We've got another banger from wonderful journalist and friend of the show Ken Klippenstein. It's titled exclusive US secretly deployed paratroopers to Israel. Quick reaction force specializes in forced entry. In it, Ken writes that when the Pentagon announced that the 82nd Airborne [00:00:19] was deploying to the Middle East in March, it concealed a key detail. Some of the paratroopers were headed to Israel. Ken's reporting is based on an army deployment order that was actually leaked to him, much to the chagrin of that Will Chamberlain guy, whoever he is and wherever [00:00:36] he came from. And the 82nd Airborne, for those who are unfamiliar with it, is trained specifically to parachute into hostile territory. So does that mean the Trump administration and the Pentagon have been preparing for troops on the ground in Iran? Further, Klippenstein writes [00:00:53] that a military source involved in war planning tells me the deployment is tied to a new US-Israeli Joint Contingency Plan completed since February for seizing Karg Island and carving out coastal territory inside Iran. The Pentagon has never acknowledged it. In public, it has said only [00:01:13] that the 82nd was bound for CENTCOM, the military's term for US Central Command. the combatant command responsible for the entire Middle East. The press echoed the vague terminology suggesting the unit was headed to existing US bases in Kuwait or Qatar. So what's really going on [00:01:32] here? What do we make of this story? Luckily, we have Ken Klippenstein joining us right now to answer some questions. to the show. Hey guys, great to be back. So I have so many questions about this, Ken, and [00:01:47] we will get to Will Chamberlain in just a second, uh because he's threatening you over this report. But first, let's get to the actual substance. So why is this joint mission with Israel uh shrouded in secrecy? Because of what it's part of, which is uh what that war planner [00:02:07] who I quote in the story you just mentioned told me, which is a contingency plan for going into Iran like within their territory, uh seizing nuclear material and also seizing Karg Island which controls a large portion of Iran's oil infrastructure. And so the question is, as [00:02:27] people ask the response to story, okay, why would they put them in Israel? It's so far away, why not put it somewhere closer? Because Israel is the only country that the US can assume will be okay with launching an attack from. If they did it from Qatar, if they did it from the UAE, if they did it from any, virtually any other country in the region, they wouldn't [00:02:47] tolerate it because Iran would respond and they would respond with a lot of force. So Israel is the only country that they could uh launch the planes from where they would carry out a raid style targeted operation of that sort. And like I said, there's been no debate about [00:03:04] this because the Pentagon has just said, we're sending them to the Middle East, broadly, no specifics. I know that part asked. I know that there are major outlets that know that there are people going to Israel. They know where they're going, but they play along with the Pentagon's game of not being specific. They would probably say for operational security, [00:03:23] but I think so that they stay in the good graces of the Pentagon. And that was really my motive for writing the story. Well, yes, I agree with you on why legacy media operates the way they operate. It's also increasingly bought up and controlled by pro Zionist, pro Israel interests. [00:03:39] I mean, just today, the California Post published a about how uh Barry Weiss is poised to oversee CNN editorial operations. So I don't have much faith that uh the editorial leadership of Barry Weiss is conducive to uh accurate reporting about what our troops are doing on the ground [00:03:58] in Israel. But what I also find kind of interesting is this reporting reminds me of what happened with our soldiers in Iran not too long ago. where we lost a ton of military aircraft. [00:04:13] Troops had to be saved from within Iran. There's still no clarity about, first of all, who those troops were who were saved. No clarity about why they were in Iranian territory to begin with, what were they doing? And Iran has put out some, not Iran, but the Lego cartoons that [00:04:35] come out. One of them specifically noted that that operation was about retrieving Iran's enriched uranium. Which really makes me wonder, what your thoughts are about retrieving enriched uranium? Because that's always been a cover story to justify war against Iran. I don't [00:04:53] think Israel has ever been genuinely concerned about Iran building nuclear weapons. And so when you see our troops risking their lives to potentially retrieve enriched uranium, the Israelis aren't even really concerned about. It makes me wonder if the Trump administration [00:05:09] has been duped into thinking this is a serious issue and they must retrieve the enriched uranium. What's your read on that? Well, it's a complicated situation because the US and Israel's interests diverge in key ways. Israel has regional interests, uh questions of influence that they want to [00:05:27] exercise over the region. The US has much narrower ones. If you're looking at nonproliferation, that's a much narrower thing. And I think a lot of the coverage on this has been kind of misleading because the US can't do a large scale war, at least not in the near term, because [00:05:43] that would just be such a massive undertaking. mean, Iran is a huge country. That is nothing like some of the other countries in the region in which we've intervened. And so what that means is that they would have to do it more like the bin Laden raid in Pakistan, a more targeted operation, which carries all sorts of risks with it. But it just looks different [00:06:01] than the traditional massive ground invasion that you saw, for instance, in neighboring Iraq. And so a lot of the arguments that people make for why this can't escalate because uh the US simply can't uh absorb the political cost that you saw um politicians have to deal [00:06:21] with in Iraq. It's a completely different situation in Iran. It would be something of the order of probably hundreds of troops, these two different locations. From Trump's point of view, not being to take over the entirety of the Iranian state, but to uh secure some kind [00:06:37] of a win so that in the negotiations would seem to not be going great when those negotiations ultimately either collapse or the US has to- concessions that it doesn't want to. He can say, look, well, we got the nuclear fissile material and we took over the oil infrastructure, [00:06:53] so I have a win. And so I think at least in the near term, that's what we're looking at. um And again, it's something that's not being debated. At all, because people don't know about it. Right, yeah, exactly. So talk to me about the May 5th briefing that you write [00:07:08] about with- Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and uh the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Cain. They discussed project freedom of some sort of defensive operation to protect commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. How does that press briefing tie [00:07:25] into your story? Yeah, so this is like an object lesson in how good the Pentagon, they're so good at manipulating the press. Because they have an information advantage, which is true, it's hard to find things out. But they take advantage of that by doing this kind of middle ground where they say, we briefed you guys on this. So in this case, they said, we're sending [00:07:42] the 82nd Air, this was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Dan Kane. said, we're sending the 82nd Airborne into uh CENTCOM, which just means the Middle East. No more specificity, but then the Pentagon can go to the press and say, hey, we told you guys about this. And you've seen some people reacting like this on social media saying, Ken's reporting, they [00:07:59] sent him to Israel. They basically already told us, they said that they were sending him to the Middle East. Well, there's the Middle East and then there's Israel. And there's a big difference between those, because like I was saying earlier, Israel is the only country that would allow us to launch an attack of the sort that we're talking about. None of the Gulf Arab countries, maybe Kuwait, I doubt it, but none of the Gulf Arab countries would [00:08:19] tolerate something like that because they would get punched back very hard by the Iranians. And that's why it's important to have these details, which the Pentagon doesn't offer in these press conferences and the media doesn't ask. I know some of these outlets know these details, but they don't go out of line by saying it. And you mentioned Will Chamberlain, that's [00:08:37] what happens when you get specific. People say, why are you talking about troop movements? You're imperiling people, completely ridiculous. Nothing is going to happen to the 82nd Airborne because I wrote this story. But that's how they stay in line, is this fear that they're going to get yelled at and that they'll be taken off the short list of the Pentagon. And then they [00:08:53] say, they already told us. They should resign. Then they're not interested in being journalists. If you're going to be controlled by the very people that you're supposed to hold accountable, that you're supposed to check. in a democratic system, just sit down, uh go find something else to do. Go literally be a court stenographer if that's what you want to do. But let's get [00:09:12] to that dork, Will Chamberlain, who I had never heard of once in my life until like a week ago, and now he's all over the place. It's like they roll new figures out to be like attack dogs and they fail every single time. But let me give you this exchange. So Ken Klippenstein [00:09:28] decides he's gonna promote his work, so he posts about his piece. over on X and Will Chamberlain responds with, tickle to hear you say that, hope you're ready to give up your source or be jailed for contempt. Wow, sounds like someone who really believes in Western [00:09:45] values and freedom of expression and freedom of press. uh Ken responds in the way that you should expect Ken to respond, he calls him Will Chambermaid. And Chamberlain responds with, you'll have. plenty of spare time to brainstorm better epithets soon enough. Basically, making [00:10:05] reference to you being, I guess, imprisoned for doing journalism, the terrible uh violation of actual journalism. So are you worried at all about these threats, Ken? No, I don't worry about this stuff at all. If I worry about anyone, worry about sources because- they can be [00:10:26] messed with internal investigations and things like that. But in this case, I'm not worried about that either for reasons I can't go into. But this is part of why media doesn't report with the level of specificity that I was just criticizing before. Because you get slimed like this. You get treated like you're putting the troops in harm's way, is certainly in [00:10:44] this case, absolutely not true. mean, the other thing is the Iranians know this. The Iranians know this. The US government knows this. I'm sure lot of the Gulf Arab countries know this because they have their own intelligence. The people that are left out in the dark is the public. They're basically the only party that doesn't know this. And it's a real shame that [00:11:00] that's the state of affairs that prevails and that nobody seems to have any issue with it in the press in terms of trying to push back on that. Well, the press protects power and I should say legacy media specifically, right? I think that they are in the position of [00:11:18] either cheerleading or providing cover for what's going on right now. And anyone who steps out of line is uh any outlet that steps out of line ends up being in the crosshairs of the Ellison's. And so if you don't want Barry Weiss controlling your editorial decisions, then [00:11:36] you better play ball with what the US and the Israeli government wants. And in this case, it would be to avoid reporting this story, which is great for you because you get to report it and you get the credit for it. uh One other thing I wanted to bring up is, There's this [00:11:52] ongoing and very annoying debate. And I say annoying because every once in a while I even fall for it, and it happened recently. Where people like Barack Ravid and the broader media will put out stories about, there was a very contentious phone conversation between Netanyahu [00:12:13] and Trump. They disagree, they were fighting, Trump called him a piece of crap. not literally, I'm paraphrasing, basically told him I hate, everyone hates you. You're crazy, you're effing crazy, whatever. I don't believe any of it, okay? I'm going to go ahead and say I was wrong [00:12:29] in believing the whole narrative about Trump having a super harsh conversation with Benjamin Netanyahu. Because I think it's all kabuki theater when in reality behind the scenes, Israel and the United States are 100 % working together. They are in cahoots and we have deployed troops [00:12:46] in Israel. to potentially parachute into Iran to retrieve enriched uranium. Risking their lives on behalf of Israel's BS cover story uh involving nuclear weapons that they're allegedly so afraid of but don't even exist. So it's just what do you make of it? Am I being too [00:13:04] harsh? Do you think that there are significant disagreements between Trump and Netanyahu or is it all kabuki feeder? Well, there are broadly two different types of stories I learned very early on when I started doing this. One is the story that gets given to you, that the White House or the executive branch agencies like the State Department or the Pentagon, the ones [00:13:25] that they want out. The second kind of story is the one that they don't plan and you have to do really hard work and go find and is an unauthorized story. It's not one that someone signed off on and wanted to be out there for public consumption. So I don't know. specific [00:13:42] stories, but that type of story, which is overwhelmingly the coverage that we get throughout this conflict, is obsessed with palace intrigue, uh these leadership figures, people in the White House. It's very reflective of what the stuff that Washington's concerned with. What they don't do is go and talk to the military, who's actually carrying this stuff out, and who I talk to for this [00:14:01] story. And I think give you a much different picture of what's taking place. the reason you don't get that is because it's not designed for public consumption. You've got to really uh I worked for the Young Turks previously, I've been doing this for what, like a decade now? You've just spent a lot of time learning the different parts of the agencies, who works [00:14:19] where, who's gonna have eyes on uh what. And so it is hard work. But uh if you do it, you can actually find out what's going on instead of this, like you're saying, theater of he's mad and they're mad, or are they not mad, now they're not mad. And uh this theater that [00:14:35] creates the impression that journalism is happening, that something is being covered, that the- fit the state is doing what it's supposed to do. But when you actually squint and look at the details, you realize, wait, there's nothing here. I didn't learn it. This doesn't tell me anything. Yeah, you're absolutely right. In fact, real journalists would question why [00:14:54] someone in a position of power is leaking something to them. because you don't do that unless you have an agenda, right? And so do you want to be a pawn? Do you want to be someone who's just used as a tool to carry out? the agenda of government officials or people in positions [00:15:10] of power? Or do you want to actually hold power accountable, which is what journalism is supposed to do? And luckily you do that on a regular basis, Ken, which is why this information gets leaked to you. I would just say for any leakers within the Pentagon or the government, wherever they are in the Trump administration, don't even waste your time attempting to leak [00:15:30] to legacy media journalists. Go straight to Ken, he'll publish it. I would say that too, I absolutely say that too. I'm a big fan of leaker, so signals in my Twitter bio, reach out. Love it. All right, everyone, and make sure you follow and subscribe to Ken Klippenstein's work over at Substack. He does excellent work. I'm honored to have you on the show as usual. [00:15:49] Thank you, Ken. Thank you, Ana. Great to see you again. Good to see you too. uh