Russia, Iran, and China have broken the West. Now it's a BRICS world.

This is a transcript, for the video found here:

Bullets:

The myth of NATO military superiority has been destroyed, first in Ukraine, and now in the Middle East.

Governments across the world must confront the failure of Western countries to even provide for our own defense, let alone project power far from our own borders. That will scramble diplomatic relationships for the rest of the century.

Business leaders and managers now understand that the key supply chains for raw materials, manufactured products, and even logistics now run through BRICS countries.

What's more, the Global Majority countries also represent the largest consumer class in world history, and firms have no choice but to transact business and trade on others' terms, and outside the Western banking centers.

Report:

Good morning.

This is another installment--the third-- on the theme that there are weeks where decades happen. The world is profoundly different today, compared to just one month ago. The illusion of NATO military superiority has been shattered, forever, in Ukraine, and in the Middle East we’ve just learned that the US Navy and the IDF are defenseless to protect Israel from ballistic missiles inbound from Iran. China’s economy continues to expand, despite high tariffs and sanctions from North America and Europe. All these realities are hitting at the same time, and now they will permanently scramble global diplomatic relationships, and reset the world’s economy.

By now, Ukraine was supposed to be a member of NATO, and Russia was supposed to be bankrupt. Western regulators seized Russia’s foreign exchange reserves in European banks, and put hard sanctions against the Russian economy. The United States and NATO poured billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware into Ukraine, along with high levels of intelligence support and logistics. That has been all for naught. Russian troops are advancing--slowly but decisively—on all fronts, and Kiev, the capital, is under regular bombardment by drones and missiles launched by Russian forces.

In the Middle East, it was exactly a month ago that Israel struck what they expected to be a decapitating blow against Iran. The objective was regime change in Teheran, and that goal was echoed in Washington, too. The Israeli operation was many months in the making, and involved attacks from multiple directions and countries. A bunch of top Iranian officials and military officers were killed. Nuclear scientists in Iran were also killed, some of whom at home with their families.

So this was a very highly coordinated operation, but it was just a few hours later that Iran brushed themselves off and launched strikes of their own, toward Israel. Up until then, everyone just assumed that Israel’s Iron Dome defenses would hold up, just as before. US Navy forces are also in-theater, and were set to work right away intercepting Iranian missiles. Most of the Iranian inbounds were intercepted, but at a staggering cost—a minimum of two interceptor missiles, costing several millions of dollars each, are needed to engage a single Iranian missile, which cost under a million dollars. That’s to say that all the math works to Iran’s favor, no matter what happens. Their missile will take out two Israeli or American interceptors, or hit a high-profile target in Israel itself. There was no downside for Iran to launch a missile, even when they knew it would probably be brought down.

Even in the first days of the Israel-Iran conflict, we knew Iranian rockets were getting through the Israeli missile defenses. Later we learned just how bad things were, on the ground there. This is a map from Larry Johnson. The website is here and he’s invited all the time to appear on other channels. He was with the CIA and State Department in a previous life, and it’s just a guess that he probably wasn’t crazy about the dress code where he used to work. Anyway, Tel Aviv had a blackout on news reporting from Israel, but enough still gets through on X and Telegram that he was able to piece together what got hit, and where.

And none of this news is good, to anyone who expected the Iron Dome and the American Navy to protect even the highest-level, most visible, most strategic targets. The Israeli War Ministry. A Mossad intelligence training base. Haifa’s oil refinery and port. The Ben Gurion International Airport. The Israeli Nuclear Research Center. A Top Secret cyber security unit. Bunch of air and army bases, power plants, weapons manufacturers. The Tel Aviv stock exchange was also hit. This is a comprehensive target map of very important strategic, economic, and scientific assets, spread throughout the country, and Iran was able to hit them all, and they did so within just a few days of much of their top military leadership being wiped out.

Pulling back a bit, it’s obvious now that it is our arsenals that have been bled dry. And it is amazing that it’s only now that policymakers and industry leaders are realizing what these Chinese export bans on rare earth metals and magnets all add up to. It means that the Pentagon and the NATO countries cannot build weapons. It doesn’t matter what the Pentagon budget is, or that Europe just agreed to devote 5% of their GDP to new defense spending. Without Chinese antimony, nobody can make artillery or bombs or missiles. Without Chinese gallium, nobody can build radars or AWACS planes. Without Chinese germanium, no more military satellites and missile guidance systems. Without Chinese graphite, no more stealthy planes or submarines, or high-performance fighter jets. Without Chinese tungsten, no more armored vehicles or armor-piercing munitions. Long way of saying that every artillery shell fired, every bomb dropped, every missile launched over Ukraine or the Middle East cannot be replaced. Same goes for everything used in our training exercises. Hard to know if this was their strategy at the beginning, but it’s certainly the reality now.

In diplomacy: Leaders in countries not in Europe or North America are facing a different world too. Nothing is moving the needle in Ukraine, after three years of intense diplomatic, economic, and military pressure. No country in the world is as lavishly supplied by the most modern equipment than Israel, who has a blank check to spend in Washington and a call on our most advanced gear. But it has become fclear that Israel is no longer the dominant military force in the Middle East—that myth blew up along with the Mossad base on Larry Johnson’s map. So for countries in South America or Africa or elsewhere here in Asia, they’re coming to some hard conclusions that if the Western military umbrella doesn’t work over Eastern Europe or Israel, the question is asked and answered how effective it could be anywhere else.

In global trade, in business and economics everything is going the same way. Russian oil and gas continues to flow despite heavy Western sanctions. Iranian oil exports last year were the highest in almost 50 years, despite heavy Western sanctions. China’s semiconductor industry is stronger than ever, despite heavy Western sanctions. Business executives and owners, in companies large and small, realize now that all our supply chains run through the BRICS countries, almost all the world’s new emerging class of consumers are also in those countries, and if we hope our companies survive we need access to those supply chains, and need plans to reach those consumers. And when firms shop for raw materials from BRICS countries, or manufactured products from China, we have no choice but to agree to whatever payment terms they insist on. We will go through banks in Hong Kong, instead of banks in New York or London. We won’t notice much of a difference, going through the new BRICS trading system instead of using SWIFT banks, and that is just the way business will be done, from now on.

Even for families across the world, everything is different today, compared to the day before yesterday. A middle-class South American or African family with a couple of kids at home--they may have planned to save up a jillion dollars so they can head off to Harvard or Stanford one day and thereby ensure the success of that family for the next generation. We should forget that too. Our universities are plunging in the rankings. So it’s much more likely that they’ll keep their money and their kids closer to home, and tell them just to be super nice to anyone they see in class who looks Asian.

This is Jinan, in Shandong province. Be Good.

Resources and links:

Most American universities plunge in this popular international ranking

https://universitybusiness.com/most-american-universities-plunge-in-this-popular-international-ranking/

Tom’s Hardware, 'Instead of crippling China's semiconductor ambitions, U.S. sanctions may be inadvertently accelerating them': Report claims Washington measures could be bolstering China's chip market

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/semiconductors/instead-of-crippling-chinas-semiconductor-ambitions-u-s-sanctions-may-be-inadvertently-accelerating-them-report-claims-washington-measures-could-be-bolstering-chinas-chip-market

Bloomberg, Iranian Oil Production Booms Amid the Bombs

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-07-03/us-attack-on-iran-leaves-booming-oil-sector-unscathed

United States Spending on Israel’s Military Operations and Related U.S. Operations in the Region, October 7, 2023-September 30, 2024

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/2024/USspendingIsrael

CNBC, NATO allies agree to higher 5% defense spending target

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/25/nato-allies-agree-to-higher-5percent-defense-spending-target.html

By the numbers: US missile capacity depleting fast

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/us-stockpiles-missiles/

US reportedly running out of key Patriot missiles

https://www.newsnationnow.com/us-news/military/patriot-missiles-us-ammo-supply/

https://x.com/admcollingwood/status/1938205795612602433

Navy destroyer, air defense systems help intercept Iranian missiles

https://taskandpurpose.com/news/navy-air-defense-israel-iran/

Trump is open to regime change in Iran, after his administration said that wasn’t the goal

https://apnews.com/article/iran-trump-nuclear-sites-strikes-503eb17f991a8509604b4b3aaf93cb5c

Russia blasts Kyiv with another missile and drone barrage, killing at least 2

https://apnews.com/article/russia-drone-attack-ukraine-war-d16f45fdbb8fbd0152c7a2c7c5d3cf9f

Russia's summer push in Ukraine targets three fronts but faces stern resistance

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c70rl6lk2yxo

Statista chart, The U.S. Plays a Key Role in Military Aid to Ukraine

https://www.statista.com/chart/34066/military-aid-to-ukraine/

Brookings, What is the status of Russia’s frozen sovereign assets?

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/what-is-the-status-of-russias-frozen-sovereign-assets/

Russia Is on a Slow Path to Bankruptcy, But How Slow?

https://warontherocks.com/2024/09/russia-is-on-a-slow-path-to-bankruptcy-but-how-slow/

The cost of war: how Russia’s economy will struggle to pay the price of invading Ukraine

https://theconversation.com/the-cost-of-war-how-russias-economy-will-struggle-to-pay-the-price-of-invading-ukraine-178826

Sonar 21, Israel Suffered Extensive Damage

https://sonar21.com/israel-suffered-extensive-damage/

SITREP 6/29/25: Russia Launches Largest Drone Swarm of Entire War as Ukraine Gets Forgotten

SITREP 6/29/25: Russia Launches Largest Drone Swarm of Entire War as Ukraine Gets Forgotten

https://substack.com/home/post/p-166917191

Israel strikes Iran’s nuclear sites and kills top generals. Iran retaliates with missile barrages

https://apnews.com/article/iran-explosions-israel-tehran-00234a06e5128a8aceb406b140297299