War Room Briefing

RICH DOES POLITICS • THE WEEKLY BRIEFING
Week of 9–15 March 2026; No 2

IRAN: THE WAR NOBODY WANTED AND NOBODY CAN STOP

The war in Iran entered its second week. In that second week, I recorded seven videos on this subject with analysts whose view did not always align. What all seem to agree on is that this war was not Trump’s first choice. This was either a trap or a crisis he was forced to manage.
Xoaquin Flores, (who writes for the Strategic Culture Foundation), offered the most detailed account. He argued that between 22 and 27 February, Iran and the US had tentatively agreed on a nuclear deconfliction framework. Then on February 28th, Israel attacked. Secretary Rubio confirmed to the press that the Pentagon’s assessment was the US had to join in, since Iran had previously declared it would retaliate against American assets regardless of who struck first. “Israel started this war and the United States made an assessment that it needed to join in,” Flores said, citing Rubio’s initial statements before they were walked back. He also referenced former CIA analyst John Kiriakou’s claim that Netanyahu used nuclear blackmail against Trump: Israel’s Samson Option doctrine authorises nuclear strikes against allies who fail to intervene.
Flores lays out his usual smart analysis on the attack on Iran here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3l2_RcseZQ&t=9s

Retired General Blaine Holt and Harley Schlanger, President of the LaRouche Organisation, appeared together and openly disagreed, albeit in an extremely civilised and gentlemanly manner. Schlanger argued Trump had failed to clean out the deep state as his first priority, leaving him vulnerable to the Zionist lobby, the neocons, and the military industrial complex. He named Scott Bessent, Pete Hegseth, Steven Miller, and Marco Rubio as problematic figures in the administration. “When did Netanyahu became co-president, I’m just wondering?” Schlanger asked.
Holt countered that Israel was preparing to act unilaterally, possibly with nuclear weapons, and Trump stepped in to prevent a nuclear conflagration. Holt acknowledged that mistakes had been made, particularly in personnel decisions, but argued that the air campaign ha dbeen tactically successful. He also hinted at coming accountability: “In the next 3 to 10 days, we’re probably going to start seeing some rather astonishing things in the field of accountability.” Both agreed that Susie Wiles, Trump’s gatekeeper, was restricting the information reaching the President, thus limiting his scope for decisions. Both agreed that Wiles should be removed.
You can watch the conversation between Schlanger and Holt here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jh0No3sljI

Matt Ehret, historian and author, pushed back against the thesis that Iran is a City of London proxy. He pointed out that Iran has no privatised central bank, has been sanctioned for over 40 years, is a full member of BRICS, and has been a central node in both the International North South Transportation Corridor and China’s Belt and Road Initiative. “If the City of London had such control over Iran, why don’t they have a City of London directed central bank? Why have they been punished with sanctions for 40 years?” He argued that the real NATO presence in the region is Israel, not Iran, and traced MI6’s role in fabricating the Iranian nuclear threat through their operative Nicholas Langman.
Listen to Ehret’s argument here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVmDbHxXOfI&t=2s

First time guest, Colonel Towner-Watkins approached it through the lens of Operation Gladio, arguing that the IRGC essentially evolved from the Shah’s Savak intelligence service with its CIA and MI6 connections intact. She revealed details about Crypto AG, a Swiss encryption company that was a CIA communications conduit for decades, that gave Washington backdoor access to 120 countries’ communications from 1945 until Trump shut it down. The Colonel’s assessment: Iran was given the chance to join a peace coalition and refused. “If those guys are still under the control of the UK and Israel and they go ‘no, we’re not playing,’ then you don’t have a choice but to take them out.”
Wacth this fascinating conversation with Colonel Towner-Watkins here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUfQy6RhMSs

Barbara Boyd from Promethean Action traced the history of MI6 and CIA. She referred to a Financial Times’ seminar in April 2025, where both agency heads admitted that MI6 and the CIA are “completely merged.” She documented how Executive Order 12333 under Reagan authorised the outsourcing and concealment of intelligence operations, creating the privatised deep state that still persists today.
This interview was first posted on my older channel in July 2025, but is still relevant today and pertinent to the richdoespolitics channel that I reposted it there.
You can watch it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEy9yvzOcyE&t=12s Forgve the poor lighting, my poorly brushed hair and note my incredible tan, courtesy of the Cypriot sunshine.

Mike Steager, also from Promethean Action, argued that the Middle East has been maintained, by the British, as a cockpit of religious conflict specifically to prevent a US/Russia realignment. He said that Russia and China abstaining at the UN Security Council vote condemning Iran suggests they see what Trump is attempting as potentially positive. Steager aserts that they agree with Trump’s strategic aim, which is to end the era of globalization and that the Middle East had to be taken off the table as a trigger for world war. “You don’t survive 10 years of near political destruction and then launch a war 8 months before a midterm without a purpose.”
See what Steeger says here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Og92KVAQ9LE

UKRAINE: RUSSIA DEMANDS UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER

In two conversations, Professor Vladimir Brovkin, retired historian of Soviet politics, and Harley Schlanger analysed how the Iran war has transformed Russian thinking on Ukraine. Brovkin described the influential Sunday programme hosted by journalist Solovyov, where senior military and intelligence figures now call for unconditional surrender of Ukraine rather than a negotiated settlement. “The spirit of Anchorage is dead,” Lavrov reportedly said, meaning Russia no longer wishes to negotiate with Trump. The war aims have expanded: not just the four provinces plus Crimea, but potentially to include Kharkiv to Odessa, regime change in Kiev, and the dismemberment of western Ukraine, with Hungarian and Slovak minorities possibly returning to their parent nations.
Their analysis of the European economy is bleak. German industrial output has fallen 20% since 2022, auto sales are down 24% in February, and the country has no viable or reliable energy source. Putin has stated Russia will supply oil and gas only to friendly countries. This means that they will not be supplying energy to the EU or UK. Brovkin noted that the French and British proposals to provide nuclear weapons to Ukraine drew an official Russian response: any such move would result in strikes on Paris and London directly. Schlanger described the European defence buildup as fantasy: “They can’t even patrol the traffic in Paris.”
Whatch the full conversations here -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUj2Z8IJQqI&t=3s & https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUj2Z8IJQqI&t=3s

AFRICA: THE EMPIRE’S GRIP LOOSENS

Journalist PD Lawton, Harley Schlanger, and Professor Jean Marie Vianney Higiro examined how the imperial extraction model operates in Africa and how it is being challenged. The Alliance of Sahel States is this really the correct name? (Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso) are implementing the American System of Political Economy: keeping natural resources for domestic benefit, building manufacturing capacity, and moving toward a common currency independent of the French-controlled CFA franc.
Critically, PD Lawton reported that the Trump administration is now actively targeting British imperial proxy forces in Rwanda, Africa. High-level M23 and RSF generals have been killed by US drone strikes. The US has redesignated Nigeria as a country of particular concern and is working with its government to eradicate jihadist networks. PD described Rwanda as “the Israel of Africa”: a Western military proxy deposited in central Africa to maintain access to Congo’s extraordinary mineral wealth through perpetual instability.
Watch here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIUkyAzstkw&t=1s

THE ELITE’S UNTHINKABLE SECRET

Mark Attwood, author and researcher, gave a deeply personal account of systemic child abuse within British institutions, drawing on his own childhood in Northamptonshire where a church was later shut down for mass sexual abuse operated within its doors by its doyens. Attwood connected the Epstein network, Jimmy Savile’s documented access to Buckingham Palace, Ted Heath’s security detail testimony, and Harriet Harman’s work for the Paedophile Information Exchange into a single picture of institutional capture. “Eight million children disappear worldwide every year. That’s 22,000 every single day. This is the fight of our lives.” He argued that Trump’s closure of the open border and his executive orders targeting trafficking are the most significant actions any leader has taken against these networks.
Watch here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0611xMU6DuI

SEEING THROUGH THE FOG
Two weeks into this war, the fog has thickened, not cleared. General Holt, with 27 years of military service, said he has never seen this volume of propaganda, deep fakes, and deliberate misinformation in any conflict.
Watch here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0611xMU6DuI

FINAL WORDS
What I can tell you is this: every analyst who appeared on my channel this week, regardless of their position on the war, wants the same outcome: Sovereignty for nations, peace and justice for people, and an end to the system that profits from keeping the world in permanent conflict. We may disagree on whether this war advances or undermines that ultimate goal. Watch the videos. Decide for yourselves. And if you are in Britain and you object to your taxes funding war or any other policy of this government, go to notaxforwar.com or upinarms.uk and learn how you can use Trusts to legally, lawfully, peacefully withhold your taxes.

THIS WEEK’S EPISODES
Trump’s Exit Strategy: America First or Israel’s War? (Holt & Schlanger)
The Real Reason Trump Attacked Iran (Flores)
The Truth About Iran Finally Exposed (Ehret)
Trump vs The Empire: The True Strategy Behind Iran (Steeger)
Exposed: Trump’s Real Enemy in Iran (Colonel Watkins)
Barbara Boyd Exposes MI6/CIA Involvement
Putin’s Ultimatum: The Globalist Agenda in Ukraine Destroyed (Schlanger & Brovkin)
How the US/Iran War Forces Putin’s Hand in Ukraine (Schlanger & Brovkin)
The Empire’s Grip on Africa: Total Collapse Begins (PD Lawton & Schlanger)
Britain’s Secret: How They Extract the World’s Wealth (PD Lawton & Prof Higiro)
The Elite’s Unthinkable Secret Exposed (Mark Attwood)
Trump vs The Empire: The Hero We Need to Win (Mark Attwood)

See you next week. All the best.