Jul 24, 2026 · 22 min · 5 segments
Today we crack open Zbigniew Brzezinski’s 1997 playbook – The Grand Chessboard – and find out it basically predicted every war the US has picked since, and why that was always the point. If you would…
So for those of you who don't know who Zbigg was, maybe some of the younger listeners or people who just haven't been paying attention, Zbigniew Brzezinski, he died in 2017, but he was a counsellor to Lyndon Johnson from 1966 to 68, so peak Vietnam War.
And he belonged to the school of geopolitical realism, probably founded by Machiavelli.
If you've listened to any of my stuff over the years, you know I'm a big fan of John Mearsheimer's analysis of geopolitical events.
I think his point of view tends to be on the money, sort of maps to... my read of things.
In 1928, his father was a Polish diplomat who was posted to Germany from 1931 to 1935.
So Zbigniew Brzezinski grew up during the rise of the Nazis in Germany as a Pole.
That's where they were living when the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and they invaded Poland.
So Brzezinski went on to study at Harvard, ended up working there, worked at Columbia University, then at John Hopkins, taught and mentored Bill Clinton's future Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright.
And during the 1960 US presidential elections, he was an advisor to the John F. Kennedy campaign.
Co-founded the Trilateral Commission with David Rockefeller, was a director of that from 1973 to 1976.
Trilateral Commission, if you've never heard of it, was basically a group of political and business leaders from the United States, Western Europe and Japan.
And then when Carter announced his candidacy for the presidency in 1976, which was considered a bit of a joke, He proclaimed himself an eager student of Brzezinski.
So for those of you who don't know who Zbigg was, maybe some of the younger listeners or people who just haven't been paying attention, Zbigniew Brzezinski, he died in 2017, but he was a counsellor to Lyndon Johnson from 1966 to 68, so peak Vietnam War.
And he belonged to the school of geopolitical realism, probably founded by Machiavelli.
If you've listened to any of my stuff over the years, you know I'm a big fan of John Mearsheimer's analysis of geopolitical events.
I think his point of view tends to be on the money, sort of maps to... my read of things.
In 1928, his father was a Polish diplomat who was posted to Germany from 1931 to 1935.
So Zbigniew Brzezinski grew up during the rise of the Nazis in Germany as a Pole.
That's where they were living when the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and they invaded Poland.
So Brzezinski went on to study at Harvard, ended up working there, worked at Columbia University, then at John Hopkins, taught and mentored Bill Clinton's future Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright.
And during the 1960 US presidential elections, he was an advisor to the John F. Kennedy campaign.
Co-founded the Trilateral Commission with David Rockefeller, was a director of that from 1973 to 1976.
Trilateral Commission, if you've never heard of it, was basically a group of political and business leaders from the United States, Western Europe and Japan.
And then when Carter announced his candidacy for the presidency in 1976, which was considered a bit of a joke, He proclaimed himself an eager student of Brzezinski.
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