The New World Order?

In the third episode of the State of it podcast, Horatio and David Murrin discuss a shifting world order: a declining, alliance-strained U.S.-led West versus a rising, industrially scaled China at the centre of an “axis of autocracy.” David argues China has converted economic weight into military power (missiles, drones, hypersonics), created large anti-access/area-denial zones, and now holds the upper hand.

David foresees a decade-long global conflict cycle unless the West urgently mobilises industrially and militarily, coheres alliances, and creates a “firebreak” by decisively backing Ukraine. India and Turkey are portrayed as pivotal fence-sitters; Taiwan is the likeliest trigger, potentially cascading into a wider Pacific war. Murrin is sharply critical of Western leadership—especially Trump—for fragmenting alliances and slowing the response.

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Transcript

Horatio: 0:00

Welcome back to the State of It podcast where I'm here again with my dad and it's been a while but... We're here again. We're trying to get more consistent now. I'm going to university. But how are you, Dad?

David: 0:20

I'm really well. Well, you've been traveling for the past year in your year off, so you've seen the world, have a different perspective. So now we can talk about the world with that experience under your belt.

Horatio: 0:31

Yeah, and there's been a lot going on. So I've put together a couple of questions today about the new global order, because your work is all about it shifting, really, and how the world is changing. My first question is going to be how would you describe the world powers currently and who holds the upper hand?

David: 0:56

So Over the past 20 years, we've seen a real shift from a unipolar, American-dominated world, which was, I would argue, the last of the Western Christian empires, and also would argue that after 9-11 went into decline. And at the same time, there was a China sitting in the background, which basically had been waiting for its opportunity. And it is the second of the super-Asian empires after Japan. So when we have a pro them configuring and thinking about the way China's behaving towards the West, it's much easier to think of it as a second Asian empire. And how did the Japanese behave towards the West? And are the Chinese following a similar pattern? And the answer is yes, they are. And they've moved into the vacuum of American decline over the past 25 years since 9-11. And most people initially were quite happy to see them manufacture things for the West and keep inflation down. And lots of Western capitalists thought this is a great opportunity to make money although I was warning all along that's probably not a good idea because we're feeding the beast would come back and eat us which is exactly what's happened and in breaking the code of history I articulated that as we moved into 25 2025 we would see very clear alliance structures the old Western American Empire NATO alliance and a Pacific alliance of some kind I call it the Pacific Treaty Organization with Australia South Korea Japan and And possibly the Philippines is another group. And on the other side, China and its allies, its axis of autocracy. And that has really come to the fore. Their economic power has been transferred and migrated to military power and a massive arms race, one that the West has not been facing up against from the beginning of 2020 when they accelerated. And so that all that came to a fruition, weak Western leadership, consistent power expansion by Xi, the Belt and Road System, The bringing together of people that felt left out by the American democratic system into the BRICS and into a trade organization around the Eurasia and the Pacific Basin. And what that did is come to a head and the big march and the big, you know, moment when she said, we're here now in this military march, which took place last week, coupled with this organization, which he wants to be the second tier of the axis of autocracy is an announcement to the sleepy Western world that it is now fair to say that we're here. a massive challenge. And that challenge, I would argue, is strongly in China's favour. America is in decline. Trump has accelerated the decline process by not respecting what America is as a fragile empire, and in fact has taken the levers that he should use to turn the corner and the U-turn for America and put it into a nosedive. So right now we're looking at a situation where if I had to think about who was stronger, it's actually the Chinese over the Western world.

Horatio: 3:55

Well, what actually makes makes America fragile at the moment?

David: 4:02

So America, many Americans find this hard to comprehend, but America is an empire. It has followed a legacy of more sophisticated empire control mechanisms, which were preceded by the British Empire, which is a small population, had a colonial model that basically took some of its administrators into countries, and with a small military arm, then worked with the local people to administer that colonial asset. And we think about that very much as our last memory of empire. What we don't see is the American model, which is essentially an envelope of defence, a bubble in which there's control of regions and alliances like NATO and the Pacific linkages to Japan and Australia. And with inside that, there's a dollarisation space where they use dollars to basically pay and transact. And that means that profits come back into the centre of America. And as a result, they can borrow a lot of money and they can keep themselves going when others couldn't. And what Trump has done is he's destroyed the defence alliances and their trust. Now many of those alliances are looking more and more to themselves and not America. And he's reduced the dollarisation envelope. And all systems, businesses, when they mature, live on scale and small margins, and empires are the same. I would argue that the margin is now well and truly negative. The bubble is collapsing. And his tariff policy, for example, whether he was friend or foe, in friend that he slapped these tariffs on and his defence vacillations in NATO and the concerns that those will be projected to Taiwan and the Asian basin have totally sowed distrust as to whether America is there for its allies. And that has shrunk the bubble and shrunk the dollarisation curve, which is also under assault from the Chinese axes of autocracy. So in effect, Trump has, instead of making America great, guaranteed its accelerated decline.

Horatio: 5:57

Right. And recently in a military parade in Beijing, Xi Jinping symbolically placed himself between Putin and Kim. Do you think this is how Xi sees himself for the new forefront of the

David: 6:09

global order? And then you can think of his allies in the axis of autocracy like Russia and Iran and Pakistan and North Korea, none of which would be taking aggressive action if China wasn't in the middle supporting them. So he is very much the centrepiece. And Putin has really had a disastrous strategic experience because the invasion of Ukraine was meant to be days and it lasted. It's still going on and he's making no progress. And he did it because he wanted to create the Russia of old, the power of old, didn't understand the weakness of Russia itself. And he's resulted in a long consequential attritional war where he's now fully dependent on China to continue. Without China, Russia would not survive. So he's now a junior related relationship and she is the powerhouse and the power broker.

Horatio: 7:19

I believe there was only two countries, two European countries that went to this military parade in Beijing. How do you think NATO NATO, EU, America saw this

David: 7:31

parade. What do you think they think of it? Tesco's speaking to a lady behind the counter who talked about her shock at seeing how much, how powerful China had become and how clearly militaristic it had become. For her, it was a total shock. So I think it was a wake-up call to another circle of people in the West that our real challenge is, yes, Russia and what happens in Europe and denying it victory in Ukraine. And I think we should do that swiftly because war is like a disease, it spreads. But more importantly, underlying it all is China and China is coming for everyone. China has been already in a series of proxy wars in Ukraine and in Iran and Pakistan. So we need to wake up and we need to mobilize and we need to make sure that we can defend ourselves and we support Ukraine in not just defending itself, but pushing Putin out before the Chinese make their kinetic move against Taiwan and that rolls into the whole Asian basin.

Horatio: 8:48

Were there new technologies that were unveiled at this military parade?

David: 8:53

There were, obviously, in the public. And if you go and look at the spectrum of technological development that the Chinese have, first of all, they demonstrated land lasers, which are no different from dragon fire. And they were small on top of a vehicle, which had been used and tested in Russia, in Ukraine rather. They demonstrated a series of drones and stealthy systems, which are designed to keep them at the forefront of drone technology. They also demonstrated submarine drones, torpedo-like, long torpedoes and short ones, which they think it's like the Poissian torpedo system that the Russians have developed, designed to gather intelligence and also to attack targets strategically with nuclear weapons. From every front, when we look at them, they have missile development long-range intercontinental missiles. Every part of their military sphere shows expansion and acceleration of innovation. And it's something I've been warning about. They are out-innovating us. They are out-producing us with their industrial base. And they are very, very dangerous as an enemy. We cannot give them any ground because the Americans have really slowed down their manufacturing process. All their missile programs, they're behind. The missiles they used, which were so, maybe a quarter of the portion of Theads and were used in the 12-day war with Israel. They just don't have enough missiles in their inventory and can't make enough to really use their exquisite weapons on a sustained basis, which is a huge Achilles heel. And I'm sure the Chinese don't suffer from that problem with their industrial base.

Horatio: 10:34

And you've got a very detailed system looking back in the past and making models to look into the future, like your stages of empire. If you look back in the past, back in history, what... resonates with you. that is similar to what's happening between the US and China right now?

David: 10:55

Well, first of all, we must all remember that when a nation rises through the stages of regionalization and then early stage expansion and it becomes economically powerful, there is no nation on earth that has not converted that economic power to military power and then used it. So for those that say China is peaceful, look at its history up until 75 when it hit the American glass ceiling in the region. It went to war with everyone around it. It's no different from any other system. It's only been delayed from 75 to now because of the American glass ceiling and it's now planning to break out of it and it will use its weapons. It will go to war with the regions around it because historically every other system has and you just have to listen to its bellicose language to see that confirmed. What we're really seeing though is something even bigger and in my work I have uncovered a 108 to 112 year side And interim cycle is a contrative wave. There are two of them in effect, net to net. But it represents a pulse of some kind of entropic energy that generates hegemonic challenge. You can see it going back to the Spanish being challenged by the French, the Napoleonic Wars, the Germans challenging Britain in the First World War, and now China challenging America. And we are in an event of that magnitude. The starting gun was fired in 2022, and China is seeking global dominion over everyone. And because of nuclear weapons, it may not be as overt initially in its levels of strike, but certainly by the engagement of proxies like Russia and Ukraine, in Iran, and basically in Pakistan, where Chinese technology demonstrators have been capable of long range air sniping. Essentially, what's happening is there's a sense of superiority, there's a sense of attrition. And for example, the missile stocks used in Ukraine, and especially in Israel, are not going to be placed in a rush. So Certainly not before the window when I think the Chinese might move in the next year. And so they've been very successful and very strategic in the way they're playing us. And we are still not mobilized. And we need to mobilize. And you talked also about Trump. One of the things that we need to do is match China's scale. So what Trump has done is made America first and severed his relationships with all his alliances, failed to create coordination, failed to create scale, and actually made the West stable. separate and includes Japan and South Korea because everyone is not America. And that's diametrically the opposite of what should be done right now. A really great leader like Reagan would be bringing every element of the Western democracies, every element of their industrial bases together to match Chinese scale. And if we did that, we could match Chinese scale. But that's another reason why I argue that Trump has been so destructive to America and Western interests because he's created fragmentation and not scale in the response.

Horatio: 13:50

And do you believe there are other emerging powers that could alter this balance. Countries like India.

David: 13:57

India reminds me an awful lot of the USSR going into the Second World War. Because basically, surprisingly, it created a non-aggression pact with Hitler and then they carved up Poland and Finland. But basically what Stalin was doing was buying time and he knew he would go to war against the Nazis and Hitler knew he was going to go to war against Stalin. And what is little known in that pact is that Stalin then fuelled the German war machine with commodities and resources to make the pact work, which then enabled Hitler to turn west and take Western Europe. It's never talked about, but in effect, it enabled Hitler to do that. I think India is playing the same game. It's the same game of sitting on the fence, trying to extract maximum bargain time, watching the other elements, you know, fight each other or go to war with each other and basically coming in a later. I always think whatever the noises, India will come onto the side of democracy, because ultimately its biggest enemy is China. So just as it was always going to be that the Russians fought the Germans in the Second World War, whatever the path looked like, I would argue that with India. And there's another country, which is Turkey. And Turkey, with Erdogan, plays the same game of sitting on the fence to maximise exactly the benefits he can as a country. And I think there's a very big campaign going on now in the White House to ensure that Turkey stays inside NATO, firmly in the West. So in that respect, Erdogan's bargaining strategy will be immensely successful, and has been, and I think continue to be. But those are two pivotal countries. And then out there, there are smaller countries like Indonesia. So one of the strategic goals, I believe, of China is to take Australia and New Zealand, because if an admiral from the PLAN could interview an admiral from the Imperial Japanese Navy and say what went wrong in your planning for the Second World War the answer would be we failed in the Battle of the Coral Sea and we failed to take Australia and as a result of it America could use Australia as a fight back base like Britain was for Europe in the Second World War and they came north at us and ultimately won the war so I think the Chinese understand they will seek to take New Zealand and Australia and the whole of the Third Island chain and control it destroy the industrial bases of Japan and South Korea as their enemies and there are a So unlike the Japanese campaign in the Second World War that had to take all the islands as they move south, I think they'll be able to leapfrog, and most importantly, the Philippines, then down to Papua New Guinea, and then Australia is probably the objective sequence for long-term Chinese planning.

Horatio: 16:43

Going back to Turkey and Erdogan, you said NATO is desperately trying to keep Turkey inside. Onside, yeah. Do you think Erdogan actually wants to stay in there, or is he staying there because he's being forced to?

David: 16:58

No, I think Erdogan... Or do you

Horatio: 16:59

think he wants to go join the

David: 17:02

East? Erdogan is a dictator by nature, but he also has a vision for the Second Ottoman Empire, which is why he's created an Islamic Turkish republic, because otherwise he doesn't see having the moral imperative and right to rule over the rest of the Middle East. So he's got this big vision. And he's been exercising it. And the Turks are incredibly industrious, despite all the penalties that have been imposed through poor economic management and inflation. But he also understands that he uses this being in this middle between Russia and the Eurasian countries and basically NATO to maximise his leverage. I think he's continuing to do that. And I think he's about to get a very big payoff from the White House that makes sure he stays as the anchor point for the south, southeastern part of the NATO front, which is so critical. Right.

Horatio: 17:55

How are new technologies and militaries reshaping the geopolitical world?

David: 18:00

So, it's a great question. Every single rise of an empire comes with an innovative surge, a lateralised adaptive phase which seeks to find ways of overcoming the encumbered hegemony and its technologies. And the best place you see it is in revolutions of military affairs How do you displace the power of the current hegemon? And that game became very real in 2018 when DF-26s came online in Italian size. What are DF-26s? They're like intermediate range missiles. And all missiles of that magnitude were predominantly nuclear weapons carrying missiles. And the innovation the Chinese brought was to use them in a conventional role with terminal targeting to kill warships, i.e. US carriers. And they determined roughly that 50 of these missiles would overcome a carrier and its three escorts that just couldn't cope with the saturation level. And so they created this access area denial strategy based on long range missiles supported by very fast cruise missiles at low level to attack in two different vectors. And subsequent to that, they built more and more of them in DF-21s and 26s. And then they added a DF-17, which is a hypersonic warhead that we really don't know how to stop if it is what we think it is. So they've created... this area denial process which means the operation for the US Navy is incredibly difficult and I argue they'll probably lose the opening stages of

Horatio: 19:29

a conflict. What do you mean area of denial process? It

David: 19:30

means it says you can't come anywhere within the range of our missiles because if you do we'll sink your carriers. Right. And the evolution of sea power or all warfare has been one of firepower and range. So battleships were superseded by aircraft because a carrier could launch aircraft and they could initially in the second one strike 300 miles away and a battleship couldn't then hit the carrier force. So this is really an extension of, and the modern carriers can extend to 620 nautical miles without refueling. But if you hold them at risk 2,000 miles away before a carrier can get within strike distance, that changes the equation. And

Horatio: 20:07

that's really what I've done. So carriers are

David: 20:09

becoming... Carriers right now are indefensible against modern saturation attacks. And so we've seen this migration between battleship and carrier. And you could argue the American hedger was based on the carrier and submarine power. And certainly one of those legs, carrier power, is now until defensive measures can be enacted that are strong enough to resist the threat, under threat. And that's the window that China seeks to use to push America out of the second and third island chain. And it means the world's in a very dangerous place.

Horatio: 20:41

And you were saying about this area of denial, how large is this area?

David: 20:46

It's quite simple. If you're DF-26 travels 3,500 kilometers. That's the area of denial. Exactly. But the Chinese, again, have been innovative. And now they're looking at putting their DF-17 versions, which are missiles with hypersonic warheads out to about 1,700 miles on ships. So now it's not just a radius from the land of 1,700 miles. If you move the ship forward, then the envelope goes forward. So they're looking to really create a denial area that pushes America right the way back back to the other side of the Pacific.

Horatio: 21:21

And do you think America is going to be able to... Obviously China has these hypersonic missiles. Do you think American... I mean, obviously... Fighting against them is very difficult, but actually replicating them and making their own hypersonic missiles.

David: 21:34

Well, this is the thing that's so interesting. The American and Western response to hypersonic technology is still years away. So...

Horatio: 21:43

Response or making their

David: 21:45

own? Making similar versions. You know, the Americans had a thing called prompt strike, which was similar, but it's not operational. And so the Chinese are just way ahead in hypersonic weapons. And the Americans and the West have been asleep. Now, interestingly enough, just because we get... doesn't mean we're safe because the basis of power for America was carrier projection. And you have to defend the carrier against that type of technology. And that's what the Golden Dome is all about. The Golden Dome is not just a defense of America. The same system with low orbit satellites can cover any aspect or area of the Earth. It's much more than a defensive system if they build it. It's an area that can project, envelope power anywhere in the world. And it is designed to basically interdict anything that comes up from the Earth through the atmosphere into space or even skips along the outer levels of the atmosphere like a hypersonic to basically clear the air above it. So it's an offensive weapon as much as a defensive weapon. And if the Americans get close to it, which I think they are going to do because of the heavy lift space capabilities, then the Chinese are going to consider preemptive action beforehand.

Horatio: 22:56

What do you think China's waiting for at the moment? Because from what you've said, it sounds like they have a serious dominant force against the West, against everyone. They're superior in every single way. So why are they waiting?

David: 23:11

So I think it's a very good question because I think their window is, and there's a good example where the Taiwanese are now making their own missiles faster than the Americans can provide them, which are still on order and backlogged since 2019. So countries like Japan and South Korea are accelerating shipbuilding programs and exporting their technology to other people. Missile technology in Taiwan is fascinating that they're building their own missiles, but of course they've got a chip business, so you can understand it. They're a high-tech producer. I think all of these things are going to narrow down that window for Xi. I think his balance is the military window. Up until last year, he had some sort of coup going on in the military. Some 1,400 PLA officers were removed at a senior level, unprecedented so we can assume there was resistance to his rule and maybe delayed it. But there's another part too, I think, in Xi's mind, and there's a great phrase, never interrupt your enemy when he's making a mistake. And right now, you know, the Western world is getting weaker and weaker and weaker and not stronger, and under Trump especially.

Horatio: 24:17

So you think China's waiting because they think the West is self-destructing?

David: 24:21

I think so. I think there's a point about if you had a window from 25 to 26, say, or 27, Xi's natural tendency will be to extend that window and watch us implode ourselves so there's an element to that which is key I also think he's a cautious man and it's all very well unlike Hitler who was a military man having been in the trenches in the First World War who liked military power I think she probably isn't as comfortable as some previous dictators have been to launch launch full-scale strikes because there's always uncertainty that goes with it and he will want certainty of course there's never any certainty in war And Hitler, when he took his big gamble in 1940, no one thought the gamble would win. Coming through the Aden forest in one major road, sending a whole army through it was unheard of. And the whole of the German army resisted his, but they did it and it worked because it was a big gamble. So whether he's going to be the person that actually makes the move because he is so cautious is an interesting question. I think in the end, they'll be forced to. They'll be forced to because their economy is a wartime economy. It's got a demand gap. And as a result, they're, it's going to keep getting more and more fragile, because in effect, since 2020 and the arrival of the pandemic, I would argue that the Chinese economy has been militarised to a fortress economy, which meant that his intentions would go to war, going to war would date back to that point.

Horatio: 25:45

How are we self-destructing ourselves? How are we making ourselves

David: 25:49

weaker? Well, first of all, we live in an increasingly inflationary environment, which is an underlying erosion of consumer society. We have massive debt debt burdens, and those burdens increasing because inflation increases the cost of long-term debt. And if you just look at the CRB and you correlate it to, for example, 30-year gilts or 30-year bonds, you can see there's a correlation. But China also has the same pressures, funnily enough. So they're both consumer systems under that pressure, whereas Russia has the opposite because it's a commodity producer. Commodity inflation makes it stronger. So I'm always very wary of the that their economy is about to implode because it certainly didn't into the peak of 75. And that's the best model we have for a commodity boom cycle and the strength it feeds into the Russians as commodity producers. So the other reason is we just, you know, you look at America, you have a dictator, you have a man migrating America to dictatorship, destroying the fabric of the constitution. In Britain, we have a left-facing neo-Marxist government, which basically is destroying the fabric of one of the better versions in the West prior to the Labour government that actually stood tall and supported Ukraine in its endeavour to resist Russia. So I think there are many components of this, but we are not getting stronger, we're getting weaker and our society's

Horatio: 27:17

more... Are we actually getting weaker or are we just getting weaker in comparison to China?

David: 27:21

No, we're getting weaker, absolutely, and we're getting weaker in comparison because they are investing in their military expansion.

Horatio: 27:28

Right. And you said China wants to make that move. He's a cautious man. What is he going to do when he makes his move? Because obviously technology is so powerful now that if your strike is so strong, you're just going to level everything.

David: 27:44

Well, you don't level everything with modern technology because unlike in the First and Second World War when the Allies dropped 1.5 billion tons of bombs on... Germany, and they leveled everything. Now it's much more about precision. So you didn't level everything, you just destroy the targets you want to if you have enough missile

Horatio: 28:07

magazines. So you think they're very unlikely to drop one bomb? I

David: 28:12

don't think nuclear weapons and nuclear war is actually on the cards. Really? Because the Chinese want to inherit the world, not ashes. And they will constrain Putin in whatever he does, and they will not seek to do it themselves. So I don't think this is the nuclear Armageddon. I think the real threat is essentially the erosion of intention that we've seen where the West was scared by the outcomes of nuclear weapons and therefore gave Ukraine, in effect, to Putin by not responding. It's a failure of intention in the West. And much as Trump loves to bluster and blows up a drug boat with 11 people on board, legally or not, and he likes to see he's really a weak bully, when it really comes down to toe-to-toe stuff he's scared of Putin all reports are he's terrified of him so he's a classic bully and there are bigger bullies in the playground than him and I think actually his loyalty is questionable I think he's fully under the reflex control of Putin which is why you see the compromise consistent compromise and undermining of a key ally which should never happen under any other president

Horatio: 29:24

Do you think the West can still counterbalance the East i.e. Look,

David: 29:29

every day we fail to truly mobilize is a day missed. Now, if I take Britain, I'm afraid that Britain's response has been lamentable. To say we're spending more money on defense is just a lie. The Labour government have said that defense of the realm is critical and a cornerstone of their government. And then we know we're at war effectively with Russia, but we're not going to increase defense spending for 2027. And even then it's incremental. That's not the measures needed. The measures are needed are the ones that Poland and Germany have taken. Germany spent 5% in capital for the equipment which it didn't have and 5% per annum and it's rearming at an impressive and appropriate level to be a bulwark along with Poland against Russia and because I don't think Russia is just the problem I think as we've seen North Korean troops on the front in Ukraine we will see masses of Chinese troops one day come with a well equipped army and we will face them on the front So I think it's a much bigger issue than just a reconstituted Russia. And no, there won't be a peace in Ukraine.

Horatio: 30:36

Don't think. But could America counterbalance, counteract

David: 30:40

China? Well, I think...

Horatio: 30:44

Let's say China striked tomorrow morning.

David: 30:46

Struck where?

Horatio: 30:48

Taiwan.

David: 30:50

So if you're a Chinese planner, you know, China launches a surprise invasion of Taiwan. What happens next? Well, we know the Japanese will probably engage very quickly because they have a forward defence policy where Taiwan is in effect just a few hundred miles away from the first of its western islands. And in that stage, now you're engaging the Japanese. And then the Americans say, we can't afford to lose our ally, Japan, because it's too big a quotient of our Asian forces. So we'll join in. And then the Australians are there and the South Koreans are there. And then the North Koreans invade the South Koreans. The whole just chain reaction. So if you're a Chinese planner, you assume the chain reaction will take place, as it did do in 1914, the cards folding in an alliance like dominoes, and you actually just go straight to go, and you preemptively strike everything. The main Japanese and American bases, the carriers, you do a whole preemptive strike in the region, and I think, really, if I had to put my money on Chinese mindsets and planning, if I was them, that's what I would be doing. Far better to strike completely unprepared, and especially because Rocketfall don't require mobilization. So you don't see the mobilization chain that we saw with the Russians prior to the invasion of Ukraine, which telegraphed warning, warning, warning. You'll just get basically go. And the rocket forces will be able to launch from their distributed locations on all the key targets within the region.

Horatio: 32:16

Finally, looking forward to the next five to 10 years, what will the new, I know we've covered the whole time, basically saying the new global order has shifted over to China. and Russia and North Korea and so on. But really looking forward further, five to ten years, in like 2035, what do you think the global order is going to look like?

David: 32:41

Well, the problem we've got is, in my study of these hegemonic conflict cycles of 108, 112 years, you can sort of anticipate when they start and think of it like a long-distance race when the gun goes off. But what is really interesting is how long it takes for that resolution and the result to come through. If you go and look at the Napoleonic War, it really started in 1792 and didn't really end until 1815. So that's 23 years of continuous conflict before France lost to Britain and that hegemonic balance shifted into Britain's hands with Trafalgar and Waterloo. If you look at the First World War, it started in 14. It lasted four intense years. There was a big pause and then it picked up again in 39 and it finished in 45. So that's a big period. That's 31 years and there's peace in between. But nonetheless, only then did you see the new order unfold. And so I think this is a decade conflict, if we're lucky. This conflict will last at least a decade before it's resolved one way or the other. And so we're in the period where the Challenger moves and challenges only move when they feel strong so Germany looked strong in 1914 and it fancied taking on Britain through France and Europe and China looks really strong now and it fancies taking on what are old and decrepit versions of western democracy but you never really know how war unfolds and especially when you think of it as a predatory action all the initial actions of a predator are ones of surprise and opportunity So they'll always look good for the first few years and then it's a question of how the other system recovers, its resilience, how it innovates and how it then finds a way to recover or it just doesn't and it loses. Now in World War I and World War II, Britain went through that. It was not prepared for war in the way that Germany was. It was on the back foot for a long time, three to four years in both cases, before it finally found its footing and moved forward and won the war. I think we will go through a similar period and it might be even longer. And this is a global conflict, a first truly global war for every ocean on the planet. So I'm afraid we're locked into something that I think will, at the very best, will take a decade.

Horatio: 35:09

Why do you

David: 35:12

think it's going to take so long? high enough to create a victory. For example, you know, when we're now beginning to see 1,000 or 900 or 826 drone attacks on a regular basis, it's because earlier in the war, Russia didn't have that number of drones to produce. It didn't have industrial capability. But industrial wars convert peacetime infrastructure into wartime structure and maximize their killing over time. And the world isn't much as, you know, China has a big industrial base. It has a militarized industrial base, heaven forbid, which will be terrifying. So it takes time to do those things especially with complex modern technology. So it will be a long affair.

Horatio: 36:07

That's all my questions.

David: 36:09

Well, a lot of good questions there. Sorry to end on a challenging note. I think the quicker the West wakes up and the quicker we get ahead of the curve to try and deter this oncoming conflict and create a firebreak. And the first firebreak we really should create is to stop the war in Ukraine. And we should actually use our air power to create a no-fly zone over Ukraine. Because the Russians could not stand against Western air power as the Iranians couldn't stand against the IDF. So we need to get ahead of the firebreak We need to make the fire break. And the fire break is Ukraine. But we're not going to do it with Trump because he's under reflex control from Putin.

Horatio: 36:46

Right. Why is he under such control? Doesn't he have a history with the Russians?

David: 36:50

He has a history with the Russians. He has a history of Russian loans in his property deals. He has a history with Trump Tower and all sorts of nefarious things which have happened related to Mafiosi and the Russians. And at the same time, it's very clear that whatever compromise there was, I think was quite slight and narrow. But I think the reflex control, which is a Soviet secret mechanism and agency, has been so potent that Trump is really under the control of Putin. And there's the other part, which is the Epstein files, which I think are a Mossad honey trap. And essentially he was caught well and truly in that honey trap, which is why he says yes to everything that Israel does. He has no agency to say anything else. He even wanted to create the Riviera and offer every Palestinian $5,000 to leave the Strip, which is a Netanyahu agenda. One has to wonder whether if Netanyahu has that agency over Trump with that information, whether Putin also got hold of some of it.

Horatio: 37:56

That's interesting. Makes him quite a weak man then.

David: 37:59

Makes him a very weak

Horatio: 38:00

man. Because he's so self-absorbed, he doesn't want his truth to come out.

David: 38:03

Yes, he's self-absorbed, he's egocentric, he's a grandiose narcissist, which is the worst kind of leader at a time like this. He has no strategic concept apart from staying in power and aggrandizing himself. And if you just look at his cabinet meetings and you look at the sycophancy displayed by the cabinet members, it's terrifying.

Unknown: 38:25

Yeah.

David: 38:26

I think that's all though yeah until next time everyone please you know pick up pick up your mouse and go to Global Forecaster and sign up for Murrinations Gold because all of this information is there in great detail and you'll be far better equipped if you do and more importantly if these ideas resonate we do need to make a difference and by supporting Global Forecaster and spreading the word amongst your friends you are doing that so please sign up

Horatio: 38:51

you can find Global Forecaster on www.davidmurrin.co.uk as easy as that go sign up new website please go check it out thank you very much

David: 39:02

thanks H look forward to the next

Horatio: 39:04

one bye David Murrin specialises in using the past to predict the future and is an accomplished public speaker, hedge fund manager and market trader. To date, he has authored four books, Breaking the Code of History, Lions Led by Lions, Now or Never and Red Lightning, with the fifth book, Breaking the Code of War, set to release in the middle of this year. Feel free to check out his views and insights called Murrinations on his website, www.davidmurrin.co.uk.