that non-stop at war, right? You do. You do have to have moral boundaries, things you will and will not do, because your force will start a slide down a slippery slope.

But there are times you deal with warlords, there are times you make compromises on things that you wouldn't want to do because the larger Outcome is more important than the near term. And sometimes it costs you people, sometimes it costs you friends, it costs you respect. But you have to make those really tough calls. You know, what's interesting too is because people say, Oh, always be honest, always bright.

Well, sometimes you can't be honest. Like in order to achieve your objective, if you say someone walks up to you and go, General, we outnumbered.

Now if you're really being honest, the answer is yes. But if you want to destroy the morale of your unit, you're out of bullets, you're outnumbered, do you say, we're fine? Those guys aren't going to do anything.

So I mean, that's those are the tougher questions that you probably pick up at West Point. I remember when I had to testify in front of Congress when I got very senior. You actually sign a paper that says, I'll always tell you exactly what I think, not what the administration thinks, before you become a three-star.

So you go to to uh testify And they ask you, can you win in Afghanistan? And if I looked him in the eye and I said, well, truth be known, yeah, 50-50, maybe, maybe not. Which was what I had felt internally and told him. But if I had said that, every soldier out there fighting in Afghanistan would have gone, what in the world is he saying? They have to believe.

And to a degree, even the leaders have got to believe. Even sometimes when the odds are much worse than you want to tell people publicly. I want you to hear well, first off, on this whole plane.

So You have Qatar offering President Trump a plane. It says Air Force One is going to be ready in 2035, the new one.

So here's a plane. Here's what Rand Paul said about the Constitution and accepting that plane, Cut 30. It's a little bit different than a gimme putt. And the Constitution in Article II talks about the President can't take emoluments or gifts from foreign leaders. And so there is a provision in the Constitution that says you can't do this.

And so the question is: can you do it if it's only for official purposes? If it came to someone in Congress, they can vote and the Ethics Committee can look at it. With his, there will have to be some kind of adjudication. This has never been done, and it's not like a ride on the plane. We're talking about the entire $400 million plane.

I think it's not worth the appearance of impropriety, whether it's improper or not. I don't think it's worth it. What should we do? Obviously, not take it. We're the United States of America.

We don't need a plane from Qatar. Right. Right. Yeah. I don't think we should be taking that plane to begin with.

But I do find it disturbing that it takes Boeing an extra 15 years. Did you know? Boeing supplies a lot of military equipment, don't they? They do. Did you notice a problem in the supply chain when you were serving?

I never noticed directly from Boeing, but I've read a lot of articles about it, particularly about the. The procurement of the new Air Force One replacement airplanes. And they've had a real tough road on that one, a lot of it internal Boeing challenges.

So are you concerned about our military industrial base? I am very concerned about it because. One, if we've underinvested in it. We can't build enough volume of weapons, artillery rounds, missiles, particularly the more advanced weapons, which take a lot of really detailed work. We can't produce those in the kind of numbers we'll need.

Right now, if we do the math against a potential foe like China, we got a real challenge, particularly in advanced weapons. What you know, you were telling me before the break that you know we weren't using as much weapons. Even though we were at war for 20 years, we weren't using them as much weapons.

So we consolidated, I think the story won in the 90s, Bill Clinton urged everyone to consolidate, McDonnell Douglas and others to come into one so you wouldn't be bidding against each other. In theory, the prices would be less that you charge in the Pentagon. But now that that doesn't work, even if the objective was pure and the hope was right. It didn't work. How long would it take from what you know to build up at a level in which we can supply our allies with what they need for profit, you know, friends and families discount?

Sure. Then we get the maintenance contract on top of that. This would be a win-win. How long would it take? Do you have an idea?

Well, I think it would take years, think five or six years to build back up again. And the other thing to understand is the free market doesn't completely work in this regard, because weapons producers don't want to create expensive assembly lines if they're not going to sell enough. And if our military doesn't need enough to require that, they won't invest. That's why I like the idea of providing weapons around the world to our allies because it helps build our capacity. But even so, I think the government has got to do investment in giving us production capacity that maybe never gets used.

And okay, that's That's an investment that we never actually you mean government would would own this instead of us going to a private contractor, the government would actually own this weapons plant? They could or they could invest. They could provide money to the producers, but require them to have the warm capability to produce weapons at a certain same way they did SpaceX. It's private, but it was supplemented and using aerospace. When I look at Russia-Ukraine, I felt frustrated.

You're the military expert because No high mars, we'll give you high mars. No f-16s, we'll give you f-16s. We'll give you javelins, but we're not going to give you attack them. And they end up with all of them. Yeah.

But they slow walked it. It it's almost like a It's the most unthinking form of warfighting ever. You know the an It is if no one di the incrementalism was maddening, and how many people died because of it, especially when you see how the Ukrainians fight. Yeah, I mean, we've always looked for an ally who wanted to fight like the Ukrainians do, and now we've got one. And who were they fighting?

One of America's premier enemy. Our primary enemy in reality. And so I think we should have now. Hindsight's twenty twenty.

Okay, let's fix it. But But my belief is we should have armed the Ukrainians with everything they needed as early as we could, and we should have essentially given them a blank check and communicated that to Vladimir Putin. Saying we are going to stay committed to this level so that this particular aggression just doesn't work. But his use of threatening nuclear attack seems to have rattled the previous administration. I think it rattled a lot of people.

The nuclear part plus natural theory. You know, you can't be sure with a 70-plus-year-old dictator. I don't think it, I didn't think it was. But it's hard to predict. If he had failed completely in Ukraine, it probably meant regime change for him.

So we may have gotten a different logic in his part. We just accepted it, but is it unbelievable that you got a about a five hundred Chinese, you have thousands of North Koreans, you have Yemeni fighters, all and uh Iranian drones all bailing out this so-called superpower of Russia because they're running out of people and weapons? Yeah, Russia's not a superpower anymore. They have managed to portray themselves as one. They are not demographically.

Strong for the long term. They're not economically strong. But in the short term, and the short term matters, they can be a huge problem. I know you're not a big fan of the present when it comes to character. I think you made that clear, and I respect that.

Who does have the character on the main stage that you think is an example of somebody that you would like to highlight? Yeah. If you were to write a character today book. Yeah. I'm not sure I would.

I'm looking for character. I'm sure that there are a lot of people out there, but I have not. seen a lot of people that have risen to really world stage level. that I'm prepared to say that, but that's what we all should be looking for. We shouldn't look for just A person's policies, or just a person's politics, or anything like that, one of our major criteria.

for supporting somebody should be character. Mm-hmm. We have a couple of men say at the end, but I just want to say this. Your generation, even though you led them, but the twenty-year-olds that fought under you, I think that they're as great as any generation the way they fought, the way they adapted, the way they had to go into the most difficult ways possible over the course of years. 20 years, multiple deployments.

When people go to war college and study what you guys did and the people you led, Are you getting the proper respect among military experts when they analyze what you've done?

Well, personally, I get more respect than I deserve, so I'm almost embarrassing, but the young people that you described were amazing. And if we try to paint a generation as ineffective, that's not my experience at all. It's exactly to hear people describe that. And yet they seem almost like a quiet generation. Our generation, the boomers, sort of got the headlines, and now the youngest generation that's just coming up is getting a focus.

There's all these. Heroes who carried our nation, And did some great things, and I'm not sure that they get either the credit or I don't see as many of them in positions of responsibility as I would like. And then the special operations that I will never know about in Africa and in Southeast Asia that took. That took place under the command and guys, and what you've been able to do, and the people you've been able to train around the world to fight for themselves and for their government? Just extraordinary.

And the wives. I remember when I'd just taken over JSOC. It was Christmas, or it was the day before Christmas, and I was having to deploy some people on Christmas Eve to Pakistan on no notice. and my wife goes to the little shopping center on the military base, Fort Bragg, and she runs into one of the wives. And Annie was a little bit Nervous 'cause I was a new commander there, and here her husband's being sent on Christmas Eve, and she thought the wife was not going to be happy.

So any went up and talked to her and said, kind of apologized, and the lady goes, Hey, This is what we do. This is who we are. Don't worry. It's good. And there's millions of stories of that.

And that's What I think we need to reinforce sometimes. I remember Colonel Wesley, who I was, I went to Kuwait before the Iraq War. And I stayed in touch with Colonel Wesley and General Perkins now. He was Colonel Lieutenant Colonel Perkins then. And when I went to visit him on a base in Kansas, his wife was busy.

Why? Because Somebody just got killed in battle. She had to go over and deliver a basket. Then afterwards, somebody just had a baby. She had to go to the baby.

I go, wow, that's your responsibility. He goes, Yeah, well, my husband's in command. That's what we do.

So when you're in command, so your family's in command. That's exactly the kids. The way they walk up to people and say, Hello, how are you doing? Look in your eye. And they go, Well, these kids have been on six different bases in the last four years.

They had to go meet the person next door. Right away.

So those kids grow up right away.

So it's pretty amazing what happens. I mean, it really forces you to raise your kids directly and. They see real values in real time. It's almost like sports, where in ninety minutes you get character in a minute. Because I have a few more minutes with General Stanley McCrystal.

His book's out today. What a great Father's Day gift this would be on character, choices at the final life. It's Brian Killmead. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show.

Hey, we are back. A few more minutes with General Stanley McCristo. General... when you wrote the book on character. What did you discover?

Is this one of those things where you loved researching it? I did, and I would start with things that I had an opinion on. And I would say, this is my opinion on X. And then I would try to write an essay, 800 to 1,000 words. And I would find that as I wrote it, it was harder to articulate what I thought.

And I actually found out in many cases what I thought was much more nuanced, more complex. And I found myself evolving. my thinking is I was forced to to do that.

So I think We sometimes take our character as too superficial. And if we really delve into it, we'll start to explore questions. This book has no answers. Just questions. But you know what's interesting, I saw you say last year you did great on the Daily Show.

Uh you said character is your fate.

So if you are showing character through your life, it'll really define more than you know what kind of life you have. Because you'll be all through your life, you'll be making a consistent decision in very different situations. And what do you want people to say about you at your memorial service? You know If they If you're big and famous and rich and all, that's one thing. But if they go, you know, but Brian was a real jerk.

Instead, if they go no Brian was somebody we could count on. I didn't agree with everything that he thought or did. But he was somebody I trusted. Understood. You said this.

Reputation is what man thinks of us. Character is what angels know of us. That really says the reason you wrote the book, right? Exactly. Right.

Because there's someone keeping score. Right. And so he might as well show some character. And it's all in his book on character choices that define a life. General Stanley McCrystal.

I always love when you write a book. It's great to see you. Great to see you. All right. Keep it here, Brian Killmee, Chow.

From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Kilmead. Hi everyone, welcome to the latest moments of the Brand Kill Me Show.

So much going on and I don't even think I can get it all covered in an hour for the rest of the show. Lieutenant Colonel Alan West at the bottom of the hour, simulcast with Barney and Company later, Molly Hemingway in studio now. A couple of things happening. Inflation did tick up, but it was less than everybody thought. We're from 2.4 to 2.3.

The market should not be upset by that because now you have the jobs numbers good and the inflation numbers fine. The only thing you had is a GDP growth that was augmented, I would say, by the tariffs that were listed. But you saw the market gain all their losses back yesterday and more.

So they actually ended up more positive since Liberation Day, October 7th, excuse me, April 7th. And we have this new news from the Middle East and the president's trip. We have the presence of Syria's president is going to be flying into Saudi Arabia to meet with President Trump.

Now, he's got that terroristic background, took over, wore a suit, and says that's the old me, not the new me. We want tolerance with all religions. We understand the Christians are having a miserable time there. Maybe this is a way to leverage that to widen things out. They want sanctions relief.

So, Molly, let's talk about this.

So far, the president's trip, most Americans were in bed. I wasn't at three in the morning. I was on my way to work, and a five was on, and it's prime time there. And we see the pomp and circumstances surrounded the president's trip. Just reading the headlines in the Middle East, Saudis are thrilled he picked Saudi Arabia.

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Well, and a lot of people are pitching this as a trade trip, but it really gets back to that foreign policy approach that Trump had even in his first administration. The Obama and Biden administrations really wanted to make Iran the big player in the Middle East. Which is crazy, isn't it?

Well, you kind of have to pick one, right? You pick Iran or you pick Saudi Arabia. And the Trump team thought that Saudi Arabia was a much better leader of the region. And so even though there are a bunch of bad guys in Saudi Arabia, too, they decided to work with them. And it worked really well during the first term.

You had peace breaking out in the Middle East. You were checking Iran. And so even though this is being billed as being about trade, I think it's also about that larger issue of how to keep peace or have a better peace in the Middle East. I think so too. And also, there's nothing that substitutes for a personal relationship.

It just enhances it even more when things get difficult, when you need oil production to go up or go down, when you need a situation where China's knocking at my door and China would like some influence in this region.

Well, it would jeopardize our relationship and we've come.

So far, with it. While we ignored Central and South America and paid the price for that, why just ignore the Middle East after we've already paid a big price for that?

Well, and there are these issues where the Middle East is becoming such a big part of the trade story, the global trade story. The more that we're subsidizing Europe and the less that they are having a good economic output, we're seeing also the Global South and Middle East are really having dramatic improvements in their economies that the U.S. needs to recognize and take more seriously.

So, Eden Alexander got out the last American, there's 23 left, we believe alive in Gaza. And if you look at the Houthi deal and these two deals, Prime Minister Netanyahu and his government feel as though they've been left out of the dialogue between the Trump administration, those two deals, and their administration. Do you think it's a big deal?

Well, the U.S. has interests that are separate and that they are prioritizing. But I think the relationship with Israel always has been pretty good, will continue to be good. Obviously, Israel is a key component in this, you know, in making sure that there's peace in the region. And so I can understand why they're nervous, but I wouldn't be so nervous.

This is a president, after all, who, again, in the first administration, the way he targeted Iranian extremists. And his head is right, I think.

So, and we do understand this. Steve Woodkoff is posted on X. Netanyahu says there's some movement on hostages.

So we'll see what could be happening any moment with the president in the region. Here's Dave Ignatius of the Washington Post, cut four. We see in President Trump a growing frustration with Israel and with Prime Minister Netanyahu, who's been slow, seemingly unable to end the war in Gaza. Trump sent his emissary Steve Witkoff finally to have negotiations separately that led to the freeing of the American Israeli hostage Idan Alexander. I think Trump is similarly uneasy, unhappy about the pressure he's getting from Israel to consider a military strike on Iran.

Trump would rather go for the big deal to cap Iran's nuclear program, even though it doesn't look very different from what he scuttled in 2018 in the so-called JCPOA.

So are you worried, Molly, at all about having something that looked like the Obama deal, which was an abomination in my view, was evaporating in ten years, would not limit ballistic missiles? Uh your thought and not limit their their support of Hezbollah Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Houthis.

Well, I do think this is an existential issue for Israel. They've got this hostile neighbor that is clearly trying to develop nuclear weapons for the purpose of exterminating Israel. How do you know that? They said it. Yes.

They're pretty clear about it. And again, Israel is a great ally of the United States, so we should be interested in it. That is not to say that it's in our interest to get in a hot war with Iran, not just for the loss of life, but how it would destabilize the region, would be bad for the economy. And also, we've just kind of had a bad track record of winning wars. Like, we're very good at entering wars.

We're not very good at completing them in a short order of time with a clear objective. And the Trump team is laser focused on that.

So they understand Israel's plight. I think they want to be supportive. They don't want it to be yet another. Drag down for the United States in a lengthy, poorly designed war. Right.

My sense is we'd support Israel's attack and then whatever happens, happens.

Well, and what does that mean to support, right? Like, we've already been moving things into the region. We're very vocally supportive, but like, what exactly do they want? I know nothing's ever clean in the Middle East, but the one thing that's been clear since 1979 is Iran's been the problem and enemy to America and killed as many Americans, still trying to assassinate Americans, still trying to assassinate the president, John Bolton, Pompeo, and just tried to send an assassin into London two weeks ago. Yes, also true.

They don't have the means to reach the United States right now.

So it's one of these things, again, where you're like, why isn't Europe more concerned about this? This is concerned. Because they don't care about Israel? That and they just don't seem they seem to think that all of their problems will be handed handled by the United States. Even you mentioned the Houthis.

Obviously, the Houthis attacking the shipping routes there. Protecting shipping routes is one of the most important roles of our military. Absolutely. But it's also true that the shipping routes were mostly affecting Europe. And again, Europe kind of just was letting it happen, thinking, oh, the United States will take care of it.

And we did. And we're good at that, but we also need Europe to really understand that the world is big, it's getting bigger, and that conflicts are getting further away from Europe, and that they really need to step up on what they can do to protect their own issues. Right, so we had a major breakthrough over the weekend in two long sessions with China. We've agreed to a 90-day window to drop tariffs. It'll go 30 and 30% and 10% roughly.

And 20% of that is because they are refusing to control their fentanyl production.

So if we're to agree with that, we're heading in the right direction. Here's Jamison Greer on the Ingram Angle last night on the next steps, Cut 18.

Well, no. We have a two-step here. First, we have the agreement of this weekend, which is to have them lift their tariffs and lift their countermeasures, which is something concrete, quantifiable, observable that's going to happen this week.

So that is something where we have trust. And then the next step is to enter into talks, broadly speaking, to see if they'll open up their economy.

Now, on that, that is a long-term project. That's something where we've had promises before and they haven't delivered. That being said, President Trump is speaking with power and in a way that the Chinese Communist Party understands. It's not just soft words like other administrations have used. It's real power and real leverage that the President's wielding.

Your thoughts about where we're at.

Well, a trade war is something that taxes, figuratively and literally, the American people. It's a difficult thing to go through. But it's also a really difficult thing for China to go through with how dependent they are on us for the purchase of their products.

So we do have leverage. We're seeing that that leverage is paying off here. And with this 90-day decrease in the amount of tariffs, we'll see what else can be done. But it shows how a tariff war can achieve things that nobody was achieving for the last few decades. I was one of those people who thought that opening up China would be very good for China and very good for the U.S.

Turns out that China has done very little other than steal intellectual property and use slave labor. That's slave labor. That's not a free market. That's a major problem. And nobody's been dealing with it.

So this is the first glimmer of hope we've really had in decades that maybe we can use our leverage to stop some of their horribly abusive practices. I think that it's President Trump's major objective. I think trade more than anything else is to somehow restructure that relationship. Probably going to meet with President Xi within two weeks and we'll see what happens. But stealing of intellectual property, I don't see that changing.

The espionage that takes place. Also, we have to find a way to bring our magnets and metals back to America. It's got to happen within five years. That's just it. National security.

Absolute national security to have our weapons and important drugs, other key things. We saw during COVID when the shipping routes were all obstructed and delayed how much of a crisis it was for our country.

So, just for basic national security reasons, we have to make sure that our trade situation does not. Hurt us for those things we really need. When we come back, the big, beautiful bill. We're at in negotiations because the House says they're going to get it done by Memorial Day. According to my calendar, that's soon.

How about it's going to be next week? Can they do it? Brian Kilmichio. The fastest growing talk show in America. You're with Brian Kilmead.

Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Joe. The White House physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, was telling White House aides that President Biden's deterioration of his spine, the degeneration, was so significant that if he fell one more time, he might have to be in a wheelchair and serve in a wheelchair for his second term. But everybody pushed off the notion that he used a wheelchair until after the election.

This is all part of a larger hole where the Biden White House tried to hide the extent of his deterioration, both physical and cognitive, as much as possible. In fact, as you all know, we all saw as his shuffling gait got worse and worse from 2003 to 2004, they started putting aides around him as he walked to Marine One, the helicopter, that was to kind of hide from public view how bad. his gait was, how bad his walking was, his shuffling, and also in case he stumbled again to make sure somebody was there. And this is just of a piece of an overall campaign to try to conceal from the American people the extent to which the President was really struggling to do his job. That is Jake Tapper, who suddenly realized that President Biden was incapacitated in office, unable to think or actually do the job.

And now him and Alex Thompson of Axios are going to try to make money off it with a brand new book that's out. Molly Hemingway is still with us, Fox News contributor, editor-in-chief of The Federalist. Molly, you're beside yourself. The absolute unmitigated gall of Jake Tapper to come out here and talk about Joe Biden's health. He spent four years.

Mocking, lambasting anyone who noticed what we all noticed, which was Joe Biden's decline. He would target people. He would joke about how they were, or he would say, You're mocking Joe Biden for having a stutter whenever they noticed his decline. And for him to now come out here and pretend that he has any authority whatsoever to discuss this so he can sell a book and make money is just disgusting beyond belief. It's going to get worse because now he's going to go into great detail about things that he found out and the things that he knew.

But to me, if you knew about this, if I'm CNN, I'm furious. I also love it. Or I told you, and maybe CNN told him not to say anything. Yeah, I love this. Oh, the Democrats conspired to hide this from the people.

First of all, the people knew. Yeah. Nobody succeeded in hiding this. Secondly, who did they conspire with? It was you, Jake Tapper.

It was you, CNN. I mean, you remember, like, whenever anyone, even on Fox, would just notice what we all saw with video and audio, there would be stories written about how ridiculous it was that people were noticing. Should not be a crime to notice. And the, you know, again, that he. That Jake Tapper would come out and say, he gets to write this.

He is the last person on earth who should write this.

So, now, what do you think it was about last week? They thought, did the Bidens actually think by going out and talking, they can get ahead of this story and dispel thoughts that he's cognitively failing?

So, in their defense, it must be weird for them, right? They saw that they were dealing with Joe Biden, the same Joe Biden we saw in 2020. Do you remember a lot of Americans said, Oh, it seems like he's not running a real campaign, that he's hiding in his basement? And he won that election. And he spent four years basically being roughly the same with some decline.

And then, all of a sudden, because Democrats thought it was bad for their electoral chances, they and the media worked to oust him. That's got to be shocking and jarring. And then, more interesting, I would say, is that the Biden family business, which has always been about sending out members of the Biden family to powerful people across the world in exchange for their connections to Joe Biden, that's all drying up. And so, with that lack of money, they might be trying to reestablish themselves so that they can. Have another Have another set at the trough.

He says he's got it. He's going to have someone's going to pay him millions of dollars to do his biography, a memoir, and it's got to be out by the end of the year. I mean, what did he actually do? I mean, there was nothing. He goes, he worked into the night.

There's no way he was working to the night. No, but I do think Jill Biden, you know, for these stories. Joe Roger, she's well, she's also, she's angry. She wants vindication for, you know, a lot of people think that she was messed up for not helping him gracefully exit the stage. And so it went.

A lot of people, how about everybody? I mean, come on. You got to be kidding me. But the thing is, Molly, the worst, this is what I think. The worst thing to happen to Democrats is for them to do reasonably well in the midterms because they had no re afterwards.

They just either snowed themselves or it was impossible to let them believe that Joe Biden was not going to get reelected because he did so well on the midterms, despite Afghanistan, inflation, and everything else, and his lack of performance. I also think that maybe this whole thing that we're talking about with the Jake Tapper book is also misguided for them. They need to understand that, yes, Joe Biden was a problem for them politically, but so is the extremism of many of their policies. And the more That they think it's all about Joe Biden leaving them in the lurch, the less they look inward about how a lot of Americans feel alienated from the Democrat Party because of how they've leaned into trans radicalism instead of caring about the working class. I think there's a bunch of things going on.

He was also very comfortable with the squad. He always was talking to those guys. He was never distancing himself from them. I mean, right there, you knew he was a problem. Plus, if you think about things that got passed, from the Democratic perspective, they were happy with the rescue package.

They were happy with the Inflation Reduction Act. Yeah, they're happy with, I guess, the gun legislation that was drawn by six Republicans. But they had nothing. He had nothing to do with that, by the way. That was all generated in the Senate.

Okay, but that is something that I think Republicans should think about. The more you can pass legislation, the more effect you will have. And a lot of Republicans seem content to let Donald Trump come out here, issue executive orders.

Well, those can all be turned around. And they were. Like Biden on day one, by executive order, opened up the border.

So it's very easy to take away that. Harder to take away legislation. And the Republicans in Congress, yes, they have a very tiny majority in both houses. That's true. But it's also true that Democrats know that when they have tiny majorities, they have to use the time that they have to ensconce their ideas.

Do you think I've asked this to Stephen Miller, too? I said, what's next? After the big beautiful bill, they'll pass something. What's next? What do you think is next?

Do you know?

Well, they actually have no idea what their plan is. I would say, sadly, probably the plan is nothing or more funding for wars. They're usually good about doing that. But they should use the executive orders as a roadmap, particularly some of these executive orders about affecting the regulatory state, the administrative state, changing civil service laws and regulations so that it's easier to fire poor performers in the federal government or to shrink or fine-tune the size of the state. That would be ultimately done on reconciliation, I imagine.

Judging by Chuck Schumer, the backlash he got for just doing what he had to do, and that is continue to fund the government, correct? Yeah, and all that Democrats want to do is make it through to the midterms. They only have to win a few seats to get control of the House, and then they can just. Spend the next two years running investigations and slowing down the Trump. True or false, Trump is really fixated in the midterms already.

That's the story that he's already thinking about it, already working it.

Well, he should be. And Republicans should realize that even though, if past his prologue, they're going to lose, this could be one of those elections where if they had a vision, they could gain something. Because the other side is so bad. And because people are ready. And people are ready for change.

Yes, or more of this. And if Trump starts caving these wins overseas and at home, we'll see, especially the economy starts kicking into gear. Molly Hemingway, thanks so much. We'll watch you and outnumbered. I appreciate it.

Thank you. The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. This is a little bit problematic, this gift of the airplane. I think it's probably legal.

It's not being given to the president personally. It's being given to the United States of America for the president's use. And when he moves on, uh it will go then to his library and that's that's under the control of what, the uh national archivist.

So I don't think I don't think it's actually a gift to him.

So, Britt Hume says he can keep the plane. I wouldn't take the plane from Cutter. I just wouldn't. Uh you know I I've I wouldn't. It's a beautiful plane.

It's probably the nicest thing I've ever seen. It looks like a hotel. But and the president likes luxury and he does not, I don't, I guess he really doesn't like Air Force One. He's ticked off, it's gonna not gonna be the one that he commissioned is not gonna be ready till 2035. Then he gets this offer, but I think it's just a little bit of a problem.

And now, like Alcatraz, the president said, I'm gonna refurbish Alcatraz and make it a prison. It'll be a great symbol for America that we're not putting up with law and disorder. All right. But now he brings up the plane, and the plane is all everyone's talking about. Why?

Because there's positive things going on in Saudi Arabia. It's a modernizing country, less than perfect. Everybody knows it. But there's things happening there. The president just signed a business partnership with Saudi Arabia, an economic partnership moments ago.

Also, the head of, I don't know if he calls him president or prime minister, of Syria just called up and says he wants to stop by in Saudi Arabia and speak to the president. And then we know that they're on Thursday, the president might be flying in to see one of coach and referee one-on-one talk with Zelensky and Putin. Can you imagine the drama there? let alone Carter and the UAE and getting investment back here. There's a lot going on.

So let's talk about the plane and whether the president should take it. That's what other people are going after. That's why their ratings are terrible. Lieutenant Colonel Alan West joins us now, Dallas County Republican Party Chair, American Constitutional Rights Union Executive Director. Colonel, welcome back.

It's good to be with you, Brian. And look, I wholeheartedly agree with you. I would not accept that plane. I know that President Trump has said anyone that wouldn't take it that he calls stupid, I guess I'm stupid, but I don't want the optics. I don't see Cutter as being a friend to the United States of America.

We know that Cutter plays both sides of the coin. The Taliban 5 that were released. By the Obama administration, they will hold up and Qatar. Hamas, their leadership, hold up and cut her. We know that Iran and Qatar do supply and fund resources to Hamas and Hezbollah and some of these other Islamic terrorist organizations.

So I would just say to Colter, thank you very much. We appreciate the offer, but I don't think we'll accept this plane. And I can understand he's upset with Boeing. But you know something? There comes a time when we have to look at these folks that are really trying to play both sides of that coin and just kindly say no.

I would think so. You just don't need it, but it is an interesting distraction to give people an opportunity not to talk about what I think is some major gains in the Middle East. You're absolutely right. And that's the thing is that I'm of the mindset never allow your opposition the easy gap to exploit or the easy optic. And I think that that is what has happened now.

And all of these great things that you just listed that are happening, that are occurring. And I would tell the president to be very leery about this new leader in Syria as well because of his Islamic jihadist ties. But they're not talking about that. I mean, we had a good CPI report this morning, and that should be something, again, that we are harping on, and we're talking about it.

So he should be showing himself as that real good, strong leader. He's going into the Middle East. He is quieting things. India and Pakistan now have a truce deal. Those are two nuclear powers.

He's bringing Zelensky and Putin to the table. Hopefully, Putin will show up there in Turkey. And this gives him an opportunity to look at Erdogan eye to eye, who is not exactly a friend to the United States.

Some are horror to Western civilization and maybe set him straight.

So, we have a president that's doing the right things. Let's not give the left any easy, cheap shots that they can take.

So, the one thing I would say to the Syrian president is this: number one, we don't have to tell them not to deal with Iran, they hate Iran. Number two is we got to say no Russia. If you actually want to have any type of relationship with us, no Russian basis, zero. And the Christians have to, they have to be, there's got to be security around the Christians. We know that we were told, don't show your Christianity during Christmas.

I know we can't, I don't want to get into each country's decisions. I get it. But if you're looking to create a trade relationship and you have a fractured country to begin with, you might have this might be the one moment where you could have leverage. And to know the Russians don't have a presence there to traffic their weapons to the Houthis and get their drones from Iran, I think that benefits us right away. It does, and I think you bring up a great geopolitical strategic security outlook because Iran always wanted that land bridge to get over and Russia wanted those ports there on the Mediterranean, so we can play that.

And I would also push the security of the Christians, and I say very simply, people can come here to the United States of America based upon Muslim faith. We don't tell them they can't build a mosque. We don't tell them that they can't worship their faith.

So why are you doing it here? And so again, I think that we can look at our principles of values and we can leverage that against this individual and say, you don't want to be on our bad side, because we're about to put the hammer down on Iran. We'll put the hammer down on you as well if you do lean toward this new axis of evil and also support to Islamic jihadism and you continue this genocide of Christians. All right. So let's talk about the Russia Ukraine situation.

Vladimir Putin, I actually think, got trapped himself.

So he didn't want he knows there's all types of pressure for a ceasefire. They know he has his big parade.

So he does not want to embarrass Trump on some level because he knows Trump is his best chance on the Western leaders. Because I do think that he's street smart, I would think, unless he's lost his mind.

So he says, okay, no ceasefire, but I'll have a meeting on Thursday one-on-one. And Trump calls up Zelensky and says, take it. And he says yes. And then Trump says: if I could be of help, I'll go. Listen, cut 12.

On Thursday's meeting with Russia and Ukraine is very important. I was very insistent that that meeting take place. I think good things can come out of that meeting.

So now Zelensky says, I'm going. Trump says, if you need me, I'll find a way. Does Putin go? What excuse does he make not to go? He has no excuse, and you're right.

He's in an untenable position. And General Keith Kellogg gave a great interview this morning on your sister network Fox Business with Maria Bartaromo, laying out these terms there. And Putin would have to be absolutely insane not to come to the table or at least have that foundation because he's about to find himself isolated. I mean, all of a sudden, now you have European leaders that are stepping up to the table, and America does not have to take that lead role, but we can definitely have an impactful role. And so, if you start to see Russia getting sanctions put on them, tough sanctions, like with Iran, guess who that ends up hurting in the long run?

That's China. And China is starting to see itself. I mean, now with this trade agreement that we hope we can put some hard conditions on them and some snapback conditions as well, we're starting to see this axis of evil getting separated. And we're starting to pick them off one by one. And I think that's what they have to be concerned about.

about.

So I can expect Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and the Ayatollahs down there in Iran starting to talk and say, what the sound hill do we do? Because this guy has come along, and in less than, what, 120 days, he's put the kibosh on us. And we're about to see all of these gains that we made in the past four years under the weak presidency of Joe Biden just be washed away.

So Putin has to show up. If he does not show up, then Russia's going to be in a lot of trouble from the United States. Yeah, I mean, but also, I would love to see the sanctions on the central bank immediately. Yes. I mean, right away.

And I would like to arm up, and they're paying for him now. Grab the weapons. I mean, let them buy the weapons from us. And let them fire Yeah, because what it will show is that Vladimir Putin is not serious about peace. Vladimir Putin is going to show himself as the real modern day Hitler who will seek to continue on with his incursions all across that region.

And it is very reassuring when you see those European leaders from Poland, from Germany, from France, from Britain, sitting there with Vladimir Zelensky and saying, okay, this is how we will come in and help you, not just writing you a check, but this is how we will stand beside you. Understood. Lieutenant Colonel Allen West, thanks so much, Colonel. Great to see you. Always a pleasure.

God bless you. We'll see you in August, man. Oh, absolutely. Yes. Coming up on August 23rd, I'll be in Dallas, and I'll drag the Colonel up at some point during the show.

Colonel, thanks so much. Thank you. Yeah, go to BrianKillme.com. Just a quick note: so I have History, Liberty, and Laps. It's also a co-sponsor with Fox Nation, and I'll be June 21st.

I'll be in Dayton, Ohio. WHIO listeners should know with that. WRVA, I know in September coming up, you'll see us there September 23rd, excuse me, September 27th. And then August 23rd, I'll be in Dallas, Texas. Big venue.

I want to see all of you there. Go to BriankillMe.com for tickets. It is fun, insightful, motivational, inspirational. I've never seen a show with so much in it, although I'm in it, and I'm a little bit biased. Back in the morning.

Now, the Brian Kilmead Show joins Fox Business's Varney and Company with Stuart Varney live on your radio and on Fox Business. Here's Brian Kilmead. Hey, welcome back, everybody. In a matter of moments, I'll be on Fox Business Network with Stuart Varney. The market's down slightly down, about 160 points.

It looks like The inflation went up, but not nearly as high as they thought.

So I don't know what the problem is, but it's down 166 points, but still over 42,244.

So it's gained everything it lost after Liberation Day and all the tariffs went on because of the 90-day pause to work out the details. of uh the Chinese uh trade deal.

So we'll see what's happening.

So that's going to be interesting to see how that develops. On top of that, I do believe that the EU is going to be the new focus, but let's listen to Stuart Varney. You've been covering Trump's trip to Saudi Arabia all morning. Looks to me like it's going very well, but are you okay with Trump accepting that plane from Qatar? I don't see why we need a plane from Cutter.

If he wants to work it out, they do it. I just don't see why he needs to have it. Air Force One, I know he's disappointed that. New Air Force, the Air Force One is not ready, but I just would not feel right about just getting a plane from. From another country, from Qatar.

And even Qatar, you know, even if it was from France, I wouldn't take it. I was like, we could build our own planes. It's the Air Force One. The other thing is, I worry about bugs in it. You know, I want someone to build it from s the from the ground up.

I don't know what's on that plane, what's what type of technology's embedded in there.

Some of the most secretive things in the world, the most important things in the world, are going to be said on Air Force One. I think the media is seizing on the jet issue as a distraction from the far more important things that are going on in Saudi Arabia at this time. I don't think we should be distracted. I think we should concentrate on what Trump is achieving in Saudi Arabia.

Well, I know, I wasn't. I just answered your question.

So, just so you know, I'm not on the radio show talking about the plane. But I will say this: I will say that this is Alcatraz. Remember, last week the president goes, you know what? I think I'm going to revamp Alcatraz. Then CNN had something to do for the next five days.

So now they're like, okay, we don't want to talk about the president's economic advantage, bringing the CEOs of the world to Saudi Arabia to work out business deals. We don't want to talk about what could be happening on Thursday with a one-on-one meeting with Zelensky. We don't want to talk about the other two stops. And how about the Syrian president coming over to speak to President Trump?

Now, he's got a dicey background. I got it. But you know what you say to the Syrian president? I know you don't like Iran, so that helps.

So, you know what's going to help? Get the Russians out of your country. Then, if the Russians are not in their country, they can't be able to get those drones right and get that Walmart port right over to Russia for the fight. No more Yemenis crossing over.

So, get the Russians out of there, and then maybe we'll create some type of relationship with them. Let's not be distracted by the jet. Change the subject. The views: Sonny Harston did a complete 180 on Pope Leo after she learned about his black ancestry. Watch this.

I'm a devout Catholic. I'm a little concerned about this choice for the LGBTQ plus community. Our new American Pope has Haitian and black roots. It's like chef's kiss for me.

So apparently, both of his maternal grandparents are described as black, Haitian, or mulatto in several census documents. I'm loving everything. I'm loving everything. I'm really enjoying it. She's done a one-eighty because of race.

I don't get it. I get it. I mean, they're the shallowest show on television. I mean, so, I mean, there's nothing insightful going on there.

So, this Pope, it doesn't matter. I don't like his beliefs. I don't like this. But, wait a second, he might be black.

So, there might be something to look up to in it. It's absolutely insane. Maybe you have. Just craziness. I'll tell you what, Sonny Hostin should not look at the social media of her older brother.

'Cause the older brother seems to be A very Anti-view, put it that way, who seems to be taking on Nancy Pelosi and others. Very conservative guy.

So I'm not sure that's going to transfer, that's going to transfer to him, but he was on Fox and Friends over the weekend. He's a dedicated viewer, and he's not a Cubs fan. He's a White Sox fan, like his brother, who happens to be the Pope. Stuart, I would not be surprised if the Pope sat down on Barney and Company. I think this guy is going to be a conversational pope.

I think he's going to be doing interviews. I think he's going to be accessible. I think it's going to be really interesting. Plus, I mean, English is native tongue. How great is that?

Yeah, it's an open invitation. Come and sit on the set here in New York. I'd love to have it. Or on the comfy couch on Fox and Friends. Right.

One of us is going to get it. He could do both. Yeah, he could do both. Very good on the same day. Brian, thanks for joining us.

Go get us soon. Thanks so much.

So that's who we're talking about. I mean, the plane is a distraction. But I don't think it's that interesting. I mean, it's Are you going to get it? It's a beautiful plane.

You're going to use it.

Well, we're going to donate it here, donate it there. I don't know. It's just like the 10th thing, that's the most important thing that's happening right now. But let's talk about on this trip. We already know that they've just signed an economic partnership with exclusive economic partnership with Saudi Arabia that just came across about Trump in the Middle East.

Mark Halpern weighed in last night on what this Middle East trip means and the fact that he picked the Saudis first, cut six. Donald Trump seeks out three things above all else. He seeks out power. News and and money. And all three are on vivid display on every stop of this trip.

You know, he talked about maybe going to Turkey. For if Putin and Zielinski meet, that would be pretty interesting. And this trip is an opportunity to reorient. Away from a relationship the United States has had for decades based around security and energy, oil. And more towards the economy.

And that's what Donald Trump wants to do. He wants to be like a governor going on a trade mission and bring a lot home. Yeah, and I'd also help too that the Saudis, the the Iranians see the Saudis UAE, they see Qatar and they say these are the Gulf, these are the these are the Sunni states, and they're united with a major power behind them.

So that further isolates Iran. If they didn't feel like they lost Hezbollah, Hamas, and Syria in the last 18 months, along with their missile defense and. As long as and by the way, the president lost in a chopper crash. Iran is not in a good stead right now. And I just think we have the opportunity to take out a very unpopular government.

We're not standing in the way of the Israelis for their own. for their own salvation To act and maybe assist them with missile defense, rockets out of the sky. We know what happened the last two times the Iranians did that. They've been totally ineffective because from Jordan, I think even Saudi Arabia, they went out of their way. To knock these rockets out of the sky and limit the type of damage that was done to actually make it negligible, where they suffered a lot more than we thought.

Do this for the Brian Killmeat Show. Make sure you get set for One Nation. I know it's five days away, but it's coming up Sunday at 10 o'clock and features me on the Fox News channel. Don't move. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show.

Brian Kilmead. Hi, everyone. Thanks so much for being here. It's Brian Kill Meet Show coming your direction. Patrick McKee joins us at the bottom of the hour, author of a new book, Apple and China, the capture of the world's greatest company, so appropriate now.

How they started there and how they were in control there and had so much power. And then sooner or later, China realized they had all the leverage and they were also able to steal a lot of the intellectual. uh progress they were making. We were making there, and they were able to catch up to us right away. Lucas Tomilson is traveling with the President of the United States in Saudi Arabia right now, where they just signed a joint.

uh uh a joint understanding of Of economics with each other, the US and Saudi Arabia.

So there is something that they signed and is tangible.

So let's get to the big three. Number three. Guess where we are today, all in on China, it's about 50%, and it's 10% all the world.

So he's doing exactly what he said to get things back to where we need to go. That's Jamison Greer. Tariff Tussle. China's deal comes in, but so many questions remain. Will they actually play ball over the next 90 days as markets soar and Trump sends his team to talk with the EU?

Number two. What is in this bill is delivering for working class Americans. No tax on tips, no tax on overtime, tax relief for seniors. And we're actually going after those elite universities, special interests, and making them held accountable, including illegals as well. Jason Smith, the big beautiful bill accelerates through the House.

What budget battles remain and what Republicans are not on board? We review. Number one. The big home run is getting the runway open for Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords. If not on this trip, then down the road.

Yep, that was you, Ewit. It's a major Middle East track for President Trump, the stakes, the agenda, and how it relates to Gaza, Iran nukes, and Russia-Ukraine ceasefire. And we also have the additional news that the head of Syria is flying into Saudi Arabia to meet with President Trump. I think he's looking to make friends, yes, and I think he wants some aid or lifting of sanctions. He wants to tell everyone I'm not a terrorist anymore.

That's the old me. Listen, I know it's problematic, but we do have some asks from Syria. Number one. Make sure Iran doesn't use your country to transport weapons or anything or people. Number two, kick the Russians out.

They killed half your people anyway. They were bombing them anyway.

Now that you're in power, they propped up Assad anyway with barrel bombs. And now that he's in exile. Kick them out. They're trying to stay there. We need them to give up their port and be out of the Middle East.

Lucas Tomlinson is in the Middle East, joins us now. Lucas, what's the latest from the trip? I understand this joint economic measure of understanding signed between the two countries. It's great to join. Brian Rudy's kicking the tires on Fox and friends.

Good evening from Riyadh. Not only are the Saudis with President Trump and the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, they signed a $600 billion. Just so our listeners could get that, maybe turn up the radio, $600 billion deal with the United States to invest Saudi money into the United States. And it includes Brian. Largest arms deal in history, nearly $142 billion to upgrade the Saudi forces.

And that money will be spread across 12 American defense companies bringing jobs to the United States.

So that's a big win for President Trump. It was a lavish reception when the president arrived here in Riyadh this morning. The Saudi Crown Prince was on the ramp, right on the stairs when President Trump exited Air Force One. He received a Saudi fighter escort en route to Riyadh. There was the Crown Prince, much different than when Joe Biden visited here during the midterms in 2022, as you remember, did that fist bump.

And of course, Biden called the Crown Prince a pariah. What this is is going back, reset, if you will, going back to the first Trump term. Remember, Saudi Arabia was the first visit that President Trump visited eight years ago during his first term. And when President Trump went back to the White House, his first call to a foreign leader, you guessed it, the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

So a lot of business deals are going on here, Brian. Business is on the agenda. And you mentioned actually the Brett Baer scoop just moments ago on air. President Trump will meet a serious new president tomorrow morning here in Riyadh, which is big. This is a Sunni leader.

And after the Assad regime fell, there's a lot of people in the intelligence community who think the United States needs to engage this man. You mentioned some of the problems. Yes, he's a former terrorist. Yes, that's a problem. I know some people are laughing, man, and driving on right now.

But here's the situation. Not only do you want to keep the Russian Out. They still operate two bases in Syria, but you want to keep the Iranians out. Remember, the Israelis crushed. The Iranian forces in Syria.

But when Alzheimer's regime is gone, this is time for a reset in their region. It's really a major opportunity that a lot of people want President Trump to take advantage of. And there's been some sweeteners. How about Trump Tower in Damascus? How about more trade agreements with Syria?

Bring them into our fold again. Keep Iran out. Just like here in Saudi Arabia, the real politic on the ground. People are looking for George Washington, frankly, James Madison, other founders. Wake up.

This is real politic, Brian, right? You need to keep these leaders on side. President Trump is here in Saudi Arabia doing these deals, so it's not China. Right. And by the way, some of the CEOs that are there: Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Larry Fink, Jane Frazier of Citigroup, Google CEO, the Jane Frazier, the CEO.

After Fortune 500 here. Yeah, also the CEO of IBM and Boeing, as well as NVIDIA. They're all there. They're looking to do deals. They just don't want to, they're just not flying over to see Saudi Arabia at 110 degrees.

It's not the time to visit unless you're looking to do business, Amazon CEO, as well, as you mentioned.

So we'll see where that goes. About how the president's visiting and what it's about. Aaron Cohen from a former special ops veteran, Israeli, said this about the perspective of the Middle East of Trump's visit, cut three. Trump is walking into the Middle East, in my opinion, like a wartime CEO. I've said this before multiple times.

He speaks the language of the Middle East. I believe that Trump understands that peace Is a transactional business. You know, it's not some UN fantasy. And Trump understands that better than Biden ever did.

So it's about oil, it's about security, and it's about aligning the Arab world, in my opinion, closer to the U.S. to counter Iran and China. And I think he's going to roll that out like the absolute leader that he is, and it's something that Biden couldn't touch. You agree? That's what officials here on the ground are saying, Brian, that's the real politic.

If the United States is not here engaging on the ground with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, of course, the president's also going to Qatar and United Arab Emirates. The Emiratis are talking about investing $1.4 trillion in America in the next decade. But beyond the business, at your point, your question, the United States needs to be here, so our adversaries are not here. Keep the Chinese out, keep the Russians out. Look at it.

The Saudis have been flirting with enriching uranium, building nuclear reactors. They want United States firms to help them do that. Of course, Iran would like a word. They are, of course, enriching uranium, spinning those tubes. The Trump foreign policy states very clearly: Iran does not have the right to enrich or not take nuclear weapons.

Something hanging over this visit, though. The Iranian foreign minister visited Saudi Arabia over the weekend. We don't know exactly what they said.

However, it is notable, Brian, that just last month, Saudi Defense Minister visited Iran. It's the first visit by a member of the Saudi royal family to Iran in decades.

So it does feel like there's a little reprochma, and that goes back a few years. You know, the Chinese tried to broker talks. They did broker talks between the Iranians and the Saudis.

So again, it's more critical that President Trump is here. make sure that U.S. influence is here in the region and also to solidify this relationship. I hear you. And in terms of the other thing that's happening, it's going to be Qatar, UAE, and maybe a visit over to Turkey where we understand.

The one of the Curtis so-called terror groups, that's how the Turkey views him, has broken up.

So they said that they no longer will be battling Turkey for their rights. And I hope the Kurds are to have security because I know the Turks want to wipe them out, but I hope the Kurds are able because they've been pretty loyal to us. Do you think we had anything to do with this? It's all part of it, Brian. The PKK, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, has been an insurgent group inside Turkey going back decades.

It's been a real threat to the Turks. Turkey's a major ally, of course, a NATO ally. The United States has nuclear weapons in Turkey, Brian, an Interlake Airbase. It is very important also to keep Turkey on its side. I think they can help the Trump administration with Syria.

Of course, these are all former Ottoman lands. You don't need to go to all the history, but that's why Turkey wants a seat at the table with these discussions. That's why Turkey is offering to host these meetings. By the way, the prediction here, I don't see President Putin going to Istanbul to meet Zelensky. And Zelensky says if Putin doesn't show up, he's not going to go.

So while some lower-level meetings could happen, President Trump has dispatched the Secretary of State Marco Lubio to Turkey, and he's already going there for some NATO ministerial meetings. I'm not seeing the big meeting between Putin and Zelensky, which would keep President Trump here in the region. And dear the Emiratis, you're about to dole out $1.4 trillion to the United States. They probably would like to do that in person. Don't you think Brian might be?

But back to your point about the PKK. Yes. Now, one of the things that angered the Turks are many years during the ISIS war, you know, is their sister group, the YPG, not going to this alphabet soup of Curtis Miller. Groups, like the Kurds, the Syrian Kurds, the U.S. military that President Trump wanted to partner with to destroy ISIS in Syria.

They are aligned with the PKK. They're longtime Marxist Leninist Marxist group. That'll be interesting to see how that pans out in Syria. But remember, the Kurds are a very small population in Syria. This is a Sunni country.

And that's why having a Sunni leader there is ripe for this opportunity for President Trump to meet the Sunni leader. Again, just a footstep on this. If we want to keep Iran out and we want to try to kick the Russians out of Syria. Yeah, we'll have to see. Have you heard anything about an additional hostage release in Gaza?

Nothing, Brian, not this time. Certainly huge news. President Trump came here with some big headwinds. You have the last living American hostage, Yadan Alexander, 21-year-old from New Jersey, a lone soldier. He did not have immediate family in Israel, but there he was fighting with the Galani Brigade, an elite infantry unit.

He was taken captive on October 7th, and had been held for over a year and a half, 584 days. Incredible news for President Trump. It is interesting, though, Brian, of course, the Qataris are part of these negotiations. We're dealing with Hamas. You have to deal with the Qataris.

The Qataris have funded Hamas in the past. Steve Woodcoff, obviously, involved. And there might be some concernation that you just won this town, the American, the last living American hostage. But that also goes into this other little dangle, if you will, if they call it an intelligence from the world, the Qataris offering this 747 jet to President Trump. You know, Boeing's been slow on their contract with the new Air Force One.

Well, President Trump is looking to receive this with the Department of Defense. You know, of course, some people worry about Trojan horses. You know, the Trojan horse, do you accept this? But it is notable, Brian, you know, a little bit different, but FDR was the first American president to meet with the Saudi king, King Abdul Aziz, and he gifted the Saudi king with D2-3, an airliner, to kickstart the Saudi airlines.

So some of the airline diplomacy goes back decades. Yep, Lucas Thomas doing a great job covering the president. He's going to be going at least three stops and be back by Friday. Lucas, thanks so much. That's Lucas Downs.

You got it. And Lucas joined us and did a great job for four hours this morning on Fox and Friends.

So I appreciate to be able to join us again on a burner phone. We're going to come back and take some calls when we get back. 1-866-408. 7669. Or you can write me briankillme.com.

We'll get to your comments. Patrick McGee is going to join us at the bottom of the hour. Apple in China. We'll also get his take on this deal that brings us, I guess, back in business with China to a degree. Don't move.

Learning something new every day on the Brian Killmead Show. The talk show that's getting you talking. You're with Brian Kilmead. I mean, I'll tell you a story. A friend of mine is a businessman, very, very, very top guy.

Most of you would have heard of him. A highly neurotic, brilliant businessman, seriously overweight. That took a turn. Top guy, brilliant. You know him, famous, bit of a chubbs.

Anyway, I'm sure public press coverage is a rough way for this guy to find out. That he is saved in Trump's phone as neurotic fat friend. But what else can you tell us about this friend who's a very famous, successful businessman? A highly neurotic, brilliant businessman, seriously overweight, and he takes the fat, the fat shot drug. The fat shot?

Do you really? Read any of your briefings? He takes the fat shot. You don't own a fat shot. I got another friend, brilliant, real estate mogul.

He takes the dick stiff bills. This guy takes the fat shot. This guy thinks the Nickstiff films. I'm sorry, continue the story about this fat f ⁇ of a friend of yours. And he called me up.

And he said, uh President, could I ask you a question? I'm in London. And I just paid for this damn fat drug I take. I said, it's not working. Yo, Rickles, that is ice cold.

Your friend is like opening up, like, oh, I took this bad drug. He's like, he's not worried. He's like, I'm trying. It's poor guy. He's just catching strays in the middle of a presidential press conference.

Trump's talking about drug pricing reform, and he's like, hey, when this guy goes to the hospital, the nurse gives him 50 cc's of Crisco. He's fat. Hey, my friend, he's very successful, went to London, and when they saw him, they changed the name of Big Ben to just Ben, because this guy's fat. Pretty pretty hysterical, right? It's so funny.

Yeah, I mean, i he's so good. Uh obviously he's having fun with Trump, but it's not nearly as bad as the other guys. Uh but and he did point out that he liked the pharmaceutical thing. Absolutely. But here's what I want investigative journalists of America and the world to do.

Who is his friend? Time to use your sources and dig deep into it.

Well, I mean, he had a few friends that died during the pandemic. We never found out who those were either. Because I got him for our friends, rich guys, they just died. You know, they weren't in very good shape. But.

Anyway, it would be nice to the neurotic fat friend.

So that was that was Jon Stewart last night. He was pretty outraged. Again, he focused on the plane. CNN focused. Caitlin Collins asked Congressman McCormick the same question Six times?

And he's like, I really don't have an opinion. We'll find out. Congress said, Oh, Congress said it's Congressman.

Okay, no, it isn't, whatever. Let's move on. He goes, Really? Are you still asking me this?

So, I mean, it's not like she's doing well. She's getting a 0.6.

So it's not like I gotta keep this up. You know, the same so just Somewhat balanced. The guy on that channel that gets it is Mike Smirkanish. I listen to his show every week. He's only one hour a week.

Yeah, one hour a week. You know, obviously, I don't think he would vote for Trump, but I, you know, he's. Going back and forth. To me, that's pretty. It's an interesting show.

My take is a little different on the plane. I think it's an issue that's pretty simple and. Like black and white, and like the American people can make a decision pretty quickly. It's not one of those more complex, like Washington procedural issues.

So, I think a lot of people can have an opinion on it. 'Cause it's something so sort of commonplace. Do you get a free plane or not? Yes or no? $400 million it is.

So we get it for free. Palace in the sky. Yeah, but yeah, the other, yeah, well, we'll see. Even if it came from France. Besides Statue of Liberty, which we did get for free, right?

We can't fly around in it. But that's just standing there. Like, yeah, we're not exactly. It's a gift. That's clearly a gift.

Yes. Right. And we didn't own it. We just put it on an island. We're not getting services from the Statue of Liberty.

We just get to admire it. By the way, how great is that? that we had an island to put the statue on. I would love to win it when that decision. That's a good well, we might be doing a shoot there.

Like, how did we decide on that island? Right. You're right. I should, I did do a shoot there before. And I didn't ask that question.

I didn't fail to answer. Thank you for that. No, but I'm saying, like. I was thinking about it. Yeah, and I think you have to pack a question.

Right. So. Yeah, it's right next to Alice Island if you haven't been to New York. There's a Statue of Liberty right there. But I was fascinated by the trip and I got in the torch and now Doug Bergam is Interior Secretary and we'll have Ryan Zinke going to be on again.

He was the Interior Secretary. He gets us into all types of great places.

So we can't wait to go back to the Statue of Liberty. You probably haven't been there since in grade school, or if you didn't live in New York or the area, you probably never were there. Patrick McKee is next, author of the new book, Apple and China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company. We'll bring you the latest from overseas. Brian Kilmicho, so glad you're here.

He's so busy, he'll make your head spin. It's Brian Killmead. I spoke to Tim Cook this morning, and he's gonna, I think, even up. is uh His number is $500 billion. He's going to.

be building a lot of plants in the United States for Apple. And we look forward to that. I really do look forward to that. Is that in fact going to be the case? Patrick McGee joins us now, author of a brand new book, Apple and China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company.

Patrick, welcome. Do you expect to see a lot of factories in America? No, total nonsense.

So this announcement that Trump is referring to was Apple said in February they would be spending or investing $500 billion in America over the next four years. If that were the case, we would be seeing job announcements for engineers needed here, there, everywhere in probably twelve or thirty different states. None of this is happening, okay? If you go through the press release and just like read it as if you are skeptical of this company's claims and you did some back-of-the-envelope math, there's only four things that are announced, okay? Like some data centers and stuff.

On a generous estimate, you might get to $50 billion of investment. You are not getting anywhere close to $500 billion. And when investment banks like UBS try to do the math, they don't know how Apple's doing it either. I have a theory, and it's only that. But the theory is that Apple is counting buybacks and dividends as investments in America.

And if you understand that, if I'm correct about that, and I feel pretty confident because I don't know how the math gets there otherwise, Apple spends more than $100 billion purchasing its own shares each year.

So, multiply that by four for four years, you're getting to 400 billion, right? Plus, if there's any growth, you're probably getting closer to 430, maybe 450 billion. And that is sort of an investment in America in the sense that shareholders live in America and they're getting money from Apple. I think that's what Apple's counting.

So, this is not about building factories. This is about some hand-waving, public attention-seeking, telling Trump they're going to make these biggest investments. But they never specifically say that $500 billion is about that. They allude to it in a way that was heavily lawyered before anyone got to read it. And I just hope there's somebody smart enough of the Trump administration to say, let's back up.

Explain to me what exactly you're doing. We'll see. But the announcement was in February, and Trump's talking about it today. I hadn't even seen that clip. I think this must have just happened.

So I think that tells you that. It was yesterday.

Okay, but I think it tells you the wool has been put over the Trump administration's eyes. President, speaking right now, for the first time since arriving in Saudi Arabia about 12 hours ago.

So tell me about what you discovered. You wanted to find out how Apple ended up.

So ingrained in China. It didn't start out that way in terms of their production. No, and I give a really broad history of how Apple gets into outsourcing at all, because people of a certain age will remember Apple used to make their own computers, right? Founded by two Steve's in a garage in 1976. The ethos back then was that you build your own stuff, right?

Steve Wozniak, like literally hand-built the computer. Steve, you know, one of the first employees was Steve Jobs' pregnant sister, who was literally building circuit boards by hand. What happens is in the 1980s and the 1990s, what you might call like the American Preempors of Foxconn, contract manufacturers, begin to take over for the likes of IBM, and they're building and badging these PCs. Apple, in a sense, is the last holdout. And by not going the outsourcing model, by not taking the offshoring model, they're basically days away from bankruptcy in 1996.

And they throw this Hail Mary pass, they bring back Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs meets Johnny Ive, this esteemed designer, and they come out with the candy-colored iMac, right? The first one was called the Bondi Blue iMac. And at this point, Apple is beginning to move away from manufacturing itself. And that computer is manufactured by LG, the Korean company.

And when it does extremely well, it becomes America's best-selling computer. They start building that in three continents because that's how Apple used to run things themselves.

So LG actually expanded to Mexico and to Wales. And then Foxconn, a company that people associate with Apple and iPhones, comes on board for the first real first time in 2000, and they adopt the three-continent strategy.

So they begin building things in China, but also in the Czech Republic and also in Fullerton. California. And part of the reason that they separated it, is it because supply chain reasons? Because they didn't want to be too dependent on any one region. Was it accessibility?

Was shipping not as advanced as it was like today? Yeah, I mean, Moore's Law really made things smaller and smaller, right?

So the reason why you don't have an offshoring model in the 1980s is because you're just coming off of the whole era when a computer was the size of a garage, right? You were never going to build a computer in Asia and ship it over the high seas, let alone put it in an airplane. But Moore's Law makes things smaller and smaller.

So once you're getting to laptops, especially iPods and of course iPhones, it makes more and more sense to have something in other countries. And because free trade does so well in the early 21st century, you no longer have to have that triple continent strategy because essentially we have tariff-free trading across the continents. And so it begins to make sense once China enters the WTO to consolidate in one place. And there's no better place to consolidate if you're looking at costs than a place that suppresses the currency, treats workers really poorly, and has 1.5 billion people. China.

Yes. So you do it. And in the beginning, they were just one of many, then they become one of one. And the beginning, how did it start? It seems like Apple is just benefiting big time for cheap labor and for the incentives to build there, right?

So here's where my book I think gets really novel. In the early 2000s, China doesn't have anything to offer. They have people and they have low wages, and they will build factories like nobody's business, right? By the time a factory is complete, if it were being done in America at the same time, we'd still be doing the environmental paperwork.

So the factories are going up at record speed in China, but there's no tech competence there.

So Apple literally begins flying America's best engineers.

So think of people that work at Apple. They come out of Caltech, they come out of Stanford, they come out of MIT, they're hired from Dell, Motorola, SpaceX, Tesla, if we're fast-forwarding a little bit. These are America's best engineers. And on day one, they're told, here's your flight to China. And I mean, they're doing this to such a degree that United in 2013 begins flying to Chengdu.

It becomes the longest flight on the globe for United, just because Apple's able to. say we will fill so many First-class seats, that even if the rest of the plane is empty three times a week, you'll be making money. And they do the same thing for Hangzhou, just outside of Shanghai, two years later. I mean, so Apple is this enormous client of the United States.

So, our smartest people is sending them to China to teach them how to build these Apple products. Teach, teach, teach. And the numbers are extraordinary.

So, since 2008, the number of Chinese workers that Apple has trained is 28 million. Oh my goodness. That is larger than the workforce in California. And I got internal documents that by 2015, when Apple was sort of fearing that it would be blacklisted in the country, they sort of had to flip the script and begin to speak the local language in Beijing, understand how they could see, be more receptive, because Beijing at the time thought of Apple as this exploitative power for reasons that we can get into. And so Apple sort of does its own study of its supply chain and realizes: oh, we're investing $55 billion a year in China.

And it's worth knowing: this investment doesn't include the cost of the components or the bill of materials of any of their products. This is the wages of having 3 million people assembling Apple products, the training costs, and they're spending billions of dollars on machinery that they put in their suppliers' factories, right?

So it's not that Apple just trains people so that the supplier can work beyond their perceived capacities, it's that they're installing world-class machinery and tooling. I think something like a CNC machine, if the audience has heard of that, and then allowing them to. Execute on plans and in volumes and at a level of quality that they otherwise would have no ability to do.

So we're training engineers, we're building this company, it becomes one of the top companies in the world, and almost all the manufacturing comes from China. At what point does the relationship change from China's so glad to have Apple there, where China realizes it's got the power over this company?

So I think Apple really thinks they're wearing the pants in the early 2000s. No, in the two thousands. And this is sort of a period of weak leadership in China.

So the president of the time is Hu Jin Chao, and he's nicknamed the Lady with Bound Feet. And it's really like a multinational playground decade. What happens is the Communist Party appoints Xi Jinping in late 2012, the authoritarian ruler for life that's still dictator there now. And he really puts Apple in a defensive position within 24 hours of being named president in March 2013.

So Apple is immediately fearful that their products could be blacklisted. Not an idle threat in a country that doesn't have Facebook or Google, right, has already blacklisted these companies. And so Apple begins this multi- Tiered, multi-pronged effort to have for the first time senior people living in the country, vice presidents living in the country. There's eight people in particular that call themselves the Gang of Eight. The book reveals this for the first time.

And these eight people begin to think about how are we contributing to China? How can we begin speaking to the government so they stop putting up obstacles in our development? And so that's when their fortunes really get tied together. And then once they're that bound, Beijing starts doing things like, you know what, we don't want the New York Times app on the app store in China. And you know what?

We're not so fond of our our own citizens sort of skirting the firewall by using VPNs.

So why don't you delete those? And Apple gets rid of 670 VPNs in the country, effectively cutting off all Chinese users using the iPhone from the open and free internet and putting them in the Chinese version of it. When did Steve Jobs die? 2011.

So he saw the beginning of this.

So he never went to China, which is interesting. He really cared about manufacturing in the 80s and 90s, and yet he never, never went to China to see what was going on there. But the key figure is Tim Cook, who comes out of IBM and Compaq, and he's this operations guru. He's named Senior Vice President of Operations in 1998. He does so well that he becomes chief operating officer in 2005.

And by the time Steve Jobs dies, there's no question that Tim Cook is going to be the person that takes the case. And he cuts these deals. I mean, the buck stops with him.

So, look, put it this way: Apple has built the most efficient supply chain in the world. If you had to give credit to one person, you would say Tim Cook. If you take my stance, which is that this is also deeply problematic and has national security implications, then the buck still stops with Tim Cook. And to prove your stance is right, how many, since we have part of the Chinese manufacturing lore is that you have to give up your intellectual property, correct? Yes.

Yeah. So, any type of technology and advances that the iPhone was making, China would not only have to build that phone, they could build their own phone, couldn't they? Yeah, so there are hundreds of factories in China that play some role building the iPhone, right? Whether it's refining the raw materials that are needed, multiple tiers. And in all of them, Apple is training people to invent the next components and not only invent the components, but invent the machinery behind the production line that builds those components.

Do they? Oh, they absolutely do.

So, this is what's not known about Apple at all.

So, you know, everyone knows Johnny Ive, and he's the person. Person creating the look and feel, the substance of what an iPod or something will look like. He's a designer. That's ID. That's the top of the pyramid, okay?

Industrial design. The next part of the pyramid is product design or PD. These are also geniuses, but these are people that have to work with what Johnny has given them and think, okay, how can we get all the electronics into this thing to make it work? Because Johnny is godlike at the company, right? He's not there anymore, but I'm talking historically.

So you had to respond to what he had to do, and a totally different skill set in order to do that.

Now, the people that I like best, and nobody knows about them, is manufacturing design. They're the people who then take what PD has given them and they have to go to China to basically work with these suppliers to invent or co-invent not just the parts, but the processes behind the parts to make this all happening.

Now, what's fascinating about this is that. There is just technology transfer engendered in this process.

So if you are hand-holding millions of employees in China figuring out how to build all this stuff, what do they do with the skills? It's common sense. They begin to supply Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, Xiaome.

So Apple actually has these Chinese phone makers that maybe you and your audience haven't heard of because you can't go down to a local Verizon and pick these phones up. But they have 70, 80% market share in countries like Russia, Indonesia, Southeast Asia.

So globally, those four companies basically have one out of two all smartphones in the world.

So there's an enormous technology transfer and there's an enormous birth of the smartphone market that takes place in China. One other thing that's sort of fascinating, Apple, Basically, it encourages to its suppliers. It says, go forth and multiply, right? Because we don't want you so dependent on us that with our wild designs, if we go in a different direction one year and you're building 100 million of these things, you're going to go bankrupt if we've obviated the need for that component.

So they say, don't get more than 50% dependent on our revenue.

So go grow as quickly with somebody else as you're growing with us.

Well, what do you do with that skill set? You go to the Android universe. I mean, what's small-time thinking, too? I mean, I guess why would you try to say, whatever you do, it's almost an arrogance. Whatever you do, you're not going to be able to do it better than me.

So you can go start your own little phone company. But the bottom line is they've taken it and they've improved on it. I would even go further than that, which is that Thomas Friedman just went to China for the first time in five years, wasn't able to go there because of COVID. And he said one of the biggest things that has changed is the phone companies from five years ago are now car companies. Guabe makes cars, Foxconn's making cars, Xiaome is making cars.

Well, what's an EV? It's a smartphone on wheels.

So you've taken the skill sets that Apple has trained for the last quarter century, and now they're building EVs that are so good. that you know never mind Trump Biden Biden's not the tariff guy. Biden had to put 100% tariffs on these Chinese EVs because China is just absolutely dominant. Because they made them so small. I mean, they made them so cheap, too.

So now are they floating the European markets?

So I want to say yes to the cheap, but we've left the stage where China is just good at imitations and selling them at a cheap rate.

So the best phone that you can buy in the world right now is the Huawei Mate XT. It is not cheap. It is a $2,800 phone. And the virtue of the phone, the key attribute that it has that Apple's not close to having, is that it's a little bit thicker than an iPhone, and then it unfolds twice.

So it's a tri-fold phone. And when it's unfolded, it's 10.2 inches.

So it's about the size of a standard iPad. And it's thinner than the iPad Pro, which Apple's marketing line is the thinnest Apple product ever.

So Huawei is not only designing and shipping things that Apple can't compete with, but they're doing it today. And Apple's hopefully having something like that in 2027, 28. Patrick McGee is here for a few more minutes. Actually, I'll take a few more minutes, a couple of more minutes out. Apple's in a tough spot now.

I mean, please tell me where you don't think they're ever going to be able to get out of this country manufacturing-wise, right? Because there was a report that India is going to be producing the majority of the Apple iPhone, and you laughed that off before we started this segment. Yeah, if there's honestly one thing I would try to convey to the audience, it's that these are stories that are being orchestrated by Apple, okay? What they're moving to India is assembly. They're not moving the full breadth and depth of the manufacturing supply chain.

So let's just say hypothetically that it takes 1,000 steps to make an iPhone. The final step is now going to be done in India.

So hooray, that is enough for a quote-unquote substantive change to the product and allows you to put Made in India on the box. Any phone you buy that says Made in India is no less dependent on the China-centric supply chain than any iPhone you've ever seen.

So the Apple wants you to think it's moving. Absolutely. But the thing is, not only do they know that it's. Not correct, Beijing knows that it's not correct.

So it's not a threat to Beijing because Beijing knows absolutely how they build iPhones and they know that this isn't a threat.

So it's sort of like it makes everybody happy and it probably should keep some costs down and it does avoid tariffs. But if we're concerned that China knows how to do all of this stuff and that we're uparming them on an annual basis, It's working for everybody but us. Patrick, congratulations on this book. Certainly be a bestseller. Patrick McGee, Apple in China, The Capture of the World's Greatest Company.

Great job, Patrick. Thanks so much.

It's scary, but it's good. Yeah, I'm not optimistic, and I wish I was, but it wouldn't be a compelling book if there was an easy way out. True. Back in a moment. Diving deep into today's top stories, it's Brian Kilmead.

Information you want, truth you demand. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. Renamed the Gulf of Mexico into the Gulf of America. That was very popular, other than perhaps with Mexico. And most importantly for the people of this room, the days of economic misery under the last administration are rapidly giving way to the greatest economy in the history of the world.

We are rocking. The United States is the hottest country, with the exception of your country, I have to say, right? I won't, I'm not going to take that on. No, Muhammad, I'm not going to take that on. Wouldn't that be a terrible thing if I made that full statement?

But I will not do it, you're hotter. At least as long as I'm up here, you're hot. President of the United States having a great time in Saudi Arabia, speaking for the first time formally, he had some comments. It's not like the Oval Office where he goes on for an hour with leaders right next to him, but he did speak and we did capture some of it, just how pleased he is about the economic development partnership. And he says we really like each other with the Prince.

And they're talking about an economic relationship and a military relationship. And what I'm most encouraged by, I did not know this, is that we've worked out a military partnership, but they're going to spread the contracts over to six different contractors in order to pick up the pace because we're not delivering Ukraine fast enough for Taiwan, but it looks like they managed to work it through when it comes to Saudi Arabia. All right, don't forget my tour dates: History Livery Laps in Dayton, Ohio, June 21st, September 27th, Richmond, Virginia, and August 23rd in Dallas, Texas. Go to BrianKillMead.com on stage. It is a blast.

I can't wait to meet you in person. Keep it here. I'm Dana Perino. This week on Perino on Politics, I'm joined by former GOP strategist and host of the Rich Zioli show, Rich Zioli himself. Listen and follow now at FoxNewsPodcast.com.

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