Transcription
Hi, I'm Steve Clemens, and I have a question. Are the talks with Iran and a shifting tone on Ukraine signs of change in Trump's foreign policy? Let's get to the bottom line. When he came to power last year, President Donald Trump made it clear to the whole world that there was a new sheriff in town. International institutions like the United Nations, well, out the window. Traditional alliances like NATO, only if he calls the shots. Professional diplomats? Who needs them anyway? He has personal envoys instead. America first meant transactional relations and deals that brought direct benefits for the United States and no need for reciprocity. But is something changing now? Even slightly. Iran's leaders are now "strong people, smart people," in Trump's words. And Ukrainian President Wimir Zalinski is doing "pretty well" in the war with Russia last year. Trump told Zalinski that he didn't hold any cards. So, is the reliance on overwhelming military and economic power hitting the wall of the real world where force doesn't always guarantee that folks will bend or surrender?
Today, we're talking with Robert Pate, professor of political science at the University of Chicago, and he's author of Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War. Bob, it's such a pleasure to have you on today. Thanks so much for joining us.
Look, much going on in the world. And I just want to start out with something that sets up, I think, an interesting tension of the moment. Uh, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan have a new book out called Regime Change and kind of looking at the Trump presidency. But if you watch what he did in the G7 recently, if you lock, and we're going to get to Iran in a moment, but when you saw the pretty positive comments about Zalinski of Ukraine making progress on Russia in their conflict and a different treatment as well of Iran and how he's framed Iran, calling it, you know, "hey, you know, we're developing a good relationship. Nobody's had a better relationship." Are we seeing a more humble Trump? Are we seeing a kinder, gentler Trump that's beginning to shift away from this kind of Genghaskhan orientation that he's had?
What we're seeing, Steve, and thank you very much for having me on. What we're seeing is the world, the world in Iran, uh, and the world in Ukraine is, uh, directly challenging Trump's self-image. So, uh, over the last years, not just in the last few months, uh, President Trump has often, um, uh, been quoted in various ways, uh, and the new Regime Change book just is another example as having this inflated self-image of the most important leader ever, not just simply a great leader in the United States, but the greatest ever in world history. This has been something that we have known for some time. And what you are seeing in the Iran war as he is now having to confront a strategic defeat of, uh, the first order that, uh, clearly is is putting Iran, uh, in a much more powerful position than it was 116 days ago and clearly weakening American power, uh, in dramatic fashion. And then also his prediction in Ukraine where Ukraine didn't have all the cards. You'll recall just a few years ago, um, just a year ago he had Zolinsky in the Oval Office, uh, basically reading him the riot act and saying, "you must concede, you must concede, you have nothing." And now Zalinski, through the power of drones, is, um, forcing the Russians to start abandoning Crimea. Just imagine that the flow of traffic out of Crimea, uh, is something, and it's drones. And what's happened with Iran? It's also drones. The power, the, I call it, the second precision revolution has been marching forward, uh, very fast in the last few years. Um, um, it starts in Ukraine, goes to the Red Sea with the Houthis, now it's with Iran, now it's even back to Ukraine. And what you are seeing is this is dramatically changing power in the world. And it's especially changing power for the United States. And this is a direct challenge, shattering almost, of President Trump's self-image.
Okay.
I want to explain to our audience that Professor Pap is someone who has been writing for decades on essentially the hubris of power, the hubris of deploying power, the hubris of occupying, uh, foreign territory and the consequences of that. And yet we've continued to bomb. We've continued to occupy. We've continued to do these things. Why do you think the strategic class is so immune to learning from these experiences you've been writing about for decades?
Uh, I, and, and Steve, I've been writing about it for decades. U the center Chicago project now on security and threats. It's expanded. Uh, and I now have the escalation trap substack. And you and I have been talking for decades about this. The core issue, Steve, goes back to the 1991 Gulf War. The 1991 Gulf War was a hinge war. It wasn't just another war. And I realize that was 35 years ago, and many people listening won't even have been born. But what happened in the 1991 Gulf War was we went into a war where Sodom Hussein, Iraq, the leader of Iraq, uh, had a 300,000 person army that took Kuwait, and we were going to take that back because if Saddam Hussein kept Kuwait with Iraq and possibly then taking Saudi Arabia, he would be the oil hegeimon very similar to Iran today. And what happened is we were expecting before the war that we might lose as many as 10,000 dead. We brought 10,000 body bags with us. Uh, this is the level of cost we thought we were going to face. And what really happened is the precision revolution was rolled out. That was the first shock and awe campaign. F-17 uh stealth uh uh fighters dropping bombs in Baghdad with no losses. And in 39 days of air war, 4 days of a ground war, we kicked that whole army of Sodom Hussein out of Kuwait and lost only 147 of our troops in combat. That was stunning. And that set the, uh, expectations for America's supreme power, American escalation dominance. And that hubris has been overshadowing us for decades, Steve. And what this war is, this will probably be the 20 thou, the 2026 Iran war, another hinge war, because this is probably the true bookend to that idea that America can't be beat. Yes, we've learned these lessons along the way. They, we, this isn't the first time we should have learned this lesson. But this war in particular, Steve, because Iran didn't just survive. Iran has gained power. In fact, controlling the straight of Hormuz means it is gaining world power. This is a tremendous shift in the balance of power. This is something that will probably start to limit that hubris going forward.
How do you think it affects, uh, President Trump's interactions and lessons from other parts of the world? Because what you're really saying is Iran was never going to be a cakewalk. You were one of the earliest people who came and really gamed this out and said this is not going to end well and here are the reasons why and you're going to propel Iran to a level of power and significance that it didn't enjoy before. But if you look at the the western hemisphere, if you, you know, look at the Dawnroe doctrine, if you look at Venezuela and the grab and snatch of Maduro from Venezuela and now the rightward shift of even of a lot of elections, um, in the Western Hemisphere, you know, Donald Trump points to that as something that's a clear win. That was a cakewalk. So when, when, what do you think the peculiar characteristics are of when it's a cakewalk and when it's not a cakewalk?
So what you're going to see, Steve, is you are going to see that the Iran war is going to have a powerful effect in constraining America as a great power in many regions of the world. I call it a constrained great power. America will remain the number one most strong military in the world. China number two and then Russia number three. Um, but it is more constrained. In the case of, uh, the Middle East, we're seeing the balance of power shifting right before our eyes. In the case of Asia, Steve, many people are thinking that what will happen is we'll we'll pull back from the Middle East and we're going to go to Asia. This is not right. That's not a correct understanding of I think our future. The future is going to be we are going to be more restrained because if we can't keep our our bases and carriers, uh, safe visav Iran, imagine what we can, how we'll hold up against China. This is not going to work out. In fact, I'd be surpris, I won't be surprised if we start to, uh, really think twice about building more carriers for Asia. This is going to be we're going to be heavily constrained. And then of course you're also seeing in, uh, with Russia Ukraine train now on its own mostly without any real new help with the drones is going to do quite well. The opposite of what most people thought again not understanding the pre second precision air revolution, uh, here that has been underway for years. And what that is going to mean, Steve, is that that thing that's called the Donroe doctrine as we are constrained in the Middle East, as we're constrained in Europe and as we're constrained in Asia, we are probably going to focus more, uh, in our region of the world. We will become a more constrained, uh, this won't be global power, global reach. It's going to be much more constrained and the countries in our hemisphere are substantially weaker than of course China, then of course Ukraine, then of course, um, Iran for now. However, uh, in the coming years, we should not be surprised to see that mass drone revolution, those cheap drones spreading. If Hezbollah, imagine this, Steve, Hezbollah now is going to have much more power with those mass drones in the future. They already have some. This is going to grow. If Hezbollah is going to be able to exert that kind of, uh, power, um, uh, increasingly, so too will states in our own hemisphere. This is this second drone revolution. This is going to have major consequences for the world and America.
Uh, and now we see, and there were a lot of people that did not give Zalinski or Ukraine, um, really much much credit in this conflict until recently. So I'm I'm interested in where you see this going and do you see now with the, uh, a kind of humbling of the US position right now as you as you've argued in Iran, you see what's happen, does this create a set of conditions where a deal on Russia and Ukraine becomes easier?
So the fact of the matter is, um, what you are seeing is, uh, you the those expectations that, well, it's war of attrition and Russia's three times the size and 3x population, all this, this is over being overwhelmed by the drone revolution and that those drones started right away. It's mostly been in Ukraine and by the way folks like Jennifer Pritsker here from Chicago, I live in Chicago. She's a, a, uh, um, of course, a wealthy, a wealthy billionaire. She, uh, provided money for those drones to get started here. This was not government program. This was not US program. They, this was basically donorfunded, Steve. Uh, now the, um, Ukraine's producing 7 million drones a year, uh, here. That that that really got started here and and I don't know exactly the coalition Pritsker put together to make this happen but this this was showing the power of that second, uh, precision revolution of cheap mass drones is what you were seeing and this can go pretty far because now Zalinsky is using those drones almost right out of a page, uh, page of chapter 2 of Bombing to Win or chap, because what he's doing is he's he's using the drones for exactly the hammer anvil that I have been talking about for decades, Steve. Uh, he is, um, uh, this will by interdicting those supply lines, uh, here as I talk about this is going to have much much more power than hitting, uh, you know, civilian targets inside of Moscow. So this is what is really occurring. Um, Zalinski is following whether he knows it or not, uh, the prescriptions of Bombing to Win and, um, uh, Putin, um, had, you know, better catch up and and this could lead to as you're saying change in the war, uh, Putin is now going to be under under even more pressure because if he doesn't make a deal now it will just get worse and worse and worse. Putin is effectively in an escalation trap.
I mean the the connectivity of all of these things is remarkable and the decision, uh, to attack Iran has unleashed a lot of other topographical changes in war and power in the world. Another that you just mentioned when you talked about Hezbollah is Israel's role in this moment as well and whether its fortunes have been enhanced or not enhanced. I'd like to know get your sense as you project forward how you see power in that situation, uh, as well.
Yeah. So, so Steve, I've been writing on the Substack these detailed analyses over the last several weeks now of how this is going to impact Israel directly. So, these are long analyses based on very detailed, uh, and what you, uh, see is that there has been a dramatic reversal of roles with the Iran war with Israel. Before the Iran war, Israel was the rising ascendant power in the Middle East. It was spreading a sphere of influence with the Abraham Accords. Now what you see is the opposite. It's Israel's the declining power and it's Iran that's the rising power. Uh, and it it's because of controlling Hormuz and now spreading of sphere of influence. They, Iran now it calls it their security resistance belt controlling from Lebanon to the, uh, Red Sea to the Gulf. Now, specifically what this is going to mean for Israel is with Hezbollah. So, for the last several years, understandably, Hezrael has been thinking, "Oh, not another October 7." So, therefore, that's the, uh, o main threat and the only real threat coming from Hezbollah. And Hezbollah has been attacking, um, uh, targets in those northern villages of Israel in northern part on the Lebanese border. But something much bigger is coming, uh, Steve, and I call it the closing of Israel is on the horizon because just project forward what happened in Hormuz, uh, here for Hezbollah. So the the issue here is a different is a different war. The next war I'm saying is going to be to close the ports of Hifa, to close the other ports using Hezbollah drones in order to shut down the shipping going into Israel. And 55% of Israeli's GDP turns on trade and almost all of that is seaborn trade. And if you say, well, they could come through the Red Sea. Remember the Houthies? So you have a situation that's going to emerge in the next probably year, not 5 years, not 20 years. This is a near-term scenario where especially coming out of the Becca Valley, there are going to be deep caverns. There's going to be growing drones. These drones may even have more AI, uh, here as, um, Iran begins to help Hezbollah even more. And what you are, what Israel is going to face is, uh, Israel will become more of an island. It will still be the strong power. It'll still have its Iron Dome, but the Iron Dome reduces. It doesn't eliminate threats and you don't need, uh, you can score 90% success against a drone swarm and nonetheless the other side wins. The 10% that get through determine the strategic outcome. That is what's coming for Israel, Steve. And I call it over the next over the next 5 or 10 years, uh, as this scenario plays out I think Israel will become something of an isolated nuclear Sparta. It won't disappear. This is not the elimination of Israel but it is going to become more of a garrison state than it is today and its vulnerability is going to grow. It's not just going to be a figment of its imagination. The the and the problem will be that the, uh, dealing with the new precision revolution that I'm explaining here. This has dramatic consequences for Israel that are are starting to unfold.
I want to play a clip for you, Bob, of President Trump commenting about another American president he doesn't want to be like. Let's listen.
"I've studied presidents, some good, some bad, some great. Not too many are great, and some really bad. We had one just recently. And the one president I did not want to be was the late great Herbert Hoover. I didn't want that."
So in there, he's saying, I don't want to be Herbert Hoover for triggering a great depression. But what I'm listening to you is he's triggered a collapse of American power and place in the world. And I'm just wondering if you were to give President Trump some advice on how to not be the Herbert Hoover of our times, how to take the world as it is right now and try to reposition the United States away from, uh, a decaying situation as you've described it to something that enhances it position. What would some of those things be that you would advise him?
Uh, what I would tell him, Steve, is that we are not out of the woods. So, President Trump was briefed the Sunday before he made that statement by his top economic people, uh, here. That's his energy secretary, Scott Bessen, about the oil inventory drawd down that I've been warning about on the substack, uh, for many months and that this is going to push be what we mean by pushing, uh, the economy over a cliff. And so, he is quite right to be focused on that. However, simply saying that is not the same thing as executing the right strategy to get us out of that economic woods, Steve. And what President Trump has been doing just in the last week is, uh, he has not been, um, uh, putting enough pressure on Israel to start pulling out of southern Lebanon because that with Iran is basically, uh, requires Israel to leave southern Lebanon. Well, Iran has shown just in the last week they will shut down Horamuz if they don't get article one of theou fulfilled also article, um, uh, five, uh, warning about this specifically on the substack a few days ago saying if we start monkeying with these arrangements in hormos we start trying to dictate the routes and all this this is going to cause another shutdown of the straight and what happened just in the last 24 hours exactly that red line was crossed exactly that scenario I was talking about, uh, here, and then President Trump number three is talking about that it's President Trump who's going to decide what happens with those unfrozen that is a violation again of one of the key articles of theou and Iran I don't think is going to stand for this. So what President Trump has got to do is he's got to fulfill the four corners of theou instead of trying to squeak out of this in a way because Iran's just not going along with it. They're not gonna play the game of putting lipstick on a peg so that President Trump will just go forward. I know many people want, uh, everybody to just give Trump, you know, uh, you know, bow to his ego, get us out of this world crisis, uh, here. But that's not what Iran's not going for that because what Iran wants is power and it wants that word for word, Steve. And so that's what I would tell President Trump is he's got to honor thatou word for word and the that has not been happening. Secretary Rubio when he's traveling, he's saying we're going to break Lebanon out of this issue with the mo that's that violates theou. So the Trump administration here can't have it both ways. They're trying to squeak out of that strategic defeat that requires Iran to allow them to squeak out. And Iran still holds all the cards with the world's economy and they're not giving that up.
I mean last week our guest Bob said that President Trump, you know, had a, you know, significant challenge across a lot of different players in the world but is one of his biggest problems is, is, you know, basically kind of changing the topic kind of an attention deficit, uh, issue if you will that, you know, he jumps from one thing to another. He did the Gaza deal. Now there's no look at the Gaza deal. And you've got a lot of people, uh, continuing to sort of wonder what the solveny is of that situation. Why would Iran be any different? When you kind of look at that scramble and the president's, you know, basically I I won't call it inability, but refusal to focus. How does that mix it up?
Uh, I just don't think you can, uh, this is a PR problem in that way, Steve. I I realize that President Trump is is almost a magician with, uh, distraction. He he he he has been terrific at manipulating the media, but there's a fundamental difference here. Those oil inventories are still going down. Now, the public may not know they're going down, but literally the American Strategic Petroleum Reserve went down another 8 million barrels this week. So, that's not stopping. Now, the public may not know that because they're focusing on the price of oil. And the oil traders, Steve, I just spent time with some of the top oil people. They are terrified to go up against Trump's PR. That's where Trump's PR. And the reason, Steve, is when, um, they if they were to actually buy oil at the correct price, when Donald Trump talks the price of oil down, those oil traders lose money. And if they lose a certain amount of percentage, they get fired. So this is not a matter that they just lose money and so forth. They're literally their jobs are on the line to obey Trump and salute. So there's somebody saluting to Trump. It's those oil traders, but that is building a balloon. And that is because those oil inventories are going down and the straight of four moves is not opening up fast enough. And it probably can't really open up fast enough. We're going to be in this situation where Iran has leverage for something like 200 days. That's what the oil that's the reality of the supply and demand situation in the world. And I think Iran is it knows that and they're going to play it for all it's worth.
Well, University of Chicago professor of political science, Robert Pap, we like to say here on the bottom line that there are no illusions on the bottom line and you helped us do that today. Uh, thanks so much for joining us.
Thank you so much for having me, Steve.
So, what's the bottom line? In ancient times, a Sparta could strip an Athens of its empire, literally destroy its army, its navy, cut off its grain supply, and starve the enemy. And even in the last century, some wars came to definitive ends, like when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japan. But today's wars, Ukraine and Russia, or Israel and the US against Iran, seem to have moved beyond Trump's wishes for unconditional surrender. Today's wars are management projects. They have a mix of winners and losers on all sides. Where some of the embers that led to the war's outbreak, well, they just keep smoldering even if they're contained for that moment under the surface. And if people around the world are worried about the high costs of war, the sad truth is the costs related to managing their conclusion are also going to be high. And that's the bottom line.