Transcription
us. We know the scenario. 100 days, 100 reasons to worry. The ceasefire hangs in the balance. The author of the escalation trap, who predicted Trump's Gulf War, returns to decode this new twist. He'll, of course, say this was not a twist. He has already modeled this into his thesis. And that thesis, viewers, you can look on Substack, and you can find the link below.
The question that I need to pose to Professor Pope, Pape, rather, who needs no introduction, is the following: Has the Gulf ceasefire collapsed entirely? Are we now in for, once again, renewed hostilities? Where do we go from here? How do we prepare? What are the outcomes? Let's have that, uh, conversation with Professor Pape.
Professor Pape, thank you very much for making the time. I don't like to use words like "vindicate," but one has to say, with a measure of regret, that you were right, and we find ourselves back in familiar territory. How bad is it going to be?
>> Well, this war is nowhere near over. I know everyone wants it to be over. We are in the middle stages of the escalation trap. We're not in the beginning, but we're also not in the end. This is the middle stages. And in the middle stages of the escalation trap, what's occurring is Iran hasn't simply survived the opening. It has gained power in the opening. Now, Iran is spreading its wings. It's using its power for more influence in this middle stage. And that is now focused on Israel. So, it is not going to be limited to Israel. There is more Iran will spread its wings in more ways. In fact, just before the escalation of the last 12 hours, Iran was spreading its wings against Kuwait, was spreading its wings against Bahrain. So, this is what what's happening against Israel is not isolated event. It's part of what's been occurring over the last couple of weeks. It's been a slow boil. I understand people have been optimistic. They thought, "Oh, this really is turning a corner." No, we're in the middle of the escalation trap. This is the middle of the trap. And in the middle of the trap, Iran has not is moving from survival to ambition. Ambition for more power and influence in the Gulf. And that is why Iran is not simply responding to a US strike. It's actually upping the ante. And we should expect more of this over time.
>> This is very interesting because Professor Pape, you're almost suggesting that this change in Iranian behavior from survival to ambition has resulted from the fact that Iran has used this pause to regroup. On what are we evidencing this?
>> So, you're seeing this in multiple ways in Iran's behavior and also in Iran's rhetoric. So, the move from survival to ambition, you can see in its missile behavior and its attacks. So, number one, attacking in Kuwait and attacking in Bahrain just a week ago. And this was nominally in in in response to some attacks and incursions by the United States, but this was a escalatory response. This was not a limited response. This was an escalatory response and it focused on US bases and other targets in those countries in order to pressure Kuwait and Bahrain to distance itself from the United States. That's what the that behavior was about. Second, you just see in the last 24 hours, Iran before this point had threatened that if Israel isn't stop its attacks into Beirut, it would attack Israel's homeland directly. Israel temporarily paused the attack into Beirut. This was because these are the strongholds of Hezbollah, Iran's ally. And what Iran has when Israel resumed the attack into the certain area in Beirut, what happened is the Iranians carried out their threat to attack Iran's homeland just as they promised. So, they are exerting coercive pressure to defend an ally and doing so in advance and then following through with that threat to make future threats credible. They're standing by that ally as we go forward. Now, further than that, in the last several weeks, they have been excavating the missile areas. They they have these deeply buried bunkers where they have their drones and their missiles that the United States attacked. And you'll recall that in the last few weeks we've been debating in the media, is Iran reconstituting? Well, what happened is the American bombs were hitting the opening tunnel areas where the essentially entrances were to these caves and these bunkers. And so, what Iran has been doing is just taking bulldozers, ordinary bulldozers, and moving the dirt out so that they can reuse that that that those drones and missiles. So, they're reconstituting their power, their offensive power, as we go forward.
Now, all of this rubble that I just described in detail is Iran emerging forward on that course to become the fourth center of world power, to become an oil a hegemon in the Persian Gulf where they are the dominant country in the Persian Gulf. So, we need to understand, since early April, I've been explaining this was going to be a key trajectory. So, for months, we've discussed it. What you're seeing is at this is how it plays out in real time. Iran won't emerge as a hegemon just overnight. This will take months and months. This is the behavior. This is what it looks like.
What Iran wants to do, just to be clear, what is this goal that Iran has? The goal is to become the hegemon in the Persian Gulf, just like America is the hegemon in the Western Hemisphere, just like China wants to be the hegemon in Asia, and just like Russia wants to be the hegemon in Eastern and Central Europe. What Iran now is has in front of it, the trajectory, is to become the hegemon in the Persian Gulf. And that's why what you're seeing is Iran is shifting from survival to ambition. It's also, just if you recall one more point if I may, just last Friday there was this major interview on another network with the senior military advisor to the supreme leader who essentially laid out this ambition in so much detail. It was stunning to hear. And this is Iran dictating terms to the United States and other countries in the region. This is not Iran seeking status quo. What that interview showed was clear ambition to be the dominant power in the Persian Gulf.
>> Which is something that you have obviously also talked about in your Substack article.