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Our full discussion transcribed after the break:
by Rod D. Martin
September 25, 2026
I appeared on NTD Good Morning with Cary Dunst to discuss how Trump’s Venezuelan oil deal gives Washington new leverage over Ottawa, offers a free Iran a way to restore its energy wealth, and gives Venezuelans their futures back.
Cary and I discuss:
Why Chinese aid can’t break the U.S. blockade of Iran
What is “Panda Diplomacy” good for
Why courtesy toward Xi doesn’t mean trust
Xi’s student exchange proposal
Why China needs the trade truce (and so do we), yet time is not on Beijing’s side
The critical supply chains America still must reclaim.
[NOTE: I misspoke at one point in the video describing a rail line as a pipeline. I have corrected that in the transcript below. — RDM]
It’s a quick 7 minutes: watch the interview, and pass it along!
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Our Full Discussion:
Cary Dunst: Joining us now for more on the Chinese regime leader’s visit to Washington is Rod D. Martin, political analyst and founder and CEO of Martin Capital. Great to have you with us this morning, Rod. Let’s start with China helping Iran evade the economic blockade. How are they doing that?
Rod D. Martin: They’re doing it quite ineffectively, actually. It’s meaningful, but it’s not enough to help Iran. Iran’s entire coast is completely blockaded. Nothing’s getting in, nothing’s getting out.
During the U.S. Civil War, the North used the same strategy against the Confederacy. In that blockade, 86 percent of the blockade runners were able to get through, and yet shipments of Southern cotton, on which the South depended, were cut by 95 percent.
Iran doesn’t even have that much happening. Iran is getting nothing in and out by sea. And as you’ve seen, when they foolishly attacked, or attempted to attack, American naval vessels recently, we blew up several of their oil tankers. Those are very hard things to replace. That’s a $100 million to $200 million loss each.
So the Chinese are really only able to help them by land and air. The land routes are difficult, and we know where they are. If we want to hit them, we just take them out. There’s a key bridge between Iran and Turkestan that we blew up a few months ago. That really causes them problems.
Also, there’s a rail line from Iran into Xinjiang. That doesn’t help them a lot either. At most, that can carry about 6 percent of the oil Iran needs to export to China. And you’ll recall, prewar, 90 percent of Iran’s exports were going to China. So the Chinese are doing things that we are not appreciative of, but they don’t amount to a lot.
Panda Diplomacy and Hard Negotiations
Cary Dunst: You can see, though, that they’re clearly still aligned with Russia’s war, and Iran supporting them, giving them that lifeline. Now, there’s been this thing called panda diplomacy for a long while. They’re just so cute. We really can’t resist them. What do you make of Xi gifting two pandas on this trip to the White House?
Rod D. Martin: We always want more pandas. Pandas are a good thing, kind of like penguins. If the premier of Antarctica would come and give us penguins, we’d be super happy with that. This is a good show of goodwill. We’re dealing with somebody who is unquestionably our mortal enemy, and they see us the same way, no matter what they might or might not say from time to time. That’s the reality.
And yet, just because you’re enemies doesn’t mean you have to be ugly to one another. There have been a lot of people on Capitol Hill calling for Trump to treat Xi Jinping in an ugly fashion. That’s crazy. First of all, it is essential to diplomacy that you are reasonably cordial to each other. Honestly, the more hostile you are, the more formal courtesies you should give, because that’s necessary to be able to say the hard things in the negotiating room.
We saw this all through the Cold War with the Soviet Union. We always treated the Soviet premiers with respect, even while they were trying to take over the world and blow us all up. That’s what you do.
You don’t make peace with your friends. You make peace with your enemies.
The second thing that some of our friends on Capitol Hill seem to have lost track of — and, by the way, many of their points are correct: China is a horrible human rights abuser. They are absolutely the most evil regime on the planet, except possibly the Iranian regime they support. Nevertheless, you don’t make peace with your friends. You make peace with your enemies. And that means you’re going to have to sit down and try to come to some meeting of the minds.
Students, Trade, and America’s Vulnerabilities
Cary Dunst: As you point out, Reagan certainly had many meetings with Gorbachev, and ultimately that led to the best possible outcome. Now, Xi wants more U.S. students to China. He put the number at 100,000 student visas. This is coming as the State Department just raised the risk for anybody going to China. What do you make of this?
Rod D. Martin: It’s really quite interesting. I think it’s intended in part to blunt the criticism that we’ve got several hundred thousand Chinese students in the United States, and it seems like a one-way street and possibly infiltration. The problem is, if we sent students over there, hardly any of them would be U.S. spies, and they’d probably all come back Chinese spies. So I’m not sure this is a good thing for us.
On the other hand, we have a lot of little hippie kids that, if they want to go to China, I’d be happy to pay for their ticket as long as they stay there. So that’s another way to look at it. But I think it’s kind of like panda diplomacy. It’s an opportunity to show goodwill on a small thing so that you’re better positioned to discuss the bigger things.
And the bigger things are very, very real. The trade truce in particular is a very big deal for both countries. This is frequently lost on some of my friends who are all China hawks, and I’m right there with them. I’m a member of the Committee on the Present Danger: China, so I’m completely aware of the dangers of this regime.
But the truth is, if we have goodwill on trade, it benefits both countries. China has built its entire economy on exports. Its consumer demand is nowhere near high enough to absorb all it’s production. That stuff has to go somewhere. And there’s only one place it can go, which is here.
At the same time, we’re still critically dependent on them for pharmaceuticals and for the refining of rare earth elements. That isn’t going to end quickly. It won’t end in this presidential term. I think it can end in the next presidential term. I think a five-to-seven-year time horizon is quite reasonable.
But in the meantime, we and China are locked in a dance neither one of us can get out of. We’re going to have to find some way forward while still recognizing that they’re an existential threat. We really shouldn’t ever let our guard down.
Cary Dunst: Such great points. We do rely on them for critical minerals and, as you point out, our pharmaceutical supply chain. We’ve got to decouple those. And for kids out there everywhere, if you want a one-way ticket to Beijing, Rod D. Martin with Martin Capital is your guy. Thank you so much for joining, Rod.
Rod D. Martin: Thank you.
