Title: \"What’s Happening in America After U.S. Strikes on Iran\" - John Kiriakou
Show: The Paper Trail
Date: 2026-03-05
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiJiTqoazLQ
Duration: 955

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[00:00] the global impacts I think we're seeing today uh at the at the opening bell this morning the Dow Jones Industrial Averages dropped,00 points the NASDAQ is off 2.3%. It's just a wipeout and the S&P 500 is down 1.8%. Um gold surged and then dropped. Apparently, people are taking profits, but uh a and uh and even Bitcoin surged

[00:30] because people are looking for someplace to put their money that doesn't have anything to do with stocks. The value of the dollar has dropped precipitously. It's down 15% in the past year. It's down another 3% today. So, this is going to be tough on us economically. the news that you've seen that Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia um said that they would help us uh in regime change operations is true. You know, it's funny. Over the last couple of years, Muhammad bin Salman

[01:02] al-Saud, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, actually worked very hard to improve Saudi relations with Iran. But as it turns out, it was Muhammad bin Salman and Benjamin Netanyahu who went to Donald Trump and asked him to invade Iran or to attack Iran. So, I'm not sure what kind of game MBS is um is playing. It's a dangerous one. Uh the goal is indeed regime change. Donald Trump told us to our faces a couple of nights ago,

[01:34] the goal is regime change. But the United States is very, very bad at regime change operations. I've long said it's easy to invade a country. It's easy to overthrow a government. It is very, very difficult to get out. We were in Afghanistan for 20 years. We were in Iraq for 19 years. It's very difficult, you know. And this reminds me, I've told this story before, but this reminds me

[02:05] very much of a principal committee meeting in which I was the notetaker the night before we attacked Iraq in 2003. The meeting was chaired by Vice President Cheney. Uh the president was busy, so Cheney chaired it. Um, it included Condisa Rice who was the national security adviser. Colin Powell who was the secretary of state. Um, uh, General, um, [ __ ] I forget his first name. H O A R. Uh, was it [ __ ] or Tommy Franks? Maybe it was Tommy Franks who was the the head

[02:37] of Central Command. Uh, it was uh a couple of the top guys on the National Security Council and George Tennant, the director of the CIA. I was George's noteaker in the meeting. And as we were getting up to leave at the end of the meeting, one of these bozos from the NSC said kind of loudly, "When we cross that border tomorrow, they're going to throw flowers at us." And I went back to the office and the deputy director of the CIA said to me, "How was the meeting?" And first I said, "Did you know we were

[03:08] going to invade Iran?" And he said, "Are they still talking about that? We're not going to invade Iran." That's what they had said during the meeting. we're going to invade Iran. Now, here we are 24 years later and we're invading Iran. But um I told him about the crack that the guy made that they're going to throw flowers at us. And I said, "Do these people know nothing about history?" And he said, "No, they know nothing about history." Well, again, it's 24 years later and the conventional wisdom has

[03:40] always been that we're going to be greeted as liberators and we're not. We're greeted as attackers and occupiers and Iranians for the most part will fight to the death to save their country from us and from the Israelis. So nothing good is going to come of this. Now about sleeper cells. Yes, the IRGC, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and the MOIS, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security have sleeper cells all over the world. I doubt that they have any in the United States or

[04:11] Canada or the UK. They absolutely have them in places like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Thailand, Indonesia, uh Argentina even. Uh probably not here. But just as dangerous are these lone wolf attackers. Just a couple of nights ago, a mentally ill immigrant from Sagal who was wearing a a hoodie that said property of Allah and then underneath the hoodie had wrapped himself in the

[04:42] Iranian flag, just opened fire on a group of uh bar patrons in uh in Austin, Texas, and and killed four people and wounded seven before he himself was shot and killed. So, we always need to worry about lonewolf attackers. If you're traveling overseas, you know, be aware of your surroundings. Stay away from crowds. Don't uh don't stay in Americanowned hotel chains. Iranian intelligence is not good. It's not at

[05:12] all good. It's never been good. And it's because they don't get good training. The Russians will help them out a little bit. The Chinese will help them out a little bit, but essentially they're on their own. Um, they are indeed hitting hotels with drones and missiles, especially in Abu Dhabi and Dubai. They hit a hotel in Muscat a couple of days ago. Um, they're they're doing this because it's the best they can do. And what they want to do is to affect the local economies, right? It's one thing if you fire a rocket or send drones to

[05:44] attack an American, you know, military installation in Abu Dhabi or Dubai, nobody's going to really care. But if you hit the the Burjal Arab, the the big hotel that's in the shape of a sale or you hit the JRA Towers hotel where I was staying a week ago, by the way, um you're going to affect the economy and uh you're going to make people staying in those hotels leave the country. So that's the plan. These are not targeted attacks against individuals. They're

[06:14] random attacks just trying to do as much damage as possible. I've been thinking about this all weekend since the Justice Department began to drop the second trunch or the third trunch depending on how you count it. Uh, of 3 million documents, 3 million documents. Um, the deputy attorney general said over the weekend on both Fox News and CNN that there will be no prosecutions coming out of these 3 million documents. even though they clearly show crimes against

[06:45] children, the statute of limitations apparently has expired, which is terrible. With that said, um it it seems that the victims are still able to file civil suits against the estate of Jeffrey Epstein. That's uh that's not much solace. Uh yeah, Donald Trump was mentioned more than a thousand times. No surprise there. He and Jeffrey Epstein were close friends at one time. You can say the same thing about Bill Clinton, about Bill Gates, about former Prince uh

[07:16] Andrew. I don't think that the scandal is how many times somebody is is mentioned. I think the scandal is in crimes and what uh what these documents reveal. For example, uh Lord Mandlesson, the uh the senior Labor Party leader in uh in the UK resigned over this past weekend because he denied and denied and denied over and over again that he had anything to do with Jeffrey Epstein. And not only was he a regular at Jeffrey

[07:49] Epstein's Island, he was a friend of Jeffrey Epstein's and the Justice Department released a photograph of him with a 16-year-old. He's in his underwear. They're both looking at a uh laptop computer and clearly the camera that took the picture was hidden because he would never allow himself to be tak have a picture of himself taken in in his underwear with an underage girl. So over the weekend he resigned from the Labor Party and he resigned from the House of Lords. Maybe that's some solace. This is a guy who um is ruined

[08:22] now personally. No one's ever going to speak to him again. socially he's he's an outcast now and you know he's not a young guy when when he dies his whole obituary is going to be about this that he was a pervert. So I'm disappointed that there aren't that there aren't going to be prosecutions. Uh but the least we can do is get the information out there and let people see the truth in in broad daylight. He had to have concluded that things were so bad in 2019 that this this was it. It

[08:55] was over. You know >> why? Why do you say that? >> Because he killed himself. >> You do believe he did? >> I do. I believe he killed himself. >> What makes you believe that considering all the evidence that they have? >> See, but the evidence the evidence isn't as clear as I think most people would want it to be. For example, and I base this on my own experience in the federal prison system. The guards, number one, have their heads up their asses 24 hours a day. The only qualification to be a prison guard in the federal system, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, is you have

[09:26] to be working on a GED and no uh felony convictions. That's it. There's this rule that prisoners can't touch the mail, right? So, we have mail call every day at 4:00 and the guards are supposed to say your name and hand you your mail. Most of the time, the guards didn't do mail call. Prisoners did mail call in violation of the rule of the rules. Any idea why? because they couldn't read. It was as simple as that. The guards couldn't competence basically. >> Yeah. I mean, they literally could not

[09:56] read to call out the names. So, number one, they're idiots. Number two, the cameras are always broken. Always. I was a janitor in the uh chapel when I was in prison, and every day part of my job was to go in there and break up guys having sex in the chapel. >> In the chapel. Yeah, because this >> of the Lord. >> That's what I said. You guys, this is God's house for heaven's sake. What are you going to do? But the reason they would all be having sex in the chapel is

[10:26] because they knew that the cameras didn't work. None of the cameras. The guards are supposed to be doing their rounds every 15 minutes or if there's a suicide watch situation going on every eight minutes. And with Epstein, they it was like two hours before they finally made their rounds. Why? Because number one, they're either jacking off in the uh in the guard booth, which happens all the freaking time, or they're sound asleep in the guard booth, or they're on the phone with their girlfriends, or

[10:58] they're surfing the internet. So, no, they don't they don't make the rounds. And then people are like, "Oh, but there's a glitch. You know, there's this 1 second glitch." Yeah, because every night the cameras reset themselves. They're old cameras. They still use tape and they tape over yesterday's. >> Then why don't they let the guards talk? Why were the guards like >> Oh, they would never let the Because the guards are I just stopped myself from saying a word that's not supposed to be [ __ ] >> These guys are so stupid. You know, a a guard from the prison where I was um

[11:28] emailed me. He he saw one of the one of the podcasts and he said, "This is exactly why we wanted to kill you." And I said, "Bring it, tough guy." >> Why he wanted to kill you? >> Yeah. because I say they're morons and retards and this and that and it's all true. It's true. Learn to read and then maybe we can have a conversation. I mean otherwise put up. Let's go. I'm not afraid of these guys. But this is why everything went wrong because what we saw go wrong the night Jeffrey Epstein died goes wrong every night. It's the

[12:00] same thing. >> But so perfectly like that. You think it could line up that way? >> Yes, I saw it. I saw it. for example, not supposed to have microwaves in the housing unit, right? And then people were like, "Ah, you know, you [ __ ] long enough, they're going to they're going to put in a microwave." So, they put in a microwave. All right. There was a serial killer in my unit. And he took a liking to me inexplicably. So, we called him truck cuz he was a long-distance truck driver, and he would murder prostitutes all along his route. And he got caught. So, so he would be like, "Hey, John. Uh, he had these like rotten

[12:32] black little nubs for teeth. John, I saved you a seat in the TV room. Watch the Steelers game. I'm like, "Thanks, Truck." Or, "Uh, hey, there's a new classic rock station. I know you like classic rock at 1600 a.m. Thank you, Truck." Truck hated hated hated pedophiles. Hated them. Fully a third of the prison is pedophiles. Cuz remember, they're all at the low security level, >> right? >> So, there's like this rule in prison. No pedophiles are allowed in the TV room. And pedophiles aren't even allowed in their own room unless it's to sleep.

[13:04] Okay? So, if you're a pedophile and it's the middle of the day, get the [ __ ] out of the room. Well, there's a pedophile in his room and the guy's like blah blah blah blah blah. He won't stop talking. Well, another thing is pedophiles aren't allowed to have any visitors in their rooms. You can't have another pedophile cuz they're going to talk about pedophilia, which is what they do. They relive their crimes every single day. They like they can't help themselves. So this pedophile is just yapping away and Truck is getting angrier and angrier and angrier. And finally the pedophile lays down for a nap. Truck had gone to the

[13:36] commissary and he bought a bottle of olive oil which is you $2.85. You can cuz everybody cooks in their cells. >> Plastic or glass? >> Plastic. So he pours the olive oil into a bowl and he microwaves it. So it's boiling like literally it's bubbling boiling. scalding oil and he pours it on the pedophile's face while he's sleeping and the guy the scream I'll never forget the scream and his skin is just like dropping off of his skull and pedophile

[14:06] got a pedophile the pedophile got you know medevaced to Pittsburgh they landed a helicopter in the yard and medevaced him to Pittsburgh truck got another 10 years onto the 40 he was already doing for being a serial killer >> was only doing 40 as a serial killer >> I know right >> a great lawyer Yeah, I did. But the point is that there are rules for everything and nobody pays any attention to them and nothing works the way it's supposed to. >> Then why does the Justice Department

[14:37] come out and say things like, "Oh, here's all the evidence." And then they show that they didn't put all the evidence out. And I'm just talking about like that. >> Well, then that proves my point because people are idiots at every single level. M >> it doesn't matter if you went to Harvard Law School, you can still be an idiot. >> Right. >> And another thing too, this is this is a lesson that that government officials, especially senior government officials, just cannot learn. And it is that the cover up of the crime is always worse than the crime. >> Oh yeah.

[15:08] >> Always. You know, >> the lie get begets 10 more lies begets a hundred more lies. >> And Richard Nixon didn't resign because of Watergate. Richard Nixon resigned because of the cover up of Watergate. M I think it's the same situation here. >> All right. Well, let me flip it around on you. I have always thought still do think that Jeffrey Epstein is dead and I feel pretty comfortable. >> I spoke to his brother recently. I said, "Is he dead?" And he's like, "He's dead. I I identified the body." I'm just saying. >> I mean, I spoke to OJ. I didn't speak to him, but he said he didn't do it. You

[15:39] know what I mean? Like >> he identified the body. He said, "I think he was murdered." And that's a debate, you know, that he wanted to have with me. But he said, "Yeah, he's dead. I identified his body. I took it to the crematorium.
