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Speaker 3: Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics.
Speaker 3: I'm here with Mick Mulroy, Jonathan Hackett, Mark Polymaropolis, and
Speaker 3: myself two Marines verus two Greeks.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 3: I think we're gonna try and keep that ratio going
Speaker 3: as much as we can. A lot happening, a lot
Speaker 3: of false starts too, with like the delegations going back
Speaker 3: to Pakistan to talk more about a peace plan or
Speaker 3: something like that. Doesn't seem like it's gonna happened. Last
Speaker 3: week we saw Jade Vance was supposed to go, then
Speaker 3: he didn't go, and then Jared Kushner and Steve wikoffer
Speaker 3: we're supposed to go, and I pulled him back as well. Uh,
Speaker 3: he wrote a truth social post about it. So we
Speaker 3: don't know where we're at, you know, obviously, I'm sure
Speaker 3: hopefully there's some backshanneling going on where we're figuring it out.
Speaker 3: The straight of her moves is essentially still the facto closed.
Speaker 3: Some ships are getting out not anywhere near what the
Speaker 3: normal traffic would be. We started, you know, basically search,
Speaker 3: you know, search the v B S S v B
Speaker 3: S S ing. I don't know exactly what the acronym means.
Speaker 3: Whatever you guys can google it is.
Speaker 4: Search search.
Speaker 3: I knew the s S, so a lot happening. Straight
Speaker 3: of her moves is still his mind, at least partially.
Speaker 3: So it's kind of a huge clusterfuck. And let's I'd
Speaker 3: love for you guys to, you know, give us some
Speaker 3: clarity on what's going on and what to expect.
Speaker 2: Make you go first age before beauty. Sorry, now's a joke.
Speaker 5: It's first a cool VBSS story. Since we talked about
Speaker 5: the Greeks, we actually trained the Greek seals and VBSS
Speaker 5: and we literally went for you know, like those those crews,
Speaker 5: those passenger ships or go to all the islands. We
Speaker 5: just hit those NonStop until we got to the island
Speaker 5: that we wanted to go to, and then we just
Speaker 5: pull into the island, sit out on the beach. Drake wine,
Speaker 5: you know, kill Maury and all that stuff, and man,
Speaker 5: that was glorious. I don't think it's as sexy or
Speaker 5: cool for the guys that are doing this for real. Okay,
Speaker 5: so we're talking about a rod again. You know, i'd
Speaker 5: start with this. You know, we do need to get
Speaker 5: to a point where the US can be successful at this.
Speaker 5: We've talked about this a lot, and I think we
Speaker 5: have accomplished some of our military objectives. We never should
Speaker 5: have used the regime change as an objective. Clearly we
Speaker 5: do have, probably and I think Jonathan and Mark can
Speaker 5: go into detail on this. I think we probably have
Speaker 5: a more hardline regime right now than we did before
Speaker 5: the war started, and I think we just need to
Speaker 5: accept that that's what it is. We have made strides
Speaker 5: against their ballistic missile program, which was somewhat of a
Speaker 5: shield for their nuclear program. We have made some strides
Speaker 5: against their suicide drones, but I'd be careful from a
Speaker 5: messaging point of view, of overstating that because clearly they're
Speaker 5: going to rebuild it, and if they're back to where
Speaker 5: they were in a year, those military objectives are not
Speaker 5: going to look as significant as they do right now.
Speaker 5: So and then, of course the question is how do
Speaker 5: we deal with the top priority, which is the nuclear
Speaker 5: ambitions of Iran, which probably would mean recovering the four
Speaker 5: hundred and forty kilograms of highly enriched uranium, but it's
Speaker 5: important to point out they have about ten tons of
Speaker 5: enriched uranium, not to that level. But the best way
Speaker 5: to ensure that they don't try to get a nuclear
Speaker 5: program is make it completely against their interest to have
Speaker 5: a nuclear program, which means a negotiated nuclear agreement that
Speaker 5: provides them benefit, you know, sanctions relief, of course, being
Speaker 5: the primary that has complete visibility, so the IAEA has
Speaker 5: the ability to ensure that they're not developing nuclear weapons.
Speaker 5: But to say that we're going to just mow the grass,
Speaker 5: so to speak, which I'm not necessarily opposed to, but
Speaker 5: I just don't think it's practical. So I think we
Speaker 5: should put all our eggs into or not all of them,
Speaker 5: but a majority of riggs into the diplomatic basket to
Speaker 5: try to get there. And yes, it has to be
Speaker 5: better than the twenty fifteen agreement for political reasons. Are
Speaker 5: people really going to ask why we elected to pull
Speaker 5: out of that just to get back to the same agreement,
Speaker 5: and it does have to address THEA ballistic missiles in
Speaker 5: some capacity, at least restrictions on the straight or most
Speaker 5: obviously that was open before we started, so we can't
Speaker 5: leave it worse off. They've found their major pressure point,
Speaker 5: and it is a pressure point. We can all acknowledge that,
Speaker 5: and we've tried to counter with the blockade. I do
Speaker 5: believe that's where the US is going to double down blockade.
Speaker 5: I don't think we want to insert ground forces into
Speaker 5: this conflict for multiple reasons. One, there's really no exit strategy.
Speaker 5: If we do, it's only escalatory. So we're going to
Speaker 5: try to push hoard on the blockade, and I do
Speaker 5: think it's having an effect it. I guess the next
Speaker 5: step is what will Iran do to try to it
Speaker 5: where they start attacking their neighbors again, where they get
Speaker 5: the huthis to try to obstruct the Red Sea. Baba
Speaker 5: Mendev don't know.
Speaker 4: I do.
Speaker 5: I mean, it's just the way it is the way
Speaker 5: we're negotiating publicly. I find it to be highly ineffective
Speaker 5: at the negotiation process itself. Every time we say things
Speaker 5: like well we really don't care if this could last forever,
Speaker 5: it just screams, we really do care. We don't want
Speaker 5: this to last forever. You're basically just telling the Iranians
Speaker 5: over and over and over again that if they can
Speaker 5: outlast us, that they'll be successful. It's clearly an indicator
Speaker 5: to me that we're highlighting what is the most concerning
Speaker 5: to us, other than that maybe a bifurcated process where
Speaker 5: we can get to it and negotiated into the war
Speaker 5: and then start the long term negotiated process to get
Speaker 5: to a new nuclear agreement. It seems like we're thinking
Speaker 5: this is all going to happen at once. It took
Speaker 5: two years to get to the original agreement. We're not
Speaker 5: going to send two guys with no experience over there
Speaker 5: and both simultaneously in the war and come up with
Speaker 5: JCPO POA two points here. It's just very unlikely to happen.
Speaker 5: And the more we think it's going to happen, the
Speaker 5: more we're going to I think fall short. And when
Speaker 5: we do get to the long term negotiated process, we
Speaker 5: need to bring in experts, nuclear experts, careers from the military,
Speaker 5: State Department, intelligence community to be successful and to be
Speaker 5: long term, and I think we're going to have to
Speaker 5: convince the Iranians that we're not just going to pull
Speaker 5: out of the agreement in three years because the next
Speaker 5: president doesn't like President Trump, right, or what's the point?
Speaker 2: I mean?
Speaker 5: They might be wondering, like, why are we even bothering
Speaker 5: this because it's we're not going to get a treaty.
Speaker 5: We're only going to get an executive order level thing.
Speaker 5: So even if they do promise never to attack us again,
Speaker 5: it's not going to matter because the current president can't
Speaker 5: bind the future president and things like that. So we're
Speaker 5: going to have to address all these issues. But ultimately
Speaker 5: it's worth it if we can get to a new
Speaker 5: agreement that stabilizes the Middle East, which of course is
Speaker 5: in our own interest as well as our partners in
Speaker 5: the Middle East. And then there's all the other issues
Speaker 5: going on with manufacturing and defense industrial complex in the
Speaker 5: United States being able to keep up with this. We're
Speaker 5: getting very short on precision strike munitions interceptors. Our allies
Speaker 5: are now wondering whether we are the right provider of
Speaker 5: said weapons because we're not keeping up with our obligations
Speaker 5: based on our actions, and it's deciding to go to war.
Speaker 5: So that's a bigger broader issue, but it's a real
Speaker 5: issue from people that are reaching out to me, from
Speaker 5: our European partners. So I'll stop there, And I don't
Speaker 5: know if we're going to talk about the event last night,
Speaker 5: but Iran's obviously the major issue.
Speaker 2: Who wants it.
Speaker 4: I can talk about the Iran politics if you want
Speaker 4: a little bit, because I think a lot of outsiders
Speaker 4: don't understand kind of the different camps that exist domestically
Speaker 4: with Iranian politics. And you've seen on social media, you know,
Speaker 4: there's indications that there are disagreements between the different camps
Speaker 4: within the regime, which to some maybe surprising. They're a
Speaker 4: little bit obscure to understand, and it's because we don't
Speaker 4: often talk about domestic politics in Iran. Instead, we just
Speaker 4: talked about Iran the threat and don't kind of go
Speaker 4: deeper than that. And there's four different camps. There's moderates, reformists, pragmatists,
Speaker 4: and hardliners, and these kind of come up over the years,
Speaker 4: especially like two thousand and nine when there was a
Speaker 4: contested election with mud Amani Nijad and then the reformists
Speaker 4: and the reformists probably won that election, but the hardliners
Speaker 4: said no and so Ahmai Nijad became the president. Again.
Speaker 4: That's why there was a two thousand and nine Green
Speaker 4: Revolution because there was this disagreement between these two groups,
Speaker 4: and a lot of these protests that have come out
Speaker 4: have been a kind of symptom or result of the
Speaker 4: disagreements between these groups that have existed since the revolution.
Speaker 4: So this isn't a new thing, but it's something that's
Speaker 4: important understand because when we're thinking about negotiating and when
Speaker 4: Trump says we don't know who we're negotiating with, it's
Speaker 4: actually partially true because probably on the NSC side, we
Speaker 4: don't actually know who holds the power levers right now.
Speaker 4: It's most likely the hard Liners, which is Ahmad Vahidi,
Speaker 4: who's in charge of the IRGC. Now. He was actually
Speaker 4: the original founder of Kutz Force back in nineteen eighty eight,
Speaker 4: when Kutz Force wasn't even a military unit yet. It
Speaker 4: was an idea they had and they started using it
Speaker 4: as this overseas. It was called Office of Liberation Movements
Speaker 4: or OLM. They actually sent that team to Bosnia, which
Speaker 4: was the first partner engagement COULDS Force ever had, was
Speaker 4: to fight in Bosnia with the Muslim groups there that
Speaker 4: the US was actually supporting, which is a very interesting
Speaker 4: time period in our history. We're actually aligned similar to
Speaker 4: when we were fighting Isis in twenty sixteen, when Iran
Speaker 4: was also hitting the same targets at that time. So
Speaker 4: Fahdi also was involved in the Amea bombing in Argentina
Speaker 4: in the early nineteen nineties and also the bombing of
Speaker 4: the Israeli embassy in the early nineteen nineties, killing several
Speaker 4: hundred people. He was directly involved in the operational planning
Speaker 4: of that. So he's been a hardliner since day one,
Speaker 4: fought in the Iran Iraq War, and now it seems
Speaker 4: as though he's kind of resting control of the internal
Speaker 4: levers of government, which means we can probably expect a
Speaker 4: more hard line position not just to pomacy but also
Speaker 4: military operations. So he was one of the first founders
Speaker 4: of the Mosaic Doctor, And like all these things we
Speaker 4: hear about that are negative about the regime what they're doing,
Speaker 4: Fahiti has directly got his hand inside of that stuff.
Speaker 4: So when we think about like, oh, was there regime change,
Speaker 4: whether there was or not, the person who has power
Speaker 4: now is worse than the person who had power before.
Speaker 4: It doesn't really matter how you define regime change. What
Speaker 4: matters is what are they doing, what are the effects
Speaker 4: of what they're doing? And I would estimate it's going
Speaker 4: to be worse because this guy is he's not moderated
Speaker 4: by how many faction that was the clerical faction that
Speaker 4: was kind of had this veneer of control. The ERGC
Speaker 4: has always had control, but now that veneer is kind
Speaker 4: of removed, and we can see it removed because Muhammed
Speaker 4: Badger Ghalibof, the Speaker of Parliament, seems to be losing
Speaker 4: control over what's going on, and that control is being
Speaker 4: distributed over to those IERGC insiders, which are led by Bahiti.
Speaker 4: And I think that's important for listeners to understand, like
Speaker 4: what's going on over there, because we may think that
Speaker 4: we're talking to Gollibof and Golibaf is leading the country
Speaker 4: because he's a Speaker of Parliament, but he actually only
Speaker 4: controls a small percentage now of the decision making that's
Speaker 4: going on in the country.
Speaker 6: So one of the things that I think is is
Speaker 6: perhaps is a conventional wisdom, but I mean, no one
Speaker 6: seems to think that a resumption of military activity is
Speaker 6: in either side's interest. Clearly, President Trump does not want
Speaker 6: to do this. He wants this to wind down in
Speaker 6: some fashion. I don't think the Pentagon wants any part
Speaker 6: of this whatsoever, because what is actually left to do
Speaker 6: when you start talking about, you know, the ground options.
Speaker 6: I'm sure there's opposition within D O D on this,
Speaker 6: and Iran doesn't get anything about resumption of military activity
Speaker 6: because they're getting thumped. I think that you know, you know,
Speaker 6: I've talked about kind of this, this fascination we have
Speaker 6: of military math and the impressive press briefings, but it
Speaker 6: turns out that all those impressive press briefings is not
Speaker 6: what the Defense Intelligence Agency is actually reporting when they
Speaker 6: said there's still significant percentages of thrones and launchers for
Speaker 6: for ballistic missiles, and so perhaps the Iranian military has
Speaker 6: not been degraded. There was a report yesterday I saw
Speaker 6: that actually in Irani and F five launched an attack
Speaker 6: in the Gulf.
Speaker 2: And so.
Speaker 6: But so let's just kind of go with that notion
Speaker 6: of and I'm just gonna say something is a little
Speaker 6: bit different. You guys were awesome what you said. But
Speaker 6: the notion is we don't want to resume military activity.
Speaker 6: But the negotiations aren't really going anywhere. So what happens
Speaker 6: is this just kind of everyone does nothing. The blockade continues,
Speaker 6: the strait is closed in some fashion, and it's just
Speaker 6: this kind of what do you call it, It's a
Speaker 6: it's a battle of time in terms of economic pain.
Speaker 6: But I guess one of the questions I have is
Speaker 6: will the United States or Israel at some point make
Speaker 6: a determination again for reasons that I'm not sure I
Speaker 6: agree with, that resuming attacks on the on Ran is
Speaker 6: actually in our interests? And again you know what does
Speaker 6: that mean? And and there is the notion of signal
Speaker 6: versus noise, signal meaning actually movement of assets and movement
Speaker 6: of assets suggests. And again you guys see the same
Speaker 6: airflow on open source stuff is still moving towards the region.
Speaker 6: We have the third aircraft carried battle Group there. I
Speaker 6: guess the second MEW has arrived or is about to.
Speaker 6: And so you know, it's not like they're withdrawing forces.
Speaker 6: We are adding. Now this might be you know, plan
Speaker 6: in advance already, but it is kind of a strange situation,
Speaker 6: is that really? I mean, if you think about it,
Speaker 6: you know, so Vice President Vans didn't go, didn't hop
Speaker 6: on a plane.
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 6: I think President Trump was probably correct not to send
Speaker 6: him because the Irani certainly could have humiliated US with this.
Speaker 6: But the Iranian foreign minister, I guess, said he might
Speaker 6: come back now to Islamabad to continue some type of talks.
Speaker 6: And so we're in this weird situation. Nothing is really happening.
Speaker 6: I mean, we're actually doing the podcast now on on
Speaker 6: a lot of nothing. Some stuff's happened, but not a
Speaker 6: lot of big moving parts. But then there's this thing
Speaker 6: hanging over us in terms of the military option, and
Speaker 6: I do think the Iranians haven't kind of unleashed what
Speaker 6: they could in terms of asometric warfare. Maybe they have,
Speaker 6: and they've we stop cyber attacks, maybe we have the
Speaker 6: US ice in the Israeli I sually have stopped kind
Speaker 6: of the Iranian terrorist apparatus overseas. But I think they
Speaker 6: could do a lot more and they've chosen not to.
Speaker 6: And so I guess the question for you guys, after
Speaker 6: my little soliloquy there is do you think actually it's
Speaker 6: possible that military active best thing that could happen, Well,
Speaker 6: the best thing that can happen would be a really
Speaker 6: good diplomatic agreement, Mick, As you said, aside from that,
Speaker 6: maybe just this kind of strange status quo we're sitting
Speaker 6: at now, Well, nothing is preferable to resumption of military activity.
Speaker 6: What are your guys thoughts.
Speaker 4: I think Medvedev in Russia said it in an interesting
Speaker 4: way that the Straits of Hormuz are the new nuclear
Speaker 4: weapon for Iran, which means there's going to be a
Speaker 4: lot of activity happening outside the straits to try to
Speaker 4: affect the straits without touching the straits, which if we're
Speaker 4: using that framework to think about what is the Straits
Speaker 4: in terms of the Iranian mind right now? They don't
Speaker 4: want to disrupt what's going on because it's benefiting them,
Speaker 4: because this is a bargaining chip that they don't want
Speaker 4: to let go of. And I think neither side knew
Speaker 4: before the conflict started just how powerful this lever would
Speaker 4: become during the conflict, and now Iran is realizing that.
Speaker 4: They're like, we don't want to let go of this thing,
Speaker 4: because now this is all we've got left, especially after
Speaker 4: all the strikes have degraded things within the country. So
Speaker 4: they're looking at this point as a non degraded, appreciable
Speaker 4: asset that they don't want to let go of. And
Speaker 4: the reason I'm mentioning that because I'm looking at Lebanon
Speaker 4: and think about what's going on with this meeting between
Speaker 4: President Awun and Netanyahu in DC, which is very historic.
Speaker 4: If people don't know, since nineteen eighty two, there has
Speaker 4: not been a meeting between the Lebanese leader and an
Speaker 4: Israeli leader. And if you've been to south Lebanon, there
Speaker 4: are signs that point south to Palestine and they don't
Speaker 4: have signs that point to Israel because Lebanon doesn't recognize
Speaker 4: Israel as a country. They recognize as Palestine. If you
Speaker 4: go into the museum and bey route, there's maps, you know,
Speaker 4: the history Museum, there are maps of Palestine today and
Speaker 4: it's all Israel, you know. So the fact that these
Speaker 4: two leaders are meeting is a very important component of
Speaker 4: this larger negotiation where if we can break off the
Speaker 4: Lebanese component from the main Iran theater component, at least
Speaker 4: from the military planning perspective, Iran's going to lose its
Speaker 4: ability to have a surrogate force in Hesbola if that's true,
Speaker 4: because what will probably happen is a Lebanese armed forces
Speaker 4: and the IDF will start to work together in South
Speaker 4: Lebanon to suppress Hesbola, which is kind of a thing
Speaker 4: that has never been discussed in the past because we
Speaker 4: had the UN Security Council resolution in the South setting
Speaker 4: up the Blue line to kind of keep the status
Speaker 4: quo between Israel and Lebanon since the two thousand withdrawal.
Speaker 4: It's possible that that could shift a little bit where
Speaker 4: the Lebanese and the Israelis began suppressing Hesbola, and that
Speaker 4: would mean the regime would only have really it's Iraqi
Speaker 4: and hoothy forces that could actually be a threat in
Speaker 4: the region, and there could be this kind of domino
Speaker 4: effect where first we suppress Hesbola to a neutral degree
Speaker 4: so they can't do anything new new to them, and
Speaker 4: then we've got the Houthis kind of suppressed in the
Speaker 4: Red Sea area, which we generally do, and then the
Speaker 4: only threat really is that western portion of the Iraqi portion.
Speaker 4: And perhaps by taking out these dominoes, now you just
Speaker 4: have a rump state of the IRGC that's been reduced
Speaker 4: significantly anyway, and maybe that's the direction that we might
Speaker 4: be moving it based on how we're doing these negotiations.
Speaker 6: With Lebanon, John, do you see military again? Let's go
Speaker 6: So I think that's I mean, you know, everyone's going
Speaker 6: to root for this to actually work. You know, those
Speaker 6: of us who have been critics in the administration, I
Speaker 6: think on this note in terms of kind of pushing
Speaker 6: these rallies elevenies together, everyone is very supportive that I
Speaker 6: certainly am. But what about the notion. I mean, so
Speaker 6: let's let's put both of you guys, put your DoD
Speaker 6: hats back on. Do you think dood wants any part
Speaker 6: of rezuming military activity against Iran? And you know, and
Speaker 6: what would that actually entail?
Speaker 4: Well, can we keep doing an air campaign only? That's
Speaker 4: the real question. And if the answer is yes, I
Speaker 4: think there might be more support for it. But if
Speaker 4: the answer is no, I think there's a lot of
Speaker 4: resistance for many different reasons, not just moral reasons, but
Speaker 4: also operational and you know, quantitative reasons about how much
Speaker 4: do we have left, how much can we put there,
Speaker 4: how much can we sustain and maintain over time? And
Speaker 4: I think they're looking at that, and they're looking at
Speaker 4: the terrain and how difficult the rescue operation was how
Speaker 4: much asset was required to get those two pilots out
Speaker 4: was a lot. And if we can expect more down pilots,
Speaker 4: we can expect more harmed forces and isolated persons if
Speaker 4: we do a ground incursion. And I don't think the
Speaker 4: DoD is willing to sustain that, or maybe they will
Speaker 4: if they have to. I don't think they want to, yick.
Speaker 5: What do you think, Well, they will if they have to.
Speaker 5: But it's a global fighting force and it's designed to
Speaker 5: be such, and if we want to keep doing that,
Speaker 5: we can't expend everything on one area, especially if the
Speaker 5: gains don't outweigh the risks. So I mean a lot
Speaker 5: of these ballistic missiles, for example, are in these areas
Speaker 5: that are very difficult to reach even with our most
Speaker 5: penetrating massive ordinate penetrators. So what do we gain from it?
Speaker 5: I would argue not that much. But of course the
Speaker 5: military planners no more than I do, because they see that,
Speaker 5: they're seeing the intel. But everything I'm hearing is they
Speaker 5: don't want to start it, not necessarily because they want
Speaker 5: the war to end, although I think they do. It's
Speaker 5: just they we don't gain that much for restarting the
Speaker 5: air war so no, I don't think the Pentagon thinks
Speaker 5: that's the way to go. To Jonathan's point, I do
Speaker 5: think that's the way to go, and I think we're
Speaker 5: going there, whether it's planned or not. In the sense
Speaker 5: that you know, the three major pillars nuclear ambitions, proxy forces,
Speaker 5: and ballistic missiles. The proxy forces have been degraded pretty substantially.
Speaker 5: Look at Hesbolon obviously a moss. The two remaining are
Speaker 5: still an issue. But we should double down on enhancing
Speaker 5: the relationship between the Lebanese armed forces and the Lebanese
Speaker 5: government and Israel and US, because if we can remove
Speaker 5: that hesbela issue, it'll never be completely eradicated. So we
Speaker 5: have to send reasonable expectations, but reduce it to the
Speaker 5: point where it's not a threat to Israel or a
Speaker 5: significant one, and it's not something that Aaron can use
Speaker 5: for its strategic purposes. That's a big win. If we
Speaker 5: can get to a nuclear agreement, then we're confident that
Speaker 5: they won't actually get to a nuclear weapon. That's a
Speaker 5: big win. And guess what if we can't. I imagine,
Speaker 5: you know, if you just listen to Jonathan's discussing about
Speaker 5: the new regime, all of them are going to want
Speaker 5: a nuclear weapon. So we're gonna have to We're gonna
Speaker 5: have to get to a place where they don't want it,
Speaker 5: and right now they do want it, like if there
Speaker 5: was hesitation before. I imagine, at least philosophically, right now
Speaker 5: they're like, well, look at what's happening. Does look what's
Speaker 5: happening in North Korea? So the two rogue states, there's
Speaker 5: your examples. So I imagine all of the IRGC people
Speaker 5: who are pushing the former Supreme Leader to get a
Speaker 5: nuclear weapons like, told you it, right, So we're going
Speaker 5: to have to address that immediately because now the incentive
Speaker 5: is definitely there. We don't want them to want that.
Speaker 5: That's the second pillar. And then the ballistic missiles, of
Speaker 5: course that could be tied. I mean, there could be restrictions.
Speaker 5: We're never going to have them eliminated because they needed
Speaker 5: for their national defense. But let's do it in a
Speaker 5: way that it's regionally makes sense, but not but to
Speaker 5: become a threat, you know, outside of the region and
Speaker 5: to the level where it could actually protect a nuclear program.
Speaker 5: So if to Jonnason's term, if it's a rump state
Speaker 5: in or on that essentially regardless of their intent is
Speaker 5: not threatening their region, is not using proxy forces, it's
Speaker 5: not destatebolizing the Middle East. Then that is a good
Speaker 5: place to hint. And if we can focus on that,
Speaker 5: that would be a win. And I'm looking for a
Speaker 5: win for the United States, not like it's a sports event,
Speaker 5: but like we did this for a reason. We need
Speaker 5: to be successful strategically, And right now it can go
Speaker 5: either way. I really could to the other point. Mark like,
Speaker 5: this could be a stalemate for a long time because
Speaker 5: neither side wants to push the military button again, and
Speaker 5: neither side seems to be willing to compromise, at least
Speaker 5: publicly on the diplomatic front. So we can have this long,
Speaker 5: dragged out blocking of the Strait for the world's uh
Speaker 5: you know, energy supply and other important material and the
Speaker 5: blocking of the Strait from our perspective for the Iranians.
Speaker 5: And I don't know what that's going to do long
Speaker 5: term for uh, you know, global economy, but it's got
Speaker 5: to be negative. So we're going to have to figure
Speaker 5: out how to break that in past. But right now
Speaker 5: we could be set for a long period of time
Speaker 5: of that, Like we could be talking about this, you know,
Speaker 5: to Christmas here on hiz On, like, what's going to
Speaker 5: happen next other than the blockade of the blockade. So
Speaker 5: hopefully we can convince the Iranians legitimately that it's in
Speaker 5: their interest to have a nuclear agreement and in the
Speaker 5: war in terms that are still amenable to the US government.
Speaker 6: It'll be interesting to see on that nick, because I
Speaker 6: think that, you know, if if that is to be
Speaker 6: the case, they will have to be compromised not only
Speaker 6: on the I but on the United States park and
Speaker 6: Trump has has pursued a in public a maximalist position.
Speaker 6: He's kind of egged on by the Lindsay Grahams of
Speaker 6: the world, and then in this kind of the kind
Speaker 6: of the GOP leaning kind of Israel pro Israel folks
Speaker 6: on the right, the freedom of the defensive democracy folks,
Speaker 6: and it's all, it's all one hundred percent maximalist. But
Speaker 6: that's not the way diplomatic agreements get signed. So I
Speaker 6: think that one thing that might constrain Trump, and this
Speaker 6: is not a good thing, is that an agreement in
Speaker 6: which you know, where there's going to be some type
Speaker 6: of you know, moratorium on in Richmond uranium, whether it's
Speaker 6: ten years fifteen years whatever, which is the only way
Speaker 6: this actually works. I think because of the national pride
Speaker 6: piece for the for the Iranians, that might not be
Speaker 6: enough to satisfy kind of some of the right wing
Speaker 6: kind of supporters behind Trump and the Lindsay Grahams of
Speaker 6: the world who are going to be howling over this.
Speaker 6: So I think politically it'll be interesting to see how Trump.
Speaker 6: I don't think he cares. He doesn't believe in anything.
Speaker 6: He would you know, come to agreement, but he has
Speaker 6: boxed himself in politically on this, and I guess one
Speaker 6: of the things that the other thing to kind of note,
Speaker 6: politics is of course involved in this, and you know,
Speaker 6: maybe he's made an assessment that the Republicans are going
Speaker 6: to lose in the midterms regardless of what he does,
Speaker 6: so he will He's okay with economic pain. I mean,
Speaker 6: you know, if you want to legacy defining agreement, which
Speaker 6: might be acceptable in terms of constraints on the Iranian
Speaker 6: nuclear program, uh, you know that's uh and it all
Speaker 6: and it might take that this notion of kind of
Speaker 6: the battle of time, and maybe Trump's like, okay, we're
Speaker 6: going to do this, and it's going to take a while,
Speaker 6: because remember he said at one point he said it's
Speaker 6: indefinite the ceasefire, then he said three to five days.
Speaker 6: Now it's back to kind of indefinite again.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 6: You know this, this will this will trigger d right
Speaker 6: now because I'm going to quote in Israeli, some Israeli officials,
Speaker 6: because anytime you mentioned Israel, TI gets all shaky and
Speaker 6: starts kind of our chat erupts into his diatribe against BB.
Speaker 3: But it's not just mine, not just me in the chat.
Speaker 3: There's other people in the chat who are not fans.
Speaker 6: No, that's true. But ultimately I think that the quote
Speaker 6: was and I've used it too much on TV. I
Speaker 6: can't use this anymore. The Israeli officials said, look, if
Speaker 6: you take all of Trump's quotes about these about everything
Speaker 6: from truth, social or his pressors and you throw it
Speaker 6: into chat GPT, chat GPT will implode because he's all
Speaker 6: over the place on everything. So you know, you know,
Speaker 6: is it extended, is it indefinite?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 6: Is it a deadline? Is it two weeks? I mean
Speaker 6: it's just and again this is diplomacy based on true
Speaker 6: social or three o'clock in the morning, you know, posting
Speaker 6: the only I mean, what happened last night with the
Speaker 6: White White House correspondence dinner was something certainly worthy to
Speaker 6: talk about and and almost a potentially awful event. But
Speaker 6: I guess what we haven't heard from Trump over the
Speaker 6: last twenty four hours is anything on Iran other than
Speaker 6: JD Vance not going to Islamabad. So you know, the
Speaker 6: best thing that they could do is take his phone
Speaker 6: away so he can't you know, tweet about about Iran.
Speaker 6: But but going back to kind of my, my, my,
Speaker 6: you know, it's the idea of you know, is this
Speaker 6: is this Trump's kind of decision. You know, it was Venezuela,
Speaker 6: Iran and then Cuba going to be his legacy. You know,
Speaker 6: politics be damned, We're gonna have five dollars gallons of gas.
Speaker 6: But you know, I'm I'm gonna be the one who
Speaker 6: took down the Iranians running nuclear program maybe and then
Speaker 6: and then and and because maybe they have it baked
Speaker 6: in that they're Republicans, lose the House and maybe even
Speaker 6: the Senate anyhow, regardless, So kind of interesting to think about.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we're coming up closer and closer to sixty days, right,
Speaker 5: so what do we expect to happen? When I made
Speaker 5: Under the War Powers Act, Congress is supposed to act
Speaker 5: at sixty days to continue, or it's supposed to you
Speaker 5: have what thirty days to start withdrawing forces, which I'm
Speaker 5: not sure exactly what means, because you don't have to
Speaker 5: withdraw from a whole region of the world. But the
Speaker 5: point being, the Congress needs to act for it to continue,
Speaker 5: and maybe that's another factor that Ron's looking at. And
Speaker 5: if they don't, what's going to happen. So if Congress
Speaker 5: doesn't act under the Act and correct me if I'm wrong,
Speaker 5: law student, then it's supposed to, then it's essentially over.
Speaker 5: We're supposed to stop combat operations. So if they don't act,
Speaker 5: then then that's going to be a institutional issue, which
Speaker 5: I may first. There you go, and it's about time
Speaker 5: that the Supreme Court decides this issue. How this isn't
Speaker 5: decided yet is beyond me. No matter where you stand
Speaker 5: on it. The idea that the most important thing the
Speaker 5: government does is the decision to go to war, and
Speaker 5: it's clearly spelled out in the Constitution Article one obviously,
Speaker 5: with the power to declare war for Congress and the
Speaker 5: Commander in Chief for Article two and it's still we
Speaker 5: still don't have a definitive statement by the Supreme Court
Speaker 5: on the constitutionality of an act that's been around since
Speaker 5: the early seventies. Is just baffling to me. Maybe you
Speaker 5: guy should talk about that at Yale.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, actually we did. I'm in my international law
Speaker 4: class and we talk about it every week we come
Speaker 4: in there's like something new happened over the weekend to
Speaker 4: talk about how it's changed the way that we're supposed
Speaker 4: to do things. But if you put the.
Speaker 5: Say about say about the War Act, the.
Speaker 4: Thing is like the way that the government has been
Speaker 4: interpreting its own Office of Legal Council decisions, which is
Speaker 4: the office that makes decisions for the executive branch, to say, like,
Speaker 4: this thing is legal, and then everyone in the executive
Speaker 4: branch can follow that thing as if it's legal, which
Speaker 4: is like the torture program, for example, had an OLC
Speaker 4: memo saying we can do waterboarding, for example, and then
Speaker 4: people are kind of covered for liability purposes under the
Speaker 4: executive branch. And this what I would mention the red
Speaker 4: hat part of it, because what's happening in the Office
Speaker 4: of Legal Council right now is they're saying, Okay, if
Speaker 4: Congress does say we can't do this, how else can
Speaker 4: we describe what we're doing in a way that can
Speaker 4: still be allowed. So what if I'm in their office
Speaker 4: and I'm thinking that I'm going to immediately look at
Speaker 4: authorization for use of military force for Iraq. And that's
Speaker 4: what they used in twenty twenty twenty January when we
Speaker 4: killed costom Sole money. We use the au MF for
Speaker 4: the Iraq war, and it passed muster. And they're going
Speaker 4: to say, we already passed muster on it. Once we
Speaker 4: have precedent that we were allowed to continue striking Iranian
Speaker 4: targets using the AUMF, we're going to keep doing that now,
Speaker 4: and we're going to say it's self defense. And if
Speaker 4: you saw that State Department message that came out a
Speaker 4: couple of days ago saying the US is acting in
Speaker 4: self defense of itself and Israel deep put in your
Speaker 4: ear plugs. We've already set kind of the groundwork for
Speaker 4: us to come up and make a justification that, oh,
Speaker 4: we're not doing an offensive war. This is a defensive
Speaker 4: conflict against Iran underneath the AUMF, and that's why we're
Speaker 4: allowed to continue doing this we don't even need the
Speaker 4: nineteen seventy three War Powers Resolution because we're in self
Speaker 4: defense right now, we're under attack, it's not that we're attacking.
Speaker 4: So if I was in their office, that's probably the
Speaker 4: conversation that's going on right now. How do we draft
Speaker 4: a memo like that to allow people to continue regardless
Speaker 4: of what Congress does. But probably Congress won't do anything
Speaker 4: because they already have had an opportunity to do something
Speaker 4: and they haven't done it.
Speaker 6: And you know, one of the things on this too
Speaker 6: is that where the argument, the partisan argument falls apart is,
Speaker 6: of course the Democrats have you know, democratic presidents have
Speaker 6: ignored the War Powers Act just as thought, yeah, this
Speaker 6: is an at Yeah. So so I mean, that's that's
Speaker 6: that would be an argument for someone who actually cares
Speaker 6: about the Constitution, I mean, or cares about the kind
Speaker 6: of the rule of law and and constraints and three
Speaker 6: brant three core equal branch of the government to say
Speaker 6: on either side of the asle, hey, you know, Congress
Speaker 6: has to get involved here because you know, it's just
Speaker 6: like so many other things this administration is doing and
Speaker 6: Trump is doing against the norms. You got to be
Speaker 6: careful because if it becomes kind of regularized, the next
Speaker 6: the next president comes from the other party is going
Speaker 6: to do all the same things. And so you know
Speaker 6: that's but but I don't I mean, look, I don't
Speaker 6: know how you guys feel. I've totally lost all faith
Speaker 6: in Congress as an institution completely. And when you've kind
Speaker 6: of going back to back to politics politics, when you
Speaker 6: see Trump's approval ratings are in the thirties, it's a
Speaker 6: you know, it certainly looks like there'll be a blood bath.
Speaker 6: Uh probably a bad term now, but you know they'll
Speaker 6: lose significantly in the midterms. But you also, if you
Speaker 6: look at the support for Democrats in Congress, it's like
Speaker 6: in the teens. I mean, so people don't like Congress
Speaker 6: to begin with, and for good reason because they you know,
Speaker 6: we have incompetent you know, of dipshits as a useless
Speaker 6: I mean, the people who are actually running you know that,
Speaker 6: you know, the powers of our government now never should
Speaker 6: be there.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry.
Speaker 6: And so you know Congress didn't do it do its job.
Speaker 6: But if you think, you know, uh, you know, Pete
Speaker 6: Hegseth and RFK Junior and Tulca Gabbert and Cash Mattel
Speaker 6: are actually qualified. That's preposterous and so but you know,
Speaker 6: but Congress has kind of given up on this, and
Speaker 6: so I don't think they're going to do anything.
Speaker 2: Mick.
Speaker 6: I you know, it's going to be interesting because there'll
Speaker 6: be some great op eds, even from the Wall Street
Speaker 6: Journal and from conservative institutions, which are going to say
Speaker 6: we'll hold on a second. But I don't think they're
Speaker 6: going to do anything past the sixty day mark. I mean,
Speaker 6: Trump's blown by so many different norms anyhow, so why
Speaker 6: would this be any different than anything else. I think
Speaker 6: it's important for people to speak up on it, but
Speaker 6: I don't see anything changing.
Speaker 3: Well, the fact that that's the argument that they're cooking
Speaker 3: up in the General Counsel's Office is complete, like utter,
Speaker 3: like nonsense.
Speaker 2: Let's be honest. It's a defense civil war.
Speaker 4: That was killed though, I mean the argument against the sylvan.
Speaker 2: At least he was he was in Iraq, right.
Speaker 4: He was flying from Syria to Iraq, so they had
Speaker 4: already had the operation going before he was in Iraq.
Speaker 4: So they preemptively staged advanced force operations and other things
Speaker 4: with TFO in the area that already had planned this
Speaker 4: thing like it's going to happen, you know, is that defensive?
Speaker 2: But the hit happened in Iraq?
Speaker 3: Well, I mean that right, Sulimani was just like I
Speaker 3: could see there being a little bit go ahead, I'm sor.
Speaker 5: Paying to kill Americans.
Speaker 6: Yeah, they used the c that was more under CT
Speaker 6: as well, because regardless of if he was an Iranian
Speaker 6: military official, it was that he was also the head
Speaker 6: of a terrorist organization. I think they used.
Speaker 4: That's what you can say is IRGC is a US
Speaker 4: designated terrorist organization. So you can continue to using the
Speaker 4: CT exord instead of using author's ation pres and military
Speaker 4: force or even the War Powers Resolution. You can say, no,
Speaker 4: this is a CTOP and it's in international waters by
Speaker 4: the way, so it's not even an issue of are
Speaker 4: we in the country and maybe we have to pursue
Speaker 4: them into their country maybe you know, hot pursuit. That's okay, right,
Speaker 4: Like this is how it can be described.
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't obviously speak for the country, but
Speaker 5: I'm guessing that if you just spelled out the War
Speaker 5: Powers Act plan, then most Americans would say yes, if
Speaker 5: you just took it out of like the current political
Speaker 5: situation and whether you're red or blue or neither. That
Speaker 5: if you said, hey, can the president just start an
Speaker 5: endless war and just keeps going on without Congress authorizing,
Speaker 5: and I'm guessing about ninety nine percent of America say no, no, right,
Speaker 5: I mean because the current people to be frank, that
Speaker 5: are in this war keep complaining about the war we
Speaker 5: just left that went on for twenty years, right, So
Speaker 5: like it seems like we need to slap the table
Speaker 5: on just how this should go, regardless the current situation
Speaker 5: or who you're affiliated with. They do we literally not
Speaker 5: want Congress, which is the direct representation of the American people,
Speaker 5: to have no say in whether we continue war. And
Speaker 5: they don't get to opt out. They don't get to
Speaker 5: just say nothing or vote to not vote, which is
Speaker 5: what they're.
Speaker 2: Doing, you know.
Speaker 6: And I think that you know it's a Congress voting
Speaker 6: on this is a good thing that would actually and
Speaker 6: so like so here's the other thing, Like if this
Speaker 6: was kind of a normally function in White House, you
Speaker 6: would say, Okay, we need to make a justification to
Speaker 6: the American people and justification of Congress. We're going to
Speaker 6: engage tremendously on this. We've talked on this show before
Speaker 6: there are legitimate reasons to actually undertake this operation. I
Speaker 6: know they haven't gotten it straight in terms of all
Speaker 6: the different objectives. But if they've done this and let's
Speaker 6: say Congress votes on it, the administration is in a
Speaker 6: hugely strengthened position because the other the other part of
Speaker 6: it too is and there's no doubt and you know,
Speaker 6: perhaps this is an interesting avenue as well, uh is
Speaker 6: the Iranians. Notice, I mean, you know, the Iranians have
Speaker 6: used kind of social media and trolling and all of
Speaker 6: this because they certainly see the divides in the United
Speaker 6: States and this exacerbates that. But let's say we had
Speaker 6: a congressional vote, the administration had done the right thing
Speaker 6: and it passes. That actually puts the Iranians in a
Speaker 6: weaker position. Trump in a better position politically. But most
Speaker 6: importantly for us is we are in a better position
Speaker 6: visa vi Iran if you had that a successful vote.
Speaker 6: But at this point, the other part of this now,
Speaker 6: maybe to throw into kind of go against everything I'm saying,
Speaker 6: is that maybe we've gone so far and that they've
Speaker 6: done so little that actually this vote might not pass now.
Speaker 6: So maybe that's part of their calculation as well, because
Speaker 6: they flubbed the initial part of this and so, and
Speaker 6: that would be if there was a War Powers resolution
Speaker 6: and it failed in Congress, that would be pretty damaging
Speaker 6: to our position, the negotiating table.
Speaker 2: It would be.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's true, but that's part of being in a democracy, right,
Speaker 5: costational democracy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I feel like our negotiation negotiating position is pretty
Speaker 3: shitty right now, for being honest, because I mean, we
Speaker 3: talked about the straight hoh Hord moves being the facto
Speaker 3: blocked where let's say five percent of what usually comes
Speaker 3: out of it comes out of it, that's gonna have
Speaker 3: major let's say you mixed it to you know, Christmas,
Speaker 3: we're talking about this, that's a huge, major hit to
Speaker 3: the global economy, to oil prices and stuff like that.
Speaker 3: Like maybe we're not feeling it that much right now
Speaker 3: in America. I mean in the West Coast they are,
Speaker 3: but like at some point, like that's gonna that Bill's
Speaker 3: gonna come due.
Speaker 6: It cost me one hundred bucks to fill up my
Speaker 6: pickup truck yesterday. I was shocked expensive gas expensive now.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I mean, I don't know if we're at
Speaker 3: a better spot but than we were February twenty seventh,
Speaker 3: to be honest on the negotiation table.
Speaker 2: Negotiating table, Hey you just question?
Speaker 6: Oh sorry, go ahead, Jonathan.
Speaker 4: I was just gonna mention with the Straits, like the
Speaker 4: whole thing where we keep talking about the Straits. The Straits, Well,
Speaker 4: I just want to zoom into what happened the last
Speaker 4: forty eight hours in the Straits, the number of transits
Speaker 4: that went through. So there was one Russian yacht owned
Speaker 4: by an oligarch that passed through unmolested. There were four
Speaker 4: Omani vessels that passed through, one ferry, which is normal
Speaker 4: like local traffic, and then two Iranian flat shadow fleet
Speaker 4: tankers passed through, one an Iranian owned vessel and one
Speaker 4: a non Iranian own vessel. That's all that passed through.
Speaker 4: Twenty five percent of the eight vessels that went through
Speaker 4: in the last forty eight hours where Iran linked vessels
Speaker 4: and one was a Russian oligarch. So to me, it's like, okay,
Speaker 4: how actually controlled is this and how are we describing
Speaker 4: it in the west versus what's actually happening on the ground.
Speaker 4: It's just a question mark, and we didn't stop.
Speaker 6: That's yeah, it's confusing because you have these these and
Speaker 6: I don't have it up. Now there's something on X
Speaker 6: which is like a vessel tracker that seems to be
Speaker 6: reputable and nonpartisan, and you look at that and you're like, well,
Speaker 6: stuff is getting through, But then dod' is announcing it's not.
Speaker 6: So it is kind of confusing on what's what's happening.
Speaker 6: But one question I have for you guys, and I
Speaker 6: think it's important, is what the Trump administration, with Trump
Speaker 6: himself has been saying over the last what three or
Speaker 6: four days perhaps is talking about these divisions within uh
Speaker 6: Iran and it is potentially significant, you know, uh, And
Speaker 6: I guess that brings up the idea or to me,
Speaker 6: it did in terms of our intel collection. You know,
Speaker 6: do you think this is because Trump is actually you know,
Speaker 6: finally even listening to or receiving intelligence briefings that hey,
Speaker 6: this is what's happening. You know, this is why these
Speaker 6: things are breaking down within within Iran because there does
Speaker 6: seem to be some type of leadership struggle and that
Speaker 6: just brings up the notion of our intelligence collection in Iran.
Speaker 6: And what I've talked about before with you guys is, hey,
Speaker 6: we're great at man hunting the fine, fix and finish
Speaker 6: us in the Israelis can kill anyone anywhere on the planet.
Speaker 6: That's been demonstrated. That's a different type of intelligence collection
Speaker 6: and different source you recruit for patternal life versus a
Speaker 6: strategic asset in the you know, in the you know
Speaker 6: Iranian you know, Supreme leader's office. So what do you
Speaker 6: guys think of that? Or if you have any window
Speaker 6: into the state of US intel collect now, I mean,
Speaker 6: do you think it's because it seems to me that
Speaker 6: Trump is now alluding to things that he did he
Speaker 6: would not have come up with on his own. So
Speaker 6: maybe there is some interesting intelligence collection that's coming in
Speaker 6: that detail. Is this kind of the splits within the
Speaker 6: Iranian leadership? What are your guys thoughts.
Speaker 5: I think it's probable. Obviously we've been tasked, we be
Speaker 5: in the intelligence it've been tasked to do this because
Speaker 5: it's absolutely pivotal for the negotiations, right, It's important for
Speaker 5: the US to know. Is this a tactic of delay
Speaker 5: where they believe they have leverage the longer this goes,
Speaker 5: or is it actually a dysfunction of the government, Because
Speaker 5: that's a big determination if you can because you know
Speaker 5: from the US perspective from President Trump's perspective, if it's
Speaker 5: literally because you know, the Supreme Leader doesn't want any
Speaker 5: technology communication devices around them obviously for obvious reasons, and
Speaker 5: there's this slow like courier system to get information back
Speaker 5: and forth. Is it because there's just arguments between Vahidi
Speaker 5: and Gollibah, for example. You see a lot of stuff
Speaker 5: about that, and it's just they just had an impasse
Speaker 5: that have been broken by the Supreme Leader. The Supreme
Speaker 5: Leader even alive.
Speaker 2: I don't know that.
Speaker 5: I'm not starting a conspiracy theory, but when you don't
Speaker 5: present any evidence you're alive, you can't help people make
Speaker 5: it a speculation you might not be. So I think
Speaker 5: it's I think that would be tasks spark to your questions,
Speaker 5: and I can see why the President would want to know, like,
Speaker 5: am I these guys really think that this is in
Speaker 5: their interest to do this delay tactic? Or is it
Speaker 5: they're just a complete disarray And if it's if it's
Speaker 5: the latter, then you might want to give them more latitude.
Speaker 6: And I think that that is actually really important because
Speaker 6: the time honored Iranian way of delay is something that
Speaker 6: Trump has said, We're not going to allow to happen.
Speaker 6: But but you know, perhaps because there is this dysfunction,
Speaker 6: he has given this more time. That would make some sense.
Speaker 6: And actually in some ways that's you know, I mean,
Speaker 6: I want President Trump to listen to his intelligence briefings.
Speaker 6: So that's kind of that's kind of an interesting point there.
Speaker 4: And I wonder how much division there is that could
Speaker 4: be exploited by COVID action in Iran to keep splitting
Speaker 4: that more, keep it up, you know, because the longer
Speaker 4: that goes on, the more opportunity we have to actually
Speaker 4: seize control of the situation instead of letting it just
Speaker 4: fantasticize on its own.
Speaker 6: Well, that's you know, that's a really good point because
Speaker 6: and one of the things I think everyone here in this,
Speaker 6: in this on the pod and our group agree on
Speaker 6: is that, you know, and we don't have the answer
Speaker 6: to this, but everything we're talking about has to do
Speaker 6: with kind of you know, over military moves or over
Speaker 6: diplomatic moves. But where's the COVID action piece on this?
Speaker 6: You know, we all worked in that kind of old
Speaker 6: secret world and there was there's been effort COVID action
Speaker 6: efforts against Iran going on forever. So I do wonder
Speaker 6: what's happening with that, because you could actually make an argument.
Speaker 6: And I think you know, Micky, we've talked about this
Speaker 6: on so many This goes back to the Solemny strike.
Speaker 6: Why in the world was it not titled fifty versatile
Speaker 6: ten oral? Trump wanted to talk about it. But there
Speaker 6: there are things that we could be doing under the table.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 6: And I hope we are. I just don't know our
Speaker 6: capabilities anymore. And and you know, there was certainly some compromises,
Speaker 6: very public compromises in our Iranian networks over the last
Speaker 6: decade or so. But it would seem to me there
Speaker 6: is a huge place for COVID action here.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 6: And because COVID action works, and when it's in concert
Speaker 6: with the US policy.
Speaker 3: What kind of examples what can they do hypothetically in
Speaker 3: the press or.
Speaker 5: Whatever political influence? Oh, in the press, I mean no,
Speaker 5: I'm talking.
Speaker 3: About not saying anything that's t TP wise, that's classified
Speaker 3: or whatever.
Speaker 5: We like, what could we actually would do that? I mean,
Speaker 5: we focus a lot on COVID action, being the kinetic stuff,
Speaker 5: stuff that Mark's saying that we're really good at. We
Speaker 5: are good at it. We're good at finding people and
Speaker 5: making making them go away for sure. We're also really
Speaker 5: good at I would say, partner force operations, you know,
Speaker 5: working with other although politically screwed that up with not
Speaker 5: keeping our end of the deal. But we're really good
Speaker 5: at doing it, like embedding with groups. Look at the
Speaker 5: de ISIS program for example. I think we could be
Speaker 5: just as good as it with influence operations. I don't
Speaker 5: know that we put the needed resources into it as
Speaker 5: we do with the others. If we are great. If
Speaker 5: we aren't, we need to do a much better job.
Speaker 5: But they're only really effective if we keep them quiet.
Speaker 5: So like if we can't, as soon as we brag
Speaker 5: about doing something on the influence side, then everything that
Speaker 5: we touched turns to the opposite of gold. Put it
Speaker 5: that way, right, Like I was going to ask you
Speaker 5: a like who do we want to actually take power
Speaker 5: in Oran? But then I thought otherwise, because we put
Speaker 5: a damn target on their head, right, So I think
Speaker 5: that's where we should not that Aron listens to eyes
Speaker 5: on but maybe they do.
Speaker 2: But we need to be.
Speaker 5: But I think we could be just as good. We
Speaker 5: got really smart people are really good, especially in the agency,
Speaker 5: I would say, and integrating actual people from there, not
Speaker 5: just making somebody who's not from there an expert as
Speaker 5: other agencies do. But I don't I don't know it.
Speaker 5: But we should be doing that NonStop, and we need
Speaker 5: to make sure that as the closest hold, like there
Speaker 5: should be no bragging ever about the fact that we
Speaker 5: did it. If we did it, and I don't know on.
Speaker 6: This note, And Jonathan maybe comment in a second. So
Speaker 6: Trump actually said, yeah, we love dealing with these moderates.
Speaker 6: There's now what you called moderates pragnant reasonable people, Like,
Speaker 6: was that like the wrong thing to say because perhaps
Speaker 6: those are the people we want to be influencing to
Speaker 6: take power. But he just then did something. And then
Speaker 6: the reaction that we saw, of course, is that Bahedi
Speaker 6: and others then crushed all these moderates. So, you know, Nick,
Speaker 6: along with your point, and Jonathan, we can put you
Speaker 6: on the spot. You know Ron better than us. I mean,
Speaker 6: who is who would be the who would be a
Speaker 6: a you know, someone that or a group can say
Speaker 6: that pragmentist moderates whatever you reformers that we should be pushing,
Speaker 6: that would be a the better let's just say, the
Speaker 6: best negotiating partner to get to a reasonable settlement.
Speaker 4: The mistake would be describing them as moderates, because the
Speaker 4: way the constitution is set up is to filter all
Speaker 4: candidates through the Supreme Leader's office. So anyone in any
Speaker 4: position of authority that currently is in the government now
Speaker 4: has already been approved by the Supreme Leader, which means
Speaker 4: they already have bought into the list of requirements that
Speaker 4: they must have, but not just religious requirements but also
Speaker 4: ideological alignment and other things that put them in a
Speaker 4: certain bucket that would be unacceptable to the US unless
Speaker 4: the US is willing to change his policy like we
Speaker 4: did with Achmedal Shara and Syria, where the first week
Speaker 4: of December he was a ten million dollar bounty in
Speaker 4: his head. In the second week of December, we are
Speaker 4: meeting with him in his office and he's now our friend.
Speaker 6: So if we're playing basketball with.
Speaker 4: Him, yeah, I mean, if that's the way we're going
Speaker 4: to go, Okay, that's how we go. But if we're
Speaker 4: going to look at it rationally and say, like he's
Speaker 4: still the same guy, They're still the same people, and
Speaker 4: they still have the same dreams and outcomes that they
Speaker 4: want from before we took the bount these off before
Speaker 4: we change the designation. So mix to your point, Actually,
Speaker 4: the answer to that question is actually more interesting. The
Speaker 4: people that are the ones who can come to power
Speaker 4: are the people. So there needs to be some kind
Speaker 4: of referendum or change in the structure of the government
Speaker 4: where the people that are not allowed to have power
Speaker 4: are allowed to have power, because all the ones who
Speaker 4: do have power are aligned with the regime. If you
Speaker 4: describe them as moderate, that's all relative. It's moderate in
Speaker 4: relation to a hardliner. And what does that even mean.
Speaker 4: I mean, that's just an abstract thing. So I would
Speaker 4: be worried about keeping the people in government who are
Speaker 4: there now and expecting them to become aligned with us,
Speaker 4: because that's not how they were picked in the first place.
Speaker 4: You know that it was like an evolution of that
Speaker 4: of their beliefs that got them to the point where
Speaker 4: they are now, and they're not going to change that.
Speaker 4: Inside themselves. They might publicly say like, oh, we're fixed,
Speaker 4: we're better now, but I don't know if I would
Speaker 4: trust that.
Speaker 6: Who So, who are the better negotiating partners are They're
Speaker 6: just it just doesn't matter. It's what you're saying. I'm
Speaker 6: not that's curious.
Speaker 4: Yeah, from a realistic perspective, probably Ghaliboff is best because
Speaker 4: he is a survivor. He knows how to move around
Speaker 4: in the system and you know, arrange power structures in
Speaker 4: a way that's beneficial. And if he's doing that in
Speaker 4: the government, that's probably helpful to keep things predictable, because
Speaker 4: sometimes it's better even if the guy is bad if
Speaker 4: you know about him. It's easier than if you don't
Speaker 4: know about him, but he's good because you don't know
Speaker 4: what to expect. So in this case, we can actually
Speaker 4: prepare things around knowing how he behaves and what he does,
Speaker 4: because we've been following him for a long time and
Speaker 4: he's you know, pretty predictable as far as what he's
Speaker 4: going to do next, whereas someone like Vahiti is a
Speaker 4: lot less like that. And that's because Vahdi has an
Speaker 4: ideological thing guiding him, and that is the destruction of Israel.
Speaker 4: And he's said this since nineteen seventy nine, that that's
Speaker 4: his dream, and he keeps saying it even now like
Speaker 4: today he said it. So, I mean, this is not
Speaker 4: something that's changing very soon for him. So putting someone
Speaker 4: like that or allowing them to reach the top is
Speaker 4: probably not going to be a helpful outcome for the US.
Speaker 4: So someone like Pozeshkian is not good the president because
Speaker 4: he's very weak, and he was selected to be president
Speaker 4: on purpose because of his weakness. And you know, Raisi
Speaker 4: was like the opposite of Pozeshkian. Raysi died in a
Speaker 4: helicopter crash. They brought Poseshkia in because he could actually
Speaker 4: be that counterbalance of quote unquote moderate to the more
Speaker 4: hardline group which is led by Vahiti. So these people
Speaker 4: all exist within the same universe basically of their belief systems.
Speaker 4: So from us on the outside, there aren't really any
Speaker 4: moderates really in there in terms of the world's idea
Speaker 4: of what a moderate is.
Speaker 5: Is it true that the commander of the IRGC can
Speaker 5: remove the Speaker of the Parliament during wartime. That's another
Speaker 5: thing that's been bouncing around with the reporters out there.
Speaker 4: So he would need the Expediency Council to approve that,
Speaker 4: because none of these decisions can be made without the
Speaker 4: supreme Leader in theory, and the Expediency Council is supposed
Speaker 4: to act on his behalf in this situation. But we
Speaker 4: also saw that much debau was selected without the correct
Speaker 4: process in the constitution, so Vahiti is the one that
Speaker 4: actually pushed that movement outside of process. So I would
Speaker 4: not be surprised if he acts outside of process again,
Speaker 4: because who's going to stop him. He's the one that
Speaker 4: controls the most violent organization in the country with the
Speaker 4: most power and authority behind him. So in this situation,
Speaker 4: I mean, he's like an authoritarian inside of an authoritarian system,
Speaker 4: So he's got this ability to just unilaterally act. I
Speaker 4: wouldn't be surprised if he just broke the quote unquote
Speaker 4: rules that they ask.
Speaker 5: So this is a worthy discussion because here's the problem, right.
Speaker 5: We could have Golliboff that could come around to our perspective,
Speaker 5: but it really doesn't matter if Fahiti can simply fire
Speaker 5: him as to all the negotiations that we if we
Speaker 5: do get these going, which we all hope we do,
Speaker 5: it really comes down if that's the case and he
Speaker 5: has the authority to do it, and obviously he has
Speaker 5: the inclination that it really comes down to trying to
Speaker 5: get kinse Vahidi, which is the most hardline person I've
Speaker 5: heard described that it's a good idea to enter a
Speaker 5: new nuclear agreement with the United States, Right, I mean,
Speaker 5: because if he gets close to an agreement, or even
Speaker 5: if he has an agreement, he can simply remove from
Speaker 5: having any authority.
Speaker 4: And think about that in the short term. If he
Speaker 4: was able to do that, Let's say that he just
Speaker 4: allowed Golliboff to reach agree with the US and then
Speaker 4: pulled the agreement and pulled Golliboff. Think about the embarrassment
Speaker 4: to the United States that would have, especially if he
Speaker 4: allowed it to like string on, so that people get
Speaker 4: their hopes up in the West and they think everything's great,
Speaker 4: and he just yanks that out. Huge, huge media benefit
Speaker 4: and information spectrum benefit by doing that, and then he
Speaker 4: could continue on without whatever plan he has. So he's
Speaker 4: almost got it like a double win out of this
Speaker 4: by allowing Golliboff to look like he's in control until
Speaker 4: the moment that it has the highest value to remove him.
Speaker 3: So Vahiti's number one target if the bombing starts again,
Speaker 3: I'm assuming right, that's who we're looking for.
Speaker 4: Yes, the US asked Israel not to kill Vahiti during
Speaker 4: the initial strikes.
Speaker 3: I feel like that's going to change a little bit
Speaker 3: now if the dust has settled now and he's like
Speaker 3: the big boy who's making the moves, and he, you know,
Speaker 3: is obviously hard, hard line, as hard as it gets.
Speaker 3: This is it's gonna be great, guys, This is gonna
Speaker 3: be great.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I really feel really confident about how this is gonna end.
Speaker 3: Uh Frank really anything else?
Speaker 2: What else?
Speaker 6: Red Sox are their entire front off of their entire
Speaker 6: coaching staff.
Speaker 2: No one cares.
Speaker 6: Mark Iran, what else? Correspondence then or whatever? Let's talking
Speaker 6: about the Red Sox. The state of the Red Sox
Speaker 6: is not good. I went to the game yesterday in Baltimore.
Speaker 6: They won seventeen to one, and then they fired everybody.
Speaker 4: There.
Speaker 2: You go, why did they fire?
Speaker 6: Because they suck. They're ten and seventeen. So the Red
Speaker 6: Sox are not doing very well. But he enjoys this
Speaker 6: as a as a New Yorker.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I'm happy. It's all right. They'll be fair.
Speaker 3: Aaron, you have Aaron Boone there you go? All right, guys, listen,
Speaker 3: it was a favor. I want you guys to go
Speaker 3: and buy Jonathan Hackett's books. I ran Shadow Weapons in
Speaker 3: the Theory of a Regular Warfare. Those links are in
Speaker 3: the description Nick Scott it on his shelf. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: want you guys to go and check out the white
Speaker 3: Fish Security Summit website. The next one is happening early
Speaker 3: twenty twenty seven, in February, end of.
Speaker 5: February, February twenty four, twenty six. Yep, we got some
Speaker 5: We got some good folks speaking if you wouldn't mind me,
Speaker 5: of course. Sam Munday, tired MARSA commander, pleased our General
Speaker 5: Carrie Philipetti, former DAZZ deputy as his secretary for Venezuela,
Speaker 5: and she runs a Vandenburgh coalition. Now who else? Ederal
Speaker 5: Burns used to run the naval component of Jaysak. Michael Ratney,
Speaker 5: former US Ambassador Saudi Arabia. Chris Costa, he's the current
Speaker 5: director of the Spy Museum, but was this Presidential Special
Speaker 5: Advisor for counac Terrorism and hopefully all of our team
Speaker 5: from eyes on so we which it's shaping up to
Speaker 5: be pretty pretty freaking good. So excited about it.
Speaker 2: Bring you.
Speaker 5: Yes or buy it here and don't take it on
Speaker 5: the plane. That's a big issue people coming on the
Speaker 5: in Montana. They always like there's like signs when you're
Speaker 5: getting get to the airport, like, do not bring your
Speaker 5: bear spreads on the plane. Apparently it blows up.
Speaker 6: You're it's totally getting eaten by a bear. They're lining
Speaker 6: up right now.
Speaker 3: I'm not leaving the fucking hotel, bro. I'm a concrete princess, dude,
Speaker 3: pavement princess, that's what they call it.
Speaker 6: You're gonna see decked out in some snow gear. It's
Speaker 6: gonna be good.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we'll go skiing. The ski resort is think you
Speaker 5: guys can see it. Can you see the It's still
Speaker 5: You've still got snow on the actual runs.
Speaker 3: I'll sit back in the cab and you guys, let
Speaker 3: me know, give me the brief when you guys come
Speaker 3: get back. No, I could ski, actually I used to be.
Speaker 3: I used to ski, Not no more. I don't want
Speaker 3: to break a fucking hit. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: I can't have that, all right, So check that out.
Speaker 3: The link is in the description for the summit, Mark
Speaker 3: p He's got a book, Clarity and Crisis.
Speaker 2: Mike Mark, you should write a memoir. Just do it, man.
Speaker 6: But I'm born starting the country doing my Red Sox stuff,
Speaker 6: you know, yeah, my little TV gig, you know, living.
Speaker 6: Actually two college talks this week. I was at the
Speaker 6: Georgetown UH and then UH and then at University Virginia
Speaker 6: and just on a quick note on that, just for
Speaker 6: for both. I mean, obviously, you know, we deal with
Speaker 6: a lot of negativity about what's happening, a huge partisan
Speaker 6: devised in the United States. But when you go talk
Speaker 6: to students and Jonathan, I'm sure you see this, uh
Speaker 6: At yelled too. I mean, there is you know, that's
Speaker 6: passing the torch to the next generation. There's some really
Speaker 6: smart folks out there. So that's what kind of gives
Speaker 6: me a boot, you know, just you know that there
Speaker 6: are there are people still willing to step up and
Speaker 6: do public service. Every time I do these talks, I
Speaker 6: ask people how many hear in an audience of fifty
Speaker 6: you are interested in going to the government. A lot
Speaker 6: of people raise their hand. That's a good thing.
Speaker 5: Good, that's good to hear.
Speaker 3: All right, boys, as always is a pleasure. Do us
Speaker 3: a favorite support to show Patreon dot com slash the teamhouse.
Speaker 3: You get everything at free and early and yeah, it
Speaker 3: helps support the show.
Speaker 2: Thanks guys, thank you. Hey, guys.
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