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Yeah, it's quite remarkable, Chris, that uh none of uh Trump's predecessors uh took the bait when the Israelis tried to trap us into going to war against Iran. And you want to remember in 2024, Joe Biden's last year as president, uh the Israelis twice, once in April and then second in October of that year tried to trap Biden into going to war against Iran. And he refused to do it.
Uh and Trump is the first president who fell into the trap and of course he did it last June uh during the 12-day war. You want to remember in the 12-day war uh the Israelis by themselves started that conflict on June 13th and it ended on June 25th. But on June 22nd uh we bombed uh three nuclear targets in Iran. But it was a one-day bombing. We talked about one and done at the time. And you remember that when uh the evening came on June 22nd, the bombing was finished, uh President Trump declared victory. Uh so although he got involved for the first time, uh it only looked like he was putting his ankle in the water, uh that he wasn't becoming uh deeply committed to fighting a war in Iran.
But that all changed on February 28th. Um, the United States and Israel together, what I like to refer to as the tag team, uh, decided to attack Iran and we are now in a war of attrition with the Iranians, uh, in which case it's hard to see how this war ends. So Trump uh took the bait and I think to put it in more specific terms, I think basically that Prime Minister Netanyahu, who has been working overtime for decades now, literally decades, uh to get the United States to uh attack Iran for Israel uh finally succeeded with Trump. Uh as I said, there was a tiny step taken forward in that regard last June. Uh but now uh Trump has jumped uh full body uh into the water.
>> And yet you see even with this sickophatic uh head of the joint chief's Ka uh every time he's trotted out in front of the cameras he doesn't look very happy. Uh it I think the military foresaw the Pentagon foresaw what is coming and is quite perplexed about how to deal with it.
>> I think that General Kaine has actually behaved quite well here. You want to remember that when Trump came into office uh January of uh last year, January 2025, he fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Brown, and he brought General Kaine out of retirement. Kaine was only a three-star general. He wasn't even a four-star general, but Trump liked him. And Trump made him a four-star general, and he made him the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Now, given that he was in effect Trump's general, uh that he owed his position uh to Donald Trump, you would think that he would tell Donald Trump what he wanted to hear about going to war against Iran. But on the contrary, uh what Kaine did before the war, this is before February 28th, was he made it very clear to President Trump uh that we did not have a viable military option. So when you say that uh General Kaine every time he's trotted out looks very uncomfortable, I think that's true. And I think there's a simple explanation for why he looks so uncomfortable. He knew from the get-go that this one was not going to work out uh the way Trump and Netanyahu thought that it was going to work out. And he understands that he is the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and he was the chairman when we entered this foolish war on February 28th despite the fact that he had warned against it.
Is it too simplistic to say that Trump and Netanyahu naively believed that by taking out the supreme leader and some of the hierarchy there would be regime change and the war would be over.
>> I think that's clearly the case with Trump. I think that that was the argument that Netanyahu sold to Trump and Trump liked the argument. I think given what happened in Venezuela, he thought that we had the ability to float like a butterfly and sting like a bee and when BB told him that the uh regime in Iran is weak and all we have to do is decapitate it and really hit hard on that first day or two uh that the regime would crumble and we would end up with a pro-American, pro-Israeli regime in its place. Uh I think Netanyahu was very successful at telling Trump that story and Trump is not exactly surrounded by wise advisors uh save for General Kaine uh who would tell him otherwise. Uh so he fell into the trap.
Now Netanyahu is a more complicated case. One could argue uh that Netanyahu understood that uh a decapitation strike wouldn't work. Uh that this would not be a quick and decisive victory uh and that instead what he was trying to do was trap uh Trump into a long war uh in which case uh Iran would be destroyed. In other words, Netanyahu understood uh that the regime would not fall quickly, but once we committed to fighting the war, we would have no chance but to no choice but to see it through. And uh a and that's the situation that we're in now. So that's a possible argument. It's hard to know for sure whether it's true, but it's also possible uh just having watched Netanyahu over time that he too bamboozled himself into believing that the Iranian regime was fragile and that we could easily affect regime change. You know, he's been saying that for a long time, as you well know, Chris, and sometimes when people repeat particular arguments, after a while, they even begin to believe their own arguments, although they initially did not. So, uh it's possible that uh that uh BB uh fooled himself or it's possible that he was just just tricking Trump into getting into this war.
>> Well, the Israeli goal is different from the American goal. The Americans want regime change. Um, you know, the the Israelis want to create a failed state. They want to fragment Iran the same way they fragmented and destroyed Iraq. Uh, the same way they turned Libya into a failed state. Those are very different goals.
>> I agree with that. I agree with that. But, uh, the Israelis don't advertise that fact. I think the Israeli view is if they got regime change and uh they got a a pro-American pro-Israel regime in place that then they wouldn't have to worry that much about destroying the country. But I think that they probably understand that that's not going to happen. That Iran's not going away. And given that Iran is not going away, let's wreck it. Let's do to Iran what we did to Syria. And then we're we're done with Iran. We can turn to Turkey and break Turkey apart as well.
>> Well, let's talk about a country that does have a strategy which isn't the United States and that's Iran. And what I found interesting is that rather than confront the uh American military might i.e. the ships and they have decided quite astutely and quite methodically to destroy the economic machinery not only in the Gulf but globally.
Yeah, the Iranians are pursuing a smart strategy. And to go back to General Kaine, General Kaine has made a number of comments about the Iranians uh that make clear that he respects their ability uh to strategize in this war. He is not contemptuous of the Iranians. When you listen to Hags, Seth and Trump talk, they talk uh about the Iranians like they're a bunch of country bumpkins and we're the strategic geniuses. And not only do we have an advantage in material power, we Americans have an advantage in how to think strategically. Uh I think that's not the case. And I think if you listen carefully to General Kaine, uh he's making that point. We are up against a formidable adversary.
Uh given what you said, given what u General Kaine said, uh they have a lot of cards to play. The key here, Chris, is that Iran has a huge arsenal of short range ballistic missiles and drones that it can use against the Gulf States. And the Gulf States present a targetrich environment. Uh it's easy to use those drones and those short-range ballistic missiles to do great damage to all of the countries in the Gulf, including Saudi Arabia. The Iranians also have a lot of long range missiles and also long range drones that can hit Israel. Now, they've not done much of that up to now. It's very important to understand that in the 12-day war last June, the Iranians fought almost exclusively against Israel. They did not target American military bases in the region. Uh and they did not target the Gulf States in this war. They're targeting Israel, uh American military installations in the region, and the Gulf States. And in the first part of the war up to pretty much now, they've concentrated mainly on attacking American installations and attacking the Gulf States. But they have announced um that they are now beginning to switch the focus and they're going to concentrate much more on attacking Israel. And they have the long range ballistic missiles and they have drones uh which they can use to hit Israel. And the problem that the Israelis face, and of course this is a problem that the Americans face, is that we only have a finite number of defensive missiles that can be used to shoot down those incoming ballistic missiles. And even when we use those defensive missiles, they often times don't hit the incoming Iranian ballistic missile. So, we have this situation in the Gulf and in Israel where the Iranians have the capability to pound all of those countries for a long period of time and there's nothing we can do about it. And in fact, as time goes by, our ability to shoot down those missiles, shoot down the drones decreases. It doesn't flatline and it certainly doesn't increase. It decreases. So the Iranians have a serious set of military options against us.
And what this means, Chris, is that as we walk up the escalation ladder, and that's what we're likely to do if we can't find an off-ramp, and I don't think we're going to find an off-ramp. If we don't find an off-ramp, I think what we'll do is march up the escalation ladder. And of course, Pete Hacksith and Donald Trump will say, "We have escalation dominance as you go up that escalation ladder." But I don't think that's true. I I think the Iranians have powerful cards to play and therefore we are in a really terrible situation.
>> What is that escalation ladder look like? What will that mean? They're already carrying out virtually saturation bombing of Thran.
>> Not yet. Uh they're pounding uh they're pounding Iran. There's no question about that. And they're p pounding Tran. Uh but uh they have not killed uh more than 1500 people. Uh I mean it's terribly regrettable that they've even killed one person, much less 1500 or whatever the number is. But uh they have not gone that far. The Israelis and the Americans have not gone that far up the escalation ladder. And in a very important way, there's evidence that the Americans are discouraging the Israelis for going too far too far and too fast up the escalation ladder because we understand that the uh uh the Iranians have a second strike capability. The Israelis don't care that much because the Israelis want to see us get deeply involved in this war and destroy Iran. They'd like us to level every city in Iran, break the country apart. But Trump does not at this point want to go down that road.
But I think what happens here, Chris, as we march up the escalation ladder is that we target civilian areas, we end up killing larger and larger numbers of people. Uh and furthermore, we begin to flirt with the idea of tearing apart uh Iran's uh petroleum infrastructure and maybe uh their desalination plants as well. We begin to really try to throttle the regime uh to strangle it. And and again, this involves not just simply killing people uh which I think if you get desperate enough, you'll do. The Israelis of course would have no problem doing that. Uh and ultimately I think if we got desperate enough we would not either. But again the problem is is we do those things um the Iranians will retaliate. Uh if we go after uh energy infrastructure in Iran, the uh Iranians will go after more and more energy infrastructure uh in the Gulf uh in Gulf States. Uh if we go after desalination plants, they'll go after desalination plants in places like Saudi Arabia and Israel itself. Uh, I think the Israelis have four or five big desalination plants that they depend heavily on and I think the Iranians will be incentivized to take them out if we or the Israelis or both of us go after their desalination plants. Uh, so you can see that as we go up the escalation ladder, uh, the Iranians will go up with us. And I don't see how you can make the case that we have escalation dominance in any meaningful way. Especially when you take into account the fact that the historical record is quite clear here that countries can suffer enormous amounts of punishment in these sorts of air campaigns and the population does not rise up against the government and overthrow it. Uh and in fact what happens in most of those cases if not all those cases is that the population rallies around the flag. So if we think or the Israelis think that killing Iranian civilians is going to put pressure on the government to quit the war, I think that is uh erroneous thinking.
>> Well, we tried that in Vietnam.
>> We tried it in Korea. If you ever look at what we did to North Korea during the Korean War, it's horrific. It's much worse than what we did in Vietnam. And then you go back to World War I, World War II, excuse me, not World War I, World War II in Europe and World War II uh in East Asia against Japan. I mean, number of people that we killed is just hard to believe. Uh but it's very hard, if not impossible, to get, you know, uh those air campaigns to cause a government to quit.
Well, they is there an example of uh an air campaign that does break a government? I don't think so. Historically, is there?
>> No. I think the only case you could make is the dropping two nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6th and August 9th got the Japanese to finally quit. Uh the Japanese were at the edge of the cliff by August of 1945. And the question was the question is what pushed them off the cliff? And some people would argue it was the two nuclear weapons on those uh two dates. I actually think that's not true. I think it was when the Russians came in on August 8th. Remember the war in Europe is won on May 8th, 1945. And at Yaltta, the Russians or the Soviets had said that they would come in three months after the war in Europe ended. In other words, they would come into the war against Japan three months after the war in Europe ended. And the war in Europe ends on May 8th, 1945. And three months later, on August 8th, 1945, the Soviets uh invade against the Japanese Quantang Army in Manuria and quickly overrun it. Uh I believe that it's the Soviet decision to attack Japan uh on August 8th, which is in between the two bombs on August 6th and August 9th, that is the critical factor that gets the Japanese to throw up their hands. But that's the only case you can make uh where one could say uh that air power helped uh a bit to uh end the war. But just quickly, Chris, on that case, because it's important to understand it, uh, we start firebombing Japan on the evening of March 10th, 11th, 1945. And the first night that we firebomb Tokyo, this is March 10th. Uh, we kill more Japanese than are killed at either Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Just think about that. That's the first night we firebomb Tokyo. Uh, and then we're working our way down the list of large Japanese cities and firebombing them, murdering huge numbers of people. Just truly remarkable. Uh, and the Japanese don't quit. They don't quit until August. And that of course is when the two nuclear weapons are dropped and the Soviets come into the war. And that's sort of the coupra. But firebombing just didn't work. And it supports the basic point that I'm making that you can murder and this is really murder because you're purposely targeting civilians. You can murder huge numbers of civilians and it doesn't work. Uh the historical record is remarkably clear on this.
And here we are in Iran. We're not going to send ground forces in, right? We're going to rely on air power. We're going to bomb and we're going to bomb Iran uh and win the war. We're going to create regime change without sending ground forces in. Just going to do it through the air. The historical record makes it unequivocally clear that this is almost impossible to do uh absent a miracle. And I don't believe in miracles. Uh it's hard to get regime change or impossible to get regime change uh using air power alone. You got to send boots. You got to put boots on the ground. This is what we did in Iraq. We had to invade Iraq to get regime change. Uh and if you want regime change in Iran, you're going to have to invade that country. And that's not going to happen. Uh country is much too big. Uh they're too many people. And furthermore, we've been there before. It doesn't work very well. And even Donald Trump is smart enough to know that sending an army into Iran would be a real prescription for disaster.
Let's talk about the economic impact of shutting down the strait of Hormuz. And just on the issue of desalination plants, having worked in Saudi Arabia, you take these out, you've in and you have a huge humanitarian crisis. I mean, cities like Riad are almost completely dependent on desolination.
>> Absolutely. Absolutely. And and and the administration, the Trump administration uh has told the Israelis uh to stay away from desalination plants. Um and we do not want to get into uh a war where both sides are uh attempting to destroy the dissolination plants on each side. This would not be good uh because as you say it would be you know catastrophic disaster for the people in all of those countries in the uh in the Gulf region and I believe it would have devastating effects inside Israel as well if the Iranians were able to take out those four or five desalination plants that the Israelis have. Uh so I I think that you know uh for the time being anyway we'll stay away from that. The economic consequences, you know, have not been fully felt yet. U and uh we'll see what happens with the passage of time. Very interestingly, the Iranians are still shipping oil out of the Gulf. Needless to say, Iranian uh tankers or tankers carrying Iranian oil uh are not going to be sunk by the Iranians and they can make their way through the straits of Hormuz. So the Iranians are still selling oil.
>> Which I think 80% of their seaborn oil goes to China. Is that correct?
>> Uh I think that's right. Yeah. Uh but I think that if you look at China's present situation in terms of you know how much oil it has in reserve uh where it gets its additional oil from uh China is not going to be hurt that much at least initially if the oil is cut off. It's Japan and South Korea that are going to be clobbered. Japan and South Korea are more dependent on oil coming out of the Gulf uh than the Chinese are. It's quite interesting here, Chris, but if you think about it, the Europeans are really going to be hurt badly if the oil is cut off uh for a sustained period of time. And you want to remember the Europeans are already in trouble because they're not getting oil and gas uh in in in the way they used to from Russia. Uh and now they're depending more on the United States and the Middle East. So if you cut off the flow of oil and gas from the Middle East to Europe uh on top of the fact that all that oil and gas coming out of Russia uh has been curtailed uh you could see where the European economies which are already struggling are going to be even in more trouble. So Europe is going to be hurt. Looks like Japan and uh u South Korea are going to be hurt and then there are countries you know that are less developed like Nigeria that are going to pay a real price as a result of what's happening here uh and uh so the economic consequences which are just beginning to be felt uh could be significantly worse and the consequences this for the world economy could be catastrophic uh and of course the Trump administration fully understands that. Uh they understand that, you know, to some extent it's hard to predict exactly how this plays out, but they surely understand that you can tell plausible stories as to how this ends up being one giant nightmare. Again, it's not to say that will happen, but you can tell plausible stories about how this becomes a nightmare. You know, we go far enough up the escalation ladder and the Iranians really go after the Gulf States and really go to great lengths uh to destroy their uh oil infrastructure and gas infrastructure. Uh the consequences could be disastrous for everyone on the planet. And the Trump administration understands that they don't want to take any chances here. This is why you see evidence that the Trump administration is looking for an offramp.
Well, the Iranians aren't going to give it to them, are they?
>> They'd be crazy to give it to them unless they get a good deal. Uh you hardly see any talk about this in in the mainstream media, but all of the talk revolving around the question of an off-ramp and ending this war has to do with how we think we fared in the end and how we think the Israelis fared in the end. In other words, the Israelis are fearful that if we cut a deal now without regime change or without destroying Iran, uh this will be a victory for Iran. And uh uh and the Americans might be happy, but we're not happy. And President Trump and his people are thinking that given that we have the midterm elections coming up, the war is not going well, we have to end it. And even if we don't have a decisive victory, so be it. It's just important uh that we get this war uh put to bed and uh declare victory and then start worrying about the election in November. That's the way the discourse is evolving in the west. But nobody seems to understand that to get the Iranians to quit, you have to offer them a deal that they find acceptable because they're in the driver's seat now. They're the war is playing to their advantage. They've figured out that they have leverage over the United States and over Israel. The fact that they have all these ballistic missiles and all these drones and they're operating in a targetrich environment, they understand that they don't want to quit here, right? They want to use this capability to give them leverage. Now, you say to yourself, leverage for what? Leverage to get a deal at the end of this conflict to get some sort of arrangement put in place that leaves them much better off than they were before February 28th. So what exactly?