The Tucker Carlson Show
Ben of Ben & Jerry’s Exposes the Motives Behind War With Russia & the Politicians That Sold Out
Mon, 05 May 2025
Ben Cohen moved to Vermont in 1977 and co-founded the world’s most liberal ice cream company. You may think you disagree with him on everything. But take a second and hear him out on the Ukraine war. (00:00): Introduction (01:03) The Russia/Ukraine War Is Totally Unnecessary (12:24): Weapons Manufacturers Lobbying Congress (46:00): The Pro-War Propaganda (56:52): Why Is This How Cohen Chooses to Spend His Time? Paid partnerships with: Policygenius: Head to at https://Policygenius.com/Tucker to see how much you could save PureTalk: Go to https://PureTalk.com/Tucker to make the switch Tecovas: Get 10% off at tecovas.com/tucker Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Ben Cohen and what are his views?
Ben Cohen moved to Vermont in 1977 and co-founded an ice cream company that bears his name, Ben & Jerry's. They made great ice cream. They still do. Ben Cohen became famous for his liberal political activism. The ice cream was great. His political opinions were deeply offensive to most conservatives.
Fast forward to 2022 and Ben Cohen was one of the only liberals in the United States to come out against the war in Ukraine. It seems like a good moment to pause and reconsider whether some of Ben Cohen's views on war are maybe not insane. Maybe they're worth hearing. Here's Ben Cohen. So you brought a book by Smedley Darlington Butler, the most decorated Marine in the world.
Chapter 2: Why does Ben Cohen oppose the Russia/Ukraine war?
One, he's a Marine general. He won two medals of honor. And he wrote a book called War is a Racket. And for some reason, it's not the most famous book ever written in English, but it probably should be. What is that and why did you bring it?
Well, I've been kind of inspired by this quote of his. I think he encapsulates what's been going on in terms of how our military has been used. You know, he's been there, done that.
That's for sure.
And I think about it a lot in terms of, you know, all these refugees, immigrants that are trying to get to the U.S. And why are they trying to get to the U.S.? A lot of times it's because the U.S. at some point in history overthrew or invaded their government or Well, I'll tell you what Smedley says here. Can I quote? Please. So he says, I spent 33 years and four months in active military service.
Chapter 3: What role do weapons manufacturers play in US foreign policy?
And during that period, I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for big business, for Wall Street and the bankers. Butler wrote in 1955. Then he goes on, in short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico safe for American oil interests. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for national city bank boys to collect revenues.
I helped in the raping of a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902 to 1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903.
In China in 1927, I helped set it up so that Standard Oil went on its way unmillested. Looking back on it, I feel I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate in three city districts. We Marines operated on three continents.
So this was a major general in the United States Marine Corps, the single most decorated Marine when he wrote that. And I think he's pretty much forgotten now.
Yeah.
And he was much maligned after he said that.
Yeah, very much.
So you think, I guess another way of saying, you think that our military heroes are the most revered people in our country. You can't criticize a man who's received two medals of honor, and yet he crossed the line and they hated him for that.
Yeah, but he told the truth.
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Chapter 4: How does the US military budget affect domestic policies?
And then we proceeded to expand NATO eastward. As a matter of fact... The government was not going to do that until the weapons manufacturers set up this committee to expand NATO, which was essentially the CEOs of the weapons manufacturers lobbying Congress to expand NATO. So, I mean, geez, if you're a weapons manufacturer and you expand NATO, they're going to buy a lot of your stuff, right?
Why would the, well, first let me ask, do you think it's a reasonable request by Russia not to have NATO expand to its borders?
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, in the same way that, you know, the United States says that, uh, what, here's our sphere of influence. Uh, you know, I remember learning about this in, uh, was it elementary school or middle school? Uh, that, uh, the Monroe doctrine, uh, uh, It's our divine right from God. To control our hemisphere. To control our hemisphere. And it sounded crazy to me then.
And, you know, I can see making sure that there's not enemies right on your borders. But in terms of controlling the whole hemisphere, I don't buy it. And the U.S. has now expanded its sphere of influence to include the entire world. I mean, it's amazing. We have military commands that cover every portion of the globe. And we have 800 military bases around the world.
You know, when I was growing up, you know, I heard we had a bunch of overseas bases. I figured, you know, that's cool. You know, every country must have overseas bases. And then, you know, I find out that the country who has the next most overseas bases has like five. I mean, it's the U.S., That is using its military power to control the world.
And the fact of the matter is that the United States is 5% of the world population. So having 5% dominate the world militarily, that doesn't sound democratic to me.
No. And it doesn't sound like it helps the United States very much.
No, I think it's incredibly harmful to the United States. First of all, we're making a lot of enemies. People don't like us being the big bully on the hill telling all these other countries what to do. And it sucks a huge amount of money out of our country. It's stuff that can be used for things that people really want and need.
uh you know you could we could have more affordable housing we could we could make it so that p so that the american dream could actually still happen that people could afford a house uh that you can get a decent education And that you can get childcare, that it doesn't have to cost you so much money to go to college. I mean, these things can all be done.
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Chapter 5: How did NATO expansion contribute to the Ukraine conflict?
I would not imagine a continental-sized country with totally independent resources, enough energy, enough food, doesn't really need anything, that's separated from the rest of the world by the two biggest oceans.
Yeah.
That doesn't make any sense, actually. No, it totally doesn't. Has the U.S. been invaded before by a foreign army since 1812? I don't think so. No?
No. Yeah.
It's a little weird. Yeah. I mean, and they keep on justifying these huge expenditures by coming up with enemy after enemy after enemy. So, you know, first it was the Soviet Union. So the Soviet Union collapsed. And I mean, Gorbachev said at the time, we will deny you of an enemy.
And, you know, I assumed that the Pentagon budget was going to, you know, drop hugely because that was the whole justification for it. But what the pentagon did was that they came up with what was called the two war scenario so now instead of the pentagon budget being structured to uh defeat the soviet union
Now what they said is it needs to be structured to fight two medium-sized wars in two different places at the same time. And what do you know, that's going to cost just as much as we were spending on preparing to fight the Soviet Union. Who are the wars going to be with? Well, I think at the time there was the Axis of Evil. What was that? Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Cuba, probably another one.
yeah it's it's interesting because russia collapses the soviet system collapses after seven years in 1991 the summer of 91 and i kind of assumed i think everyone assumed that we would take the win like we were having this cold war all these years and they collapsed we won and then we could be friends right and move forward because there are no more soviet communists left they're gone
Right, and they wanted to be our friend. I mean, I was walking on the Arbat in Moscow. People were joyful, and they were all wearing these pins that showed a U.S. flag crossed with a Soviet flag. They wanted to be friends. Why didn't that happen? Because our... Cold warriors who for their whole life, you know, fighting the Soviet Union, that's what they were about.
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Chapter 6: What is the Eisenhower Media Network and its purpose?
Excuse me. So I've been I've been listening to your views on this for a long time and they haven't they haven't changed. Do you think that your views have changed?
No, my view hasn't changed, and Bernie's views certainly haven't changed. I've been listening to him for a long time. I tell you, it is the same freaking speech. People say you should change your speech. He says, when the country finally acts in a decent way, I'll change my speech.
But Ukraine feels a little different. All of a sudden, there was always this... persistent enthusiastic anti-war caucus on the left where you're coming from um not quite mainstream democrat but sort of moral fashion democrat they like evaporated maybe chris hedges jeff sacks jeffrey sacks you like where's everybody else
Yeah, it really split, I guess, people. I mean, you're talking about people on the left. I guess we could talk about people on the left. I mean, anti-war people in general.
Yeah, whatever they are, left, right, I don't know.
Yeah, I think there's people like that on the left, right, and center.
That's 100% true. You're exactly right. And in fact, there are a lot of them on the right, whatever that is. Those are fake categories at this point. It really is. Well, let's say it was 1985. OK, it was 40 years ago or 1988 when I lived in Burlington. That was considered like a lefty view.
Yeah. Yeah. So you're saying. Right. So. So some of that group is, you know, behind Ukraine. Let's defend Ukraine. And some of that group is saying, no, we shouldn't be involved in this war. You know, I think the people who are saying, let's defend Ukraine, I can certainly understand it from their point of view.
And their point of view is that Russia made an unprovoked invasion and Russia therefore started this war and they're trying to take over this country and we should defend that country. Yeah. But people don't understand what led up to it.
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Chapter 7: How do media and military interests influence public perception?
myself and a veteran, Danny Serson, decided to start up the Eisenhower Media Network as a home for higher level former military people to use their credibility on the issue of critiquing the Pentagon. Because what usually happens when you
critique the Pentagon is that you don't have the the credentials you know you say that well the Pentagon is doing this weird thing or that screwed up thing and you know and then the and then the Pentagon you know general gets up there in uniform with all his medals and stuff and says You know, those guys have no idea what they're talking about. I'm the military expert.
So the idea of Eisenhower Media Network is to have those military experts that can support a different point of view than what the Pentagon is putting out.
What kind of response have you had from the media?
You know, those guys are in the media sometimes, but they're certainly not in the media, despite our efforts, as much as the former high-level military guys that are now being paid by weapons manufacturers. I mean, so they're brought on these TV shows, TV talk shows, as experts, And they're never identified as in the employ of essentially war profiteers. That's actually happened?
I speak of the truth. I shit you not. I mean, that's disgusting. Yes, sir. I've known a number of them, of course, because I worked at a TV channel. I worked at a bunch of TV channels with a bunch of retired military officers. Yeah. you know, on the air, letting their expertise to this or that. And some of them are impressive. Some of them are utterly fraudulent and stupid.
Well, I'm thinking of one in particular who doesn't know anything. I don't know how he was a general, but sorry. I didn't realize they were being paid by defense contractors to do that.
That's really... And it's not revealed.
Well, I didn't know. And I know them. Right, right. Huh. So who was in the Eisenhower Media Network or is in it? What kind of people?
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