Good evening. It's Friday, February 14th, which is Valentine's Day. I was instructed by my colleagues here to say how much I deeply love our audience, which I think it goes about saying. I think you already know that, but I was told to say that on Valentine's Day. So here I am saying it. Welcome to a new episode of System Update, our live nightly show that airs every Monday through Friday at 7 p.m.

Eastern exclusively here on Rumble, the free speech alternative to YouTube.

Tonight, we reported on Wednesday night on the extraordinary remarks by new Defense Secretary

Pete Hegsath on the war in Ukraine in which he told the Europeans what they long needed

to hear about the futility of this war and the

limits on America's willingness to fund it and similar proxy wars in defense of Europe.

Over the last 24 hours, even more significant statements have emanated from the highest levels

of the new administration. President Trump himself last night announced his desire

to reach an agreement with both China and Russia, whereby all three countries would cut their

military budget by 50%. Vice President Vance in Munich today told the Europeans that their pompous

view of themselves, that they stand for democracy promotion,

is often the exact opposite of what they do,

whether it be when they nullify elections,

whatever the outcome is one they dislike, as they recently tried to do in Romania,

or imposing censorship online.

And Elon Musk told a conference in the Middle East

that the United States has been interfering

relentlessly in other countries' politics for far too long, and that the United States

should, in his words, mind its own business.

Whether all of this will result in tangible and radical and enduring policy changes remains

to be seen, of course, but the announcements themselves and the admissions and acknowledgments they entail and the direction that they signal are

highly consequential simply by themselves, and so we're going to break that down and analyze it.

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