Karen Kwiatkowski
Karen Kwiatkowski is a retired US Air Force lieutenant colonel who served in the Pentagon’s Near East South Asia policy office in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq invasion, left that office a month before the war began and retired from the Air Force weeks later, becoming a prominent whistleblower on how prewar intelligence was shaped. A paleoconservative and libertarian anti-interventionist, she writes the Without Reservation Substack and is a recurring guest on Judging Freedom.
Where they stand
A short read of where Karen Kwiatkowski lands on each front we follow, drawn from their recent appearances and refreshed whenever they turn up in a debrief.
Iran
The IRGC has run and professionally managed the Strait of Hormuz since around March, behaving like a normal transport-corridor operator rather than a collapsing regime; the administration’s tough talk on Iran is theater aimed at the American audience. Now says the US has adopted Israeli-style targeting practices in strikes on Iran over the past five months, killing children and chalking the deaths up to psychological warfare.
as of 2026-09-15
Ukraine & Russia
Russia has the clear upper hand and is now dictating terms; Russian warnings against UK/British targets are statements of fact, not escalation, while the real escalation is continued Western arming of Ukraine. The US has abandoned any pretense of being a neutral mediator. Now blames NATO's eastward expansion and Western elites for pushing toward a wider war with Russia, and calls Poland's foreign minister reckless for claiming Poland would beat Russia in a war.
as of 2026-09-15
Israel
In a straight Turkey-versus-Israel matchup she would bet on Turkey for sure. Now casts the proposed $2.8 billion, 40,000-bomb sale to Israel as reckless escalation that an AIPAC-financed Congress is unlikely to block, with the IDF and Pentagon already effectively integrated: "we don't have a Congress, we have a Knesset 2.0."
as of 2026-09-15
East Asia
Bessent’s "economic D-Day" plan to sever China’s ties with Iran has zero chance of success: isolation is impossible in an interconnected world unless the US can defeat and control China, which it cannot.
as of 2026-08-28
American power
A dangerously drained Strategic Petroleum Reserve, alongside $40 trillion in national debt, is itself a symbol that things are not going well for American power. Now frames emergency-powers abuse, extrajudicial killings of boat passengers and the Venezuelan oil grab as symptoms of an American government sliding into unconstitutional, illegitimate overreach.
as of 2026-09-15
The global economy
Reads Bessent’s recent moves (gutting the beneficial-ownership database, fast-tracking a bank charter for the Trump family’s crypto company, and writing stablecoin rules that favor the Trump-branded coin) as the most corrupt restructuring of the US financial system in modern history. Now argues the US will not grow its way out of $40 trillion in debt; historically that kind of debt gets resolved through a major war that resets currencies and repudiates debt.
as of 2026-09-15
Recent appearances
US Steals Oil in an Emergency
Judging Freedom (Judge Napolitano) · 2026-09-15
2026-08-28 · Judging Freedom (Judge Napolitano)watch ↗
INTEL Roundtable: weekly wrap (w/ Larry Johnson)