Scott Horton
Director of the Libertarian Institute, editorial director of Antiwar.com, host of The Scott Horton Show and author of Provoked
Scott Horton (Director of the Libertarian Institute, editorial director of Antiwar.com, host of The Scott Horton Show and author of Provoked) has appeared as a guest on 1 episode in TMT. Topics they speak about most include United States war with Iran, Nuclear program of Iran, Enlargement of NATO.
In their words
Positions and remarks grouped by topic, each with the exact quote and where it was said.
United States war with Iran
Horton describes his coined term 'backdraft' terrorism, citing an Austin shooting after the war began as an example.
“backdraft terrorism is when the consequences of your overt foreign policies just blow up right in your face”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 2:21:39
Horton argues Trump's war has boosted Iranian regional power about as much as George W. Bush's Iraq War did.
“what Donald Trump has done with this war is about at least equivalent to what W. Bush did in terms of enhancing Iranian power in the region”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 2:29:03
Horton recommends that the United States end the war and withdraw its forces from the Middle East.
“I really think that the thing to do is just quit. The thing to do is for America to just come home”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 2:15:41
Horton cites recent reporting that officials admit Iran retains most of its missiles and launchers.
“admitting now that the Iranians still have 70, 75 percent of all their missiles and launchers”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:24:07
Horton argues that Iran's strikes on US bases showed America's Middle East military empire to be a bluff that Iran successfully called.
“America's military empire in the Middle East is completely bankrupt, right? That whole thing was a hollow bluff, and the Iranians just called it, and we lost”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:16:19
Other remarks
Horton says he gave up his KPFK radio show in Los Angeles because podcasting had made radio irrelevant.
“I actually gave up my last radio show on KPFK in Los Angeles last year”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 4:10
Horton says Mordechai Vanunu personally confirmed to him that Israel had about 200 atomic bombs at the time of his disclosure.
“that they had 200 atom bombs by the time that he squealed on them”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 2:07:09
Horton alleges that Clinton-era licensing let Hughes and Loral transfer advanced rocket technology to China.
“Hughes Aircraft and Loral Corporation then sent their very best three-stage rocket technology to China”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:48:39
Horton argues that China is an overextended, largely poor empire with little appetite for conquest beyond Taiwan.
“I think China's already a pretty overextended empire and it's very poor in many parts of it”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:07:45
Nuclear program of Iran
Horton assesses that Iran is now more likely than ever to try to build a bomb, while declining to predict it outright.
“they're more likely to go ahead and try to break out and make an atom bomb now than ever before, although I'm not necessarily predicting that”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 2:13:17
Horton says there is no proof that US strikes destroyed the centrifuges at Natanz and Fordow, though the sites appear frozen.
“I don't think there's any proof that they destroyed the centrifuges at Natanz and Fordow”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:56:27
Horton argues that Netanyahu persuaded Trump to adopt Israel's position that any Iranian civilian nuclear program equals a weapons program.
“Netanyahu convinced Trump to change that line and to adopt the Israeli line that for them to have a civilian nuclear program at all is equivalent”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 1:49:03
Enlargement of NATO
Horton asserts that George H. W. Bush first promised Gorbachev at Malta in 1989 that the US would not take advantage of the Warsaw Pact states' departure.
“H.W. Bush gave the first promise to Gorbachev in Malta in December of 1989”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 36:06
Horton compares Ukraine's importance to Russia with Canada's importance to the United States.
“Ukraine is Russia's Canada, right? Kazakhstan's their Mexico. Ukraine's their Canada”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 33:58
Iraq War
Horton argues that the Iraq War empowered Iran rather than the US allies it was meant to strengthen.
“what happened then in the war was they just empowered Iran. They didn't empower Jordan and Turkey and America and Israel over the Iraqis”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 20:10
Horton estimates that the Iraq War cost at least $5–7 trillion and the whole terror war about $10 trillion.
“On Iraq alone, at least $5 or $7 trillion. I think it was probably $10 trillion for the whole terror war”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 24:00
Russian invasion of Ukraine
Horton argues that Biden's strategy of bogging Russia down in Ukraine backfired by strengthening Russia–China ties.
“I think it was totally wrong because it just strengthened the relationship between Russia and China”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 49:52
Nord Stream pipelines sabotage
Horton says he does not know who destroyed Nord Stream but is sure the perpetrators had at least US support.
“Now, I don't know exactly who blew up that pipeline, but I'm sure they had at least the support of the United States”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 54:52
Extending Russia (RAND Corporation study)
Horton describes the 2019 RAND study as a plan to provoke Russia into overextending itself.
“it's called extending russia And by extending Russia, they mean overextending them”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 43:28
Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine
Horton blames the Ukraine war on the Russia policy of US administrations from George H. W. Bush through Joe Biden rather than on Kyiv.
“I'm blaming it on essentially Bush senior through Joe Biden that they all of them had such a ham handed Russia policy that it led to this”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 40:48
Clean Break memo
Horton says Richard Perle and David Wurmser wrote the Clean Break paper in 1996 for Netanyahu, and that it underlies later US policy.
“But Perle and David Wormser had written up this policy paper called A Clean Break in 1996. And they wrote it for Netanyahu when he was first prime minister”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 16:36
Wolfowitz Doctrine
Horton argues that the post-Cold War 'New World Order' meant building up Washington, not the United Nations, as a world government.
“it was never to build up the un as the world government it was to build up washington dc as the world government”
The Joe Rogan Experience: #2500 - Scott Horton (May 15, 2026) · Listen from 7:37
Appearances
#2500 - Scott HortonThe Joe Rogan Experience · May 15, 2026 · 2 h 41 min
Joe Rogan talks with libertarian antiwar author Scott Horton about neoconservative foreign policy, NATO expansion and the Ukraine war, and the US war with Iran.
Discussed in
#2507 - Harland WilliamsThe Joe Rogan Experience · May 29, 2026 · 3 h 20 min
Joe Rogan and comedian Harland Williams riff through prop gags and debate UFOs, AI, simulation theory, wolves, the death of the sitcom and comedy roasts.
Often appears with
- Joe Rogan · 1 shared episode