Hegseth Says U.S. Will Have COMPLETE CONTROL Of Iran Airspace

0:00Welcome to Navara Live on Day 5 of America and Israel's illegal war on Iran. Tonight we will be discussing Pete Hegsf, who said that Iran is toast. He sounds very confident that America are just going to win this war. It's going to be very easy. That's his message. In the background though, there are signs that a civil war could be brewing in Iran. If the CIA gets its way, they're funding the Kurds to start an uprising essentially. Trump has also said that the wrong Iranian leaders are being killed. He's saying we had some ideas of who could take over but we keep killing them. And Marco Rubio backtracks on the moment he accidentally told the truth about why the war started. Which is the Israel wanted it to start. I'm Michael Walker. I'm joined by Aaron Bistani. Good to see you. Great to see you, Michael. We're back to Wednesday. Although Friday's show was a corka. I thought a corka. If you'd like to support our work, if you also enjoyed Friday's show or Wednesday's show or Tuesday or for any of them.

1:01If you've enjoyed any show in the last year, you must simply support our work. You can sign up at Navara Media dot com forward slash support. US Secretary of War Pete Hexf made this pledge at a press conference earlier today. Starting last night and to be completed in a few days, in under a week, the two most powerful air forces in the world will have complete control of Iranian skies, uncontested airspace. I hope all the folks watching understand what uncontested airspace and complete control means. It means we will fly all day, all night, day and night, finding, fixing and finishing the missiles and defense industrial base of the Iranian military, finding and fixing their leaders and their military leaders.

2:08Flying over to Iran, flying over Iran, flying over their capital, flying over the RGC, Iranian leaders looking up and seeing only US and Israeli air power. Every minute of every day until we decide it's over. Now, the US and Israel's attempt to achieve total control of Iran's skies would require them to destroy all of Iran's missile sites. They're also heavily bombing Iranian cities, so it can be difficult to work out, of course, exactly what footage on social media is legit. The BBC, though, have put together this collection they can confirm is real, so you can see their buildings destroyed in comms. Huge plumes of smoke in Isfahan, also in Tehran. The reports from Tehran over the past couple of days do make it sound really, really horrific. You can also see, I think, Sana Daj, you can see some enormous explosions there. That's in the west of Iran.

3:12The US Department of War also released footage today of the destruction of an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean. It's fought around 180 people were on board the vessel when it was hit by a US torpedo. It was just off the coast of Sri Lanka when it was hit, at least 32 people were rescued. Authorities tell the BBC that 80 bodies have been found so far. The US has struck or sunk to the bottom of the ocean more than 20 ships from Iran. Iranian media is reporting that the overall death toll in Iran now exceeds 1,000. In terms of the balance of military power, much seems to rest on which side might run out of missiles first. The Iranians, or the Americans, and their allies. Now, in particular, over the past couple of days, there has been much speculation that the Gulf states may be running low on the missiles needed to intercept Iranian attacks, which are either by missiles or drones. Even the Americans, of course, by far the most powerful military in the world, apparently they are having to make tough decisions.

4:16The Washington Post reported today that the US risks running low on precision missiles and air defense interceptors in Iran. They say America's stocks were already stretched by the Ukraine war. More recently, by Trump's vast use of the military to carry out his foreign policy goals in Iran. Of course, Iran, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, everywhere in the world. Trump seems to think it's a good time to deploy the military, and that is stretching it thin. They also say this. Two of the people familiar with the US inventories said that an extended conflict in the Middle East could require drawing down munitions stocks in the Indo-Pacific region. A separate US official speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe the sensitive state of munitions said that inventories were so thin that a lengthy campaign against Iran wouldn't leave enough munitions for other threats, especially China. So I suppose that would be bad news for Taiwan potentially. Today, though, Pete Hegsf dismissed those concerns.

5:18We are accelerating, not decelerating. Iran's capabilities are evaporating by the hour while American strength grows fiercer, smarter, and utterly dominant. More bombers and more fighters are arriving just today. And now, with complete control of the skies, we will be using 500 pound, 1,000 pound, and 2,000 pound GPS and laser-guided precision gravity bombs, of which we have a nearly unlimited stockpile. We used more exquisite standoff munitions at the start but no longer need to. Our stockpiles of those, as well as patriots, remains extremely strong. The enemy can no longer shoot the volume of missiles they once did, not even close, and the Chairman will lay out some of those percentages. So our air defenses and that of our allies have plenty of runway. We can sustain this fight easily for as long as we need to.

6:20So the percentage he was referring to there, which was given later in the conference by the Joint Chief of Staff, is that apparently Iran's missile launches are down 86% from the first day of the conflict, so the idea being that while the US and their allies are having to use lots of interceptors to bring down Iranian missiles, the Iranians are also potentially running out of missiles as is evidenced by the fact that they can't keep up the pace. They were sort of using deploying when this war first started, of course, when it was first started by the Israelis and the Americans. Allies of the Iranian regime, though, are talking up their arsenal, they're saying they're not about to run out. Professor Muhammad Miranda is an academic close to the Iranian government. What percentage of Iran's missile stocks remain? The vast majority. Because after last year's war, it was estimated that Iran had used up around 40% of its missiles. Are you saying that was replenished in the last few months?

7:23Those numbers were always fake. Those numbers are provided by the Israeli regime to the media in order to convince foolish Americans that war against Iran is simple. This war was supposed to end in a day or two, as well as they were supposed to bring Iran down like a house of cards. That failed, this failed, and now the United States will have to pay the price. And if the United States escalates, that will mean that the most sensitive region in the world, the Persian Gulf, where a quarter of the world's energy comes from, everything could be destroyed. And if that happens, it doesn't even matter if the straighter hormones is open or closed. Because there will be no oil or gas, and there will be no tankers. For Iran, this is a fight for survival. For the United States, this is a war of choice, a choice that has been imposed upon the American people by the Epstein class. We will expel the United States from our homeland, and we will make sure that the United States never again thinks about aggression against our country.

8:29And we will not allow the Israeli regime to behave with impunity and to continue genocide against the Palestinian people. So, Aaron, I don't know what you sort of make of this. I've sort of been following lots of people talking about it, and it's sort of difficult to totally ascertain which side is right. It's worth noting, the reason we don't just have a big bar chart of how many missiles that the Americans have, how many interceptors do the Gulf States have, how many drones do the Iranians have, is because it's all classified information. They don't want to tell the other side what they've got because then the other side can work out when they're going to be running them down. And that's also why we're seeing both sides sort of stand up and say, actually, we've got infinite weaponry because they're trying to intimidate the other side. I do understand is that the interceptors are a lot more expensive than the drones or the missiles which are used for attack, which makes sense because an interceptor has to knock a moving target out of the air, whereas a drone or a missile has to hit a sort of static target on the ground.

9:31So, I can see why the interceptors are much more expensive, and so if Iran can continue to shoot these rockets or missiles or drones around the region, that's very expensive to defend against. At the same time, throughout this, ever since October the 7th, I've heard lots of people say how the cost means that it's going to be Hezbollah, it's going to be Iran. This is going to be really difficult for Israel and the United States and every time, militarily, the United States and Israel are dominant. Well, I think in the 12-day war, which is the example people give, right? People said that they're going to have to stop at a certain point because the intercepts are going to run out. That is what happened, actually. There was a ceasefire. It wasn't a complete capitulation by one side. I think it's really important to say that the Shahed drones are incredibly low tech. They're powered by a Raspberry Pi, and you can build them really quickly and really cheaply. So, any kind of cessation and hostilities in Iran can just build those stockpiles back up again, and that's why the Americans are doing what they're doing.

10:34They're the kamikaze drones. The kamikaze drones. You fly a drone into your target and then it explodes. It's like a lawnmower, the Raspberry Pi, and some sort of explosive on it. And they're very cheap to build. I'm like, say, correctly, the intercept is a much more sophisticated in terms of technology and therefore much more expensive. Everything that Pete Hexeth was saying there is propaganda. It is for public consumption. That doesn't mean it's not true, but he's obviously going to put a very positive spin on everything. He also has done TV and broadcast, and he's a TV guy. The Americans have lost six people in less than a week. I don't know about the Second Golf War, but that is significant. This was meant to be a decapitation job of the top guy, hasn't happened. The Iranian regime. And I say a regime saying, oh, you're saying regime, it means that you're critical of it. That's just a term in political science. The people at the apex of this state apparatus. The Iranian regime is much more resilient. I'm not talking about some lowly 21-year-old besiege. I'm talking about senior people within the state apparatus. That's why I use the word regime.

11:35Has been much more resilient than was presumed to be the case. A lot of few more points here. This is really, really key. What people at Pete Hexeth don't understand is that for the Islamic Republic of Iran, ideology is a weapon. What do I mean? Martyrdom is central to the political theology of the Islamic Republic. But we've also been here before in the Iran-eraq war of 1980 to 1988. The entire world was arming Iraq. Iraq used chemical weapons. Iranians, Iranian children were walking into tanks unarmed, trying to stop them. The suicide bomber as a political and military technology was developed by the Iranians in Lebanon, again in the early 1980s. So this idea that, well, if we take out their most high-tech elements than their beaten, sure, you'll shut them up for a few months. But you're going to start to see, I would imagine, suicide bombings and political assassinations and targeted political violence in other parts of the region.

12:37That is just going to happen. That's not some outlandish claim. That's very much in line with the genesis of the Islamic Republic and how it's sought to project power in the early 1980s. It's about our bombings, for instance, and, like I say, suicide bombings. In the 1980s, not really talked about very often, not only did the Americans withdraw from Lebanon after attacks by his bala, so did the French. So this is something that has been repeatedly successful. The idea that these people won't have that ideology as a weapon for a long time to come is, I think, outlandish. I actually think, in my sort of more bleak moments, that's why I think a nuke might be used. Why tactical nuke might be used? Because by conventional means, these people will fight and fight and fight. And we can talk about more later on about how the other side isn't willing to fight. The Iranians who want regime change aren't willing to fight. They're willing to tweet, right? But they're not willing to fight. As Mao said, political power is at the end of a gun. It's at the barrel of a gun.

13:39They're willing to fight for political power. They're not willing to fight to change the regime. And I'm talking about the people overseas, and I'm talking about people inside the country who are going to be broken every in which way. If you're not willing to fight for political power, you're not going to be able to keep it, which we saw, of course, with the non- or anti-teleban forces in Afghanistan. I mean, at the US Marines left, we had a return to the status quo, and I think that's what would happen. Best case scenario, by the way. For Iranian liberals. Do we know they're willing to fight? I mean, I suppose... Well, you tell me, Reza Palavist in Maryland is not... He's not even in the region. Sorry, I think the Palavists are not willing to fight. But I'm not sure the Islamic Republic supports a necessarily willing to fight. I've got no idea. I was listening to your brilliant interview of Valinasi saying, actually, very old population. The average age is in the 30s. This is not kind of like a sort of Afghanistan or Iraq when those are incursions. It's not an old population, that's not true. It's historically compared to sort of most incursions. No, no, it's not true. It's old compared to Afghanistan. It's not an old population.

14:41I think average age is about 30, yeah. This country is an average age of 41. Ukraine is an average age of 40. I suppose Ukraine did manage to resist. So what I would say is, look, Muhammad is still the most popular name in the country. The idea that there are people who are religiously observant in Iran is obviously stupid. Other than the majority, I have no idea. I doubt it, actually, right? But 10 to 12 million people who still support the Islamic Republic, still see it as a form of stability is significant. That's just my view. And the point is, even if they're minority, if they're more willing to use calculated violence, then they won't lose. So quickly on my final point here, I've said about ideology being a weapon. I've talked about the psychological elements all of this. The bombing of Iran could end up being one of the great war crimes of the 21st century. People have talked about Gaza, and of course, what happened in Gaza was a polling. Terms of munitions by weight dropped on Gaza greater than multiple cities in the Second World War. Iran, greater Iran as a population of 16 million people. The idea that we're going to have carpet bombing of a densely populated area like this,

15:42I cannot think of it as a recent precedent since the Second World War. Of course, you have huge sustained bombing campaigns on Vietnamese jungle, or in Laos and the jungle, career to a lesser extent slightly more urbanized. But to run in 2026, a highly urbanized environment, like I say, grades to run 15 million people. The idea that you have an American, a senior American politician saying, we are willing to just keep on bombing and bombing and bombing and bombing. On somewhere like I say, 15, 16 million people, one of the largest cities in the world, this is new. I would call it evil. I mean, our job as political journalists is not necessarily moralized like that. But I think you have to add that moral dimension to it because we've honestly not seen this. Well, certainly not in our lifetimes. And of course, Gaza is the precedent, but we're talking about something, a magnitude of order larger. Do you have an opinion on who's going to run out of the missiles? Because at the moment, you're talking about ideology. I mean, we're definitely going to get on to that in a moment when it comes to,

16:43is there an attempt to ferment a civil war because that's when that will really matter? But at the moment, it's sort of who's got the biggest military stockpile. I feel like I'm not in a position to judge. I wonder if you sort of got... Well, I think Iran's ability, or the Islamic Republic's ability to project power outside its borders, is clearly going to become increasingly limited. I think that's true. I must add, though, what Miranda said there in that clip about them having significant stockpiles, I also believe that. The problem is the launch sites. There's no point having a ton of missiles and kamikaze drones if they're in these stockpiles underground, and you know that the minute you have them above ground and there's a heat signature, you've lost that. They might even make a political calculation, which is don't use them. Stop using them from a while. Who knows? So I do believe that. I think they have substantial stocks, you know, to what extent can they keep using them? This is not about Iran winning. Iran can't win. Iran cannot win. Do you think the Iraqis won in the Iraq war? Of course they didn't. The point is, they don't have to lose. They just have to keep in power.

17:45The regime just has to keep in power. It has to keep some kind of political authority over its population. It has to keep some kind of structure with regards to its military. It just has to stay there. And they've not lost. And that is why I think the end game ultimately. I said about the possibility of a tactical nuke. I really believe that. The end game has to be a civil war and state breakdown. Because they're not going to be defeated while maintaining something which resembles a coherent, you know, centrally administered nation state. The United States has started a war with absolutely no plan. It's very clear. I mean, his meeting with Chancellor Merch yesterday Trump appeared to admit as much. I guess the worst case would be we do this. And then somebody takes over who's as bad as the previous person, right? That could happen. That could happen. Like, that's how much this guy has fought about this. In that same meeting, Trump said that he wanted a new Iranian leader from within the current regime.

18:49But that they'd killed all the candidates by accident. And we'll look into more detail at those claims, those comments later in the show. Crucially though, he also said he didn't want the kind of regime change we saw in Iraq, where the entire system was overgrown and civil war broke out. So that's what he's saying, you know, to say he's learned from anything is potentially an overstatement. But he's suggesting I don't want what happened to happen, what happened in Iraq to happen in Iran. So therefore, we're not going to try and, you know, completely dissolve the system. However, his actions, if we had to believe this report from CNN, tell a very different story. So according to CNN, the CIA has been working to arm Kurdish forces in order to spark an uprising in Iran. According to CNN sources, the Trump administration has been in active discussions with Iranian opposition groups and Kurdish leaders in Iraq about providing them with military support. A senior Kurdish official said that Iranian Kurdish opposition forces are expected to take part in a ground operation in Western Iran in the coming days.

19:51And the report says this. One person familiar with the discussion said that the idea would be for Kurdish armed forces to take on the Iranian security forces and pin them down to make it easier for unarmed Iranians and the major cities to turn out without getting massacred as again as they were during unrest in January. Another U.S. official said the Kurds could help so chaos in the region and stretch the Iranian regime's military resources fin. Still, others have centered around whether the Kurds could take and hold territory in the northern part of Iran that would create a buffer zone for Israel, so not hiding why that would be useful. This is just insane, though, the same basic. What we're going to do, we're going to arm the Kurds and they're going to distract the IRGC and then the Liberals in the cities. They can then have their protests and revolution without getting shot because all the guns will be busy in a fight with the Kurds in the North. It's just insane. It's insane on multiple levels. First of all, Reza Parlivi, who is the only alternative politically in terms of the current government,

20:55has said that one of his red lines is territorial integrity for the country as it present exists. Of course, if you're arming a separatist militia kind of undermines the argument and many of his supporters have been online, people I don't have the time of dayfall frankly, have been online saying this is awful, this cannot happen. So that's one thing. And of course, that would bleed through to the fact that if this did ultimately unfold, those protesters wouldn't be as naive as to think all of that. Those same protesters inside Iran, they very much exist, millions of them. Also see territorial integrity as a very, very important issue, very much a red line. So that's the first level. Secondly, why would you broadcast all of this? Again, it goes back to my point about propaganda. They are trying to demoralize the government, the regime. They are trying to demoralize people all the way down the chain of command from Larajani to a junior BCG who's a 20-year-old dude in Tehran, walk around a t-shirt, maintaining the rule of law, trying to maintain martial law. This is all to demoralize these people.

21:55So I think the fact that broadcasting this, which actually is something which many people who support regime change find abhorrent and don't support, in a way I think this is a signal of weakness. I know why they would do it. I'm sure they will do it, right? I personally have always said the plan is to create a failed state and bolcanize the country. Iran and game is Syria meets Yugoslavia. But I don't know why you would broadcast it and telegraph it at this point in the whole process. And I think to me, trying to think outside the box and maybe I'm wrong, is that it's kind of a little bit desperate. It is a very strange thing to broadcast because it's going to be very bad for the Kurds to have this broadcast because it obviously puts a big target on their head, on their communities. And not just from central government, but from the Iranians, but also from Turkey, right? Because look, Iran has a huge Kurdish population, actually, very large, and 10, 12, 15 million people, and they're not all separatists. This is a stupid thing. Remember, of course, Kurdish culture is a Persianic culture.

22:58They have noruz. They, you know, the Kurdish language is an erratic language. So there's slightly less tension than there is historically between Kurds and Turks. I'm not saying it's, you know, or apple pie and, you know, dances in the garden and tea parties, but it's a different relationship. But anyway, if you're Turkey and you're Erdogan, you don't want Kurdish separatists in a country which, you know, is very nearby, being arms the teeth and getting experience of gruel warfare and maybe even making some territorial gains, you'll stop that. So again, it just doesn't make sense to me. You're broadcasting it. Why? Yes, Tehran is going to get prepared. It's going to really undermine your message with your target audience inside the country, but also Erdogan and the Turks. All of a sudden, they have a trigger response, right? Wait, hold on. You're arming the Kurds. Absolutely no way. And I should also add, the Kurds repeatedly, poor people, they should have had a country after Versailles. They are a nation.

23:59The Kurds have repeatedly been used as a toy like this, as a tool by Western powers. And they are always let down. They're always murdered. They always lose out. The same will happen here. And of course, there are many people in Iranian Kurdistan who know that. They're not stupid. They read history. I've got an interview on this because, obviously, even if the United States are seeking to ally with Iran's Kurds, or if this is just some sort of ridiculous briefing, that doesn't mean that there are Iranian Kurds who want to play ball for many of the reasons you've just suggested. Today, I spoke to Sara Kamanian. She's a Kurdish-Iranian doctoral tutor in the Department of International Relations at the University of Sussex. And I asked her for her response to that CNN report. Well, first of all, I think we need to wait how Kurdish parties are going to respond to this, and whether there is any base. Because I think that the report was a bit, to an extent, a speculative and not actually very definitive.

25:03So it was mostly showing the US's desire to use the Kurds as its artillery, which we know, actually, they have had this desire, because something paradoxical about this war is that the US has been claiming, according to their national security document, the one that Trump wrote a few months ago, according to that, they want to avoid falling into the trap of another Iraq or Afghanistan kind of plan. But it can happen, because with the 12th-day war with Iran, they opened the Pandora box that no one exactly knows how it is going to be wrapped up the table, how this war is going to come to an end. So it might actually become quite inevitable for the US to enter Iran, and they would prefer someone else to do it instead of them, of course. So, of course, this is something that the US might be planning to do. But whether or not Kurds have decided to do that, or the scope to which they have decided to do, there is something else that we need not to really just speculate,

26:05based on what CNA report says. And the main reason for that is that, at the moment, as I said, both the Islamic Republic and their largest opposition, they are both securitizing any action done by the Kurds. On the other hand, the Kurds are being pushed into this, into a conflict. I mean, when you think about it, they are being threatened by the Islamic Republic by their opposition. Turkey is right across the corner. If there is a power vacuum, they might actually try to do another Rojava scenario come and occupy Kurdish regions. Israel has really, Israel benefits a lot from pushing the Islamic Republic into the point of becoming a failure state, of course, kind of bringing them into some sort of civil war in Kurdistan, could be, could be, could ignite that sort of tension. So I think there are many forces on the ground who are benefiting from pushing the Kurds into the security trap. It is into their interests.

27:06And whether or not the Kurds are actually willing to take up arms, they still need to do self-defense. The time might come that they need to be armed, that they need to take up arms. Where they're taking it, I mean, they already have some, but where they are being supported from, this is another question. But I think kind of thinking about the Kurds simply becoming proxy, as some people are referring to, it is proxy kind of forces of the U.S. is really not seeing the larger picture that they are being forced into the security trap. They might, at the time, might come that they might need to actually defend themselves. And a fact that actually the U.S. doesn't have a great record of supporting the Kurds. We look at the Rojava, right? They were once the U.S. allies in their fight against ISIS. And when it came to Giuliani targeting Rojava, basically, they received no support from the United States. So it's important to, I think what CNN report does, is that they are all playing their game into cornering Kurds. The point of being forced to take up,

28:08and then they have to basically seek it from Sombra, seek support from Sombra. This is, I think, the Kurds have the right to self-defense. They have the right to self-determination. But it's also important, as I said, I want to, I prefer to wait and see what the Kurdish parties eventually decide. But they have shown in the past at least good political wisdom in the sense of where they have to take up arms when they have to resist and things like that. So at the moment, I think, in a situation where even Arab states or NATO, they're trying to stay away from this conflict that no one knows whether there is an end into it. Kers should not be the people who pay the price. Yeah, but I think the way CNN reported it, they were trying to show it is something beyond that, something beyond self-defense, something about turning the Kurds into proxy forces of the US, which I think is a very unfair judgment to have at the moment. And I suppose it's their danger that sort of the idea

29:08of being able to do self-defense becomes self-fulfilling, I suppose, in a way. Because if you have this group of Kurds who, sort of, for the sake of self-defense have become armed, then that in itself becomes a reason for the Islamic Republic to go in and repress those people. Because they say that the fact that they're arming or trying to defend themselves, that is itself a pretext, a reason to clamp down on those peoples and that region. Exactly. Actually, some reports say that the Islamic Republic, IRGC, has also been trying to send forces towards Kurdish areas. So that might already, or that might happen actually in the near future. But there is another, as you said, this is one of the dangers of this sort of rhetoric, because they just basically motivate the Islamic Republic of all the more reasons to go and start a war in that area, which I think is something that the Israel has planned. So I prefer to insist on this aspect of the story

30:12that the Kurds have not yet decided to make any collaboration with any state, and if they do, still willing to distinguish between a situation where they are doing it after they're being attacked, whether it is just self-defense or whether it is something beyond that. But the situation is very paradoxical, as they can see, because, yes, of course, arming themselves, it can have security repercussions, but not being prepared, also, might have security implications. It's a very paradoxical situation that this conflict has put the Kurds in. The death of Ayatollah Hamanei. I mean, how will that have been received? I mean, obviously, Kurdish Iranians don't speak as one, but sort of in the Kurdish regions. So as far as I understand, as you said, the Kurds in Iran don't particularly feel recognized or represented by either the Islamic Republic or the Palavist opposition. So is it just a wait and see? Hold your breath moment. In a way, it is. Although the Kurds have always tried to be more proactive,

31:14so at least in these and some Kurdish parties already talking about the importance of trying to organize people, like grassroots groups, to be prepared to govern themselves, to organize themselves, if a power vacuum is created, instead of rushing into the armed solution and the armed solution could only be used if it is needed to defend this basically self-governing unit. So it shouldn't be anything beyond that. This is what, from what I've heard, some parties and also many kind of Kurdish scholars, activists, et cetera, are kind of thinking is the best way to go. Regarding the death of Hamanei, I mean, this is no hidden fact that most people in Iran, even those who are quite against, or even those who are suffering the war, are quite happy from the death of Hamanei. But at the same time, they don't have the luxury of being happy even, because they are under war. But there is a sense of desperation,

32:15I think, at the moment, among some people, that Hamanei has died. Everyone, for years, were kind of thinking that the moment of his death is going to be the moment of the overthrowing of a teocratic authoritarian regime. But now they're experiencing it under a condition of war. At the same time, if they have not collapsed, they're still talks of the possibility of negotiation. What if Hamanei has died, and also the state is going to be restored, which is actually something that also threatens the future of Kurdistan a lot. Because if they take up arms now, if they resist now, and the Islamic Republic end up being restored, then they are going to pay the price. And if part of this takeover power, and still they're going to translate these acts of self-defense as separatism, and they're going to attack them, is the U.S. going to support them, and that happens. Well, many things are still quite, security implications of them are quite high. So yes, as you said, mostly like a moment of people have to kind of wait and see.

33:15What's going to happen next? The contingency of the situation is really high. There are many things we cannot predict, and it seems that the U.S. has kind of, as we know Trump, he always keeps the discourse and the objectives of the complex. He enters in quite vague, so deliberately quite vague. So yes, the situation, I think, is a bit of a way we need to go with the contingency of the situation, and see what happens next. In a mind-blowing moment in Trump's meeting with Chancellor Merz of Germany, he was asked who he'd like to take over in Iran, now that the Ayatollah Hamanei was dead. Well, most of the people we had in mind are dead. So, you know, we had some in mind from that group that is dead, and now we have another group.

34:17They may be dead also based on reports. So I guess you have a third wave coming in. Pretty sure we're not going to know anybody. This is how much he's fought for it. Like, he's starting a war with a country of 90 million people who's a very big deal. Like, you're taking on a lot of responsibility again, and he's like, we killed him. The people we fought could take over, we killed him all. Whoops. And then there were another bunch who we fought, maybe could take it. Oh, we killed them as well. And there is a small group now who we think could maybe take over, but we'll probably kill them as well. And then we won't know anyone. Iran is a population of 93 million, I think. It's the world's largest Shia Muslim country. It sits on the world's second largest reserves of gas. It is the fulcrum in a broader Shia community of hundreds of millions of people in Pakistan, Iraq, Lebanon, hundreds of millions of people. And he's just going, we killed them all. And they're dead. There's more people, maybe they're dead. They're nuts. And we're very lucky that they only have two term limits, right?

35:18And maybe they're going to amend the constitution that this guy does the third term. I mean, he's pretty old. I mean, by the way, we're not talking about this on the show, but people are talking about cognitive decliner Joe Biden, including us, rightly so, it was happening. I kind of feel like he's losing the plot a little bit, right? I mean, there probably needs to be some kind of intervention at some point, maybe not now, but I think clearly within six months a year, I mean, he seems to be losing his marbles. And of course, if the plan all along was complete regime change, then killing the leadership and the people below the leadership and the people below them as well, I think it would be a mistake, but it could be coherent if that's the plan. However, I mean, in Trump's mind, at least in terms of what he's saying, that's very much not the plan. Venezuela was so incredible because we did the attack and we kept government totally intact. And we have Delcy, who's been very good. We have the whole chain of command.

36:19And they've been, you know, look, the relationships have been great. We've taken out 100 million barrels of oil already. And a big part of that goes to them. And a big part goes to us. And it's been great. We paid for the war many times over. And we're going to be running the oil. And then as well, it's going to make more money than they ever made. And that's great for the people. The relationship has been great. It's been seamless. Nobody's actually ever seen anything like it. If you look at Iraq, where very stupidly everybody was fired. The generals were fired. The military was fired. The police were fired. The fire departments were fired. And all of the government workers were fired. So after, you know, people would call. They had no idea. And by the way, ISIS was formed. That's where ISIS came from. All of the fired people. We don't believe in that. So, I mean, his analysis of what happened out of the Iraq war is not wrong. Right?

37:19What George W. Bush and the neocons did is they took out, you know, every element of the Iraqi state that was functioning and said, well, just recreate it from scratch. Now, obviously, what follows an action like that? State failure and civil war. Right? So even though Trump seems to be fermenting that, you know, on one level, he doesn't want that. Like, he seems like he wants, like happening in Venezuela, where there was someone from within the regime who took over, Delcivat Regres, who was a little bit more cooperative, I suppose, with Donald Trump. That's what he wants. He wants someone who's cooperative from within the regime to take over, so that he can, you know, I suppose sign a similar deal to what that which he had before in declared victory. However, Israel has other ideas. So this morning, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said that whoever replaces Hamina as Iran's supreme leader will be a quote, unequivocal target for elimination. So, Oh, Naren, in that press conference,

38:19you had a sort of coherent idea from Donald Trump of what he wanted. Now, is it a coherent sort of sequence of actions he's taken, probably not? But from there, he wants something like what happened in Venezuela. He wants someone from within the regime to take over who he considers it's easier to deal with. But Israel is saying, whoever looks like they might be in a position to take over from within the regime, we're going to kill them. Yeah. So I suppose there's two different interpretations. Does the Americans and the Israelis have different ambitions for Iran or are the Israelis being more honest than the Americans? No, I think the Israelis want a failed state. They want to reconfigure the regional order of West Asia. By the way, there was an article in one of the biggest outlets in Israel talking about precisely this, just overtly talking about it. Hey, you know, maybe the state system in this part of the world is over except for us. I don't think that Trump and the US are thinking in those terms. However, he is very wrong. You know, the idea that the Islamic Republic is anything like Venezuela.

39:19He has no idea what he's talking about. And I'm not saying that because I'm half Iranian. It's nothing like Iraq. Iraq was an autocratic, strong man. You take him out. You take that clan around him out. And then you had obviously that sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shia for a little bit. You have separatism. But the main problem ultimately came a more regional problem of Islamic fundamentalism with ISIS, right? But in terms of the sort of sedimentary leftovers of Saddam Hussein, some of it radicalized a lot of it, just wanted a normal country. The Islamic Republic of Iran is built on blood. When I say that, what do I mean? It is not just built on the historical martyrdom, the political theology of Shias and the Battle of Karbala. Also between 1980 and 1988. Maybe half a million Iranians died in that war. So when you've lost that many people, when that many families have sacrificed so much for something, it is millions of families. And veterans families in Iran are really looked after. The idea that, oh no, we're just going to give up now.

40:19It's not the same thing. There are many people. And again, I'm not talking about the majority of the country. We could be talking about five million people. Six, it doesn't matter. Who are deeply ideologically invested for personal reasons as well, for reasons of loss and trauma, who are deeply invested in this regime, in this government. It's not the same thing. Oh, we just take out this guy and replace it with this guy. Very, very, very different. And I think actually the Israelis do know that more than Trump and the Americans. And that's why they're actually saying, oh, the whole thing is, we need to have a failed state. That's the only way you're going to be able to deal with a government like this. You either negotiate them, negotiate with them rather, and have some kind of settlement. And of course, the Israelis would say, well, we can't have a settlement with them. They want to literally get rid of the state of Israel. There's some truth to that. Right? Or you have a failed state in your Balkan eyes, and you do Syria meets Yugoslavia. So they're both wrong in different ways. But they do want different things, yes. The bill on blood. Well, this is sort of where I was going to go in our first segment. But then we got sort of into a conversation about how young or not Iran was. Because that's what I brought up. But this idea that it's really important in Iran

41:22that it was built on blood. That was quite a long time ago. And I was sort of looking at the timelines. And the Iran war is about as long ago from now, as the Second World War was to the collapse of the Soviet Union. And you could really imagine someone saying in 1989, look, this is a society where, what was it, 25 million people? I mean, so many people died fighting the Nazis. And the whole identity of that state in many ways was sort of founded on being this sort of anti-fascist resistance state where the whole state was mobilized in this ideological cause. And it can be the case that sort of over time, what is presented as an ideological society below the surface just doesn't believe it anymore. Well, first of all, that is still the case in Russia. So the great patriotic war is still a major center point and kind of pivot for national identity and national political consciousness in Russia, right? And a lot of people that support Putin will think in those terms.

42:23It isn't quite the same because, of course, 45 to 89 is what is 44 years, 45 years. This war finished in 88. So what it's 38 years ago, it's a bit shorter, but it's a really important point. I would say that makes what's happening now even more relevant. Why am I saying that? My personal view is, and people might disagree, had the Iran or Iraq war not happened. I don't think the Islamic Republic would have endured as it has done. Without that founding myth, confirming the world's view of martyrdom, right? Without that founding myth, I think after Khomeini, Khomeini, rather, so I'm saying Khomeini so much, after Khomeini, after he dies, I think they would have had a transitional problem. And I think they probably would have become a more pro-West. I mean, pro-West like Reza Parlivi, but broadly a bit more pro-West, broadly a bit more pro-market, a bit more quote-unquote normal, right? I think some of the ideological edges would be, would be blunced a bit more quickly. That war and that loss of people

43:25generalized that culture of martyrdom, right? And it's really important to say that the Islamic revolution was really popular. There was a referendum. It was pretty fair. It was voted in for people really supported it. And then you have this horrible thing, 80-28. It was like 97% in favor, isn't it? It was crazy. I mean, does that mean it was fair or is that mean? Well, many people say it, but no, but many people say it was genuinely... There's no need to... I don't know, but basically the people that didn't agree with it have left the country. And in bloody campaign, they were so terrified. So nobody's going to say it's like, you know, indie ref in this country in 2014, but there was mass consent for it, among the people in the country. Anyway, without that, my view is the country, as it was, wouldn't have endured as a revolutionary stay, like the one we see today. And of course, Saddam is encouraged to invade by the Americans. I think arguably, one can make this argument, they're doing the same thing now. So you would say, without the Iran or Iraq war, the Islamic Republic wouldn't have lasted a couple of decades,

44:25probably would have burned out a little bit or reformed, would have had some kind of den figure, I think that's probably true. Same mistake today. Arguably right. If there's some kind of conflict, and they kill 50, 60, 70,000 Iranians, they flatten Tehran, I just think it's a reconformation of that world view. And I think it is in miniature, you know, a similar event to the Iran or Iraq war. So it is an ideological society. You're right, these things can be overstated. I think it's a little bit different to communism. Branko Milanovic is a great sort of argument around this stuff. He just says that communism made people really lazy, you know. In Yugoslavia, he says at the end in Yugoslavia, they had a really nice life and they were working three or four days a week. And ultimately, market societies have this fantastic mechanism of disciplining people, making them work, driving innovation. So socialism achieved what it wanted to do, but it also failed. Really, really interesting hypothesis. Anyway, this is different. Because in many ways, Soviet Union was a victim of its own success, right?

45:25The Islamic Republic is a little bit different. But I do think it's to return to this story in that clip. That crazy clip, Michael. I do think it's a very different kind of regime type to Venezuela. Have we got one more clip from that press conference? The whole thing was incredible. This is when Trump is asked whether the crown prints Reza Palavi. So that's the exiled son of the former Shah could take over Iran. This was his answer. I guess he is some people like him. And we haven't been thinking about too much about that. It would seem to me that somebody from within might, maybe would be more appropriate. I've said that. He looks like a very nice person. But it would seem to me that somebody that's there, that's currently popular if there's such a person. But we have people like that. We have people that were more moderate. You know, these were radical lunatics. And you know what they get? They get nothing.

46:25All they do is kill people. It's the same press conference where he said, oh yeah, there were some people from within the regime who we thought could maybe take over, but we killed them. And then there was some other, but then we killed them again. And now there's a few, but we're probably going to kill them as well. So there's some internal inconsistency. I suppose what struck me is just how he thinks this is Venezuela. Because that word for word could have been him talking about Maria Karina Machado. Yeah. Where he, you know, they're originally all these Venezuelan exiles who were saying, oh, Trump, please go invade Venezuela and then we'll put our hero Machado in power. And in Iran, there's all these exiles saying, please invade Iran and put our hero Palavi in power. Then Trump does it, invades himself. I'm not going to put your guy in power. I mean, they're not going to be able to control it. They've got no roots in the country. But it's word for word exactly the same. Now, over your Palavis, just as if you're a fan of Machado, you'd be a bit pissed off. This wall was done on false pretenses in many cases. I mean, there's many ways in which in Venezuela, it's he did work for him to some degree.

47:27It's probably not going to work in Iran. It's probably not going to work in Iran. No, but also you're saying that Palavis we pissed off that there won't be because they've constructed a completely alternative reality. They get their news from Iran international. You know, I think the Iranian diaspora in the United States right now is the most supportive base of Trump voters. It just is. So they've constructed a completely artificial reality. It's like a cult, right? And I think that will take a very long time to snap out of. But also, Michael, I'll be brief, who would want the job of being the top dog in Iran? Let's say you're Ali Day, you know, a former football superstar, European footballer played for Bayern Munich, hurt to Berlin, he's loved by Iranians. You can imagine him as a sort of, you know, the equivalent of like Klitschko in Ukraine. You know, above politics, breaks the country together. Why would he want the job? What the Israelis want? They just go bomb his house one day, kill his daughter, kill his granddaughter, kill his brother, his mother. Like, no, thank you. I'd rather just be like a national treasure. And the costs now of being in front-line politics in Iran are obviously very, very high.

48:29Everybody's trying to shoot you. Both sides, by the way, both sides. And the reason why Pallavi is not in the country, Reza Pallavi is not even in Doha, right? He's not even in Riyadh. He's nowhere near this because he knows that people will try and kill him. So how on earth is he going to run the country? The only way they can do that is that if they literally kill hundreds of thousands of people. And of course, that just creates more grief, relatives, friends, et cetera, right? Every person who dies is a recruiting sergeant for the other side. The whole story is just built on nonsense and incoherence and contradiction. But it's happening. It is happening because ultimately America has this awesome capacity for military violence. And it's willing to use it under Trump. So obviously Trump is completely incoherent. There's just one more clip on this I wanted to show where there was... I'm an account given that was coherent, I think. So this is Yalda Hakeem from Sky. And she gave sort of...

49:29She relayed a conversation she'd had with a member of the Israeli security establishment. They expect to basically do it that way for the foreseeable future. I just wanted to share a conversation I was having with someone from the Israeli security establishment. And they described it as this scenario not being regime change. They don't believe. And even before the strikes were launched on Saturday, they said regime change was just not something that they thought was possible. Unless there is a major surprise over the course of the next few weeks, there will be no regime change in Iran. They described it in a way that we've heard about other places that Israel has targeted. Mowing the law. So smashing everything for a few weeks, going away and then perhaps coming back in six months, nine months, just as we've seen, I mean the 12-day war was eight months ago, just as we saw then. And then when the Iranians basically re-emerged and regrouped

50:29and reestablished themselves, they've come back to mow the law again. And they expect to basically do it that way for the foreseeable future. I mean, that was very depressing, but it sounded plausible to me. You know, if you're looking at what are they hoping? Because obviously, yeah, one thing Israel could go for is state failure and state collapse, which I think they don't mind. I think they're up for that. But there are some risks with that. You get a lot of instability. Whereas it might be that they get the best of both worlds with this mow the law and strategy, which is, I suppose, what they did with Gaza, but they didn't try and overthrow her mass. They actually were quite happy for her mass to be there. And I suppose, you know, to do in some respects, delegitimize the Palestinian cause. And what they would do is just every now and again, they'd just do some carpet bombing and say, well, that will take them back a few years in terms of development. And I suppose Israel are trying to normalize a new world where they can do that beyond the borders of Palestine, right?

51:29Just loads of different countries in the Middle East. Well, they do anywhere right south-level. And they're getting a bit too big for their boots. We're just bombing for a while. You're mowing the law on, I mean, it's an incredible way of talking about human beings, isn't it? Of course, there are 93 million people reasonably sophisticated technological base. It wouldn't be easy, but you were absolutely trying to develop nuclear weapons, wouldn't you? Of course you would. I can't think of a set of conditions where it'd be more rational to develop nuclear weapons as quickly as you can. Of course, getting them to Israel, that would be hard. Some kind of dirty bomb. And people might be saying, oh my god, who's projecting fantasies of a dirty bomb in Tel Aviv? I'm just saying, if that's what Israel pursues and achieves, it's a very rational thing to do. This is, again, to use words that we shouldn't really use as political journalists. It's evil. What you're basically saying is we're going to create a failed state. We're going to create Afghanistan. And to repeat, it's sitting on the world second largest reserves of gas, the very strategic part of the world in terms of its location. Refugees will come to Europe. We'll have energy price spikes, but Israel doesn't care.

52:29It will kill all these people. And it will be funded by America. Of course, that won't go on forever, because it's losing support from the American public, but for the foreseeable, right? For the next five years. Certainly, for the rest of Trump administration, it will carry on. And I think this is where there has to be now a response from Europeans. You cannot have the Labour Party, you know, at Labour Conference with Labour Friends of Israel. So, well, we support Israel, but we don't support Netanyahu. It is a force for complete chaos in the world. Complete chaos in the region. Yesterday, Gaza, today, Iran, tomorrow, Turkey. Israeli politicians are being very clear about that. I actually look at this, and I think they kind of want to create ballpark 200 million refugees. I'm not your forarsers cheering it on. That won't be able to endure. I think it's too much of a contradiction. People are picking up on it too much. You've got some kind of rupee-low, politically entrepreneurial, spying opportunity. If you want to stop the boat, you've got to stop the wars. True, by the way.

53:29And he's saying, we shouldn't be making more Iranian refugees. And I won't accept any. No, I know lots of our audience won't like the accepting any bit. But the causality, at least, is a little bit more coherent than what forage and the rest of the right has been saying, basically, my entire life. So, you know, it sounds big and clever. But I think the costs of it are really, really high. And I try to be moderate and pragmatic. But we have to now think about a world where the rest of the world literally can't afford to have Israel. Right? It's not about Gaza, Palestine, or Iran. If they're just trying to create infinity-failed states and create tens, hundreds of millions of displaced people in Turkey, Iran, some say in Pakistan, Syria, the world, the global community, in particular Europe, literally cannot afford that. Politically, economically. We literally cannot afford that. You know, Israel is a luxury. What do they like to call it? Well, luxury belief. It's a luxury belief. If you think, oh, no, Israel should just be able to create, you know,

54:30infinity refugees and infinity global instability. Europe and stable, reasonable political life in Europe cannot afford that. It's a luxury belief. Well, Zionism is a luxury belief in North Americans. It is. The whole, because the whole point of it, if you're not aware of this idea of luxury belief, it's an idea mainly from the right, where it's saying middle-class people support things like abolish the police, because when the police are actually defunded, it doesn't affect the middle-class people. It affects people in working-class communities. You don't actually support these, you know, outlandish policies. There's not normally used on the left, but I think that is a very, I think, Zionism is a luxury belief in North Americans. Makes a lot of sense. There's a comment from a Bixia. Can't keep mowing the lawn if they shut down the oil trade. Which I think is, I suppose, that is Iran's strategy in a nutshell, which is to say, we are going to make the cost of doing this as high as possible so that, you know, you can't do it as often. Because obviously, the Palestinians and Gaza weren't able to impose that bigger cost when it came to mowing the lawn,

55:30especially not on the global economy, whereas Iran, by sort of hitting out at any US or Israeli ally in the neighborhood, they are significantly raising the cost of this. So, you know, as you say, and hopefully it will be the Europeans who sort of push back and say, well, the Chinese or the Asians, you know, saying, on our oil prices and our gas prices, to go up so that you can have your luxury project of expanded borders. You've got things you're helping, saying in bourgeoisie, enrich yourselves. It is glorious to get rich. That's what Deng famously said. Now, I'm on the left, you know, I'm not meant to be saying that. But that is generally where politics has meant to, you know, has kind of, that's what people claim to be pursuing on the center right in European politics. This is for closing that possibility. Dominantly, for Western Europe, Zucker Carlson said this yesterday, right? He said, the big lose and all this is Western Europe. And you've got the Western European right, shearing it on. I don't think that can last forever. And I'll say one more thing, Michael.

56:30Forever. For ever in the days, people at U.M.E. you have fizziness saying, well, don't you think it's right to a state of the right? Don't Jews have a right to a state in that part of the world? Don't Iranians have a right to a state? Don't Iranians have a right to a functioning state which can feed them and provide water like the rule of law? Don't Iranians have a right? Don't Lebanese have that right? Don't Syrians have that right? Don't Turks have that right? They're next, as I've said. Don't Pakistanians have that right? They would go for them already if they didn't have nukes. Don't these other countries have that right? Or is it just Israel? So I think in a way, Israel is completely discrediting the already stupid arguments which have been made to defend it. And I think Zionism... I don't know. Zionism on the one hand has never been stronger because it's propped up by this extraordinary military force with the Trump White House, obviously. But the political support and the kind of the logical arguments which you've underpinned it for a very long time, for 80 years, they're kind of evaporating. This will be the third year in a row I think where Israel will see net emigration. That is significant. It's only tiny, but this is a settler state.

57:32I don't say that as a glib thing. It's literally a settler state. If you're a settler state and people are leaving, that's probably not good. And I do think there's a contradiction here, Michael, between Netanyahu and 76, wants to create a legacy for himself when he's gone. I'm the man that got rid of Hamane and Assad and expanded Israel's borders, et cetera, et cetera. That might be in his interest, you know? Second only to Ben Gurin and the history of the Israeli state. Is it in the actual long-term strategic interest of Israel? I'm not so sure anymore. On Monday, Marco Rubio made this shock admission that confirmed the U.S. bomb Iran on the weekend only because Israel had already decided to. Does Congress have to wait? Is the President and does Congress have to wait? No. And is there an imminent threat? Did you tell followers that there was an imminent threat?

58:33There absolutely wasn't an imminent threat. And the imminent threat was that we knew that Iran was attacked and we believed they would be attacked that they would immediately come after us. And we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow before we responded because the Department of War assessed that if we did that, if we waited for them to hit us first after they were attacked and by someone else, Israel attacked them, they hit us first and we waited for them to hit us. We would suffer more casualties and more deaths. We went proactively in a defensive way to prevent them from inflicting higher damage. Have we not done so? There would have been hearings on Capitol Hill about how we knew that this was going to happen and we didn't act preemptively to prevent more casualties and more loss of life. Is there any time that I let it go? Why would we do that? So that was a completely explosive admission. He's saying, you know, sort of just completely confirming everything John Mayer-Schlimer wrote in that book, The Israel Lobby with Stephen Well, which is a very controversial at the time, they're saying that the tale wags the dog. He's literally saying that. Israel said they wanted to do this attack, which would have meant that, you know,

59:34some of our assets would have been retaliated again so we had to join instead of telling them not to. Now, Marco Rubio saying that seems to have very much annoyed Donald Trump because he gave a press conference where he was saying, no, it was me who actually for I forced Israel to. If anyone's strong armed anyone, it was me strong-arming Israel. So Marco Rubio probably got some angry texts, you know, someone's showing in his ear. And when on Tuesday, he tried to walk it all back. Yesterday, you told us that Israel was going to strike Iran and that's why we needed to get involved. Today, the president said that Iran was going to get it. Yeah, your statement is false. So that's not what I was asked very specifically. Were you there yesterday? Yes, I asked. No, did you, were you the one that, because somebody asked me a question and said, did we go in because of Israel? And I said, you were asking me, are you from the follow-up? And I said, no. I told you this had to happen anyway. The president made a decision. And the decision he made was that Iran was not going to be allowed to hide behind its ballistic missile program. That Iran was not going to be allowed to hide behind its ability to conduct these attacks. That decision had been made.

1:00:34The president made a decision to systematically destroy this terroristic capability that they had. And we carried that out. I was very clear on that answer. This was a question of timing. Of why this had to happen is a joint operation. Not the question of the intent. Once the president made a decision that negotiations were not going to work, that they were playing us on the negotiations. And that this was a threat that was untenable. The decision was made to strike them. That's what I said yesterday. And you guys need to play it. And if you're going to play these statements, you need to play the whole statement. Not slipping to reach an narrative that you want to do. I... He sounded... Very, very worried. Well, he screwed up on the one hand, right? In terms of staying in Trump's good books. But I do also think that him and Vance in the last couple of days, what particularly in the last 24 hours, have basically been signaling. They don't agree with this. They don't agree with this. And I do buy the argument, which is that when they have their... Till at the presidency,

1:01:35it will probably those two guys running for the Republican nomination next time, unless they change the constitution. I think this is an insurance policy having in my back pocket. I didn't agree. It was Trump. I love Trump. They're going to have to appeal to MAGA because MAGA has captured the Republican party. But this may be a... You know, a stain on the copy book. And they might need to say, well, I didn't agree with it entirely. And we were led into it by Israel and Paul Donald. Well, you know... Because Rubio will say, well, Venezuela, the one that went well, that was my idea. Iran, you know, Trump got love him. Yeah. Got a little bit overexcited. Well, you wouldn't even blame him. He doesn't even need to blame Trump, right? He just didn't say no to Benjamin Netanyahu when he should have... You know, he's not saying that this Trump's idea. He's saying, ultimately, this is, as you've said, the tail wagging the dog. I do find as well, it's just so transparent, the way he's saying, did you say this? Just trying to buy time. It was her, right? You remember, and it's like these are little tricks, we're trying to buy time, throw people off, no Marco Rubio, you said something which fundamentally contradicted the position of your president.

1:02:35They were at odds with one another. And people are going to pick up on that. It's an insurance policy. He's a very clever man, by the way. That wasn't an accident. He knows what he's doing. Someone else keen to go back on their comments about Israel this week was Democratic leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer. Though his U-turn was even more rapid. Do you think Israel, you know, forced the U.S. is hand here, box the U.S. and on this? Look, no one wants a nuclear war. No one wants a nuclear Israel, but we certainly don't want an endless war, plain and simple. What did I say? Nuclear Israel? Oh, no. Got it. Let me say that again. No one wants an endless war, but we certainly don't want a nuclear Iran. That's for sure. Okay? What point does the knockout do you just like? So much wrong with that. For a while, you've got the gerontocracy of the United States, where it's all like the Democrats, most senior guy in the Senate just isn't very coherent

1:03:36because it's a bit past it with all due respect. And then you've got this really cozy relationship with the journalists. We're like, are you sure you meant to say we don't want a nuclear Israel? And he's like, oh yeah, come on. Let's do that again. He does it again, where he's saying Iran instead of Israel. We shouldn't want a nuclear Israel, by the way. No. Like he was right the first time. I mean, I don't particularly want a nuclear Iran, but I don't want a nuclear Israel. Like, did I say we don't want a nuclear? Of course we have it with a nuclear Israel. It's a nuclear Iran, I don't want. No, it's terrible. I mean, there's an argument for a nuclear Iran, isn't that Boris Johnson famously made it, which is similar to Pakistan, India. You know, it's actually that has stopped the possibility of a conventional war breaking out. I think there's some truth that I think Israel will be much more rational in the region if Iran did have nukes. Of course, the problem is that Iran might actually use the nukes. However, I mean, Israel having nukes is just... It's a terrifying and terrible fact that has completely recalibrated world affairs. And they don't have any legitimacy in having them. You know, they develop them on the slide. They lied about them for years.

1:04:37People don't know this, but actually the French, whether the key players in the requiring nuclear weapons are an atomic bomb. In the Nagar Desert. And it's one of the grotesque misfortunes of the last... 50 years, Michael, actually, a bit longer. It goes back to the early 1950s. These are awful weapons and the worst people in the world presently have them. And they would say, well, if we didn't have it, then Israel wouldn't exist. Okay. You have literally the world's most impressive security agencies. You have limitless funding from the world's imperial superpower. What do you want? What do you want? What does it kill everybody? And to break down Turkey and Iran and Syria and Lebanon. It's sickening. But there you go. And by the way, here's an interesting one for you, Michael, because people on the left have always been against Britain having nukes. Right? That's been the argument. I think the exact plan is that you made that argument recently, didn't they? We should, you know, disarm. Whether it's unilaterally. Some people say it's unilateral disarmament. Britain gets rid of its nukes voluntarily.

1:05:38Or as part of a broader process of multilateral disarmament. It's historically been the labor position, even actually for the soft left. Britain should not give up its nuclear weapons as long as Israel and the United States have nuclear weapons. You'd be crazy. You would be crazy to say, let's get rid of our nukes, but Tel Aviv can still have them. No, thank you. Let's have them. We need them. We need them. They'd mow the lawn here. They would. They'll do it anywhere. They'll say, well, they're getting a bit too big for their boots in the UK. They've got a Pakistani Muslim mayor. He's saying some pretty bad things about us. We need to mow the lawn. No, thank you. We need nukes. And I'm not saying this lightly. This is really important. And I think actually the events of Ukraine and to a much greater extent here. I'm not taking a side on Ukraine's stuff. But it's a war in Europe. I think we can take a side on both. No, no, no. But my point is I'm not taking sides here. I'm saying that's a war. These focus the mind in two different ways, right? Because I don't think Russia is going to nuke Britain. Right. Right. Ukraine is a really horrible conventional war in Europe. That should focus the mind, firstly.

1:06:38First one if you take away the Yugoslav war. First interstate war on mainland Europe since the Second World War, right? That focuses the mind. This focuses the mind. The Israelis having nukes for me focuses the mind. Like maybe we need iron dome to stop these people. Maybe they're going to come after us. I mean, I'm being slightly flippant there, but the point stands. You know, this is a big question actually for the peace movement. I'm not a pacifist, but I have a ton of time for the peace movement, Michael. That post-war moment was entirely underpinned by US global hegemony. The idea that what we don't need to have a military, we don't need to have nuclear weapons, what because the US was fundamentally protecting you. Right. That's why that moment's gone now as Israel is showing in West Asia. And I'm being provocative and I'm saying it because our audience might not necessarily like it, but this is a hugely important question. Would you really get rid of nuclear weapons, as long as BB Nessinyar has the codes? I wouldn't. Yeah, I mean, it's a strange time to be arguing for a nuclear assignment away. It's sort of at this time when sort of, you know,

1:07:39well, it's the obvious argument. It's the most obvious argument against disarmament, which everyone's made, which is you only do want to do it if everyone else does it. No, but I mean, I'd go further. I'd go further. People are saying, you know, that we have often said, oh, look, the media, the caricature, this debate, would you press the red button and that would kill vaporized millions of people that would lead to some global armageddon? If Benjamin Nessinyar was pointing missiles this country, and he's going to nuke this country, I'm pressing that red button. I'm pressing it. There you go. There you go, BBC ITV, Sky, GB News, there you go. I'm pressing it. I'm pressing it so hard and I'm going to break the bloody thing. Are you doing the same thing for poo in and anyone, presumably? But I don't, they're not using, I would, of course, I would. They're not used, but actually, no, no, no, that's a really good point. I would put Russia and Israel hand in hand in terms of trying to reorder our near abroad. Israel far more so, actually, but that's pretty quite controversial. But in that, in that sense, they're similar.

1:08:48Regime change wars really go well. And according to the leading academic on air wars, bombing campaigns to replace governments don't just not usually work. They never, ever work. Robert Papers, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. And he advised every White House from 2001 to 2024. And he was speaking here to Sky. I have studied every air campaign since World War One. This is my specialty. I spent three years teaching conventional targeting strategy for the US Air Force. I've studied leadership decapitation in detail. I've modeled the bombing of Fordot, the regime change in Iran for 20 years. So there's something I know quite a bit about. And literally 10 days ago, I started on sub-stack the escalation trap because I worried exactly watching the Armada being built. We would fall into the escalation trap. And that's what's happened. We are now in the grip of the escalation trap or the smart bomb trap to be more precise.

1:09:49Where the illusion of the 100% tactical success, which is real. It's the success of the bombs blowing up the targets is not false. It creates the illusion of control of escalation. And that is the smart bomb trap. And that is what has gripped us right now. And the problem is that once we drop those bombs and once we announce regime changes are goal. And we had no other tools trying to do this from the air. This has never worked in over 100 years. This is not like it works sometimes or rarely works. I'm choosing my words carefully. President Trump is up against the weight of history here. And it's the illusion of the smart bombs being near perfect and destroying their target. And the problem is when those bombs fall, they inject, they change politics in the target.

1:10:51They inject nationalism into the regime. They inject nationalism into the society. And they essentially fuse the regime and society against the air power attacker. And this is what you are seeing because now society in the regime are taking more risky steps. And they do things that no one anticipated before. And that fact failure to anticipate the worst case that has happened numerous times with smart bombs. That's just what happened in the last 36 hours. That was Robert Pate, University of Chicago. It's supposed to sort of John Meersheim, a type of character. I have email Robert Pate. If you're watching this Robert Pate, do come on the show. I'd love to interview you. Very well put there though, right? I mean, the point being that regime change wars in general never really work. Very, very rare. But if you've got boots on the ground, there's a small chance it might work in your favor. So there's a small chance you will be able to rebuild the country in your image. You know, a bit like Germany or Japan, for example.

1:11:52But if all you want to do is bomb from the air. If you don't want to have any boots on the ground at all, as the Americans don't seem to want to, I mean Israel definitely doesn't have the capacity to do that. Then the chance is not just small. It's literally zero. Yeah. That's what he's saying. Yeah, so a few things in terms of air war. You know, the exact same figures in British politics who were saying, you know, just bomber on submission. The exact same people look at the blitz in the Second World War. They look at it as a moment of national togetherness and resilience. They say Hitler and the Luftwaffe tried to flood in this country. People never came together more. Why do you not think the same would happen in Iran? Which is Robert Peck's point, right? There is a dual reality here of seeking to destroy people, but actually the response is a different one. That's what we see. This is actually one of the primary criticisms that are made against Allied bombings of Germany, but Maharas and whatnot, the bombing of Dresden, Hamburg, Berlin, et cetera. They were not meant to actually undermine the German war effort.

1:12:54The whole point was to demoralize Germans. It literally didn't work. We have a ton of dates, Sean, it doesn't work. It's no different with Iran. And the exact same people who were aware of this argument with regards to the Second World War in this country are making it in relation to this other place. Thousands of miles away, presumably because they think they're less brave than we are. They're not like us. Well, no, it's exactly the same as Robert Peck's point, so eloquently explained. Let's wrap up there, Aaron Bistani. Pleasure spending an evening with you. Really, really fun. I was an on top form tonight because I slept five hours. Oh, you were very energetic. Very energetic for a man who only slept five hours. Up with my daughter this morning. And I must say, Michael, for people out there with kids or grandparents, partners, brothers, sisters, make the most of them. That's really what this whole thing brings home with me watching is that there's so much death and suffering in the world. You need to bring more joy and happiness into it. We need to balance things out. It makes me want to have more kids with my wife. That's for sure, but strange thing to say.

1:13:54But it's important to focus on the positives. My dog wakes me up in the night because the duvet has, she sleeps on the floor with the duvet on her. And the duvet, if the duvet falls off her, she winds until I wake up and put it back on her. How big is the duvet? It's a double duvet on a big dog. But it doesn't give me the same meaning for love towards the world and existence that you get from your daughter. So there's a message there about dog ownership versus parenthood. Thank you everyone for tuning in. Come back tomorrow for another livestream from 6 p.m. For now you've been watching the Viromedia. Good night. This broadcast is brought to you by Viromedia. Go to niviromedia.com slash support.