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So we are doing our job. Uh I hope that Those who are seeking war and want to drag the United States into an unnecessary and disastrous war once again. I hope they won't prevail and let us diplomats work with each other and find a diplomatic solution, which I believe is at our reach and can be achieved in a very short period of time. Really?
Okay. That is the foreign minister talking on MSNBC this morning. Michael Doran joins us now, Hudson Institute, Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East. Michael, do you believe this Foreign Minister that they're going to rapidly get together a deal, they want a fast pace to get a deal, that we can get something done? No, I don't believe him.
He's working under very strict restrictions from the Supreme Leader. He cannot offer the United States a diplomatic solution to the nuclear question, let alone anything else that is anywhere near what the United States needs. Here's what Morshe, he said, cut eleven. We had a very good uh talks. A few days ago in Geneva, and we were able to discuss the questions related to our nuclear program and to.
to the US sanctions. And we agreed on a set of principles or guiding principles for our negotiation and how a deal can look like. And we then were asked to prepare uh a draft of a possible deal So next time that we meet uh we can uh you know go in in into that draft, start uh negotiating about its language and uh hopefully come to uh a conclusion.
So that's how he left off. He beat the U.S. to any type of public statement, kind of caught, I think, the U.S. by surprise by saying we had a lot of progress within two weeks. We have a framework.
So I guess we go back to your original answer. He's just trying to delay, it seems. Yes, and this is a normal tactic that the Iranians use. I was the senior director in the White House for Iran back in 2005 to 2007, for the whole Middle East. And Iran was in my portfolio.
And I used to say to my colleagues that if we behaved like them, we would go before the cameras and say, you know, we met with the Iranians and we proposed that they disarm all of their proxies around the Middle East. And we were very happy with what they said in response. And then watch all of the Iranians have to go to explain to everyone that that's not actually what happened. Witkoff met with them and they discussed a framework, but their position and our position are so far apart that they can't be bridged with these negotiations.
So, Michael, you write that this could, you know, we have the firepower. I think that Gerald R. Ford is going to be there in a couple of years. Of days be in position to, I guess, in more of a position to protect Israel. And be able to go offensive as well.
So if we get the firepower in place and the missile defense the best it can be, and we decide to take action. The Wall Street Journal says the President's considering an initial small action, limited action, just to send a message. Do you think that might be a good move? Look, I think that if we want this to resolve in a way that we get what every President has said since Clinton we have to have, then use of force is almost inevitable unless they buckle. They already know we're serious.
We already used force in June to send this message. The President assumed after the bloody nose we gave the Iranians in June that this would make them more amenable to negotiations. I don't think another limited strike is going to convince them that we're serious. If we go at him, what do you think we're going to be aiming at? What do we take out?
Because what we want to do is, we don't want to own the country, we don't want a land war, we want to give the We give the people that are riding the streets a chance To run their own lives to a degree. But that's a very ethnically challenging place, more than one would think.
So, what are the risks and what should the targets be? I I think the number one target has to be the supreme leader. Iran is an unusual country. It's a dictatorship. But yet there is an open public debate about where Iran should go and what should it do.
And there's a clear alternative view among the Iranian elite about how Iran should approach the set of problems that it has. You know, the water shortages, electrical shortages, the collapse of its currency, the collapse of its economy. And the answer that the other element of the elite, other than the Supreme Leader, is putting forward is that they should cut a deal with the Americans and come toward the Americans and stop supporting terrorism all around the region. The Supreme Leader is adamantly opposed to that position. He is a dictator, and I don't think we're going to move forward as long as he and his family are in charge.
But isn't the IRTC And the Bashties, aren't they the ones killing people in cold blood and shooting people in the hospital beds? Doesn't that show you? That they believe what the Ayatollah believes? They certainly believe that if the regime goes down, they're going to be slaughtered by their own people. I don't know how much the ideology of the Ayatollah has purchased on all of their hearts.
Maybe some of them. Others are just part of this system, and there's no way once you're in for a penny, you're in for a pound. But I think that you can find, even among those elements, a range of views about how to work with the United States. Ultimately, if we want to really stabilize, if that country is not going to be really stable until the IRGC is destroyed, I guess that's the ultimate goal. But I'm looking, I'm trying to think about this the way President Trump is thinking about it, exactly the way you put it.
We want to get what we need, the minimum that we need, which is no nuclear weapons and no ballistic missiles that threaten. In our bases and Israel. And we can't get that as long as the Ayatollah is in power.
So he's 86 years old. He doesn't look healthy, but is probably hiding in tunnels like he was last time. You write that, and I did not think about this, Iran. After we did Midnight Hammer, we asked for a ceasefire, not Iran. And to Qataris, you write, intermediaries to seek a sensation of hostilities, they say it was proof that Trump blinked.
Now I don't see it that way, but do you think the Iranians see it that way? No, they absolutely see it that way. They absolutely see it that way. Part of it is just propaganda. When you run a dictatorship like this, you can't show any weakness to the outside world because you fear your own people as well.
But that is actually what happened. You remember the angry exchange or the angry statement by President Trump before the television cameras on the morning of the ceasefire, where he got angry at the Israelis and the Iranians. And he said, you know, he cursed at them and said they have to stop fighting. It was Donald Trump who imposed the ceasefire. The Iranians never accepted it, and never accepted it formally.
And they're very proud of that. And they identify that as a sign that it was the Americans who buckled and not them. Yeah.
Meanwhile, they pulled off a devastating attack on their nuclear sites, and we were not hit.
So I don't know how they spin that in their own minds.
So what do you What are the risks of going in militarily? Seeing that we do have, we're not going in halfway if we go in.
So, what are the risks, Michael? Before I do that, can I just address what you said about the their victory doctrine is not totally absurd. Because they recognize that each one of these rounds of fighting with them is costly to the United States and Israel. We went through 25% of our THAD interceptors. These are the exo-atmospheric interceptors.
This is America. Forget about the Israelis. In June alone, we went through 25% of our global stockpile, and it takes five years to replenish that 25%.
So they and the Chinese are aware that this comes at a cost to us. Look at this major military buildup that President Trump has ordered. That's costly. And history has taught them that they can wait the United States out because they can create a bigger mess than the United States wants to deal with.
So, yes, we're more powerful militarily than them, but they have the ability to cause us a lot of heartburn. Nearly home. Isn't home where we all want to be? Reba here for Realtor.com, the pros' number one most trusted app. Finding a home is like dating.
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So, if the attack takes place, and knowing that they have almost no missile defense right now, knowing that the Israelis would be a partner in this, and their intelligence is beyond even I could put into a movie. They knew where the generals were. I imagine they know where the politicians sleep. Do you sense that there'll be a joint this will be virtually a joint operation? I do.
I think it will have to be because the Iranians have made clear that if they're attacked by us, they will attack Israel.
So we're together in this. The problem with the limited strike, the Wall Street Journal reported, is that from the Iranian point of view, that looks like the beginning. It's hard, if you're on the receiving end of a limited strike, it's hard to know whether that is really a limited strike or whether they're going after you. And they're going to hit back with everything that they've got.
So we have to go into the war in order to protect our own forces with everything that we have in order to suppress all that they have. I think the most important thing is that President Trump just make his goals very, very clear. And the minute the fighting begins, he makes it clear that the fighting will not end until they publicly accept our goals. Yeah.
That is great. And I think he's got to address the American people. And I think he knows that too. And I wouldn't, you know, of people that he can trust not to leak on the Democrats among Democrats. I imagine the gang of eight.
So when you look at targets, the Revolutionary Guard might be one. The ballistic missile production plants might be another. Maybe finishing off the other nuclear sites could be another. Maybe emptying a few prisons. I said the Israelis blew open the door to that infamous prison over in Israel, over in Iran.
Can you give us an idea of how that would look? Yes, I think all of the things that you said, but I would hope that they would target the Supreme Leader first and foremost. The Supreme Leader and his entire apparatus. That will if we eliminate him, That will change the whole balance between the United States and Iran. Just like when the Israelis took out Nasrallah.
Before the fall of Assad, the taking out of Nasrullah was the single greatest shift in the balance of power toward the United States and Israel that we've seen since October 7th. And so I really think we have to think of decapitation as the most efficient way to get what we need. You know, if you're a dictator, we can see watching the politics of this country, they don't care about their own civilians. They are willing to wipe out tens of thousands, maybe even more, hundreds of thousands of civilians in order to stay in power. But they do care about their own hides.
So we have to make it clear that the leaders of that country are going to be held accountable. I know, but a manhunt for an 86-year-old who probably's got a deep bunker might be a tough objective. And I think you point out a good thing, Michael. They told us before: if you take out these religious leaders, it'll inflame the region. Nasser is buried in rubble, dead, and it didn't inflame the region.
It helped Hezbollah go flat on its back. This is what I look at. And tell me if it's naive. If you look at the Middle East now and the progress they have made in suppressing the al-Qaeda doctrine, the Wahhabi religion that was in Saudi Arabia, it seems like these countries are thinking economy first. And they're beginning to think with their dollars.
Then you look at Syria. And as complex as that leader is, he's been a partner for us and certainly not an enemy to Israel. And he's an enemy to Iran. That is unbelievably helpful. And then you see what Iran, excuse me, Israel did to Hezbollah and Hamas.
And you know that their armaments and their money come from primarily Iran, along with the Houthis. And it all goes back to this country who put a bounty on the head of our president. who made it clear, you know, and they chanted yesterday, death to America.
So I know I'm in danger of being too simplistic, but it's almost like a planner's wart. If you pull this out, those tentacles will die. Look, if you're overly simplistic, then so am I. I see it exactly the way you just stated it. All of the things that President Trump wants in the region, disarmament of Hamas and rebuilding of Gaza, disarmament of Hezbollah in Lebanon, it all goes back to Iran, and it all goes back to the Supreme Leader and his doctrine of perpetual conflict with the West and with Israel.
Yeah, I guess we're going to see what happens. Michael, thanks so much. I really feel before I go, I think something's got to happen within two weeks. I don't think the President would do something that would overwhelm the State of the Union address. And on Tuesday, especially with Gerald R.
Ford not in place yet, but I'm wondering what you thought the timing would be. I agree with you again. He gave a 10 or 15-day time limit to the Iranians. I think he'll probably let that clock tick down. But the playwright, short story writer Chekhov said: you don't put a gun on the table in scene one unless it's going to be used in scene three.
You see this kind of buildup that President Trump has ordered, he's not going to turn around and send aircraft carriers back to East Asia or the Caribbean without getting something significant from the Iranians. Absolutely. And if you want to pivot to China, you've got to handle this problem first. Michael Duran, thanks so much. Thank you.
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