Where are we headed on this?

Well, the belief, of course, is that Xi was going to come to Washington and his brief state visit to Washington this month, cap in hand, basically having to acknowledge the global supremacy of the United States.

Well, that has, over the past couple of months, been watered down to the fact that we're looking at a meeting between Xi and Trump, which neither president really is looking forward to.

They have to do it to show that there is some continuity of contact.

Indeed, the Communist Party of China has basically made this a condition of Xi that he has to start to rebuild a trading relationship with the United States, ideally diminishing the tariffs which the United States has placed on the People's Republic of China.

But what has happened, of course, is that the stagnation in the U.S.-Iran war Basically, which we'll talk about, I think, shortly, but the reality is that the U.S. appears to have lost its momentum, lost its way in the war against Iran.

And this has given Beijing absolutely a great incentive, a new incentive.

Can we blame the general staff? Good evening, Gregory.

Is that all correct? Good day to you.

Good day, John.

Yes, indeed it is.

In fact, the Queen of Sheba, her son Menelik, who was born from her union, from the Queen of Sheba's union with Israel, King Solomon when she visited Jerusalem.

So basically Menelik brought back with him a whole lot of the senior, well, the firstborn sons of the key men, Israeli or Jewish families from Jerusalem back to the Sabine Kingdom and then across into the part of the Sabine Kingdom, which is now Ethiopia.

So that's why Ethiopia itself also became Jewish until about the fourth century AD.

or the fourth or fifth century A.D.

How does the empire respond to this? Thank you.

I stop there to say, what do we need to know about the Mutawakkilite kingdom of Yemen that today is now nascent inside of these battling forces? Good day to you, Gregory.

John, it's great to be with you.

Well, the Mughal-Wahilite Kingdom of Yemen emerged in 1918, literally at the end of World War I, with the overthrow of the Turks, who had been the successor state to the Ottoman Empire.

But you can go back even further.

I mean, if you look at what's now the northern part of Yemen, this was the great kingdom of the Sabines, the queen of Sabah, or the queen of Sheba, as we recall her, 500 B.C., thereabouts.

And you had them... as a combined kingdom which dominated both sides of the Red Sea, and it's now modern Ethiopia.

So it's got an incredibly complex history going back.

Do I understand that correctly, Gregory, that they have no way out right now because the Saudis want them extinct?

I stopped there to say, what do we need to know about the Mutawakkilite kingdom of Yemen that today is now nascent inside of these battling forces? Good day to you, Gregory.

John, it's great to be with you.

Well, the Mughal-Wahili Kingdom of Yemen emerged in 1918, literally at the end of World War I, with the overthrow of the Turks, who had been the successor state to the Ottoman Empire.

go back even further.

I mean, if you look at what's now the northern part of Yemen, this was the great kingdom of the Sabine, the queen of Sabah, or the queen of Sheba, as we recall her, you know, 500 B.C., thereabouts.

And you had them... a combined kingdom which dominated both sides of the Red Sea, and it's now modern Ethiopia.

So it's got an incredibly complex history going back.

Do I understand that correctly, Gregory, that they have no way out right now because the Saudis want them extinct?

Is it possible in your measure?

Well, it's definitely possible, although the problem is that if you've got those assurances for Ukraine...

President Zelensky would probably then find that he has no leverage left to stay on in power.

Already, bear in mind that he's not serving legitimately as an elected president of Ukraine.

The time for new elections has come and gone, and they were not held.

They've been postponed because of the war.

well and good.

Is this a positive development?

Good

evening, Gaius.

There are, as always, many levels here that need to be uncovered.

And one of those levels is the motivation for the emperor, the American emperor, to send Not a delegation, but I would use the old 18th, early 19th century term, embassy to Moscow.

It's an embassy in the sense that it is meant to convey a message.

It's not really there to negotiate.

Those men are not capable of negotiation and the Russians don't take them seriously and wouldn't believe anything they would say in an actual back and forth kind of exchange.

That does include Odessa, if you're traditional.

Gregory, what is it and what is its mission? Good evening to you.

Good evening, John.

Well, the Pacific Islands Forum is a gathering of 18 of the regional states, particularly in the South Pacific, including Australia and New Zealand, who are both South Pacific countries, but basically anchored on Fiji because that's the largest of the island economies and political circles.

So they're meeting in Palau where they meet in a different member country each year.

This year, it's Palau.

And they started the meeting there yesterday or actually on the 30th local time.

And they're going for until September the 4th.

Well,

Good evening to you, Gregory.

Well, good evening, John.

Yes, we have to ask whether this has any real strategic meaning other than, if you like, signaling from the White House that the United States is not letting the Iran issue go.

The reality is that the United States is now in a very frustrating position where it can't do anything because it didn't plan for a follow-on operation after the initial military plans against Iran began a few months ago.

So basically the U.S. is looking frustrated, angry, like a petulant child, stamping and saying they are going to do great things to damage Iran and all those who support Iran.

Well...

For a start, they can't do much more to any of the countries which trade regularly with Iran.

Is it time to get it up? Can it get up?

Gregory, has Australia made contact with the adversary of the moment, China? Is Australia ready to take China on? Good day to you.

Good day, John.

Well, of course, as always, it's never that simple.

Yes, Australia and its defence forces are technically and positionally capable of tackling China.

the People's Liberation Army, whatever its projection form is.

Clearly, Australia doesn't have the full resources necessary to defeat a large People's Liberation Army offensive.

On the other hand, China doesn't have the capacity to to have a major thrust against Australia like the Japanese did in World War II.

Are they capable? What is your opinion of the Houthis as a threat to the Babamandev?

Is this a defensive pact that they're backing? They're worried about who's got their back? Or is this a way of saying no matter who comes out in the Iran-American war, we're the power in the region? Good evening to you.

Good evening, John.

Well, it's a bit of everything.

For Turkey, for example, it is definitely an offensive pact, one to expand Turkey's influence and interest in the region, particularly in the old Ottoman Empire areas such as Lebanon, Syria, and Israel as well, if they can do it, and so on.

The For the others, it's slightly defensive.

It's not really a viable military pact yet in that they do not have an interactive military or intelligence capability.

It is definitely in many ways addressing Iran from the three countries' separate perspectives because they do regard Iran as the big ally alien power in the region.

Gregory, are the countries that are going to participate in the Europe-Asia trade or the Eurasian trade, are they willing participants or is everybody kicking sand and saying if it was only the good old days?

What does it see in this word stuck between the U.S. and Iran?

Well, I think we should preface everything by saying people have... intractable views on things until their wife gets home, and then things start to change, reality hits.

So the other thing is American audiences, of course, like black and white answers to things.

They want to see things in very clear terms, and nothing about this is clear.

This is why you keep me on late at night, because they're looking to the people who are listening to the gray areas.

But what does Russia want? Russia had developed quite successfully an integrated plan called the International North-South Transport Corridor, which started with a terminus in St.

Petersburg, up in the northwest of Russia.

What's happened in between? Thank you.

Is there more that he can do, Gregory? Can the King speak to the troubles that the country is experiencing because of lack of growth?

Well, yes.

In fact, it's not what the King can do for Prime Minister Andy Burnham.

That's never been his role to support the Prime Minister.

It's always been to act in the interest of the country as a whole.

absent political parties.

So he's definitely not in a position to or desirous of supporting Andy Burnham as the embattled Labour Prime Minister.

You think Burnham is aware of the fact that he's no more welcome now than Mr. Murr was before?

What does he look like without Mr. Trump, who's hosting him later this year?

Well, that's that's the interesting thing.

And that I've just written a piece for The Epoch Times.

What if she outlasts Trump? But to get to the initial point, that rocket launch, that submarine launch, ballistic missile launch earlier this month.

was part of the preparation for the Xi state visit to the United States.

The PRC, and Xi Jinping particularly, has to look strong and implacable as he goes into this meeting with Trump, knowing, as he does, that...

the outcome of that summit, if you like, will impact his survival rate back home.

Did he know that Trump would know that?

They're struggling and they're not at fault.

Well, that's the big problem, the human dimension of this.

The Cuban people have been suffering for decades, but increasingly over the past couple of years, as the Cuban economy collapses, as key supporters like Venezuela supporting Cuba at the behest of Beijing and of Moscow and so on, as that's now gone out of the question.

So the, the Cuban economy and the lives of, uh, the Cuban population is deteriorating dramatically.

So the, the question for the United States is, does it move to increase pressure on, uh, president Miguel Diaz-Canel, uh, and Raul Castro's team, uh, so that things collapse quickly, or does it allow the Cuban economy to collapse and declare defeat? Um, There are arguments for and against both.

The question is, though, will the core of the leadership voluntarily go somewhere else? Will they abdicate and get protection somewhere? We don't know to what extent they've been offered any kind of safe haven.

So that's the key.

30 seconds, Gregory, 30 seconds.

To your knowledge, is there forced labor anywhere in Australia? What would it look like? Good evening to you.

Good evening, John.

Well, I do remember the era of forced labour in Australia.

It was when my father made me get out of bed in the morning and go and get a job.

But that was as far as it went.

The reality is that President Trump has imposed these tariffs on a broad range of countries using this excuse that there has been a component of forced labour in the products exported to the United States.

Now, that's pretty thin on the ground, and certainly it doesn't apply to Australia, which, as you have pointed out, and even as Prime Minister Albanese has pointed out it doesn't apply to Australia.

How is it played in Australia?

What is the purpose of the king in this part of the constitutional monarchy? What does he represent to the PM? What does he say to the PM?

He represents the nation, and the crown represents the nation itself.

historical, all of the people's, regardless of beliefs, regardless of their geography or geographic dispersal.

So, basically, it's one thing for Parliament to say, here's our leader in Parliament, and he's duly elected by the public, and, you know, please accept him as the new head of government.

The king, just as any government in the United States, needs to be blessed by certain ceremonies to ensure that it meets constitutional norms, has to have some ratification.

And the king calling upon an individual to form a government is partially the... fact that the the parliament itself or the largest body within parliament in this case in britain the labour party uh has decided upon a new leader uh and they put him forward and the king basically says okay i see where this is going uh so i'll call on that man to form a a new government which is what he did of course with andy burnham the reality was that andy burnham was not elected as to the leadership of the labour party It was more or less a pronunciamento, a consensus which said, OK, he's the one who we brought in through a special by-election to fill a gap in Parliament.

And he's the guy who's going to take over from Sir Keir Starmer, who's resigned.

seconds, Gregory, 30 seconds.

Gregory, what is the balance of ignorance between nations, between peoples? Thank you.

Well, this is what I would see as the result of the declining literacy, curiosity and individuality of the urban populations of most of the world's states.

It's most profound, of course, in Western Europe and the United States, North America and the like, because that's where you see a huge amount of the urban populations.

And what we've seen because of social media trends and the like, is that people are reading less, they're less inquisitive, they are more inclined because of the urban hierarchical structures of societies to argue against, if you like, political correctness or the opinions which are promulgated by their governments.

And as a result, We're seeing, as we've discussed many times in the past, this competing balance of mass movements between globalist urbanised societies who literally have a very narrow window of individuality and rural populations which tend to... wonder what happened to the nationalism and the national cohesion of the past when a broader view of national interest was prevalent.

When you saw the need for rural areas as well as urban areas, you saw the need for the exploitation of agricultural lands as well as minerals and energy resources and the like.

So what we've got now are societies which are less and less literate, less and less inquisitive, They are being governed, if you like, by not even slogans on social media, but literally a few initials and buzzwords, which people don't tend to question.

About the Orwell versus Churchill, who's winning?

Gregory, what is NORAD?

Nor adds the North American air defense pact between Canada and the United States.

This was created during the Diefenbaker prime ministership in Canada when Canada developed the world's most advanced combat aircraft, the Avro Arrow.

And this really frightened the U.S. defense and aerospace industries.

And President Eisenhower, among others, said, moved to stop the Canadian Arrow program and promised Canada that if it gave up that aircraft and that independent approach to the air defense of the northern part of the North American continent, that the U.S. would work in partnership to create an overall continental air defense system, NORAD, and that the Canadian Aerospace Authority where workers and scientists could migrate into the United States where they were used on the Apollo program, for example.

So it was a double win for the United States.

It stopped Canada from becoming a major competitor in combat aircraft exports around the world.

So the sum is that Canada has decided to go its own way on some weapon systems, and that right now we'd say that we're still friends, but trust is not obvious? No.

Your expectation of Mr. Burnham at this point, can you measure it? Good evening to

you.

Good evening, John.

Well, my measure of Prime Minister Burnham's future premiership is perhaps less positive than his own.

He basically said before, when governments were changed without an election...

in Britain, that the incoming government had a moral duty to go back to the electorate and seek their mandate.

He is behaving today, one day after he was sworn in as Prime Minister, he is behaving as though he's going to be there ad infinitum.

And the participation in NATO, do you expect that to be passionate and devoted or something that Burnham will do when he has spare time?

Where's the King today, Gregory?

Well, the King has been on his first visit as King to the Isle of Man.

And, uh, if you're an American, you probably say, "Who cares? Where's the Isle of Man?" And it's just an island, obviously.

Well, it's a strategic island situated in the Irish Sea between Ireland, uh, and the [clears throat] and Britain.

[clears throat] It's, uh, been under British control for a thousand years or, or so, um, and who ...

And the, and the, um, the, the Scots and English had taken over control of it from the, the Norse, uh, power lords.

Um, he was-- The King was there not only because he is the head of state of, of the Isle of Man, and the Isle of Man is not part of the United Kingdom.

We have 30 seconds.

How so, John?

Well, the fact is that Australia has been the guardian of the South Pacific and Indian Ocean and so on, Southeast Asia, essentially since World War I, as the great powers fluctuated, the British and the Americans, particularly the French.

And as a result, Australia has built its dominance.

It's always had a markedly superior naval capability, then an air power capability to dominate the regions.

It's had long-range strategic strike capabilities.

It has now got a navy which, in many respects, except for the two manned aircraft carriers that Britain has, it's almost as powerful as the Royal Navy.

It lacks the, as you say, the two full aircraft carriers and some of the long-range ballistic missile submarines that the Brits have.

Who's in the game?

It appears that NATO has made a decision, or am I jumping to a conclusion, Gregory?

Well, NATO has sort of made a conclusion, but it's not one which I think would stand a vote by all NATO members, which is critical to adding a new membership.

The US and others have talked about the inevitable path to NATO membership for Ukraine, which is something that actually is picking up on on the Joe Biden campaign.

provocation to Russia, which caused the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022.

So essentially now we're back to getting Biden philosophy here, which is automatically going to place NATO at odds with Russia for as long as that process applies.

And President Trump in the past has said, We've got to move away from that.

We promised with Reagan and Thatcher that we would not move NATO eastward into the Russian and Soviet sphere of influence, Russia, post-Soviet Russia, then disbanded the Warsaw Treaty Organization, which meant that Russia was not going to move westward.

30 seconds, Gregory.

Is it now entirely about the Strait of Hormuz? Good evening to you, Gregory.

Well, good evening, John.

But let me first say on the monarchy side of things [chuckles], just remember how wonderfully stable it was when the Shah of Iran was in power until the beginning of 1979, and how well Sa- uh, Saudi Arabia and Iran got on under the, uh, friend- mutual friendship with US President Richard Nixon, uh, and to see how far things have deteriorated in the years since.

Well, the, the fact that the Strait of Hormuz is experiencing diminished tanker traffic, and I don't think it's cut off entirely, uh, it certainly is, uh, at heightened alert, uh, i- is important.

But the markets have calmed down.

Uh, when this conflict first got underway a couple of months ago, we saw oil prices going up to the hundred and ten, hundred and twenty dollars a barrel range.

They're now down in the eighty-two to eighty-five dollar a barrel range.

Is it?

So I have to believe

that's probably part of the puzzle, but it's too long to develop it.

Can the king solve this, Gregory? Well, what the king has to do is to make sure that these problems are not imposed on the crown itself and can be dealt with within the family.

Harry, however, has shown no ability or even understanding of the scale of the problem Et il pense toujours qu'il peut, qu'il a une position de négociation pour atteindre ce que nous ne savons pas.

Une chose par laquelle il est maintenant absolument pressé, c'est le fait qu'il a une part, ou l'entire, d'un salaire de 50 millions de pounds sterling.

bill for the lawsuit that he and a few other people just lost against the Daily Mail, which the lawsuit claimed that the Daily Mail had used illegal wiretapping and other measures to gain information and invade the privacy of Prince Harry and others.

The case was thrown out today par le Conseil des ministres de l'État à Londres, et ce n'est pas vraiment un sujet appréciable, donc ça laisse Harry avec une grande dette, et toute la monnaie qu'il avait accumulée et multipliée pendant sa volée de Britannique il y a quelques années est maintenant ouverte, donc personne ne va le déposer de cette dette, certainement pas la famille royale, qui n'a pas le droit de payer 50 millions dans une lawsuit comme celle-ci, qu'il a conseillé à Harry de ne pas prendre en premier lieu.

What is to be done?

Well, I think what we're seeing now is the reality that there is no cohesive leadership within Iran at the present time.

You've got different factions doing different things.

You've got certain IRGC commands literally undertaking attacks without necessarily instructions from the center, whatever the center might be.

The reports that Mojtaba Khamenei is alive but for security reasons, couldn't go to the funeral.

Nonsense.

He's either dead or incapacitated, as you've indicated.

I lose track of what defines success.