This is an I Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George Washington broadcast center. Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. I'm Strong and Getty. And now, here is Armstrong and Getty. Wow, there is a lot going on live from the studio. See a D. Senior. He did not want me to do that anymore. That's he keeps the day. He's not really giving me space. I can't eat space. I kind of like the overlap. But definitely let them put them the bowels of the Armstrong and Getty communications compound. And today we're toiling under the title of our show. We're going to have to rehearse that. A whole civilization will die tonight. Or in cheerier fair, you can you can't. Wolverines, rain, spring. So this is all happening really fast. So Israel put out a statement in Persian. Stay off the trains in Iran. Do the president of Iran put out a statement saying 14 million Iranians have committed to die for their country tonight. Trump just put out a statement as Joe referenced saying a whole civilization is going to die. Holy crap. For planning purposes tonight. Trump's whole statement, a whole civilization will die tonight. Never to be brought back again. Wow. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. He warned grimly. Wow. Talking about the bridges and the power plants and everything like that. And the former secretary of state from the last administration just saw him on MSNBC. Say that what Trump is promising would be war crimes. So you have the secretary of state now saying what Trump is proposing are war crimes. Hours before Trump vows to take out an entire civilization. Wow. Yeah. This is some heavy S. Yeah. I don't know. The whole Jake Sullivan saying strong things. I just, we actually have a bit of a montage of a couple of Democrats saying things that are just so patently ridiculously false. That it's just anything goes as you pointed out more nonsense. There's no cost for saying something completely ridiculous anymore because within your circle, either people believe you or they think, well, he's just signaling that he's really with us. And I appreciate it. Well, you got to admit though, if you went back, you wouldn't have to go back very many years. If the secretary of state under H.W. Bush said what Bill Clinton was about to do would be a war crime, it would be a giant deal. Yeah, it would have been. It would have been a huge deal. Yeah. We just didn't do that that many years ago. But holy crap. So I don't know. I feel like we ought to, maybe we have an expert on or something about that or who would be a good expert or fair, fair arbitrar of the what's a war crime and what's not and all that sort of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I wouldn't mind that. It's just, it's very much in the eye of the beholder is the honest to gosh truth when you're talking about attacking civilian infrastructure. Well, no, it's military or dual use. Okay. Is it, is it or isn't it? I don't know. You also, at least, you know what that would be helpful in that they could lay out the questions to ask, if not the answers. Mm-hmm. You also have the reality of, and this is what you said yesterday. And this is true of all international law. Who's going to stop me? Right. How many war crimes has Putin committed? Will he ever pay a price for it? No. No. No, please. On a daily basis, he commits them. Yeah. It's like having, declaring that you're in violation of the ferry court. No. The ferries say that's illegal. Okay. So what happens now? Oh, nothing. In case anybody's screaming at their radio or headphones or watch or Alexa device. Amazon Dot or... Why don't we just say, yeah, listening device and over. I understand. We can't use well, Putin commits war crimes. So we should do as a defense. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. I didn't know. It's just the whole idea of international law. I mean, it's a lovely idea. Period. Trump said, we've got, this is what he said yesterday, not in a truth post. We'll play this clip later, I suppose, but he said in four hours, we're going to take out all the bridges and power plants. You think that's what's going to happen? It's one of several possibilities. I feel like so far, Trump either pulls up way short of what he promised. That's the taco crowd, which is a stupid scenario, but it's a negotiating thing. Anyway, he either pulls up way short, he promises something huge, then doesn't do it at all. Or he goes way beyond what he said he was going to do with Maduro or several different strikes on Iran. Often with a little faint of, yeah, I don't know. I can't decide what to do. And then, you know, six hours later, Maduro's on a plane in handcuffs and the eye shades, thinking boy, this night is taking a turn. And what turns out to be a very popular hoodie. Yes. Yes. Well, I feel like you can't pull out of this one unless Iran really conceded a whole bunch of stuff. You know, they shave their beards, they come out and they say, I was that part of the deal, they have to shave their beards. They come out and they say the straight is open. Unless that happens, I feel Trump, like Trump has to follow through on this. He's gone so far with these promises, I think he's got to follow through. I've come across a small handful of learned commentators who are echoing what I said yesterday, which is it's also entirely possible that there's a limited but significant example of, you think I'm kidding? All right, look at this. Now the big, the big burrito is coming up tomorrow unless you seriously sit down to talk. I don't know if you can do that after what he said yesterday and has said this morning. I'm going to give him one more chance. Sure, that would be a very Trumpian thing. Within four hours, we're taking out all the bridges and power plants. All civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. Wait, what? Who talks like that other than Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan? Right, right. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. Oh my God! How about the president of Iran saying, and I don't know how he came up with this number, 14 million Iranians are committed to dying tonight. They're trying to put together human chains that will get around the power plants, civilians. This would be the crowd that wears the, you know, this is the year 1300 garb and chance death to America in the street. Of course, if you're chanting. The 20% of the population that loves the, uh, the mullies. If you're chanting death to America and we're the great Satan, and go ahead and stand in front of the power plant then. Enjoy your, uh, afterlife. Well, having given ample warning that we were going to attack those targets, uh, at some point you got to let people, uh, make their own decisions. Well, is that a decision you get to make or are they going to be, uh, a whole bunch of bad guys and guns surrounded people up in certain neighborhoods? And you need to go stand over by that power plant. Yeah. I guess what you're volunteering for the human chain. Yeah. It's, it's ugly and horrifying. It's why this regime must be ended. Whether it can be ended is an open question. God dang it. It's amazing. I was, um, I was re listening to the book. I mentioned this book last week, Ike's bluff because there's a lot of that sort of stuff going on right now with international diplomacy and, and us versus Europe and that sort of stuff. But anyway, it features a part in there. Eisenhower, I forget which awful thing happened, but he saw a lot of awful things happen in a variety of wars he was involved with. And he said, people are humans are stupid. He wrote in his own diary about just our willingness to kill each other rather than come to an agreement of some sort. That's been my observation too. It is amazing. You would think when it comes down to somebody's going to die, we could sit down and think, rather than die, let's work something out, but that's just not ever going to happen. Yeah. You know, Katie, it would have been funnier if my title had been you con. No, you can't. That's pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. What up? Yeah. You can't. You can't. I'm a little bit. You can't. You can't. You can't. Wolverine's reign supreme. Yes. Except the day I say you can't on mother, mother, I'm afraid you can't. It's like the other day when my son said neither, I said, we are not neither people. We are neither people. We are not a neither family. How are you? You're nice on a mind. You can't say that. Let's start the show officially. I'm Jack Armstrong. He's Joe Getty on this. It is it's Tuesday, April 7th, which might go down as a date in history. The year 2026, we are Armstrong and Getty and we approve of this program. Let's begin that officially according to FCC rules and regulations. The show starts at Mark. And it's over. Hail to the champions. Hail to Michigan for the first time in 37 years. The Wolverines win the national title. You know what would be fun? It'll never happen. It'd be impossible to do it. It'd be interesting if you could run the same tournament five times with the same teams. I guarantee you'd get five different results. Almost impossible, I think that you did. Some years maybe you'd get the same thing. The entire tournament. I mean, just the winner. I think it's very. But the 64. Yeah, starting with the 64. I think it's very unlikely you'd end up with the same champion, let alone, you know, all the other lower tier results. Right. I mean, because, you know, you watch seven games series in the NBA, great teams get beaten by lesser teams all the time, several times in a seven game series. But it's just that's what makes the tournament so exciting, I guess. And Michigan got lucky and hot at this right time. Someday, perhaps, man will learn to control parallel universes. And we can stage that tournament. Then you'd be like the super universal champion. Of course, we'll destroy ourselves before then. Trump goes on to say after saying a whole civilization will die tonight. Who knows? Well, we will find out tonight. One of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the world. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death will finally end. God bless the great people of Iran. I like when Trump says stuff like the long and complex history of the world. Like you need to point that out. It's like saying the late great Abraham Lincoln. I think it's just a way of saying this is a. We have a giant monument to him. We know he's late and great. I think in this case, it's just a way of saying this is a really, really big deal. I'm about to do something historic. He is. I mean, if he follows through on his promise, this will be talked about for a long time. Yeah. And it's funny, you've brought this up before, but imagining how Trump will be described 50 years from now, it'll be grossly oversimplified because that's what happens with history. But the combination of being completely out of control and doing completely unnecessary damage in a lot of ways together with bold moves that needed to happen that nobody had the guts to do. It's possible it's not going to be very complex depending on how tonight goes. Oh, I see your point. If tonight unleashes a horrifying period, that'll be the whole first paragraph of his the story of Donald Trump. Yeah, really most of the book. What is tomorrow going to look like if we actually in four hours, well, wipe out a civilization, take out all the bridges and power plants and thousands and thousands of civilians die. What's tomorrow going to look like in Iran? Will they just be walking around in the rubble looking for water? What will the reaction around the world be? What will the reaction in Congress be? Holy cow. All right. We got Kate. Oh, good morning. That's a heck of a thing. May you live in interesting times. We've got Katey's headlines next. Armstrong and Getty. An interesting conversation with the president of the United States. I had an interesting conversation with Claude last night, and I want to talk about that a little bit later. I don't understand how these things work. Did they did they did they program them to talk to you like they're people? Or is that just an accident of the intelligence? I think it's quite deliberate. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, I got a specific question around that. I love how we're I love how we're saying I talked to Claude last night. I look at the person. Well, yeah. Yeah. Let's figure out who's reporting what it's lead story with Katie Green and Katie. All righty. The alphabet networks first ABC. Trump threatens quote a whole civilization will die tonight as deal deadline looms. CNN US strikes military targets on strategic Iranian car island and NBC. Vance says the war in Iran will conclude quote very shortly, but how that happens is ultimately up to the Iranians. Military strikes on car island. That would be an interesting faint if we promised destroying the civilization, but we're just going to move on car island, which has been the threat for a long time. They're all prepared around to ran. Sure. Get deception. Absolutely part of warfare. USA Today Artemis two crew flies by the moon's far side and begins journey back home to earth. They're already headed back home. That's the way vacations are. Seems like you just got there and it's time to go home. Yeah. No, that's why you gotta you gotta have the right ratio. It's got to be at least two to one for enjoyment to travel at least. Yeah. This is like you flew clear across the country went to the zoo, got on the plane the same day and came back. Yeah. From the Washington Post at Easter egg roll. Trump tells children about war and mocks Biden. Yeah. That was that was an interesting setting for some of the comments he made about the war with the rabbits standing next to him yesterday. That was funny. And he's sitting at a table with a bunch of kids that are coloring and they're having him sign or they're they're a little coloring page and he goes if it was Biden this would have been an auto pen. It would have been an auto pen. From TechRadar talking to AI feels easier than talking to a real person. 26% of Gen Z are already dating AI. No, they aren't. That's what this says. No, they aren't. But that first part is weird. The second part is just not true. From the New York Post. Woman jumps into action to stave struggling swimmer only to learn that he's wanted for double murder. Oh, wow. Oh, that's a twist. Uh-huh. Study finds unethical brain rot. Why are millions of people watching AI fruits have affairs on TikTok? I have no idea what that means. Oh, boy. It's a new category called AI fruit drama. Fruit drama. Literally like an apple is in love with a banana. And it has like a soap opera storyline and there's an affair. Off to check that out. I've always found peaches very attractive. And finally the Babylon bee. How about eggplant? I'm straight. Yes. Look out. What's wrong? Is your microphone malfunctioning? No, my brain is because of you two. Babylon bee, look out, shouts female astronaut as Artemis ship gets within 5,000 miles of the moon. Wow. Now that made me laugh. We're not even close. It's fine. Jeez. Armstrong and Getty. The entire country could be taken out in one night. And that night might be tomorrow night. Where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o'clock tomorrow night. Where every power plant in Iran will be out of business burning, exploding and never to be used again. I mean complete demolition by 12 o'clock. And it'll happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to. We don't want that to happen. We may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation. And you know what? If that's the case, the last thing we want to do is start with power plants, which are among the most expensive thing and bridges. Every bridge and power plant will be taken out. Going to destroy the whole civilization, as his truth social posts said today. You got a golf course with an island green. We're taking out that bridge. You're going to have to use a row boat. In Bremer's said it looks bad for a U.S. president to threaten genocide. Seems a little hot for the rhetoric. Now, well, the quote about destroying an entire civilization. It was edging close to the G word. Yeah, I suppose. I'm probably just giving Trump the leeway of he exaggerates. Trump, Herbaly. Trump, Herbaly. That's a good word. If you're going to go literally and pretend anybody else had said it. Yeah, sounds pretty genocide-y. If Putin came out and said, by eight o'clock tonight, I'm going to take out the entire civilization of Ukraine. We'd be calling that a genocide threat. Yes. Wow. Although there would be the caveat of if Ukraine were trying to get a nuclear bomb and had been promising for a half a century to wipe them out if they ever got a hold of it. And you're saying to them, if you give up your uranium and play ball, we're not going to wipe you all out. It is a little different. In fact, we can be friends. Right. We'll help you rebuild the stuff we've taken out. Coming up, they've started a streaming channel for pets in China. Stay with us. Just trying to lighten the mood. I don't know. I have no problem with being really dark. Well, I don't know if it's dark, but this is a huge freaking deal. Huge freaking deal. This could be among the biggest deals. Could end up being the biggest deals of our lifetime in terms of a story, depending on how things go tonight. It could be Pearl Harbor-y. Certainly a battle of the bulgy. Okay. So Trump threatens every bridge, every power plant. I just saw this former Secretary of State under Biden, Jake Sullivan, say a national security advisor. I don't get a blinkin and Jake Sullivan mixed up. Okay. National security. You know what? I trade one for the other. They look the same. Couple of numbskills. Anything of the skinny dudes. Said these would be war crimes. So did a little researching around what people are saying. There are very few mainstream legal experts saying this is clearly not a war crime. Of course, anything mainstream is left leaning. Yeah. I read a great quote the other day. NGOs and think tanks exist so that journalists can get a quote that expresses what they believe. That's pretty good. Yeah. The main not necessarily a war crime argument is, as Joe has already pointed out, the key idea is dual use infrastructure. Power plants, bridges can be legal targets if they support military operations. Under the laws of war, a target is allowed if it provides a definite military advantage. Well, then that gets into the eye of the beholder. I mean, does a bridge helping people get out of the city on the weekend to get to the suburb, give a military advantage? Well, if you're going to roll tanks across, it does, I guess. Right. Right. You'd have to get really, really lawyerly to get to the bottom of that. One legal argument cited in news coverage today, Tide said infrastructure tied to military use in any way could be lawful to strike. Well, that is pretty broad. It'd be pretty hard to come up with any infrastructure that you could clearly make the argument it'd be impossible to use this power plant or bridge for any military use. Exactly. How could you even make that argument? An escalating attacks on infrastructure can be a legitimate wartime tactic. Such targets can qualify as lawful if they're part of an enemy's war capacity, which is even beyond the arms. You've got to knock out the power grid because that's the power grid that powers that missile factory. That's what I was saying before. I mean, you get into this and you realize pretty quickly, all right, the people in favor of it are going to say it's not a war crime. Those who are against it are going to say it out. Yeah, it is. And they'll yell at each other for a while and then history will move on and never talk about it again. The strongest version of the defense would be if it helps the military, it's a valid target. Or yeah, if it helps that country wage war, then it's a valid target. So yeah, what you just said makes sense. And of course, this will all be settled eventually in the International Court of War Crimes. Oh, that's right. It doesn't exist. There isn't even a final arbiter. Well, it's going to be very tiring hearing about that all day long. The whole war crimes. And we will. And we will. And maybe for the next several days, weeks, months or years, again, depending on how things go tonight, if Trump fulfills his promise of wiping out a civilization, it's going to make the papers. Well, and there'll be a giant refugee crisis too. So that could destabilize, you know, certainly the region. So I was listening to a podcast yesterday and they had an Iranian reporter on and this Iranian reporter said the population is still really gung-ho for the strikes the United States is making because they hate the regime so much. I mean, if you were a protester at all, you probably know somebody that died. Practically guaranteed. Yeah. Like close friend or family member was tortured or killed just a couple of weeks ago by the regime. I'm sure it's one of those situations where there's hardly a family that wasn't touched by the hand of death. So I could see why you'd give quite a bit of leeway to the United States for bombing crap because you hate the regime so much. At what point could that turn, do you think? To where the even the population that hates the regime Hates us for destroying their country so much. If the grandest of Trump's threats comes true, I think we're at a real tipping point for that. There's a great email that's going to be part of it at Mailbag about that. I hate to steal the thunder since I'm kind of stealing the thought but Whether it's the Greenland thing or Canada or You know a handful of other examples Trump seems incapable of realizing okay now this is unproductive. This is causing more harm than good. Let's reign in a little bit. Sometimes he can't find the break It's pretty tough though. I mean because to live in Iran Especially the younger crowd and they have so many more young people as a percentage than we do but it's very young country To have a regime that murders and tortures your friends Things that have to get pretty bad before you'd be Upset about what happened but if by this time tomorrow people are just stumbling around looking for water No electricity Chaos in the streets. It's anarchy whoever's got the gun's rules You might think you know what it was better last week Yeah, it's possible And it's possible to do the right thing in the wrong way as we've learned through various chapters of history So Yeah, why trump is the all-time go bigger go home He is go big whether it's making a ballroom Or uh or uh taking out a civilization whatever whatever you're doing go bigger go home Or expressing the desire to perhaps have a security agreement with greenland Yeah, or uh, you know criticizing someone who just died Whatever whatever it is go bigger go home. I'm glad it's dead. I hated him Yeah, I know I again i'm amazed at your capacity to laugh at this stuff because it feels like the uh unintended and unfortunate consequences of his excesses are accumulating We'll see we'll know a lot more tomorrow Holy crap. Well, and my point is the month after that and the month after that and the month after that There there are a lot of stories we don't cover because you know number one We're not the anti trump left media and they're a little in the weed z but There are negative consequences piling up in various departments of government and that sort of thing I'm trying to figure out. Do I hope he pulls back? before five o'clock our time on the west coast or not I suppose if I if i'm using my rational good person brain i'm hoping he pulls back the Kind of wants to see what happened. I hope it's opening his follow through Yeah, I like the idea of a demonstration strike of significance, but not wiping out a civilization You know what? I'd love to hear and I got to do some digging is an expert like a real expert on the irgc with Given their interests and their control What will their probable reaction to the various scenarios be because I don't know I'll tell you what I might I don't want and then we can take a break and get the mail back Here's what I would this would be the worst case scenario We do take out all the bridges All the water plants everything you have absolute anarchy chaos in the streets Every country on planet earth including our closest friends decries it of war crimes Uh snap polls come out where like 85 of americans including lots of republicans A majority of republicans say that was awful congress convenes emergency sessions, etc. Yeah, that's that's on the table, right? It is yeah, wow. Okay mailbag next I think i'm learning or leaning it's a diversion tactic gonna take carg islands Fould ya Anyway, we'll talk more about that later got uh interesting ai conversation that happened lots of stuff to talk about I hope you can stick around Here's your freedom loving quote of the day this one from william tecumseh Sherman the civil war general on the union winning side I believe this is from his letter to the city fathers of inlanda. I'm pretty sure of it War is cruelty. There's no use trying to reform it the crueler it is the sooner it will be over I have uh read most of that uh on the air at least once maybe it's uh time to read it again There are some who debate his logic. I think he's absolutely right mailbag Drop us a note will you mail bag at armstronginggetty.com keep it as short as you can but you know with any reason if you're brilliant You're making great points. Yeah ramble a little Obviously people are concerned with the war situation One of our main themes ryan from houston dear cold warrior an old fancy jack Whether trump is right or wrong I don't want the destruction of a civilization to come down to one man congress needs to get involved This from another jay in san jose If trump takes down the iranian regime it will bring a prosperity to the world not seen before it opens up gaza It's the end of hezbollah and iran is sitting on immense wealth It can be spent peacefully all the other countries in the region seem to be basically on board with trade not war Love them or hate them. He saw around this corner back in his first term and we're all just catching up Yeah, well, he's not threatening the regime will be the gone by the end of the day. He's threatening the civilization will be gone by the end of the day Again trump herbaly. I think This from paolo Guys trump says a lot of wacky stuff and only he knows why he says it Although I have to wonder here if he isn't risking fairly broad support Re iran the same way his undisciplined handling of immigration enforcement turned people against him there And he cites a couple of articles Um, da da da deadline threatening, uh, the entire civilization Uh, yeah, okay. It's hard to imagine how it is to your benefit To say an entire a whole civilization will die tonight Wow, I mean that makes his other hyperbolic statements throughout all the years seem like nothing Like he was just stretching and getting loose getting ready for this one Yeah, uh, this is just because it's interesting Um, oh, you know what? Do we have time? Yeah, we'll do this one because it's longer and save that one Uh, hey big freedom an old man jack Right ed I was a b-52 tail gunner back in the day While the communications for downed aircrew has certainly changed the ejection process is basically the same as when I was in While I had a signal uh mirror and a flare gun I'm sure they now have encrypted satellite communications Correct and then he talks about similar technology. He uses now as a private pilot um As to ejection imagine being accelerated from zero to 40 miles per hour in one tenth of a second You sustain about 20 g's of force And that can tear muscles cause hemorrhages in the eyes blow out your eardrums, etc You're sitting on your survival kit and a half second after the rocket motor fires the seat kicks you out quote unquote A seat separation device literally kicks you in the ass to separate you from the seat Which weighs a few hundred pounds the seat crashes to the ground while your parachute deploys oof Your survival so already you are seriously traumatized as you float to the ground Your survival kit contains some signaling devices camouflage makeup water space blanket fire making device iodine tablets to purify water and an mre It may contain a map of the local area, but i'm pretty sure this is now a gps device Also contains a small american flag a translation card that says i am an american airman in multiple languages And a couple of gold sovereigns you can use to bribe the locals your weapon is the sidearm You're flying with and you have very limited ammo Ah your flight suit has been sterilized before the mission your name rank squadron patcher all put on with velcro And for a combat mission all of that comes off before you take off Interesting i didn't know that Then all airmen undergo undergo survival training. There are basic land survival water survival desert survival Jungle survival and arctic survival courses in which you take depends on the environment you're expected to fly in obviously There's also a simulated pow camp where you are captured while trying to evade There is a solo experience and a group experience where they teach you various interrogation techniques and how to resist them without being killed The john wane name rank serial number date of birth approach is top It's slightly discouraged because it leads to a lot of torture and death The instructors speak their own made-up language and they're very good at stressing you physically without leaving any permanent damage They have several stress positions and mechanical torture devices that you're subjected to that simulate torture Trust me it doesn't take long before your muscles are quivelling and you're feeling the pain Uh There's a little more. Let me finish this just a couple more sentences as to whether to fight or surrender You're taught to do it. You think will allow for the best survival But if you fire a weapon or harm the enemy, you're still combatant and the enemy has the legal right to kill you Um, no what i'm interested in is why colonel was flying this mission once you become a senior officer You become a planner manager mentor to young troops and are typically considered too valuable to risk interesting. Thanks ed I was kind of surprised the guy was a colonel me too um I was going to bring this up with mike lines, but I thought it might be too indelicate Is there any situation where you kill yourself rather than be taken captured? and uh, I thought about that and then I was listening to the eisenhower book and when uh, Dwight eisenhower's son was in korea He had told his son if you're ever captured. I want you to kill yourself Because he was worried about the son of Dwight eisenhower being too valuable a prize for the enemy So he said if you're captured kill yourself before they have a chance to uh to take you Hey dad, how about maybe they don't treat me too bad because I am your son and they'll parade me around and use me for propaganda And stuff, but I get to that point could and then that was the concern right that they capture this guy and use him for propaganda Could it be so bad that you'd be you'd we would want them to kill themselves rather than be used for propaganda? Do we do that or not probably not a case by case decision? Oh boy, you know any more about that email or a textus? I thought that was interesting Dwight eisenhower telling his son that holy crap. We got a lot more to come if you miss a segment get the podcast armstrong and getty on demand armstrong and getty
