- 6/20/2025
In this powerful intelligence briefing, ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern and former CIA officer Larry Johnson return for the June 20th edition of the Weekly Wrap โ providing sharp, insider analysis of the latest geopolitical flashpoints ๐โ ๏ธ.
From the Iran-Israel escalation and U.S. military posturing, to the intel games shaping Ukraine, NATO, and global perception warfare, this roundtable exposes what mainstream media wonโt. The duo unpacks diplomatic missteps, disinformation trends, and the dangerous miscalculations that are dragging the world closer to full-scale conflict ๐ต๏ธโโ๏ธ.
With their deep experience in U.S. intelligence, Johnson and McGovern provide essential clarity in an increasingly chaotic world.
#IntelRoundtable #RayMcGovern #LarryJohnson #ForbiddenNews #WeeklyWrap #June20Update #GeopoliticalIntel #MiddleEastTensions #IsraelIranWar #USForeignPolicy #CIAInsiders #NATOWatch #GlobalDisinfo #UkraineConflict #ProxyWars #IntelBriefing #UnfilteredTruth #RealAnalysis #DeepStateWatch #WW3Alert #StayInformed
From the Iran-Israel escalation and U.S. military posturing, to the intel games shaping Ukraine, NATO, and global perception warfare, this roundtable exposes what mainstream media wonโt. The duo unpacks diplomatic missteps, disinformation trends, and the dangerous miscalculations that are dragging the world closer to full-scale conflict ๐ต๏ธโโ๏ธ.
With their deep experience in U.S. intelligence, Johnson and McGovern provide essential clarity in an increasingly chaotic world.
#IntelRoundtable #RayMcGovern #LarryJohnson #ForbiddenNews #WeeklyWrap #June20Update #GeopoliticalIntel #MiddleEastTensions #IsraelIranWar #USForeignPolicy #CIAInsiders #NATOWatch #GlobalDisinfo #UkraineConflict #ProxyWars #IntelBriefing #UnfilteredTruth #RealAnalysis #DeepStateWatch #WW3Alert #StayInformed
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04:59Because over the years, they've been building them underground and storing them underground, and we really don't have the human penetration to get in there and find out exactly how many they have.
05:09Meanwhile, Israel is put into the position of having to fire upwards of 10 to 12 missiles at incoming ballistic missiles fired by Iran.
05:20And we notice like with the THAAD, those costs, each one of those missiles that go up in the air, they cost $12.9 million.
05:34The missiles that's going to throw theirัะธั
in the air, they cost $12,000 to $1000 to $18,000 to $13,000 to $14,000 to $1000,000 to $15,000 to $18,000 to $15,000 to $2000 to $15,000 to $15,000 to $15,000 to $25,000 to $17,000 to $15,000 to $15,000 to $15,000 to $21,000 to $500,000.
05:41So the math on this just doesn't work, not only for Israel, but for the United States.
05:46Israel has finite anti-air defense missile systems.
05:52And up to this point, Iran has depleted them.
05:55Now Iran's like firing 15 to 25 missiles a day, but they're precisely targeted at intelligence, defense sites, factory sites, ports, and power stations.
06:08Israel cannot sustain this for much longer.
06:13Ray, does Israel even have an end game, a theory of victory?
06:20Is it possible for them to achieve their goal just with their bombs?
06:24Oh, sorry, you added just with their bombs.
06:27No, just with their bombs, but with U.S. support, they think they can.
06:32That's the key to all this.
06:34Israeli intelligence is very, very well-informed and very honest in telling their prime minister,
06:45look, if we start this thing, you're not going to be able to finish it unless the U.S. comes in with both feet.
06:52Now, did the Israelis know how many missiles like Larry knows or we think we know?
06:58Of course they did.
07:00So this is just proof positive.
07:02This isn't about Iranian enrichment or about a nuclear bomb.
07:09This is about regime change.
07:11And this is a last gasp effort by Netanyahu, who, let's remember, has his own really, really serious problems domestically and could end up in jail.
07:22A last chance issue to say, look, Mr. President Trump, now you've got to bat it because we can't survive without your help.
07:34Larry, you're in either good or bad company, depending on how you want to look at this, because about 15 minutes ago, the Wall Street Journal, of all people,
07:43the mouthpiece for the CIA and for the Zionists, reports that Israel is running out of missiles.
07:49Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Look, this is this is a simple math problem.
07:54It would be one thing if Israel and or the United States as its backer had robust capabilities to replace what's being fired.
08:04But we don't. That's what's been exposed in the course of the war that has taken place between Russia and NATO slash Ukraine over the last three years.
08:12Right. As Mark Ruda said, right now, Russia produces more missiles in three months or more artillery shells in three months than U.S. and NATO combined can produce in a year.
08:24The same problem applies to these air defense missiles, and particularly when you get into things like that at almost 13 million dollars a pump.
08:34So Israel's got finite resources compared to Iran, which has ample resources.
08:42And by virtue of being 91, 92 million people, by virtue of being 27 times the size of Israel,
08:52this simply for Israel to try to target anything inside Iran.
08:58Yeah, they're making some hits, but they're not devastating.
09:01It's not crippling Iran. By contrast, Iran can hit specific targets in Israel.
09:09Israel's got three ports. Two of them are now knocked out.
09:13They only got down in the south. Now Haifa's been knocked out by these missile strikes.
09:17One airport, international airport, Ben Gurion, knocked out, shut down.
09:23Power plant, refinery. Israel doesn't have dozens of these.
09:28Iran does. You can knock out two or three refineries in Iran.
09:32They're still going to refine oil.
09:34That is so absurd about this that, you know, the hubristic Israelis thought that they could do this and get away with it.
09:43Now they're finding out the truth.
09:45Wow. Ray, how desperate is Netanyahu?
09:52Does the world now know that the goal of this military escapade was not to destroy the Iranian enrichment facilities, but to bring about regime change?
10:06And, of course, it seems to be having, from what the three of us see and hear, the opposite effect.
10:13The Iranians are rallying around their government.
10:17They're not turning on it.
10:19Well, I think anyone watching our show, Judge, and hundreds of thousands do, do know the real story.
10:26Now, part of the real story, which I would emphasize, is not only that the U.S. intelligence community has been saying since 2007 that Iran is not working on a nuclear weapon, with high confidence, that judgment, and unanimous,
10:41but also that the head of the CIA on his way out last October said, not only that, I want to remind you about that.
10:49Iran is not working on a nuclear weapon, but also, if it started, we would find out their start very quickly.
10:58So don't worry about it.
11:00That's William Burns trying to tell the truth for once.
11:03Now, that was October.
11:05He repeated that pretty much two weeks before he went out of office.
11:09So the business isn't about nuclear enrichment, but, you know, they can play that game.
11:17Why is Iran enriching up to, what, 300, whatever it is, percent, okay?
11:23It doesn't need that much.
11:24What we heard from that professor, Mirandi, it's a negotiating point.
11:31We got that highly refunded uranium.
11:35We're willing to give that to Russia.
11:36That's why we did that.
11:39We have to have more than just the stuff for our medical reactors to have a decent negotiating point.
11:48So, yeah, it's so clear that it's for regime change.
11:53Now, the last thing I'll just say is nobody ever mentioned that two days before this happened, before it's done, Netanyahu was almost voted out of office by a no-confidence vote.
12:07He was able to prevent that by making concessions to some of the even more hardliners that he has.
12:12So this plays big into this.
12:15Do I think that Netanyahu could be doing this for his own personal reasons to stay out of jail?
12:19Well, yes.
12:21Is he doing that, is he doing genocide for the same reason?
12:24Yeah.
12:24Is he likely to use his nuclear weapon, for God's sake?
12:28I can't rule it out because the guy is just as willing to do this kind of thing to prevent himself from going to jail.
12:35Ray, Alistair Crook is about to come out with a piece in which he believes he knows where Trump and Netanyahu got their argument from that the Ayatollah is preparing a nuclear bomb, even though all the intelligence agencies say no.
12:57He's about to say it's from this Zionist organization called, Zionist-owned organization called Palantir, with which the federal government of the United States, thank you, Donald Trump, has just entered into a contract for a couple of 100 million to consolidate the data that American spies gather warrantlessly on all of us so that the other spies can have access to it.
13:23Does this make sense to you, Larry Johnson?
13:25Yeah, no, absolutely.
13:28Look, this is a fabrication.
13:31Now, we've got to explain something to the audience that they understand.
13:35When Tulsi Gabbard made her statement, she wasn't giving her opinion.
13:39She hadn't been sitting around having coffee saying, hey, I got a good idea.
13:43Let's say that Iran doesn't have a new.
13:45This is a result of a coordinated process that means senior analysts, people like Ray McGovern back in the day at CIA, at the Defense Intelligence Agency, at the National Security Agency, at State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, and at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency.
14:03Those are the five big ones because they're the ones that actually generate raw intelligence.
14:10So they're the ones that give the judgments.
14:12They all agreed and have agreed over the last, you know, almost 20 years that Iran's not doing this so that when Tulsi said that and Trump stupidly, ignorantly said, oh, I'm not going to listen to her.
14:28What does she know?
14:30She's not speaking for her, Mr. President.
14:33She's speaking for intelligence professionals across the board.
14:37However, we got a bad sign yesterday that the politicization has started because John Ratcliffe sold out.
14:44He went and he's supposedly telling people, oh, yeah, Iran's on the one-yard line.
14:49They're going to have a nuke any minute.
14:51He's doing his Netanyahu impression.
14:56This is outrageous.
14:57And what Trump is doing by, he's not the first president to ignore intelligence, but at least he's the first one to be openly disrespecting someone in Tulsi Gabbard's position because she's not speaking as an individual.
15:13She is representing a community of analysts, and he, Donald Trump, has betrayed them.
15:19You know, we know this is about regime change, and we know this is about pleasing the Zionists, because if they were really concerned about a nuclear weapon, there's another madman on the planet who has a nuclear weapon that can reach Honolulu and maybe even Los Angeles.
15:44He happens to be the dictator.
15:45He happens to be the dictator of North Korea.
15:48He's Donald Trump's friend.
15:50No effort is being made to destroy his nuclear capabilities, and he's certifiably crazy, Ray McGovern.
15:58Well, Judge, I don't agree that he is certifiably crazy.
16:05What I do know, and what we have divulged on this program two years ago, is that he has an ICBM given to him, lock, stock, and barrel by Russia.
16:18That is, that is, there next to the most sophisticated ICBM is the Topol M.
16:24It can reach not only Honolulu, but Mar-a-Lago, for God's sake, or up in Maine.
16:30It can reach the whole United States.
16:33Now, how do we learn that?
16:34Because Ted Postol did the research on it.
16:37Ted Postol wrote an article, and when Jake Sullivan was confronted with a question about this more than two years ago at a briefing, open briefing in the White House,
16:47he said, oh yeah, we know about that, the intelligence community is working on that, okay?
16:52Well, we haven't heard word one since because it's too damn embarrassing.
16:56The Russians have done this.
16:57You would think they'd be criticized for it, but no, it's so embarrassing for Jake Sullivan and the rest of them there that they've concealed it.
17:07But that's the reality, and as you know, North Korea and Russia have a mutual defense treaty.
17:14This is of terrific significance because as close as Iran is to Russia, they do not have a mutual defense treaty.
17:24They have something short of that that makes a big difference.
17:28Larry, should Tulsi Gabbard resign because of Trump summarily dismissing the very, very solid, sound, evidence-based statements she made under oath to the Congress?
17:41Probably not yet.
17:44She should stay there as a thorn in his side and force him to really be hoisted on his own petard for the one who has blatantly ignored intelligence.
17:55I think there will come a moment when she'll have to step out and resign and just say, you know, he's ignored this.
18:02I'm hopeful that we could find some military officers who might be commanded to launch attacks inside Iran, which would, you know, expand this war.
18:12But, you know, for now, I think she's better off making sure that not some other obedient toady is going to be put into the job.
18:20You've got to at least have somebody who's going to try to stand up.
18:23Now, she is smartly not trying to pick a public fight with Trump, but I think she's also reading the tea leaves.
18:31Trump's MAGA base is split down the middle.
18:36And I saw this firsthand.
18:37I gave a speech on Wednesday to the Lakewood Ranch Republican Club, which is really Manatee County, one of the reddest, Trump-less counties in the United States.
18:48And how did that audience receive your comments?
18:50The number of people that came up to me afterwards expressing grave concern about Donald Trump, including people who had been, you know, they had had major roles in previous Trump campaigns.
19:04Very much concerned.
19:06And it reflects what you're hearing from Matt Gaetz, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson, even Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk of Talking Point USA.
19:16The number are, it's significant.
19:19And Trump, if he launches this attack, he'll be committing political suicide.
19:26We already know he's not going to be reelected, but it is going to shatter his base that he won't be able to get anything done in Congress legislatively.
19:34Ray, what happens, what do the Russians do if Trump unleashes an assault on Iran?
19:42I think the Russians have made very clear to President Trump, you're not going to do this.
19:48This is really crazy.
19:50Our friends, the Chinese, already have a couple new intelligence ships there in the Persian Gulf.
19:55We will not stand idly by.
19:58We have this agreement with Iran.
20:00It's not a mutual defense treaty, but we're giving them arms as we speak.
20:06Israel can't win this darn thing.
20:08Pulling your horns.
20:09Here's a suggestion, President Trump.
20:12Why don't you wait two weeks?
20:15That would bring it to right before the 4th of July.
20:19And then you can claim, oh, we've got negotiations going.
20:24The Iranians will make a deal.
20:26They'll give enriched uranium to us, the Russians, for safekeeping.
20:30And you can brag on the 4th of July that you solved the whole thing without bringing the world to a World War III.
20:38Larry, who would believe Trump that he's going to wait two weeks?
20:43Perhaps this is another ploy, just like the negotiations were on the eve of the Israeli strike.
20:50Yeah, that's what he's done.
20:51He's destroyed his credibility on this, and no one believes him.
20:56They're always going to assume the worst.
20:58Let me make one other comment about Russia, what's important to recognize.
21:03This week, I had always assumed that it was maybe Russia that didn't want to make the decision on a defense pact.
21:12But in fact, President Putin said in comments to a group of foreign dignitaries, where they were asking all sorts of questions, and he was giving the answers.
21:20He said Russia actually offered that to the Iranians.
21:26The Iranians didn't want the defense pact because they wanted to keep open the possibility of restoring relations with Washington, D.C., and the West.
21:38Now, I think they realize they've been had, and they were naively foolish.
21:45And Pazeskian, as Putin said the other day, hey, what have they asked for they're going to get?
21:51And notice that, as Ray mentioned, the arrival of those Chinese ships in the Persian Gulf sets up a possibility for a false flag attack of some sort.
22:02Or I think Ray has commented about the possibility of a USS Liberty replay, where the West attacks a Chinese ship, and all of a sudden the Chinese could be brought into the fray.
22:15But Xi and Putin talked about this yesterday, and they gave an extensive readout, and they made it very, very clear that what Israel has done is an illegal act,
22:25and that they are firmly backing Iran, and also there's been reports that the senior defense minister made a trip to Iran as well.
22:36So there are movements afoot.
22:39China and Russia are making it known.
22:41They got Iran's back, and in that context as well with China, Pakistan is weighed in.
22:49China is, you know, another sort of, let's call it a client state of China.
22:53So, Ray, Cy Hirsch, for whom we all have a great deal of respect, is out with a piece based upon his sources claiming the two-week period that Trump talked about as a charade,
23:12and that the attack will begin tonight and proceed in earnest over the weekend.
23:17What do you think about that?
23:19Judge, Cy is a good friend of mine.
23:21I'm not going to comment on his latest because I disagree with it greatly.
23:26Let me go back just for a second to this business about Trump very, very cleverly, very, very cleverly cooperating with the Israelis in a gross deception to make Iran put its defenses down so that they could.
23:42It was terribly cynical.
23:44I don't buy that.
23:45My evidence is, if you follow the chronology, that Trump was surprised by what happened.
23:53His associates took him down to the White House Situation Room and said, look, Thursday night, Thursday night, last Thursday, watch this.
24:00And the Israelis attacked without any opposition because we had defeated the air defenses of the Iranians.
24:07They said, look, Mr. Trump, we've won this thing.
24:10And the next thing you know, Trump is out there saying, oh, excellent.
24:14We won.
24:14I know about it.
24:16I know everything.
24:17He changed his tune within hours as soon as he realized that the Iranians, clever as they are, put their defenses back up.
24:26So I think it was a surprise to Trump.
24:29I think it was not a surprise to some of his neocon allies.
24:32And I think that he can't believe that this two-week thing.
24:37I think the evidence is very clear that he has virtually no support, except maybe from Ted Cruz, who can't find Iran on the map.
24:47How can Ted show his face again after that disastrous job he did in a fabulous surgical interview by our friend Tucker Carlson?
24:58Larry, what would happen if the Ayatollah is assassinated by the Israelis or if they resume murdering the Iranian negotiators?
25:10Well, he's not the only cleric in Iran.
25:13And, in fact, you know, while Iran is predominantly Persian, the Azeris are like the second largest ethnic group.
25:21And apparently the Ayatollah Khamenei is an Azeri.
25:25And so there's always been this notion, oh, you can't, if you're an Azeri, you're a second-class citizen.
25:30Well, you know, it looks like that second-class citizen sort of running the top of the heap.
25:34But if they assassinate him, A, they turn him into a martyr, and he'll be replaced.
25:41You know, this whole thing about Iran, the myth and mythology that dominates the Western narrative about it,
25:48ignores the fact that we've had, you know, Alistair Crook and his wife, Max Blumenthal and his wife, Pepe Escobar has been there,
25:58Glenn Deason, whom you've interviewed, has been there.
26:01And they all came back with the same story of, you know, it's an open society, this notion that they're beating women for not wearing head coverings.
26:11Not true.
26:12They saw young couples, you know, teenage kids making out on the subway, you know, doing what teenage kids sometimes do, not being beat up by the religious police.
26:21And we actually have prima facie evidence of how weak the intelligence capabilities of Iran is by the fact that Mossad was just able to run circles around him and setting up all these assassinations.
26:34Gentlemen, this has been, Ray, anything else to say?
26:38Because I need to sign off, but this has been a great conversation.
26:41Yeah, just a thing on Khamenei.
26:46Please.
26:46I think Larry is right.
26:47He can be replaced, but I don't think that the Iranian authorities would be able to restrain those Muslims in Iraq or in Syria or elsewhere.
27:00I think they would storm U.S. facilities, and that would be a major problem.
27:06And maybe that's what Netanyahu would like, because that would be the tripwire.
27:12Now, Mr. Trump, they've killed Americans, for God's sake.
27:16Now you have to jump in with both feet.
27:19Well, we'll be watching, guys.
27:21We look forward to seeing you both at your usual times on Monday morning.
27:25Thank you very much for your time.
27:26Thank you for tolerating the Magnificent Seven, which was most enjoyable.
27:31And have a great weekend.
27:33All right.
27:33Thanks so much.
27:34Of course.
27:35And coming up at 4.30 this afternoon, if you're watching us live two minutes from now,
27:40Professor John Mearsheimer and Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom.
27:46We'll see you next time.