The Man Who Predicted The Iran War: The Next 9/11 Will Target Your Bank Account! | Professor Jiang
The Diary Of A CEO
Predictions Built On History 0:00
Professor Jiang opens by framing himself as a polarizing figure trying to prepare people for what is coming. He lays out several predictions structured around the idea of a new 9/11. The first is that if there is another attack of that scale, it will target US financial infrastructure rather than physical buildings, meaning someone could open their banking app and find their account wiped out with no clear timeline for recovery. He also predicts, more playfully, that Lionel Messi will become president of Argentina, and he makes a friendly $100 bet with Stephen that if Trump gets a third term, there will be a siege of New York City. He warns that much of what follows will sound extremely pessimistic, describing the current moment as not just a war but the regression of civilization itself, and states plainly that he believes civilization is collapsing.
The Petro Dollar System Explained 2:30
Jiang traces the roots of today's global economy back to 1945, when the United States, dominant after World War II, lent dollars to Europe and Japan to buy American goods, on the promise those dollars would eventually be backed by gold. Overspending turned the US from a creditor into a debtor nation, and in 1971 Nixon severed the dollar from gold entirely. To keep demand for the dollar alive after this "Nixon shock," three arrangements followed: Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern nations agreed to sell oil only in dollars, China agreed to price its manufactured goods in dollars, and Japan, through the mid-80s Plaza Accord, agreed to funnel its savings into US treasuries. Jiang describes the whole system as a set of promises, with the dollar acting as a contract underwritten by oil, manufactured goods, and savings.
Semiconductors And Global Convergence 5:00
Using a semiconductor chip as a physical example, Jiang points out it depends on three elements, silicon, gallium, and germanium, with China supplying roughly 60 to 70 percent of the world's silicon, 70 percent of gallium, and 90 percent of germanium. The design happens mainly in California companies like Nvidia or Apple, manufacturing happens in Taiwan and Malaysia, and the machines needed to print the chips, worth around $400 million each, come from a Dutch company called ASML. The finished chips then often go to China to be assembled into appliances. He offers a simple formula: technological progress equals specialization multiplied by globalization, and says this whole system only works because of two supports, the US dollar and US military dominance over the seas.
Why Progress Has Peaked 8:31
Because technological advancement depends on specialization and globalization working together, Jiang argues the world has now hit the ceiling of what it can achieve. The war centered on Iran, he says, is forcing nations to become more self-sufficient and nationalistic, which means less specialization, less globalization, and therefore a decline rather than a continuation of technological progress. He insists this is not simply a reordering of global power like past shifts, but the actual collapse of civilization, playing out over roughly the next 20 years.
The Bronze Age Collapse Parallel 10:30
Jiang compares the present era to the Bronze Age collapse, a period when bronze production required both copper and tin sourced from different regions, forcing a similarly globalized world. That integration eventually produced massive inequality, debt, and polarization, and when the system broke, the whole world broke with it. He describes how the collapse unfolded: climate change caused famine, mainly in Europe, which pushed migrants known as the Sea Peoples into Anatolia and Egypt, overwhelming those societies and dissolving traditional hierarchies until the fundamentals of civilization disappeared entirely.
Iran's Proxies And A Widening War 13:33
Applying that pattern to today, Jiang describes how Iran's proxies, the Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Shia militias in Iraq, have all been drawn into the current conflict. The Houthis, based in mountains that make them nearly impossible to dislodge, are a Shia minority known for fanaticism and control the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, a critical Red Sea chokepoint, which matters because Iran has already closed the Strait of Hormuz, leaving Saudi Arabia unable to easily ship oil to Asia. In response to feeling threatened, Saudi Arabia signed the Mecca Accords with Turkey and Pakistan, a mutual defense pact Jiang expects Saudi Arabia to invoke against the Houthis, who could retaliate by striking Saudi energy infrastructure with ballistic missiles and drones.
Coordination, Backing, And Collapse Risk 20:01
Unlike earlier militant groups such as al-Qaeda or ISIS, which acted separately, Jiang stresses that the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Iraqi Shia militias all report back to Iran's IRGC, giving them active coordination. Both China and Russia are backing Iran, China through the Belt and Road corridor and Russia through the Caspian Sea, meaning Iran could theoretically sustain the war indefinitely. Because the Middle East sits at the center of the petro-dollar system, feeding oil to Japan, China, India, and Pakistan in exchange for manufactured goods and recycled dollar investment in the US, a disruption to oil flows threatens to collapse the whole arrangement within months, since Japan, China, and Gulf states are the three biggest buyers of US treasuries.
A Sheltered West And Personal Turning Point 24:31
Jiang pushes back on the idea that this scenario feels distant, noting that people in Iraq, Afghanistan, and parts of Africa have never known the peace and stability the West takes for granted, and that the US empire has been built precisely to shield Western populations from the chaos it causes elsewhere. He explains his own shift toward pessimism came after Brexit and Donald Trump's election, events that shattered his prior belief that the world ran on meritocracy, reason, and truth. Raised by a dishwasher father in poverty, he had reached Yale on a full scholarship and believed the system rewarded talent and hard work, and it was the disruption of that belief that pushed him to study historical patterns and global supply chains as a way of predicting what comes next.
Global Supply Chains And Water Wars 33:00
America counters China's rare earth dominance with Spruce Pine, North Carolina, a town that controls about 90 percent of the world's high quality quartz needed for silicon manufacturing, meaning technology would stall if trading relationships collapsed. Food security follows a similar pattern, split between a wealthy north that produces most of the world's fertilizer and a global south, largely Africa, the Middle East and South America, that depends on imports of it. In a war that breaks global supply chains, the north risks losing luxury goods like smartphones, while the south faces famine. The professor argues the defining conflict of the next twenty years will not be over oil but over water, pointing to a map where red zones mark water scarcity and, in his view, predict where wars will erupt. Even the western United States shows this stress, with Colorado, California and Arizona fighting over the Colorado River, while the Middle East sits like dynamite ready to explode and India's water shortages push it toward conflict with China. Northeast Asia, including Japan and North Korea, is flagged as another likely flashpoint.
Migration, Aging, And Rising Nationalism 36:30
A fertility map shows Africa and the Middle East producing the most children per couple, and since these are also the regions under the greatest geopolitical strain, the professor expects mass migration toward Europe as young people seek better prospects. Europe, though, faces its own demographic trap: it has some of the fastest aging populations in the world, alongside Japan and North America, which creates demand for cheap healthcare and nursing labor that immigration is best positioned to supply. This collision, more migration meeting native populations already strained by aging societies, raises the risk of domestic conflict, civil war, political violence, or even revolution. The host notes this may explain the surge of right-wing parties such as Reform in the UK, the AfD in Germany, MAGA in the United States, and Vox in Spain, all campaigning on closing borders to prevent that unrest. The unresolved question becomes what replaces immigrant labor if borders close, and robots are only a partial answer since they depend on copper from Chile, Peru, China and Australia, lithium from the lithium triangle, and silicon and rare earths largely from China, meaning broken supply chains make human labor the cheaper, more expendable option.
Iran's Best Move Is Chaos 40:31
The professor lays out a scenario in which American victory and regime change in Iran would restore globalization, letting oil flow freely, manufacturing resume, and profits fund AI development toward solving global problems. But he says momentum has shifted, and describes Iran's strongest game-theory play as disrupting global trade entirely rather than fighting conventionally. With Iran controlling the Strait of Hormuz, the Houthis holding the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, Hezbollah able to threaten the Suez Canal, and Shia militias able to threaten the Mediterranean, coordinated random attacks by these actors would destroy the confidence that underwrites global shipping insurance, and without insurance, shipping stops functioning. He calls this a madman theory, Iran's best available strategy, since the United States lacks the military capacity to respond to simultaneous strikes across the region. He stops short of predicting this will definitely happen, citing internal Iranian political divisions, but predicts escalation is coming regardless.
Attacking Iran's Power And Water 44:30
The professor argues that if Iran disrupts global trade, the American response would be to strike Iran's civil infrastructure, including desalination plants and power plants, which he says would be worse than a nuclear strike because Tehran's ten million residents depend on refrigerated food and would face starvation without power. He predicts the United States would ultimately be forced into this by the logic of maintaining empire, invoking a formula that more power brings less imagination and empathy, and suggesting leaders convince themselves that immense human cost is an acceptable price for preserving dominance. This, he says, would trigger new migration crises from both Iran and Africa, as people flee starvation and lost access to cheap energy and fertilizer, echoing and intensifying the migration wave that began after the United States destabilized Libya and Syria around 2014. His overall conclusion is that the United States cannot defeat Iran and its proxies outright, and that the conflict will keep escalating, with South Korea already authorizing a naval contingent to help secure shipping lanes. Asked what he would do as Trump, he says he would go all in and strike Iranian power plants, arguing that half measures would only look weak and invite further aggression, since backing out risks shattering the aura of invincibility the petrodollar system and US military prestige depend on.
Predicting A Siege Of New York 49:00
The professor offers three predictions timed to the anniversary of 9/11, starting with a possible siege of New York City. He builds this on the idea that Trump could secure a third term, either through a declared national emergency allowing suspension of constitutional norms, citing precedents like Lincoln suspending habeas corpus and Roosevelt's wartime internment of Japanese Americans, or through running as vice president in 2028 alongside Don Jr., who would then resign to hand back the presidency. If a third term happened, he expects revolt in Democratic-leaning cities, especially New York under a charismatic mayor, refusing federal taxes and resisting ICE agents, prompting federal forces and allied state militias to besiege the city by cutting off food and water. He places this scenario in 2028, and the host makes a hundred-dollar bet that Trump will still be in the White House past the January 2029 inauguration date, which the professor accepts.
A Financial 9/11 58:01
The second prediction concerns a possible new 9/11-style attack, which the professor believes would target US financial infrastructure rather than physical landmarks. He frames the original 9/11 as an attempt to traumatize Americans into self-destructive violence by destroying symbols of American power, the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and hijacked planes, which led to twenty years of forever wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya that drained US finances, damaged military prestige, and deepened corruption in Washington. He argues a modern attacker, recognizing that physical attacks no longer produce the same shock, might instead strike financial data servers, wiping out access to bank accounts nationwide and inducing mass panic, anger, and anxiety once people found their savings inaccessible with no clear timeline for recovery.
Detained Trying To Reenter America 1:03:00
The professor describes becoming one of the most polarizing figures in the world after the March Iran war made him suddenly famous, which left him fearing that reentering the United States could result in detention or deportation by customs. He avoided travel to the US for months, declining interview invitations, until tensions eased over the summer, prompting him to fly from Toronto to Los Angeles on August 5th to appear on the Theo Von show. At Pearson Airport, an immigration officer questioned him extensively, and things proceeded smoothly until the officer asked whether he had a travel letter for his eight-year-old son, Chris, who was traveling with him.
Detained Again at the Border 1:05:01
The professor describes being pulled into secondary screening at US immigration despite having his travel letter and his son's birth certificate ready this time. He believes the real reason is not paperwork but something he said in recent podcast interviews, specifically comments tied to the Clean Break memo, a 1996 document laying out a plan for Israel to become the dominant power in the Middle East. He names Richard Perle and others from the study group behind it, noting that some of these figures later helped architect the Iraq War under the George W. Bush administration alongside Paul Wolfowitz.
A Pattern of Silencing Critics 1:08:01
He points to journalist Max Blumenthal, a US citizen who had his devices confiscated after covering a funeral in Iran, following public calls for his arrest by an online influencer. Blumenthal is now suing the Department of Homeland Security. The professor frames this as part of a broader pattern where a declining empire, in his words, responds to criticism with hubris and arrogance rather than accepting it, and he suspects his own US entry status may not be renewed once his I-94 expires in six months.
Messi as Argentina's President 1:09:30
His third prediction is that Lionel Messi will become president of Argentina. He connects this to Argentina's recent demand for the return of the Falkland Islands, Trump's support for that claim, and the close relationship between Javier Milei and Benjamin Netanyahu. He describes a rift inside Israel between messianic Jews who see the current war as ushering in the end times and secular Jews who reject that framing, suggesting Argentina could become a destination for exporting secular Jewish emigration, with Messi's popularity serving to make mass Israeli immigration politically acceptable to Argentines.
Why China and Japan Will Clash 1:13:00
He argues that everyone in China believes conflict with Japan is coming, even though Westerners assume China's ambitions center on Taiwan. He frames China as a self-sufficient land power historically rooted in agriculture, and Japan as a resource-dependent sea power shaped by piracy, earthquakes, and an aging population. Japan needs resource colonies in Southeast Asia to survive, especially as US protection recedes, and Taiwan's location makes it central to that need, since a China-Taiwan reunification could give China the option to blockade Japan's supply lines.
Proxies and Alliances in Asia 1:17:00
He explains that outright war benefits no one, so nations build leverage instead. Japan is forming alliances with the Philippines, Australia, and India to counterbalance China without direct confrontation, while China avoids appearing too aggressive to prevent Southeast Asian nations from uniting against it. Instead, North Korea becomes the proxy, capable of shelling Seoul or firing missiles into the Sea of Japan, allowing China to pressure Japan and South Korea indirectly while the US, in his view, benefits strategically from tension that could push Taiwan's semiconductor industry, including TSMC, to relocate to Arizona.
Russia Provoking Europe Into War 1:21:32
Shifting to Europe, he describes Ukraine's shift toward drone strikes on Russian energy infrastructure as changing the war's character, turning Russian public opinion against Putin by causing direct economic pain. Since Ukraine's drones are manufactured in Germany and the UK and financed by Europe, he argues Russia now sees NATO Europe, not Ukraine, as its real adversary. He points to the Leipzig airport drone attack blamed on Russia, Germany's closing of the Russian consulate in Bonn, Russia's retaliatory closure of its German consulate in St. Petersburg, and Sergey Lavrov's comparison of the moment to 1941 as evidence that Russia may deliberately provoke Europe into mass mobilization.
Why War Serves American Interests 1:26:00
He argues Trump does not personally need Ukraine to win, because prolonged war forces Europe to depend on American energy instead of Russian energy. Russia's only realistic path to victory, he says, is to cause enough instability in Europe that populations revolt against their own governments rather than mobilize for war, though this would require Russia to shift from a "special military operation" relying on volunteers to full mobilization, drawing on an estimated three million reservists.
The Clean Break Theory Explained 1:29:00
Asked what would have prevented all this, he goes back to 1995, when Bill Clinton's Washington Consensus and the Oslo peace process assumed that trade and prosperity, as had happened with Japan and Germany, would eventually pacify Israel and Palestine. Netanyahu's Clean Break memo rejected that path, arguing Israel could never trust Arab states to stop hating it and should instead pursue regional dominance as a kind of manifest destiny. He lists its three pillars: abandoning land-for-peace and the Oslo framework, pursuing regional dominance by weakening Iraq, Syria, and Hezbollah, and adopting preemptive rather than defensive strategies, all of which he says Israel has since carried out.
Advice for Ordinary People 1:35:00
He argues it is now too late to reverse these structural forces, since the conditions for conflict between Japan and China, and between Germany and Russia, have already been set in motion. Asked what ordinary people should do, he says the best advice is to believe in God, describing his own past decades as angry and depressed under a purely materialistic worldview shaped by his elite education. He credits his marriage and children with restoring his belief in order and meaning, a conviction he says only fully formed in the past two years, and he frames his own choice to speak publicly, including doing this interview, as an act of following the principle of telling the truth.
Faith Demands Action 1:38:01
The professor says believing in God is not a passive state but a moral obligation to speak the truth and participate in the world, since faith without action makes no sense. Asked why God would allow the wars and conflicts unfolding across Russia, Ukraine, and the Middle East, he points to struggle, pain, and failure as the path to wisdom. He argues that suffering forces people to transcend themselves and ask what truly matters, and that the answer everyone eventually reaches is love for the people around them. He calls this potential collective realization a great spiritual awakening capable of redeeming humanity, since too much wealth, fame, or power makes real empathy and imagination impossible.
AI As Control Grid Not Savior 1:40:31
Turning to artificial intelligence, he lays out a formula that technology equals specialization multiplied by globalization, meaning that as global supply chains break down during conflict, AI cannot progress into AGI. Instead, he predicts AI will be repurposed as a surveillance and control grid rather than a tool to reduce scarcity or solve medical and climate problems, with crises like a hypothetical siege of New York accelerating autonomous drone warfare from companies like Palantir. His deeper worry is not surveillance itself but that AI cheapens the human experience, distracting people from what he sees as humanity's true mission of love, imagination, and spiritual growth.
Family, Faith, And Closing Fears 1:43:32
He says his children, especially his son Chris, give him hope and keep him from being corrupted by fame or money. He recalls Chris at age two saying he was an alien visiting from another world, a claim the parents accepted with love rather than doubt, seeing their role as empowering rather than controlling him. Asked about his biggest challenge, he admits fear and doubt, including worry that his blunt criticism of China, Canada, and the United States could get him banned from all three, saying his ongoing struggle is to keep faith in God, family, and purpose.
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