Date: Tuesday, 15 September 2026
https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/the-us-empire-collapses
https://theduran.com/the-u-s-empire-collapses/
The U.S. Empire Collapses
14 September 2026, posted by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K76Ea7QaqF0
“Chas Freeman: U.S. Alliances Collapse & Israel Commits Suicide”
14 September 2026
Ambassador Chas Freeman is a former Assistant Secretary of Defense, earning the highest public service awards of the Department of Defense for his roles in designing a NATO-centered post-Cold War European security system and in reestablishing defence and military relations with China. He served as U. S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
00:00
GLENN DIESEN: Welcome back. Today is September 14, 2026 and we are joined by Ambassador Chas Freeman, a former US assistant secretary of defense and um well very very relevant to today's discussion in that Ambassador Freeman was also the US ambassador to Saudi Arabia. So uh it's
00:20
great to see you again and uh well let's start with Saudi Arabia. It's uh we see that Saudi Arabia has launched more than 300 air raids against Yemen over the past few days and uh Ansar Allah or the Houthis as we call them in the west. They are reportedly hitting Saudi
00:37
Arabian radar radar systems uh ammunition depots, airfields, aircraft hangers. I mean how are you interpreting this uh these developments this escalation? CHAS FREEMAN: Well, it's tragic really because it all arose from u an attack on Sanaa airport by the Saudi sponsored um
01:01
internationally recognized government of Yemen which only controls about 20% of the Yemeni population and the Houthis control 80%. Uh they have just as you as you know u conquered uh the Red Sea coast down to the Bab al-Mandab taking the port of Mokha uh from which we get
01:22
our mocha word of for coffee uh the Dutch began the trading there in the 16th century um uh for coffee um and um they now have a commanding position uh on the street of Battle of Mandep but they're also seeing their the escalation with the Saudis uh going on. There is a
01:45
meeting today in in Salalah, um a town in not too far from the Yemen border in Oman. Um uh I've been there. It's quite there's quite an elaborate palace there. Absolutely beautiful woodwork from Indian um Indian carvers. uh and the Iraq Iranian uh foreign minister
02:11
uh will be meeting with u the foreign ministers of the six Gulf cooperation council um members um Oman is the host of course um Saudis and Iranians will be there and able to talk and uh my hope uh is that um uh the despite the impetuous nature of Muhammad bin Salman.
02:38
He will authorize his foreign minister to uh seek Iranian mediation with the Ansar, with the Houthis, to break the chain of escalation that is going on. It's not just military facilities that are being hit but uptake which is the largest u sort of node in the Saudi
03:01
petroleum industry Saudi Aramco has been hit and badly hurt. Um and uh as a separate matter possibly coordinated without the con the um involvement of the Iraqi government various Iraqi mil militias have been confirmed to have been the source of the strikes on the
03:23
east pipeline in Saudi Arabia. But Saudi Arabia is now at war with Ansar Allah [Houthis] again having seen the four-year truce broken by its allies in Aden in the internationally recognized government. Um and uh it is also out of oil revenue since it can no longer export either
03:45
through the strait of Hormuz or through the Bab al-Mandab. Uh and it cannot produce uh cannot deliver oil to Yandu, the port on the Red Sea from which uh it has been exporting through smaller ships uh transiting the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean and markets
04:07
up there. So the Saudis are in real trouble and Sanaa is on the move. Um very aggressive. The prospect of a military solution to this is nil. Uh we know that uh Donald Trump claims the Houthis called him and said look we're not going to disturb anybody's shipping but the Saudis.
04:32
So anything going to or from Saudi Arabia or owned by Saudi Arabia will be attacked by the Yemenis, but other international shipping will not be. And Donald Trump said that's great. So we won't um he's refused to two effort two requests from the Saudis to back them in
04:52
this in this re reborn war. This is not a good situation. Uh what it does um in addition to the continuing Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries um is put Donald Trump in a political box that he can't escape from. He has apparently asked the Ukrainians to cease and desist
05:17
their attacks on facilities that produce diesel. Diesel uh is now something over $6 a gallon in the United States, which is a crippling amount in terms of trucking and uh and farm uh equipment which depend on it. Um supplies are drying up. Um the price is
05:39
still rising. It's going to go higher yet. And Donald Trump faces um midterm elections in the in the face of this. I say this with a little bit of sorrow because it appears that the only thing the American people care about is how much they pay for gasoline and diesel.
05:58
They don't seem to care about the uh damage to our country uh and to other countries and peoples that is being done uh with our u wars of aggression in several places. So um uh but we'll see a political reckoning I think in early November. >> DIESEN: Well given all these problems for Saudi
06:22
Arabia that is as you said their economic infrastructure I mean they're heavily dependent on exporting oil. So their energy infrastructure is being uh either well destroyed or or put a blockade on it. And uh also it's uh we see the Houthis striking a
06:41
lot of their military assets and uh you know the war waging now isn't cheap either. And at the same time the the US uh seemingly can't guarantee their security. Indeed, as you said, Trump is um uh not bragging, but uh making a point that it's not his problem. So, uh
07:03
what are the possibilities for Saudi Arabia now? I mean, how can they navigate themselves out of this mess? >> FREEMAN: Well, as I suggested, they need a mediator with the Yemenis. Um the only logical mediator is Iran. Saudi Arabia after the war over the street of Hormuz
07:24
uh is concluded one way or another will need a cordial and cooperative relationship with Iran. Um I think uh when Araghchi meets in Salalah with the Gulf Cooperation Council members uh his counterparts from them um today [IT WAS CANCELLED] one of the points he will make is that you must
07:47
get rid of the American bases on your territory which have been used to commit war crimes against Iran. um start a war of aggression and um do a great deal of damage to Iranian infrastructure and the like. Uh and u I don't know what the answer will be. Um it's pretty clear uh
08:08
in the case of Saudi Arabia which I know well um the bar the basic bargain in the relationship has been broken. Um there was a meeting um in 1945 between Abdul Aaziz, the founder of this third Saudi dynasty uh and of Saudi modern Saudi Arabia and Franklin Delano
08:31
Roosevelt, the president of the United States in the great bitter lake of the Suez Canal uh aboard the USS Quinsey. And uh pursuant to that for decades there was a partnership between the United States and Saudi Arabia by which in return for um for privileged access
08:51
to Saudi hydrocarbon uh reserves and production uh the United States protected Saudi Arabia against its more populous more militaristic neighbors with the implication one of the implications being that protection included restraining Israeli actions
09:10
against Saudi Arabia. Well, all of that has gone up in smoke. Um uh when the in the earlier war between the Houthis and Sarah and the Saudis, they struck Abcake um the this junction in the Saudi Arabian eastern province of many uh oil pipelines. Um and
09:34
Donald Trump did nothing. um uh and uh that uh led to an acceleration in the Saudi effort to diversify their international relationships and their dependencies on others. They've gone beyond that now. Um the Pakistan, Saudi Arabian, Turkey uh three-part tripartite
09:58
on tant uh is an explicit repudiation of the American management of uh the security situation in the Persian Gulf and West Asia and an attempt to replace it with indigenous forces that are not beholden to any particular patron abroad. That includes Chinese and the
10:17
Russians. But the Chinese and the Russians are quite happy to provide support when the United States fails to do so. So we've seen this in a way uh at the recent BRICS summit meeting in New Delhi where the one thing that many people could agree upon was the
10:38
condemnation of the war with uh Iran and the demand that um uh means be found to to end it. Now in Salalah, if I understand what is happening, uh in addition to listening to Arati, uh the Gulf Cooperation Council countries uh are likely to signal their
11:00
support for whatever it is that Oman and and Iran have worked out uh to manage transit through the state of Hormuz. Well, that pulls the rug out from under the American blockade. Um, how long can that blockade continue when uh, first of all um, it uh, appears to the rest of
11:20
the world that the United States is collaborating in effect with Iran in cutting off their energy supplies, producing inflation, hardship, possible food shortages and the like. Uh, the ships that are conducting the block blockade are in increasingly shabby and
11:40
unsustainable condition. I mean, if you looked at the USS Abraham Lincoln when it arrived in Patea in Thailand, um, presumably where the allow the sailors to have a little bit of fun, although we've been assured that prostitution is illegal in Thailand, something I didn't
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know. Uh, and um, uh, if you look at that, it's a rust bucket. Uh, it's foregone usual, uh, maintenance for a very long time, and the other ships are in equally poor condition. They're at the end of an unsustainable long supply chain which supplies food, fuel and the
12:17
like from very far away. Uh and um they can their original reliance on the headquarters of the fifth fleet in Bahrain is impossible because that facility has been destroyed. Indeed, we now have American military sources, senior people, openly admitting that
12:39
Iran has done a great deal of damage uh to uh the bases in the Persian Gulf, which has essentially become unsustainable and that it has done great damage to the retreated uh position in Jordan. This is uh a contradiction of the White House line and Pete Hegseth's line which
13:01
is um nothing to see here. Go look someplace else. Um so um uh from the Saudi point of view um it's now urgent to make peace with Iran to find a solution to the war with the Houthis uh in order to resume um uh the various programs that they had have had to
13:25
suspend or curtail. I mean the vision 2030 um pro projects have all been curtailed earlier as a result of this war and um uh now we have uh the Saudis have a problem you mentioned um the uh Houthies attacks on Saudi military facilities and equipment and that equipment with almost
13:50
all of it comes from the United States but the United States is not in a position now to resupply it having in effect shots wad as the saying goes um uh in a war with Iran. So I think uh we'll see whether the Saudis are capable of doing what Donald Trump is not and
14:11
that is admitting that they're in a very bad place need to come to grips with that and to make peace with those with whom they are at odds. uh accept defeat in effect because this is a defeat for Saudi Arabia. >> DIESEN: Well, what you've been seeing though the
14:31
the fighting in the street of Hormuz, the attacks on the Gulf States and now the talks in Oman uh as you said which would put the pull the rug from beneath the United States. Uh all of this signify essentially a breakdown though of the whole hegemonic security
14:47
architecture uh led by the United States. Indeed, we see a similar development taking place in Europe except for the Europeans would never talk to Russia. But but otherwise, you see the the security architecture built around uh the hegeimon has uh is now
15:03
falling apart. And it just seems like the ideal situation for the United States since World War II has been this uh security architecture because the US has been the principal security provider and you know from this position had has been able to extract great political and
15:19
economic benefits and uh given that no one actually challenges or you know the United States either uh it's you know it's it's been a good deal but this seems to have come to an end now uh when they actually have to go um you know possibly fight for Saudi Arabia or or
15:37
any of these other countries and as you see the Europeans also want to pull the US into a war now. Uh but uh so you know the real story then seems to be this um yeah the decline of US primacy in the Middle East. But uh um but but how does this uh affect a country like Israel
15:55
though? Because you know if if I was Israeli I would think you know over the past few decades you know we could do whatever we want because the Americans were standing behind us. But at the moment it's very perplexing because as the US is in decline and Israel seems to be ramping up
16:15
against all its neighbors. Uh it doesn't make much sense. I would you would think they would go the other way. that is find strike a deal with your neighbors today about a new status quo if you think that your position tomorrow will be weaker than it is today but uh again
16:31
we're seeing the opposite uh how do you see this you explain this in the wider geopolitics the domestic issues in Israel or how do you make sense of this sorry a big question >> FREEMAN: well yes this is the classic Glenn Diesen uh, what is this, the club sandwich
16:49
of questions? I, uh, Yes. Uh so uh as you were speaking, I was reminded, since you're an academic and um we're talking about suicide which is uh the suicide of the United States with respect to its global primacy and specifically its primacy in the Middle East. Since you're an
17:08
academic, I'm sure you know the story of the member of the MIT faculty who was found dead in the faculty uh uh club uh with um 30 stab wounds in his back and the faculty gathered and looked at him and said this was the clearest case of suicide they'd ever seen. Um, you know
17:29
the viciousness of academics is, uh, a legend. Uh, people in foreign affairs are more polite but equally vicious, or should I say self-serving, and the United States has basically done away with um all of the reasons [for others to rely on us], really other than its uh uh its supply of weaponry which now
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it doesn't have. …
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MY COMMENTS:
Notwithstanding Freeman’s excellent summary of details of the current collapse of the U.S. empire, Trump was successful in having won an important additional colony: Venezuela.
So I asked ChatGPT “Have the Venezuelan people (net) benefited or lost from Trump's takeover of their Government?” and here was its answer:
If by Trump’s “takeover” you mean the situation since the January 3, 2026 U.S. military operation that captured Nicolás Maduro and left Delcy Rodríguez governing under extraordinary U.S. leverage, the evidence through September 14, 2026 points in two different directions.
For Venezuelans’ immediate political and economic welfare, the balance so far appears modestly positive—but nowhere near enough to establish that Venezuelans have benefited overall from the takeover. And if Venezuelan sovereignty and ownership/control of national resources are counted as benefits, the judgment becomes considerably more negative.
Economically, there are genuine improvements or prospective improvements. Oil production has risen from about 1.0 million barrels/day in August 2025 to roughly 1.16–1.25 million in mid-2026; exports to the United States reached 786,000 barrels/day in July, the highest since 2019. U.S. sanctions have been substantially relaxed, equipment and investment are flowing back into the oil industry, and the IMF projected about 4% real GDP growth for 2026 (other Venezuelan economists have estimated roughly 5.8%).
But that has not yet translated into anything resembling prosperity for ordinary Venezuelans. Inflation remained catastrophic: the Venezuelan central bank reported 90% cumulative inflation in just January–April, with Reuters calculating an annual rate above 600%. The statutory monthly minimum wage remained below $1, millions depended on government transfers, and some food parcels and cash benefits were disrupted following Maduro's removal.
Politically, there have been real gains. Hundreds of political prisoners have reportedly been released, repression has diminished somewhat, and Maduro himself—whose government had suppressed opposition and was widely accused of manipulating the 2024 election—is gone. But Venezuela has not become a democracy. Rodríguez remains in power, the Chavista apparatus remains substantially intact, María Corina Machado has remained outside power, and there still has not been a genuinely competitive national election establishing a government chosen by Venezuelans.
Interestingly, the best polling evidence suggests that Venezuelans themselves initially regarded the change as beneficial. One nationwide face-to-face survey found 83% optimistic about the country's future and 55% supporting Maduro's arrest. Another poll reported 72% saying Venezuela was moving in a positive direction, although 58% simultaneously thought security had deteriorated. Those figures don't prove material improvement, but they are important evidence against saying that Venezuelans generally regarded Maduro's removal as a disaster.
But there is a major qualification: Venezuela's oil
This is where I think the assessment changes substantially.
The Trump administration has now obtained extraordinarily favorable U.S. rights over Venezuelan petroleum. According to the White House's own description, Venezuelan authorities granted a private company 100-year concessions covering 17 fields containing approximately 65 billion barrels of proven reserves. The company in turn granted the U.S. government a 35% equity stake, guaranteed the State Department the right to buy 20% of production at production cost, gave it first refusal on the remaining 80%, and gave the U.S. government veto power over board appointments.
The White House itself describes this as giving the United States “majority control” of more than 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan reserves, and explicitly celebrates it as increasing American energy dominance.
That makes it difficult to characterize what happened simply as liberating Venezuelans from Maduro. The United States removed Venezuela's president by military force and subsequently acquired extremely valuable, century-long economic rights over a huge portion of Venezuela's principal natural resource.
There is a countervailing fact: Venezuela is supposed to receive royalties and taxes—according to the administration, an estimated $200 billion over 25 years—and potentially enormous investment in otherwise underproductive fields. If production rises sufficiently, Venezuelans could conceivably receive more oil income under this arrangement despite surrendering substantial control. That proposition therefore has to be tested against actual future revenue, wages, employment, public services and living standards rather than assumed either way.
So, as of September 2026, I would classify the evidence this way:
|
Dimension |
Venezuelans so far |
|
Removal of Maduro |
Benefit for most, judging from polling |
|
Political repression |
Improvement, but incomplete |
|
Democratic self-government |
Little/no demonstrated net gain yet |
|
Oil production/investment |
Improving |
|
Ordinary living standards |
No clear substantial improvement yet |
|
Inflation |
Still disastrous |
|
Venezuelan control of oil resources |
Major loss |
|
U.S. control/influence over Venezuela |
Major increase |
|
Long-term economic effect |
Too early to determine |
Therefore I would not presently say, as a factual finding, “Trump's takeover benefited the Venezuelan people.” The defensible conclusion is narrower:
Maduro's removal appears to have benefited many Venezuelans politically and has created conditions for an economic recovery, but the material benefit to ordinary Venezuelans has so far been limited, while Venezuela has surrendered extraordinary long-term control over its principal national asset to U.S. interests. Whether Venezuelans are net beneficiaries ultimately depends heavily upon how much of the resulting oil wealth actually accrues to them.
And that last question is measurable. We could make this considerably more rigorous by calculating the economic value transferred to the United States under Trump's 65-billion-barrel oil arrangement versus the additional investment, royalties, taxes, production, and income accruing to Venezuelans. That would get much closer to answering your “net benefited or lost?” question quantitatively rather than politically.
Only over the long term will the answer to my question be able to be answered. America’s virtual economic strangulation of Venezuela via sanctions etc. made it a miserable country, but even if those strangulations will be eliminated, I can see for that country nothing but misery, because Venezuela has now been captured by a declining empire, which is even worse than being a colony of a growing empire — even more miserable than that — it’s the stage when an empire cannibalizes its colonies. It’s well recognized that an empire cannibalizes its colonies during its final stage of decline, when the central government aggressively drains its outer territories of wealth, people, and resources to keep itself alive. Mark Lowe provided some recent examples in his 10 July 2026 “THE CANNIBALISATION OF AN EMPIRE IN DECLINE WHEN GREAT POWERS BEGIN CONSUMING THEIR OWN”
And now Trump is also trying to eliminate virtually all Governmental regulation and block AI from being regulated:
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https://www.semafor.com/newsletter/09/14/2026/pm-semafor-washington-dc-full-speed-ahead?
14 September 2026
TRUMP REJECTS AI EXECUTIVES’ CALLS FOR OVERSIGHT
Trump responded to AI titans today, rejecting their calls for regulation of frontier models and dismissing warnings that the technology poses threats to humanity as a “hoax.” “The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!” Trump posted to Truth Social. He argued the US must maintain its lead over China in the AI race, complained about Google’s decision to expand data center operations in Finland, and suggested detractors are part of a conspiracy. Trump predicted that AI would be the greatest economic development driver in history and warned naysayers. “Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!” Vice President JD Vance also weighed in on the debate, saying Americans shouldn’t “be scared of” AI and called for “consensus” between the administration and Congress.
2028 DEMOCRATS DRAW CONTRAST WITH TRUMP ON AI
Democrats with White House ambitions are setting themselves against Trump’s AI boosterism. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who had announced his own state’s restrictions last month, said that it was “long past time for our federal government to step up, take this seriously, and put up some guardrails.” Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., who campaigned in primary states with midterm candidates over the weekend, emphasized last week that he’d introduced AI safety legislation last year. Just two Democrats who are seen as possible 2028 presidential candidates, Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., have signed on to legislation from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., that would halt new hyperscale data center construction. No Democrat on the long list of potential hopefuls has taken Trump’s unabashed expansionist position on AI, as they consider polling that finds toxically low support for the technology and for data centers.
EPA PLANS TO RESCIND CARBON LIMITS FOR POWER PRODUCERS
The Environmental Protection Agency plans to repeal limits on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants today, removing regulations the Trump administration says have driven up energy costs and limited domestic energy production. The EPA has pushed to repeal the Biden-era standards since 2025, arguing that they impose costly restrictions on the power industry. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said that the move will save the industry billions of dollars. The planned revocation comes as Zeldin, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, and Energy Secretary Chris Wright hosted a G20 ministerial meeting focused on “energy abundance” in Houston. With the Iran war driving up global oil prices, the administration is framing expanded domestic production as a buffer to cushion Americans from global energy shocks. Critics warn the rollback will increase pollution and harm public health, and environmental groups are expected to challenge the repeal in court.
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This cannibal is consuming even itself — turning America into a libertarian paradise of privatization, whose billionaires will be consuming everyone else including the land itelf.
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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.
