YouSaid · the spoken record

Ian Bremmer

lines on the record: 122
first: 2026-04-16
most recent: 2026-04-16
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“The concern with China is that the world changing new technologies out there, the Chinese are investing at scale. And the Chinese are now either at parity or ahead of the Americans. And everyone else by a long margin in many of the core technologies that matter most in the world.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not But the present trajectory, if it continues, clearly would challenge America's dominant position. Clearly. I mean, the U.S., the dollar is the global reserve currency right now. Nothing else is close. And transacting in the dollar is a huge advantage for the Americans who can continue to print money with reckless abandon and run massive deficits and have lower interest rates as a consequence. China does not have a convertible currency. They don't have rule of law. If they opened their currency to become convertible, there'd be massive capital flight and political instability. That's what they worry about. So they don't compete with the US there. China's military is still a fraction of the capabilities of the US. They're watching what's happening in Venezuela, in Iran. They don't have that capacity. They're not close. They're building their nuclear weapons out. They're building their conventional weapons out. They have never fought a naval war.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“World's leading oil producer by a long margin. And fracking natural gas as well, by a long margin, do incredible work there. Yet the United States is actively undermining the ability to also produce clean technologies for energy. Texas produces more sustainable energy than any other state in the United States. Red Texas. So, I mean, it's not like this is these energy technologies are not Republican or Democrat. They are at scale becoming cheaper, you need all of them. And so the Europeans made a mistake in not recognizing that you need everything.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Solar and wind, and their car companies are the electric vehicle leaders in the world, and batteries that are the best batteries, the most efficient batteries at scale in the world, and all of the materials, the raw materials that go into producing those. The Chinese have invested in this for decades now. And nuclear, right? While the Europeans have, with the exception of France, France has heavy nuclear and that's helped them in this crisis. Most of the Europeans have turned away from nuclear. The Europeans have not done for all approach. The Europeans have done a, let's lean into green, but let's make other technologies more challenging, including nuclear, which should be seen as a green technology. So, yeah, there's no question that that has inhibited growth in Europe. The United States has been on again off again. You've got one administration that's leaning into green, the next one that's not, when America should be doing, America today is the”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So the Chinese, you say the Chinese didn't really give a fuck. Not true. The Chinese have invested in everything. So the Chinese know that they still need lots of dirty coal in order to power their industry. But they also have invested like nobody else in green technologies at scale.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They believe that the world was just going to be peaceful, that everyone was going to have a system like the Europeans did, so they didn't need to invest in defense. And it was okay if they didn't invest in lots of technology because they had friends that they could work with, and maybe their growth wouldn't be as big, but their quality of life would be so high. And they were completely wrong. China did not, they got wealthier, but they didn't suddenly align with the United States in Europe. China didn't become a free market economy. China didn't become a democracy. China is a consolidated dictatorship under Xi Jinping with no term limits and with control of the economy. State control of the economy. And that's not an easy environment for the Europeans to be comfortable being non-competitive.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The Brits as well to address that, to build entrepreneurship, to spend in ways that would actually bring a return long term, to invest in new technologies, to reduce red tape. The plan is there. But unlike the United States, unlike China, Europe is not a country. Europe has 27 countries in the EU and the United Kingdom which decided for Brexit. It's a lot harder when you don't have scale. It's just harder. And when you have elections every sort of couple every few years, it's just more challenging. You can't do the sort of stuff that the UAE or the Saudis or the Singaporeans or the Chinese can do at scale long term. So as a consequence, what did Europe do wrong? Europe focused, Europe believed that the world after the wall came down in 1989, after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1999.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Europe, Canada, Japan, South Korea. These are countries, most of which are contracting demographically. They're countries most of which that have much flatter growth and much more reduced productivity than the United States. They've not been investing in their own defense. They've not been investing in their own technology. So what you see is an asymmetry at the same time that the Americans are saying we're not interested in the rest of the world. We don't want to do all this stuff, don't want to fight the wars, don't want free trade. You're also seeing a reality where those countries don't bring as much to the table in a conversation with the United States. So the so-called draghi plan, the 800-page plan by the former central bank head in Europe, the ECB, Mario Draghi, they called him Super Mario. He had this competitiveness report that all of these things that the Europeans needed to do, and he would say,”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah. Well, first, the Americans talking to the Europeans that way has a lot more to do with the change in administration. Don't think any other Democrat or Republican president would do what Trump is doing to his closeest allies. I think that's more unique. But it is certainly true that over the last 30 years, there have been two really big geopolitical shifts. The United States has shifted its orientation, but not its geopolitical power. But in terms of power shift, you've got the rise of China and the Global South, India in particular after China. But China is the biggest piece of that. And then you have the decline of American allies.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Already talked about how Europe is having its problems economically. It doesn't have the productivity, it doesn't have the growth.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And to begin with, Trump at the beginning of this term promised he would end this war. He was hugely frustrated. He goes to Israel to announce the Gaza ceasefire. It's a big win. The Knesset, the Israeli parliament, they're standing, ovation. It's like, you know, I thought I was going to get the Russia war done. And I failed it. I haven't been able to do that. I got this one instead. Trump never brings up his own failures. But this really bothers him. So here you've got yet more ability for the Russians to say we're going to persist. And it makes it more likely that Trump will eventually do a deal with the Russians over the heads of the Europeans. So that's the Russia issue kind of in a little box. Now, Europe.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They manufacture. They've got oil, they've got gas, they've got fertilizer, right? All the things what the prices have just spiked through the roof, that's what the Russians have. That's where their power is. And so they are making so much more money. Their economy was really getting squeezed with all the sanctions. Now they're getting so much more for everything that they actually sell. And the Americans have reduced sanctions like they did on Iran against Russia because Trump cares about the markets, as you say. So Russia's in a better position for that reason. And they're in a better position because all the weapons the Americans have been selling to the Europeans to get to Ukraine, America now needs to get to the Middle East. So the Ukrainians are going to have a harder time defending their cities against Russian ballistic missiles, against Russian drones. So this clearly means that Putin will be much, much less interested in a ceasefire, which let's face it, he wasn't really very interested.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“China's the most pertinent because it's the most powerful. Russia's the easiest to deal with, which is that for the Russians, they don't have much that they produce that's manufactured. They don't have very good technology, right? They're relying more on the Chinese.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It has not in Europe, I promise you, but in the United States they're talking a lot less about it, it's true. In Poland, this is a very big issue. In the Baltics, it is a very big issue.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He's the decider. Like, he did it. I mean, he's got his secretaries in cabinet that are all saying, well, the war's up to Trump. He's got the war goals. It'll be over when he says this. It's all about Trump. He can blame NATO for not wanting to join them. They're joining him was his war of choice. And he's never been responsible directly for an economic downturn. I mean, the pandemic wasn't his fault. This is an economic downturn. With oil prices shooting up, gas is over four bucks a gallon. Diesel's over five. Inflation's ticking up. Food prices are going up. He's wildly underwater on affordability and he is completely responsible for it. No one else is responsible”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Now, the Iranians at that point could still disrupt the strait. And there are other conversations, there are other military plans about how you might be able to take coastal regions' raids on the territory that would take out more ballistic missile sites, go after their drones, all of this takes more troops. All of this takes more casualties, but would also give you more capacity to eventually enforce a navigable strait with escorts, which right now you can't do. Right now, the Iranians can prevent you from getting any ships out if they wish to. I think that the likelihood that Trump is ultimately going to make that order is well below 50%. I think that the worst scenario is not the more likely one because he understands how unpopular it will be. But it does mean that he's going to have to sell a pretty ugly pig with lipstick on it.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Involve okay, he can just stop the oil. He could stop the oil. Okay. But again, if he has control of Karg, the oil coming out of Karg, if you want to bring it to market, the only ones that could do it would then be the Americans”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, Carg Island is right about here. It's not in the strait itself, but it is this, it's right off of the Iranian coast. And we're talking about 90% of Iranian oil export comes out through there. So if the Americans take it, obviously very easy for the Iranians to be engaged in strikes against them, but the Iranians will not be able to get any oil out. So suddenly the Americans have far more leverage over the Iranian economy, right? In a very direct way, in a very targeted way. And that is the way that you take the oil.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“This is a comparatively small island, it's about half the size of Manhattan. It's not incredibly fortified or defended. And it's very close to the Iranian shore. And it is responsible for 90% of the export of Iranian oil. CENCOM, the central command, say that you can take Karg Island with 12,000 to 15,000 men relatively comfortably.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He was saying, we don't need to defend the strait. We don't need the nuclear. We can hit them. But he also has been saying we should take the oil. I've heard him say this on a number of occasions. Have also seen him say, If just the American people were a little more patient, we could take the oil. What does he mean by taking the oil? That's not a block. Blockade isn't taking the oil. Blockade is stopping the Iranians from getting the oil out. Take the oil is control the export facility on Carg Island, right?”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, they'll call it reparations. No one else will call it reparations, but that's fine. I think that is the good scenario, again, the less bad scenario. And I would say it is more likely than not. There is another scenario, right? And the other scenario is that everything that Trump has been saying is because he doesn't yet have a military plan. Over the last days, with all this ceasefire, there's still this new aircraft strike group that is motoring its way over to the Gulf. You've got thousands more American troops that are heading into position, ground troops, right? They're going to have almost 15,000 total that will be deployed by Trump since this war started. They're going to be there in the next two weeks. Once Trump has them there, he can use them. And there are lots of things he might use them on. He keeps saying, I keep seeing them go back. Before I was talking about all the way.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, they'll get a charge. And by the way, you could define them charging the toll as part of the reconstruction money that they're going to need for the war that they just suffered.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And they will start escorting ships to create a more secure environment in the strait itself. That is the good scenario, or it's the less bad scenario because all of this should have been avoided.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Will help provide them with money and with security. They get a level of deterrence if everybody knows these guys could shut down the straight in the future. That helps them. They never had nukes. They weren't going to get nukes. If they got nukes, they were going to get blown up. Like everyone knew that. They were two weeks away if they had access to the material and they reprocessed the nuclear grade and they weren't stopped by the Americans and the Israelis. That's a lot of if-ands, right? But here they've got influence over the strait. They have it. They've used it. They're using it. They're making money. Trump does not have a military plan to hit them back. So I think that is the most likely outcome. And if that is the case, then over time the Iranians will cut more deals with more countries to get more oil out. And meanwhile, there will be after the ceasefire is in place and strong, then the Europeans and other countries, the Indians, other countries will come.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So many of the announcements he makes are right before or right after the market opens. And obviously there's been a lot of insider trading concerns around that too. And people, he's concerned about personal enrichment and people around him making billions of dollars. That plays into. I wish it didn't. It's horrible to talk about it. But you can't avoid that topic. What happens? You want to know what happens? I don't have a crystal ball. No one does. But where I think this could be going on the basis of that, the most likely outcome is that the ceasefire is eventually extended, that we have those talks that were 21 hours that were substantive. There'll be more talks. Maybe not with the vice president, but there'll be more talks. They'll become more substantive. And that eventually I expect that the Iranians are more likely to give on the nuclear issue and on enrichment if they're able to maintain a privileged position on transit through the strait.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I do not want to be Trump's psychologist. It is very clear. That he is impulsive and that he does not have much impulse control, nor does he create around him mechanisms that create impulse control, that enforce impulse control. He's on his phone all the time. He watches the media relentlessly. People engage with him from all over the world on his cell phone. And he has recency bias. The thing he heard and saw last, he frequently focuses on.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Think unlike almost anybody else you can imagine if he decided that he wanted to end this, he could end this. He could just leave. And he would say, I won. He's already said this in different ways. I don't even care about the nukes because we've already entombed them. They're under all this rubble. We've got satellite coverage. If the Iranians try to get at them, we can hit them back. He's already said that there's already a regime change. It's already new people. We can work. We can talk with these people. He already said the straight isn't his problem, right? But of course, he's also said different things. Sometimes in the same tweet. So he's picking and choosing. But what I'm suggesting to you is that Trump has already moved towards de-escalation.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Whose economy and industry have been substantially degraded and who were already running their economy into the ground before the war happened, these guys aren't winners. They're survivors, right? They have influence over the strait, but they're not winning. And this is dangerous long term.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“On this region. At the same time, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan long worked together on defense are now much more public about an alliance. Pakistan is nuclear, Saudi Arabia is not, but Pakistan would provide them nuclear weapons if they really wanted it. That's absolutely something to think about. They are increasingly becoming a regional defense quad for countries together with Turkey and Egypt. Big countries, big populations aligning more diplomatically and on defense, calling for a regional security architecture in the region, but that would not be easily aligned with the UAE, America, Israel, and with India. That is also a significant tension. And in the context of all of that, 95 million people in Iran whose military has been substantially degraded”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Different blocks that are starting to form. You've got the United Arab Emirates together with Israel. You remember the Abraham Accords, which was Trump's big foreign policy success in his first term, where he got these countries, the UAE and others, to recognize Israel and start doing a lot more tourism and business and technology transfers and the rest. So UAE, Israel, the United States, and India are increasingly aligning on national security and technology. And they're becoming more of a international bloc.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That everyone would want to travel and engage in to create work opportunities that are far better remunerated than anything that foreign labor could get in their own home countries, allowing them to bring money home. And in the case of Saudi Arabia specifically, they're taking 35 million people. Half of that economy used to be closed to women, and now they're bringing women into the economy. They're actually not just educating them, but they're giving them opportunities in every area of employment. That is one of the most extraordinary stories in the world today in terms of change and governance, and that continues. Then final point here is that in the context of the Iran war, and in the context of the United States, which is doing less global leadership, there are questions of how these countries that are aligned with the U.S. want to ensure their own futures. And so we see increasingly to”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Those are two fundamental drivers of conflict and instability in the region, one aligned with the United States, one a revolutionary theocracy. There have been very positive developments in this region, very positive developments. First of all, Syria, Assad was a brutal dictator that was overthrown by his own people and his own military would not support and fight for him. And the Russians proved that they didn't support him in a significant way. And so now you have an opportunity for Syria to become a representative government that can engage with others around the region and more broadly. That's a positive. You've got Saudi Arabia and the UAE and Qatar that are engaging in transformative domestic policies to attract investment from all over the world, to build experiences.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“This country is very capable of now attacking all of its enemies and creating outcomes that it wants, whether or not it creates instability in those countries. We've seen that in Gaza and the West Bank. I mean, reality is Israel is continuing to take more and more territory in the West Bank and no one can do anything about it. They hit Lebanon really hard. No one can respond to that. So that is creating a reality where Israel is able to determine outcomes and even attack Iran directly with the United States. They felt very confident about taking that on and that there would not be backlash that would undermine Israel's own political survival. It wasn't an existential risk to Israel. And even if Iran developed nukes, which is everyone wants to prevent from happening, but Israel has their own nukes, right? I mean, they have like 100 plus.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You do have an enormously repressive regime that has the ability to take action against their own people in an incredibly brutal way, as we saw it play out in January. And it's also a regime that does not respect the right of Israel to exist. It's also a regime that has been sending weapons and money and military advice to other revolutionary actors around the region undermining security in Yemen, undermining security in Iraq, undermining security in Syria. So, I mean, the fact that at the core of the Middle East, you have a revolutionary regime that was exporting instability and violence is a serious problem. That's number one. Number two, Israel, America's top ally in the region. America first, but Trump still gives billions of dollars every year to Israel, even as he's cut off.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To protect those Israeli civilians from Hezbollah being able to hit them with their weapons. That is the intention here. And so what Iran understands is that their ability to deter Israel from hitting Hezbollah. Hezbollah at the beginning in October 7th, Hezbollah was the most powerful non-state military in the world. No one else was close. And today Hezbollah has shown that their leadership gets targeted and destroyed, assassinated across the board by the Israelis, that their military is incapable, their critical infrastructure can be disrupted, and that Israel can also hit Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, and no one can do anything in return to Israel.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, Hezbollah, which is a terrorist organization, as recognized by Israel and the United States, though not everybody, continues to have the ability to engage in strikes against Israel, nowhere close to the strength of the Israeli military, but the Lebanese government promised to disarm them. They have not done that. And so Hezbollah has been able to continue to engage in missile strikes, relatively small numbers of missile strikes, into the north of Israel where Israeli citizens lived. There was a period of time after the October 7th attacks by Hamas where over 100,000 Israelis had to evacuate from their homes and their schools and the rest for like a year because Hezbollah was making their lives hell, right? So what Israel is now doing is they're going to take territory about five to seven kilometers of Lebanese land. They're going to occupy it as a buffer zone.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I hear what you're saying. I would put it slightly differently. I think that after the 12 day war last June, the Iranians understood that their deterrent capacity had failed. They were incapable of preventing the Americans and the Israelis from hitting them and their proxies whenever they wanted. We've talked a lot about Iran. We haven't talked at all about Lebanon. There's another war going on in Lebanon right now. The Israelis are hitting the Lebanese very hard. There's over a million displaced people in the last several weeks.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“In red states, Trump has to back down, right? So we've already seen that when a country has leverage over Trump and they can hit him, he has the most strong military in the world, but he also has a glass jaw. He can't take a hit the way that unelected non-democracies can, the Chinese, and now the Iranians over the street. So what Trump is doing with announcing the blockade, and by the way, he hasn't broken the ceasefire. So even though a blockade is an act of war, he still hasn't said, okay, you guys have to start hitting the Iranians again right now. So this is still de-escalated compared to a week ago. A week ago, this looked much more dangerous than it looks today. He's saying to the Iranians, hey, I'm willing to cut off your source of funds. I'm willing to stop you from exporting oil and making money off of it. Same Trump that suspended those sanctions on Iran because he wanted to keep the prices down. So that's what's happened.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They saw China. China did this, right? Last year, Liberation Day, as Trump called it, where he puts tariffs on all these countries. He puts these high tariffs on China. They hit back. He does it again. They hit back again. He's like, I'm going to do export controls. I say, well, we're going to shut down your critical minerals. Suddenly, CEOs are going to Mara Lago. They say, you've got to deal with the Iranians or we're going to shut down our factory lines.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“This issue specifically, he is underwater just like he was on Greenland, where he eventually completely did a 180. He was going to put tariffs on all the Europeans that supported Denmark. He had to take Greenland. Those things went away.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That were a disaster, we're going to engage in further talks. So maybe it wasn't such a disaster. Maybe what's really going on here is Trump wants to show that he still has more leverage to use against the Iranians because he's lost a lot of his leverage. He gave a speech to the American people. One speech so far about Iran, primetime speech. In that speech, he said, war's almost over, two to three weeks. Max, we're done. If I'm the Iranians and I hear that, I'm like, great. The Americans can't take this pain anymore. They can't take it. He keeps saying straight, not my problem, straights. Let them take care of it. I hear that. I'm the Iranians. Great. He can't take the economic pain. He knows he doesn't have a military solution. So it's not that the Iranians are only hearing for Trump. I'm going to destroy your civilization. They're seeing what he's actually doing.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Hours ago. I think that is also overstated. You have twenty one hours of talks led by the Vice President of the United States. I assure you, if these talks were a disaster, they don't last twenty four hours. Two or three, and then they're out. twenty one hours means very substantive conversations on the entire range of topics that were of importance to the Americans and the Iranians. Trump did not get the outcome he wanted ultimately. I'm not super surprised because the Iranians feel like they have more leverage right now than the United States thinks they do. And this frustrates Trump immensely. And so at the end, and remember, he's calling and talking with Vance more than 10 times over the course of this entire conversation. They're in regular contact. At that point, Trump says, okay, I'm blockading the street. But just before markets open on Monday, you also see reporting that, well, these talks.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Parliament, but also a team of experts who had briefs on negotiating on a number of different points on the strait and on ballistic missiles and on support of proxy actors and on the nuclear issue, which proved the most divisive in those 21 hours of talks, shows that this regime is still very much functioning despite all of the Israeli and the American efforts to say that they've done all this incredible damage. This regime is still very much in place.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“First, that their ability to make centralized decision plans and implement them is real. So when their biggest gas field is hit and they say, we're going to hit you back in return, they are able to implement on that in short order. So we've seen a number of occasions in the last five weeks where Iran has gone from statement made by the foreign ministry and by spokespeople to action taken by local commander in Iran, which implies that there is a centralized structure. We also see toll taking on the street by individuals that are being ordered by the Central Iranian government to do that. They're not operating by themselves. So in that regard, the fact that the Iranians showed up in Islamabad in Pakistan with significant leadership with the foreign minister, also the Speaker of the Party,”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“First, the honest answer is it's impossible to know because this is right now, the internal decision-making of Iran is extremely buttoned up. And they ain't talking to anyone about that. But it's very easy to assess two things.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Which is one of the more interesting things about this presidency. What happened is the Iranian leadership was taken out. The response was immediately what they call this mosaic situation where they decentralized the military decision-making to local commanders because they were worried that the high-level commanders, if they were on cell phones, if they were engaging with other commanders, the Israelis would know where they were and they'd be able to assassinate them. So then suddenly the Iranians were taking shots at Gulf states, at critical infrastructure, and stopping transit from the straits.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Did not happen. What actually happened is the Americans took out, well, the Israelis took out the Supreme Leader. And also took out a lot of the military leadership that the Americans had been speaking to, which is why Trump came out and he said, well, a lot of the guys we're talking to are dead now. So we don't really know who to work with. He said that even if it's true, and it was, you don't want the president saying that, right? He has no filter.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“What he hears from them is shaded towards how brilliant he is. And that makes him think that he will be more successful even when the military thinks this is a horrible idea. And we just saw this with the reporting from the head of the joint chiefs, Dan Kane, who clearly thinks that this is a really bad idea and understands that the military scenarios are super dangerous and that the Iranians will be able to shut down the strait. Every military in the U.S. for the last 20, 30 years has gamed out how the Iranians could shut down the street in a major conflict. And Trump hears very little of that. And he's taking away, I'm incredible, I'm confident, I'm going to make this happen. Those are the reasons he went in.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Most important reason is that unlike Trump's first term, where he had people around him that were patriotic first and foremost to the country, and when they had disagreements with Trump, they let him know. And they leaked. And they also were willing occasionally to do what they could to undermine an incompetent decision that would hurt the country. And we saw that, whether it was with Mike Pompeo or Mad Dog Mattis, right? All of these people who were much more independent, strong actors. This time around, Trump has some really good advisors. People like Marco Rubio and Scott Besson. He also has some staggeringly incompetent advisors like Pete Hegzeth, for example. But what they all share is that they are first and foremost loyal to the president. And they will not tell him. They won't push back.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The biggest US base, they warned the Americans through Iraq before the missiles were launched. So it was very clear the Iranians didn't want any part of that fight. So Trump is thinking to himself, this is going to be awesome. Because I'm going to go in, I'm going to pull Venezuela in Iran. I know they don't want to fight me. I kill the Supreme Leader, 86 years old. He's going to die anyway. He's not that popular among the Iranian, the Islamic revolutionary guards corps, the IRGC, because they're the ones that really run the country. I'm going to have this huge military force. that shows what I'm capable of doing than the rest of the Iranian leadership, they're going to want to work with me just like they did in Venezuela. So that was reason number two. And then the most important reason.”
2026-04-16 · The Diary of a CEO · World Collapse Expert (Ian Bremmer): The Real Crisis Is What Comes After Trump · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT