WAR: U.S. & Israel Strike Iran, Khamenei Killed | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

0:00Hey, what's up, guys? This is Dee. Could you do us a favor and check out our Patreon page. It's patreon.com slash the teamhouse. You get both Teamhouse episodes and eyes on geopolitics episodes completely ad-free You get them early too. You can ask us questions. You can also watch the teamhouse episodes live as we shoot them. So And you help support the show and support what we're doing here It's patreon.com slash the teamhouse those links are in the description or if you're listening It's in the show notes down below. So you can click it real quick and easy and it helps us keep the lights on So we appreciate it and we appreciate you guys listening. Thanks a bunch Hey everybody welcome to another episode of eyes on geopolitics. I'm here with Mick Mulroy Jonathan Hack and Andy Milburn should be joining us soon Lock going on. I mean you guys have been glued to your phones and your TVs just as much as we are I'm sure if you're watching a podcast about you know geopolitics The huge new story was the US and Israel launched a strike on

1:04Iran killing the supreme leader Ayatollah Kamani Iran came back retaliated and you know shot ballistic missiles and drones that basically everybody in the region Israel and like there's like nine countries I think at this point that they've tried they've hit and tried to hit UAE's Began smoke too, which is interesting. I'd love to know why that's like UAE has gotten just almost as much as what Israel's gotten in terms of like firepower retaliation back towards them Yeah, fluid situation obviously is she'll just launch another a bunch of a strikes again in Tehran right now like as we're recording this like 11 a.m Eastern So yeah, well, I don't know guys. I mean that's like the cliff notes real quick version What do we got Mick So to start with I'd say I do support the strikes I do support the strikes. I am very happy to see that the supreme leaders no longer with us

2:07I'm sure people have seen it on social media if they didn't know it already, but the the laundry list of things that the Iranian regime has been responsible for is extensive and each one of them I think Needed to be addressed whether it's the Beirut Brahmins the the amount of soldiers sailors Airman Marines killed in Iraq Thanks to Kha'am Salamani who was obviously being directed from above I think it was a long time coming that there are issues around it. I would say We all thought that they were we're gonna see a meeting on Monday. So tomorrow Which would have been I think at Vienna and there was going to be getting down into the technical experts Which meant to most people that the negotiations was going at least in a positive direction You generally don't get to the technical experts unless you could create on the principles or framework of the agreement, right? So I think there'll be a question about the U.S. and negotiations and whether you can

3:11Essentially trust that the negotiations are in good faith. Don't know if that was not the case But I think it'd be fair to say that some people say kind of looks like you were negotiating just to prepare for the inevitable in your mind Again, I support the strikes, but I think that's going to be a question the the other issue that we saw all of a sudden start being said is This idea that there was an imminent threat to the United States I don't have access to the intelligence now, but it was kind of like wait Where does happen? They have an ICBM that can reach the United States never heard that before. I think that had more to do if you look at the War powers act it talks about the president's ability to use military force an imminent threat is part of that Ability, right? So they basically some lawyers said just say imminent threat continuously, right? And again, I do think I did sports strikes I do think they were going toward a nuclear weapon. There's no reason to enrich uranium to the level they did

4:12You know a thousand pounds about 60 percent. We didn't even know where it was So I do think there was real issues being addressed, but I think that part is going to be questioned It's going to be an investigation not investigation, but they're certainly going to look at Well, where's the intel saying that this was an imminent threat? Where's the intel saying that they were getting close to being able to deliver The you know weapons to hit the United States because we just never had heard that before Other things to to talk about obviously, you know the tactical level You know, I was reading this morning at several friends telling me that it was a real combination of intelligence fusion that led to this massive success of taking out Homan E the Minister of Defense IRGC commander their equivalent of national security advisor and go down the list is I think there was up to 40 senior people that were eliminated and it apparently was a great combination of the Masad obviously which focuses almost exclusively on Iran and the CIA and

5:17And the original strikes were substantial And of course, we're trying to diminish the the nuclear program and one thing about you know I'd say a cautionary tale for future politicians who were undoubtedly not heed my advice is don't exaggerate things Right, because you end up your exaggerations then hurt you in the future, right? So if you obliterate something and then you can't say there's an imminent threat that it's about to be reconstituted because it's at the terms don't actually Right, so I know people the media is making a lot of head of that probably rightly so, but it's if it's a cautionary thing Just say what actually don't lie. Yeah, don't exaggerate Right So what are we doing now and okay, so we saw the attacks they were it is a war of choice So they're he's gonna have the president's got to explain that to his side of the the party that is More isolationists and under the idea that we should stay out of force

6:17But that's that's his murder bear the retaliation. I'll say one more thing about that and then throw it over to you guys And before we started, I think it'd be great to have John as an explain the secession that comes with the spring leader But the the last thing I'll say before pausing is it the Iranian response There's a couple of things one it looks like they were going on orders and then once the decapitation happened They just did it right and they made a very big strategic blunder. They attacked the civilian populations and almost every country in the region So these countries who either were promoting diplomacy were trying to avoid The actual conflict itself are now formally on the side of the US and Israel in fighting Because I mean we saw that the Shahid drones and slamming into Hotels and Dubai and skyrise civilian apartment complexes in Bahrain and that was a huge strategic mistake

7:21And so I think that that is something that we're going to have to see and now we're seeing this Non-stop rhetoric about some supersonic weapon system that's going to be used Probably today or tomorrow by the Iranians that is going to cause all sorts of death and destruction So we'll have to see where this goes. I would hope that the US takes the opportunity to say okay We took out the supreme leader Let's stop and Let's go to the negotiation Of course, you're going to need to have to agree to this but look for an opportunity to offer up this because if it continues too long It's going to have major impacts around the world about 60% I think of the traffic's already down go with the straits of her moats It is in an oil is going to skyrocket a lot of bad things are going to happen and of course If the Iranians really view this as an existential threat to their regimes existence They're going to use every possible means available. So clandestine attacks terrorist attacks against not only military and diplomatic

8:23Facilities in personnel, but civilians and they do have the ability and I have penetrated inside the United States So there's a lot of reasons why the US and Israel should take the win if you want to call that And see if there's a way out of it again, the enemy gets a vote and Iran has promised specifically later on Johnny to To retaliate pretty strongly. So we're gonna we're gonna see what this goes. Can you blame them? I would I would expect going scorched earth. They just like their 87-year-old supreme leader just got smoked including like another dozen or so top guys What are they supposed to do? Right because your goal is regime security obviously Yeah, if any and any other point to that day is I mean it's a 5,000-year-old civilization It's almost important human history yet 47 years. They freaking destroyed it and 37 of those 47 years Chomene was in charge of it So they've brutal the only thing they're good at is brutalizing the Iranian people to stay in power

9:25That's it right. Yeah, they can't run a country. They run out of water They have one of the biggest oil and gas supplies in the world. You they can't they their economy is Is well, that's because they were sanctioned right? I mean I'm not saying I was mentioned because of their actions their Regions I'm not like crying over fucking Kamani being small. I could care less What I care about is like the blowback and we are not seeing What's happening now across the region? We have no plan. It's almost like it looks like 2003 was like a masterstroke in Iraq compared to what's going on right now frankly You know, there's gonna leave a obvious power vacuum and we're gonna talk about this this session and what that's gonna look like I don't really know what the point of this was to be frank I don't really I mean I understand Kamani being a bad guy and and the regime as a whole being horrific But if we really cared about the protesters of some whatever it is 30,000 people that have been killed

10:28Why didn't we start doing this a month and a half ago when the protesters were at the protests were at their height and The regime actually looked like it was really on its back foot Frankly like as the layman here and I told this to John before we started You asked people like I've asked friends of mine who are like, you know, they just read headlines really and they don't really Understand or care about the nuances of foreign policy and geopolitics They honestly just blame Israel and frankly to quote them. It's like the Jews run us That's what they said to me like layman people right Uh Obviously, I don't agree with that. I think Israel's a belligerent actor and all this but I I can obviously You know, you could differentiate Israel IDF BB Netanyahu the right wing of them that party and like regular Jewish people like most people don't want war um But frankly like in terms of like the person on the ground

11:28Who pays the taxes that does this They don't understand what the fuck's going on and they think that Israel is our daddy here for lack of a better term I mean I'm gonna start saying people are anti Irish if they disagree with me because it really doesn't And I mean, that's a that's a weak argument man Like you can disagree with people and not be you know anti-Semitic or racist or whatever Whatever moniker you want to use and obviously, I mean most American Jewish folks disagree with the policy of Netanyahu Sure, I'm sure and frankly there is there is an argument there to say that Netanyahu is also a war criminal. So But from the Israeli perspective, I mean, let's face it They have dealt with proxies that have attacked there almost them almost non-stop to include on October 7th Uh, then Joey didn't buy the Houthis and the in Hezbollah and Yeah, they're gonna want to get the United States to help them To to grade if not destroy their enemy. I would

12:31So I see it from their perspective. I mean, we can go into how they conducted the war in Gaza God knows we have the expert right there Andy Seriously, and I mean that Very essentially, but the idea that Iran is a threat to the Israelis is clear So I would if I was in their shoes. I would have loved to try to get my big brother to roll in there and Help me take out what and do what they did and I do think the United States had the justification I mean nobody ever but nobody ever gives like any blame to the Iranians here They could have actually negotiated in and agreed not to have a nuclear weapon And they wouldn't have the sanctions against them that they do and they wouldn't have to brutalize their own people You just said they killed 30,000 of their own people, right? So what about the what about the actual culpability of the Iranian regime? It's almost like it's like al-Qaeda where they get a complete pass. It's just all all the criticism is Is to the countries reacting to their actions Uh, and I think I think they need to

13:32Well, the countable and they were held accountable. Well al-Qaeda is a terrorist organization and Like it or not the regime is the leadership of a sovereign country, right? Um, so I think there's a little bit of difference there um as well as like Capable culpable for their own actions. I completely agree with you guys are we a terrorist organization, so right my my standard of Of actions and somehow different than every other human on earth, right? If you if you're gonna commit murder And you're gonna attack another country stand by for being attacked back Right And you can't use proxies to try to avoid Responsibility that that they should be over and as soon as that happens then proxies will be less effective Sure, I mean well like I think it's arguable that after October 7th and this the the What israel's done not just in Gaza, but in Lebanon and in Syria and Iran back in the 12-day war that and the us in the red sea like that The proxies in Iran are the weakest they've ever been in terms of like being a threat

14:38It's definitely to our homeland like um But you know even in the region. I would say that like hezbollah got smoked essentially Asshara hates fucking Iran and we and israel still bombs them um So I would I would argue that the Iranian proxies are the weakest they've ever been In the last why it's that the case Because Israel did Right you you they attack Israel Israel attack back. Yeah, but I don't think this is like it's not I mean It's not I don't know ideologically shifted space and decided not to be an enemy of Israel in the United States. It's because they got their ass kicked That's what happened Right Yeah, I just don't know you know the capitating strike on a on a sovereign leaders thing You know international law. I mean that's been a myth in the last year anyway It's just things we uh We've never really done before and like now like we're going to a place where like we you know

15:38We're acting more like israel where it's just like you know they can just they assassinate whoever they want whenever they want um But yeah, I don't know. I just don't and plus again like I'm going to come back to the planning Like in terms of the fallout and what comes back and the blowback right because hezbollah supposedly has agents everywhere That you know there's a huge diaspora of Lebanese people in America So I would argue that the homeland is more at risk now with like a rudderless ship and some lunatic Let's say rrgc guy taking over in terms of like attacks on the United States of America actual like United I live in new york, you know what I mean? So it's like That's an you know compared to what it was with like this, you know He was a jerk off and I'm not sad. He's dead. I don't care one way or the other um, but like this sickly 87 year old who like kind of was You know Our best case scenario in terms of that regime and you know, that's crazy this you know, it's a little wild to say but Some like 50-year-old crazy irgc commander coming to power. I don't know if he's gonna be like the

16:44The kind of guy we want to negotiate with like a real sage person. That's like thoughtful and considerate in terms of like Global you know global order and the rest of it, but I don't know I think it just can be messy and I don't think we've really learned our lessons from Iraq or Afghanistan frankly And we're in a worst position in Iran right because we don't even have a ground force there And there's 90 million people there. So even if even if you know the Kurds and other groups come up and like Be back like the like the hardcore regime people How do we you know this is gonna probably devolve into civil war Right most maybe I mean most likely. I can't see this being apt. I haven't a happy ending. Anyway John what do you got? I was interesting to listen to um Yeah, I'm thinking about you mentioning the geriatric 80-year-old ruling the country thing is uh that guy's been ruthless since day one and it's easy to look from the outside in and and kind of think about how it affects the the world

17:47And ignore how it affects the inside of the country and since he became First president and then Ayatollah he was right there directing every death every killing He signed the death warrants of 3,000 people in 1988 where they executed Mujahidini Kalk You know frankly, that's a wild cult the Mujahidini Kalk But there's still people there was zero trial no due process They were basically these little slips of paper that had a person's name on it and a single box where you just check Yes, and they get executed and actually Reisi who who died tragically for himself an helicopter crash a few years ago was the one of the judges that was signing those slips of paper And the reason I mentioned the Ayatollah and Reisi who were later on politicians All of them started out as these blood-thirsty revolutionaries who wouldn't take no for an answer no matter what And when the revolution happened in 1979 there were actually eight different groups that were part of the revolution One of those groups is what the Islamic Republic of Iran Came from the other seven were violently suppressed to become extinguished the only ones that survived were the

18:53Mujahidini Kalk in in any big number that actually matters and they were actually pushed out of the country And they went to go to Iraq and when Saddam invaded Iraq the Mujahidini Kalk that remained in Iran helped Saddam come into Iran And there's that that long history is very important for thinking about today We think about the Ayatollah today that he's this old man, you know Can barely walk There's a reason his left arm doesn't work And it's because he was almost assassinated in 1981 for the things that he did to other Iranians So since day one he has been a target other Iranians because Iranians have been a target of him Andy Just imagine he's ready to go I can tell No, yeah, I've been that I've been following and learning with great interest. Yeah, I mean I I believe I We need to get Occasionally people on who um who don't know what they're talking about so that we can have to suffer as arguments, right? Maybe I don't know Andrew Fox or someone like that but because I'm absolutely on board with everything that making Joe on the set But I'm not going to simply rest at that. I'm going to say what's kind of interesting

19:56uh You know to to kind of sum up what everyone has said so far look the death of Khmeri From illegal and ethical standpoint Justified. I mean that's the general argument here within the group. I think You know based on all the things that have been said plus from a kind of a perspective of national interest It say it's a debt some consider long overdue for Iran's support of pro-Iranian militias within Iraq, right? Which resulted in substantive US casualties We all know that from the development of EFPs back in what 2005 2006 All the way up to the the fight against ISIS right and and beyond when we've been continuously having problems and incurring casualties from Iranian back militias and so so this didn't come out of the blue. I mean we there is a ledger

21:00That Khmeri has established and not not just vis-a-vis his own people in terms of brutality but in terms of of his proven Antipathy to the United States and which has resulted in in US casualties and in the past so I could just say sitting that right but one thing I would say A question going ahead and I'll be interested here both John and Mick on this is you know, how does this fit into We we understand what You know is Israeli views are is really israel is always very on point when it comes to pursuing their strategic objectives and they have Always portrayed Iran as as an existential threat to Israel whether you believe in that 100% will not Doesn't matter. It's the fact that is that's israel's standpoint on this israel views Iran's regime particularly It's nuclear missile capabilities as and the next it then existential threat of course

22:00You'd have to have a convoluted kind of chain of thought to regard think of both of those either of those as existential threat to the United States, but certainly a threat to US interests Um israel justifies targeting, you know, the leadership of an IGRC infrastructure Uh as as a continuation of the war that they've been involved in several years and this frame does degrading some Iran's capacity to protect our In the region all right all of that we understand as israel strategic interest very clear, but what are ours at this point, you know, so um I the aside from the president reaching out and directly to the Iranian people and trying to encourage an uprising um coming out of the Pentagon though It's very clear that the framing emphasize it's preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons Um defending American forces and allies from Iranian missiles and proxies in the region. That is how we frame this um But what do we expect to see next so

23:01So So I would you know what we've seen is is Iran's IADs they integrated air defense system totally stripped right and that was the goal presumably apparently by today Um we've gone after Command and control nodes we've gone after leadership and I believe we've also gone off to nuclear facilities But what uh what do you guys think is is the end state number one number two Are we only seeing Part of this Do you think Do you think there is there is stuff going on on the ground of the cova nature to encourage I a A regime change to take over because we've all talked about on this show the fact that bombing alone no matter how effective is is not going to The guarantee shift of balance of power domestic balance of power within Iran. So How does this all fit do you think into the end game at the end game? um the last piece I mentioned you know deep brought up there

24:02Is there an element of this that is purely purely punitive going after Iranian officials for what they have done to their own people or or again is this part of a A concerted effort for regime change what it would you guys thoughts based on what you know what you've seen on the ground So I think um one I you know I would join the chorus that the president could do Himself uh emanation A favor by really sitting down and explaining what the plan is there Generally speaking that's done well in advance perhaps it was a little bit of deception And that's why uh he hasn't so okay Now it's there's no deception needed we're obviously engaged in fall on conflict So I think that would be helpful there might be in what what he might say is that the US is prepared To do militarily what we can't do diplomatically Well, we are prepared to degrade any time they try to build up their nuclear facilities

25:05We're we're ready to hit them Every time we think their ballistic missiles reaches a critical mass because obviously quantity is also an issue when it comes to dealing with the threat They can mass them in other words And that is what causes all the death and destruction and is ruling on now what we can see in other countries And of course if the regime is going to continue its nonstop Not only threats against israel the United States in the west but actions right by supporting proxies that will attack all the above And let's remember hezmullah was responsible for more american deaths Than any other group until 9-11 right So um that might be what they say With the end goal hopefully being to get back into the diplomatic sphere and end up with an agreement That we can all live with and That uh allows the Iranian people to essentially kind of escape the yoke of these Maximum pressure campaign and sanctions, but also gives the world

26:05Assurances that are on will never get a nuclear weapon and will stop using proxy forces to attack its enemies in the region So I think they're I think there could it can be explained um But of course the enemy gets a vote So what is there i'm going to do are they gonna are they gonna accept this Is president trump going to look at the venezuela model as Okay, so i'm not really going to support the opposition I'm just going to deal with somebody for practical reasons that are going to be You know like the you're delsy or odd reguses of the world. Is there somebody like that? Is there is there any possible way that the the what's left of the regime? Would be amenable to that. I think Jonathan she can't do that Um, but there's a lot of questions out there But I think the first thing we could do uh the president could do the white house could do is to sit down explain Why we are where we are and where we hope to be headed for this Yeah, I'll piggyback right on there. Yeah, so i'm thinking about

27:05There's two possible outcomes of this one is a change in the system Which is a new government and the second is status quo Which is remnants of the current government remaining like you were mentioning With the venezuela model The problem here is that venezuela model can't work in Iran Because the regime is so entrenched and it's so monolithic and as far as as it's you know the shields are stuck together Just like a phalanx as far as this regime is concerned And they're all in survival mode every single one of them shares very similar views and those views aren't Perhaps to other people surprised they aren't necessarily religious. They're survival minded There are certainly clerics were you know fanatic religious folks, but there are very wealthy You know Very powerful individuals in Iran that benefit only from the existence of the regime in any form And as long as that system stays there those people will remain corrupt and empower the Central bank will continue printing currency left and right continue destroying every day iranians lies If you go right now into a grocery store and I saw this last weekend in Iran

28:07You have to use a payment plan to pay for yogurt It's become so expensive and currency is so devalued You cannot purchase it with money, but because they're not part of the swift banking system You can't use a credit card either So you have to do a payment plan where you promise to pay for your yogurt over the next month Which is insane I mean, that's just a tiny little speck of like how how this regime is treated some people because like you said They've had plenty of opportunities to come to the negotiating table to the last 47 years and say all right We're gonna change how we're behaving and they've never done it except once which was during a JCPOA where they changed one element Just one element of how they conduct foreign policy, but still continued instigating and antagonizing people in the region and the world Let's go back to the two options So if we have the IRGC remain like you mentioned the Venezuelan model What you're going to have is people like Ali Lara Johnny, Abbas Aragchi, Mohamed Bhagra Gali Baf Yeah, yeah, Savawi named some of the listeners might never heard before But if you watch the regime for a long time these are people that you don't every time you hear these people's names

29:09You shudder because these are the people that have been holding power the entire time when you see the itola up there In his elderly state talking on a Friday to the people That's not who's in power and has not been in power the people in power are those names I just mentioned those would be the people and by the way, those are the people that are still alive. They were not killed yet yet Those are the ones that if we hand over power and say oh, they're these pragmatic people Ali Lara Johnny He's the speaker of the house or Gali Baf is the speaker of parliament Laurie Johnny's supreme national security. Oh, these are pragmatists politicians absolutely not these guys have had the levers of power We've talked about this in the past about the Sapahis or the guardians These are the guardians these are the ones that have been ruling the country It would be an absolute mistake to hand over the keys in a legitimate fashion like oh now we actually recognize that you are our brokers The the country won't just status quo it'll get worse Because now they've been exposed and that there's nothing to hide behind anymore. They'll say well now We're in power and you have to do exactly what we say there's no more secrets There's no more hidden black market where the IRGC controls 80% of black market now will be 100% of black market because they will be the government

30:16Will legitimately the government in their eyes and in our eyes if we legitimize them that would be a huge mistake Yeah, I think it's fair Right John that the Since 1979 The regime has Has focused on developing built-in redundancies right? I mean through parallel institutions. So you mentioned um the the IRGC and the real power brokers behind there um, you know, they act as a they act as a check of course on the on the regular conventional armed forces And then you've got the besiege and the specialized units um, who backed the regime and and then the whole you know the layer of civil security in there intelligence bodies You you brought up a really interesting point about the economy. So uh Although the civilian population is clearly suffering heavily from the state of the economy

31:19Isn't it true to say that the regime itself has kind of the economic networks built in as buffers, right? I mean the IRGC has its own linked enterprises smuggling networks And then there are kind of quasi-government bodies right that The manner social services economic projects By outside state channels and continue to function Yeah, these are called banyads and they're kind of like private equity firms at in equivalent to the united states There are worth over 150 billion 200 billion 300 billion There's one called khatam al-ambia, which is the construction jihad headquarters. That's what it is in english That's this giant multinational conglomerate that has offices all over the world. They have These shell companies holding companies in places like Hanberg, London They even have bank accounts in the united states They're they're completely evaded the sanctions regime that is designed to stop them And in fact, they've enriched themselves because they're the only actors that have access to the money Which means like they control that scarce resource and inside of Iran

32:22There's these groups that are supposed to support poor people or poverty All that money gets funneled into regime pockets all of it And even the central bank of Iran back in the early 2000s There was a big scandal because the director of the central bank fled to canada with 3.6 billion dollars How do you flee with 3.6 billion dollars? That's not really a thing you can bring with you in your pocket That means a bank transfer was facilitated and approved by a Canadian bank Right, how is that possible if they're not part of the swift system? Right, and it's because they're able to get around all these sanctions with what they're doing And we can have a whole episode on how they do that because I've studied that in great detail But they are able to do it and the mechanisms exist and states allow it For example, Germany is a big facilitator of this regime money that flows in and out of Iran You've got the children of all these regime leaders The ones I just mentioned like Larry Johnny, Kali Baf, even Khamenei Their kids live in canada, London, Paris And they have Instagram accounts so you can see them They're all wearing Louis Vuitton, bikinis, zero hijab at all

33:23I mean, they don't look Muslim right But you have these guys talking on the TV as if like Islam is the end and that's it And their kids are in Paris at a pool party posting on Instagram Right, so what it really comes down to in reality is corruption You have this small group of highly corrupt individuals who will never change I mean, you can't come up to a corrupt billionaire and tell him, hey, can I just get your money back please They're not going to do that, right, there's only one way to go Right, and I think these people see it like for example if you see Larry Johnny currently speaking to the public He's right now like the number one guy that's kind of leading the the existence of the regime In the media and he's talking about like we'll do everything we can to survive I mean, he's telling the truth they will do everything they can to survive The question is how much longer than can they survive What's that target list look like that we have what's that spreadsheet look like Like remember back during the war we had the joint prioritize effects list I'm sure his name's on there with an objective name And I'm curious how long is he going to survive on that spreadsheet So these barnyards I mean that you obviously just described it

34:25Is it a lack of will for countries or whether it's Germany or Canada or Or is it to just they just are being deceived uh It's deceptive and they just don't know what they can't I mean can you explain that maybe we should send this to the Treasury Department The section right there Yeah, actually we just in class at Yale Law School had the Assanctions and money laundering experts speak to us is very interesting Listen to they were talking about cartel money, but it's a very similar situation where walkovia bank for example There was a big scandal because walkovia bank got find several billion dollars for facilitating almost much of the cartel money Between the US and Mexico And the problem there are two problems one problem is a self-interest of the bank Because they collect fees from all this money So that we they don't want to Screw dies that I mean they're making a lot of money That's one issue the other issue is on banks like this like walkovia or bank of America for example They have trillions of dollars of assets moving through daily Daily, I mean, how can you track every one of those dollars on that spreadsheet every day you can't

35:25So it's a very tough kind of cat and mouse game if you if you care about it if you want to stop it It's very hard to do it especially when there's one degree of separation between the sender and receiver Let's say you've got a a small subsidiary bank in Hamburg that sending money to Paris Well, if you're the Paris bank, it looks like it's coming from Hamburg. It's hard for you to know who sent that to Hamburg Now add a second layer in there and you and the the amount of Complexity you can introduce by adding two or three layers between sender and receiver. It's it's hard to even dab them I'm not making an excuse for the bank because on the other side It's that really that first reason in the beginning why they didn't scrutinize it to start and that's because they're making money off of it Right, I mean their their corporations It's it's normal for a corporation to maximize the value of shareholders And that's what a holding company for a bank does. Yeah, well, I wish this to say that you know the Iranian The whole regime system is is just built to withstand sharks, right? It's built for redundancy and resilience and and that is That's a significant problem when you're talking about regime change as potentially being a strategic

36:30Objective for the United States, but with his midpoints now. We don't know if it is yet That was just something that they were talking pondering because of what the president His address to the Iranian people Hasn't addressed the American people yet, but he's addressed the Iranian people Well, we did the same thing with the authorization of use of military force to kill Kossum Soleimani If you read that document It's about Saddam Hussein and Iraq and Iraqi forces in Iraq And that was the document that was used as legal justification for that assassination Like right or wrong about the assassination the document they used does not connect to the action right so how's that legal Well, that's the thing I mean if you're the one writing the rules and nobody stops you everything's legal, right? Yeah, and like you we've seen like the messaging from the administration even before the Strikes happen It's yo-yoing all over the place. It's the protesters and it's nuclear weapons then it's you know proxies There's no real you could put them all together sure But there's no real like actual plant in terms of like why we're doing this and to what end is there

37:35Because it does sound like they're extremely entrenched and we don't have half a million troops You know driving down main street in Tehran to like start to unravel this so Andy I remember a few weeks ago maybe a week ago you mentioned about like Moan the grass was like every time another guy pops up Like oh, he's the new IRGC guy. He's the new iatola Will smoke him too and like we'll just do this game forever And another bit about the nuclear program Sure, no one believed it was obliterated or whatever they said back last year But a bunch of nuclear experts had mentioned that like their nuclear program had basically stopped had basically like pause and definitely after that So to bring up we had with cough last week as well talking about there is a week away some bullshit is really talking point There a week away from having deliverable shit like There's no clear messaging here and frankly like when you send Steve with coffin Jared Kushner to be the negotiators I don't I don't have a ton of confidence in that group gonna be honest

38:38I'm sure they'd be great at negotiating a lease for a hotel person or some bullshit like that. That's good great This is like real deal foreign policy that's extremely nuanced extremely complicated um So yeah, I'm not exactly Confident in this administration and their plan or lack of thereof On what happens next and frankly, I think we're more in danger in the homeland right now than we ever will then we ever were Three days ago Gotta be honest, but I'm an idiot. I don't know Who wants to take that up? Jump in here so we're talking about the nuclear enrichment stuff You were talking about that make about how you don't need 90% in rich uranium for anything except a weapon Between 60% to 90% small technical step. This was the issue all the way back to 2015 Well, Laurie Johnny that guy that I mentioned that's like the behind the scenes puppet master that's still alive He's the one that said giving up nuclear fuel abandonment or abandoning it. It's like giving up pearl for a candy bar

39:42That's what he said and he still has said that So if this is the guy that we want to remain The nuclear issue is gonna continue. It's gonna exist and we killed for something like 40 people in the past three days Some of whom were scientists Yeah, it's not like you can extinguish science You know, there will be more people that learn how to do these things and once you've produced a method to do it New people can come in with less knowledge and reproduce the thing that that original smarter person created So earlier in the 2000s when they set up those centrifuges and set up the way to do the cascading Enrichment and all this this kind of little more complex way of enriching uranium to to mask the way that it's Enriched to hide it from the iAEA that's been done It's been it's been created so that way when someone comes in with less technical knowledge They can take that plan off the shelf and reproduce it and that's even what iran did in the first place when The acucon network gave iran nuclear material back in the late 80s early 90s You know that Pakistani weapons broker came in and sold the uranium plans to iran Iran didn't have to invent it and this is the problem that still exists because that is that knowledge is there

40:47It's kind of like killing an ideology. You can't do it. You also can't kill nuclear knowledge So a less experienced technician might come in and restart the program because Larry Johnny wants them to Now leave a problem where we're going to have nuclear weapons that might be improperly manufactured Which could be even more devastating because of unforeseen effects of these weapons So the threat of the weapons exists. I just don't know if in the past two months it got worse than it was Because the rhetoric they were you know our the west was saying it sounded like it was a lot worse and worse and you know Pretend days away. We're a week away, which you remember Netanyahu standing in the UN a few years ago holding up the picture of the bomb saying we're five days away And we've been five days away for 20 years So I don't know how real that threat has been actually Also the nuclear threat we they had no enriched uranium during the JCPOA Right they had it done a under five percent which is an incredible commitment to actually fall the deal Problem is though it didn't include proxies. So it was never an acceptable deal to Israel Yeah, but we're America like we don't give a shit what Israel wants

41:50That's how it should be I mean Israel should be safe and secure absolutely But they cannot dictate our foreign policy no other country should be able to dictate our foreign policy That's my position as an American citizen anyway And I'm a Greek too right my family's from Greece Greece shouldn't be able to dictate our fucking foreign policy Sorry guys. I mean we call the shots. There's a reason why we're the big stick There are there should be anyway And the issue when we get out of the Because for a long time it's been troubled me that the Greek government may be dictating US foreign policy I'm just saying even if the even if we had they had sway like that. I wouldn't be like oh, yeah, let's go for it like Yeah, I mean, I think that's why it's important like you both make and Jonathan said that the president Addresses the American people to explain what the what the objectives are you know, we We can go back and forth we can as we have and we talked about the

42:52probable possible consequences What what our objectives are But at the end of the day Only one man can really address that can conclusively right and it's probably time To do that to explain why that is and there's there's you know, there's good Legal and ethical reasons for doing that of course. I mean We haven't discussed in depth for the legal basis for what has happened so far though I mean, I would venture we're probably on legal Solid ground we can justify what has happened under the president's you know the The the president's um powers under the war powers act although he's that's tied to a limited timeline right um, you could you can talk about I you can talk about self-defense you can talk in terms of both past actions by the Iranians and Potential imminent action although of course that's kind of thinnerized, but all of these things

43:54probably need to be explained um until the American people to congress So that everyone understands and what the goals are of of these strikes going ahead and if it is simply To keep Iran within limits when it comes to support for proxies and nuclear it's nuclear Capabilities and other words if it is a mowing the grass effect Then let's you know, let's announce and announce it, but I think all of us are concerned about kind of an open-ended Unstated goal of regime change Without that being fit into any kind of strategic plan without anything else happening beyond the bombing Yeah, you mentioned earlier Andy about the idea of whether the US is really promoting The opposition to take control of country and as Jonathan said The the this change in the actual governing structure I would be hesitant if I was advising the president to have him

44:56Ask the protesters to get out in the streets. I mean obviously we would like to see a regime change I get that. I would like to see a regime change But if we're not willing to do much to a system we could be sending them to their death, right? So we've you already mentioned a 30,000 dead. Well, can you imagine how less of the restrictions the regime would have on protesters now? Right, so it could be just an object slaughter. So again, it's not because I don't want to see a regime change, but When we ask people to do that and we've done this before we collectively the US, you know in Iraq after does the storm It can go really poorly for them and if they felt like we were promoting Them getting out there or to do something because we were going to step in and assist them That could be a problem. I would imagine I don't know But the that the agencies been tasked to help foam in it But that those never work unless it's organic, right? It's you can't like create it out of whole cloth. Yeah, you can enhance something that's actually

45:57Genuine and I think the I think the opposition is obviously genuine, but the question is gonna be It's easy for us to send them out on the streets But is it gonna is it there's a real chance before it to be successful or is it a real chance that we instead of 30,000 dead we're looking at 300,000 dead and I think we have to consider that before just telling them to get out there and protest So, you know, that gets to to john uh And actually mick two. I mean, this is both you both you baili wicks, but Presumably one hopes that there are a list of kind of uh CCIRs, right that would indicate what's that mean? um Commanders critical information requirements, right? So in other words That Presumably the intelligence community has been trying to pick up on certain indications that regime change Maybe a prospect right in which case there may that might be a trigger to follow on actions

47:01So you simply as mix that simply where I'm hitting on this is simply calling people out on the streets as as mix pointed out It's been disastrous in the past for us think back to 1991 with the sheer uprising in Iraq in Iraq, right? So maybe so maybe before we do that What the IC has been trying to look for certain things. I don't know you know visible splits among power centers The clerical establishment being it kind of being pitched against the IRGC there being a riff between them or perhaps IRG C factions Going against each other Provinces ignoring torrents directives So behave you know differences Significant changes in security force behavior, right units refusing orders standing down openly switching sides Or a challenged succession process, right? Or maybe sustained protest

48:02Capacity they you know the protest just continue to get bigger and bigger or many one of those or all of those things might be Indication snack regime changes even a prospect But you'd have to key the intelligence community to look for those things and report them You'd have to have a plan to follow up on reinforce Success in those areas which which is what I mean about having part of a bigger strategy Part of a bigger strategy isn't simply bombing and then saying hey guys I think it's time to overthrow these shit heads And also for there to be a threat that's credible to the regime You need the intent which the people have but you also need the capability for them to materialize that threat That means weapons lethal force control over communication control over media outlets ways to communicate to disparate widespread groups to actually come together Join together use that lethal force to then become a threat to the existing system And the problem is the regime has done a very good job of having no second amendment in Iran So the regular people cannot own weapons and have not own weapons since 1979

49:04This is a huge gap between the those halves and the have-nots the regime people have weapons and the 90% of the country that Opposes it do not They even went through and took away hunting rifles up in the mountains and things like that So there are no weapons except a very small amount in the country If the US was going to help This is a great way to covertly supply them with weapons Providing you know, we did the same thing in Albania actually in World War II when we were supporting the partisans We dropped huge amounts of weapons and creates what ammunition medical supplies all kinds of things to sustain the Albanians And they succeeded that was a huge success in Albania And I think that's actually a very good resistance model for a situation similar to this where you had a very repressive regime coming in With zero qualms about harming anyone in their path And the US and Britain both came in and supplied those resistance forces and those resistance forces were able to become a credible threat Jonathan would you mind explaining the secession plan and how that works for the spring leader that we were talking about before

50:04Yeah, sure, so the the constitution they have actually talks about it pretty in depth the constitution is very lengthy It's not like hours, which is succinct and easy to understand. I'm just kidding us sometimes simpler is not better But yeah, they have right now three people that have come together by the constitution to actually sit in the council similar to how the pope is selected Where they they come down secretly and deliberate and talk about the different candidates The reality is though that the candidates have already been selected by the itola far in advance So they're basically deliberating over a list that's already pre-determined There's a little bit of tension between the people on that list two of them that stand out one is the first itola's son Hassan And the recently deceased itola's son Mochita Now the recently deceased itola said I don't want my son to take over. I don't want it to be a hereditary regime etc. I don't know how true that is because he was president and then became itola and then never let go So you know action speak louder than words. I'm not sure how that works The thing with Mochita by is he's been kind of out of the spotlight

51:07Perhaps on purpose to allow him to look like an aloof cleric because that was a big piece of insecurity that the itola had Was he wasn't actually a grand aitola when he became the leader of the country Somehow that title materialized in 1989 that he was suddenly a grand aitola But he wasn't and he was very insecure There's actually interviews of him speaking about that in 1988 before he ascended to what is ostensibly a throne So what's going to happen now is The three people that are supposed to meet one of them's dead because he was killed during the initial bombing against harmony And that was a hijazi his chief of staff So now there's only two that's Pasezky and the president and then The chief of the judiciary golem Hussein a jai Now golem Hussein a jai's name is on that document So you have two people deciding who the aitola will be and one of their names is on the list It is not unlikely that his name ends up being the one brought to the assembly of experts Which is this group of 88 clerics who then take that list and ratify it

52:07And it's very similar again to the pope They release the information to the public and suddenly everyone accepts it And I mean if that's as far from democracy as you can get that's that's the way it is But that's that's how their constitution is designed The thing is these individuals I just named are all top targets for the west It's not clear if they're going to be alive next week So and we saw this with Hezbollah actually in June where Nostra was killed a successor was named two days later the successor's dead now We have the third third string quarterback in charge of the Organization who hasn't done anything since then because he's probably scared for his life if he's even alive right so This is what they're facing right now. This is what they're deciding while they're deciding that There is the group that I mentioned earlier the real power brokers Ali lari jani Gali bhaaf the speaker apartment these like hardcore IRGC Individuals they're making their own decisions now about what's going on separate from that quote-unquote constitutional clerical secession system And we might see a thing where these two groups that religious group and the pragmatic group are coming to head

53:13Because perhaps lari jani wants to rule the country as the IRGC Person who that he is without a clerical backing It's possible that the clerical component is removed because of an emergency situation that they create or has been created That would mean that that religious component is sidelined This is actually what the CIA complained about in last year of as a warning about regime change in Iran Is if this is a runaway regime change without actual outside support to stop it from running off on its own The IRGC will take over the country This was in the New York Times last week. I believe that it was that this was part of the CIA's assessment I think that's that's a realistic assessment Because the clerics don't have guns either The people with the guns are the IRGC So if the IRGC in this moment of danger decides you know what guys we're going to change things a little bit lari jani's in charge now That who's going to stop them That is to say, you know, that's that's that's a possible outcome It's a likely outcome Unless the US does something and what that something is is that that other option I mentioned earlier in the show

54:15Which is a new system The the most likely new system is Raise up halabi the crown prince comes into Iran Perhaps on a white horse. I don't know how He'll come into the country and he actually has something called the Iran prosperity project Which is a 10-point plan You know, this has been ongoing for a very long time talking about you know if there is regime change and if Outciders are allowed to come back into the country. This is how it's going to go Very in depth. It's like a 200-page document that talks about how they're going to reform the economy and governance etc The bottom line is their plan is a secular government That is Either monarchist or not and they're going to have a referendum Which is like in the very beginning of this plan It'll be a referendum where the people choose do you want a monarchy that's similar to the UK Where it's kind of in the background, but you have a parliament that's making the decisions or do you want a straight Democratic system like the United States where we have separation powers and all that without any monarchy Whether that also comes to fruition on that. I don't know because there's always a change between what someone says before They have power and then what they say when they do have power as we saw even during the revolution

55:18So that even is not a certainty of what people actually look like if that other option comes in How does the Crown Prince come back to Iran without His own guns like the IRGC has So you saw in Trump's eight-minute statement He said if you defect now you will have immunity That was very clear in there. He said it the second time in a speech he gave So clearly this is part of the the narrative that hey if you're in the R-tash Which is the regular conventional forces or if you're in the IRGC even if you put your weapons down now Somehow the US promises that you will not be touched Now if I was in Iranian who just lost 11 family members to these people killing everybody I don't know if I would listen to that instruction from this guy in another country telling me that these people are suddenly immune from me Right, so I don't know how enforceable that is but that is part of the US plan at least that If these forces especially the R-tash the army the regular conventional army who's not Involved the way the IRGC is they put their weapons down perhaps that will be the new military

56:21Perhaps they'll be the new security forces which is exactly what happened in 79 It's not like the military left the country in 79 the Shah's military put their weapons down took off their Shah fatigues and put on Revolutionary fatigues same thing with Sabak which is the original intelligence organization that the CIA helped to create Sabak took off their Sabak badges and put on Islamic Republic intelligence badges It was same guys. I mean Laurie Johnny's father was in Sabak and a lot of these guys that are currently in the IRGC to parents were all in Sabak So there's even a precedent for that in the country in recent memory of some people So it is possible that that could happen and we just wonder you know, which of the people Hang on to the beliefs that they had before in which surrender them Yeah, so I think um To your to your point the the way that John has just laid it out that that gap that gap between identifying a successor and

57:25Him actually taking power Being able to come in and and flipping a the transition of power all those things that need to happen that is That that's the gap that that right now unless we're getting additional information just seems So improbable right because John the way you've painted this the most likely outcome is going to be short term consolidation Harsha repression, you know, a tightened role by by the IRGC Even even to the point of them taking over from You know from their fear crats, but that's the right word Yeah, in your own you have three types of politicians. You've got hardliners pragmatists and reformists And we haven't talked about the reformists at all in this episode Those are the people that have been sidelined There actually have been some presidential candidates and you remember back in 2009 there was the green revolution That was because of Machmoud Al-Nani Nijad was elected a second time in a dramatically fraudulent or election

58:26Because the person running against him was a reformist and the government didn't want that reformist because that would loosen their grip on power So the the contest right now is between the hardliners which are those theocrats and the pragmatists which are the laryjani's of the world Those are the two groups that are currently duking it out But there still exists a reformist camp in Iran. They're it's small, but it exists The question is is the West willing to accept the most part of a new government or are they too tainted with the memories of the past because they work They are part of the regime Right, but they're these reformists who are trying to Remove the hijab law for example They're trying to allow women to travel alone because there's actually a rule in in Iran People know this women are not allowed to travel outside the country by themselves They have to have a guardian a male guardian with them This is in their legal system So these reformists are saying we need to stop all that stuff. This is not making sense. It's you know ruining our view Others of you of us in the world and it's not letting us progress and so on Even even those small changes were not you know, they're too unpalatable for the regime to accept

59:29So we don't know if those reformists will also come up in this transition period and help to bridge that gap between the old regime and the new regime Because their voices have been suppressed since 2009. Wow well The so the gap is pretty pretty wide I'd say Andy and I feel like it would be Good for whoever the power is that be whether it's us CIA to Involve the reformists into this right. I mean you're probably going to have to involve IRGC people as well Right, do you want to make the same mistakes you did in Iraq by like the the bath vacation and that stuff? I mean uh the similarities Are there I would say I mean you have to these people are the people that live in this country So you have to have them involved in terms of how the next steps and what it's going to look like Yeah, it seems like a tall task to be honest in terms of regime change going to be honest But I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm just reading the tea leaves

1:00:33We talked about All right, make it out of you. I'll see you later. Thanks, man Yeah, probably good time to to wrap with um, you know, we've we've wrestled with the topic well You know, you know, it's just it was the only thing I was going to say to your point Deers that you know, we talked about yes low prospects for regime change Then need in order for it to happen. I think we we're probably All agreeing that there needs to be substantive action right not just Provide weapons or create the create the conditions by Taking out the leadership of the current administration. I mean there needs to be more to enable Uh, a viable opposition to to gain power because of the fact that the The IRGC in particular is so embedded into the fabric of the Iranian society

1:01:37And so That's again gets back to is this part of a coherent strategy that is focused on regime change or is that not one of Our goals and the regime regime change option is simply a It's no not not a rate herring, but it's it's something that That would benefit us and if we can bridge that gap by By providing encouragement then we will certainly do so, but we're not prepared to do more than that That's the real question, right? Whether whether that's kind of our stance Cheering from the sidelines or whether we have a plan in place a covert plan To enable a viable opposition to actually seize power I think that goes to your all what we've all said about uncertainty the the leader of the country our country needs to say What are objectives are? Because that will help people understand why step one two and three are happening in that order and for what end You know purpose method and state why are we doing this? It's a military operation We need to know what the end state is as the people

1:02:38And congress needs to know that too so that they can understand what are we approving and disapproving What are we actually debating about and perhaps there's a good reason for whatever has happened or there's not We don't know because we're not receiving the information to make that informed decision. Yeah, I would say there's no coherent plan At all and congress is completely fucking useless They yeah, I don't have any confidence in congress Just the way they've been acting the last year plus when it comes to Venezuela and to this now I mean you see congress you see senators cheering the song um Like like it's a great thing with no actual plan as to what happens next um and it's kind of Scary frankly But you got Lindsey Graham he's pretty level headed Oh, yeah, no, yeah, he's the best he's the best soul level headed super pragmatic I have some we fucked up jokes to say but I'm not he's he's I'm demon. Let's be honest you guys don't have to say

1:03:42I'll say it. He's a demon He and AOC can have coffee together. Yeah. Yeah. That'd be a great little coffee date A couple things from Zach and we'll wrap up soon. I'm sorry guys if you guys have to run There's one thing I wanted to talk about in terms of what the blowback and look like in in the United States Zach Dorfman National security journalist really respect the great he does great work He said I spoke with a former CIA official with extensive Iran Hezbollah experience about this he argued that one sleeper cuts force or Hezbollah operatives in the US saw the writing on the wall They'd opt to lay low instead of committing to error hacks likened it to the Soviet Erid deep cover spies at the end of Cold War What do you guys? I push back on that there's been a long narrative from certain analysts that there's this huge sleeper population of Hezbollah in the United States I've seen estimates the FBI put an estimate out in the late 90s saying there were like 1,200 Hezbollah sleeper agents in the United States I think this is a similar approach to the approach we have with North Korea where we give them so much credit

1:04:45That part of their threat is derived from the credit that we give them And what is a sleeper agent from Hezbollah? What does that look like? You know, is that someone with a gun under their bed that's waiting for the signal to get out like the minute men that we had in the revolution Or is that a Lebanese guy who's shea that Maybe you have his phone number We there is zero definition of what this means and I'm sure there are certainly threats in this country Whether that threat is so large that we could call it this like sleeper agent network that just sounds so sophisticated I mean look at how the attacks have been in the past 20 years from Hezbollah are those sophisticated or are those typical guerrilla Actions, I mean if if their best forces which are now destroyed Can't even cross the border into Israel to do a raid anymore. How are you going to have a sleeper agent who got trained 15 years ago Get activated in 10 years and remember all of this training. I mean if in the Marine Corps I was trained to use a rifle pretty well I haven't used my rifle that way in a long time If you give me that rifle today and say go do x, y and z in this very sophisticated manner

1:05:47I'll probably to make some mistakes because I haven't practiced or trained or kept up that capability So I just have to kind of push back on this thought that there are there's this huge sleeper network in the country That might lay low and do the sophisticated long-term mascarovka and you know Illegal's operation that the Russians did during the Soviet Union. I just don't think that that's likely Milburn Yeah, I mean I I would agree I I think um, I mean what we're looking at now is probably If if I was if I was going to hazard a guess which I will right it's uh That the US will look soon to de-escalate right that's been up patent in the past rapid escalation rapid de-escalation Sigling Iran that further retaliation will be bad for them right um The the risk of a the risk is still there are the white and regional war You know with shipping lanes disrupted. I mean it really depends on how Iran How far Iran's prepared to take this right? I mean oil markets convulsing U.S. bases under sustained attack

1:06:51um Israel potentially fighting on multiple fronts. I mean some of that's unlikely because we've seen the state of Of Iran's proxy forces But but there's certainly an opening for escalation kind of accumulative escalation right and that that may have been Iran's purpose in targeting golf countries even though It it seemed like a strategic loss to lose their support um But yeah, I I mean I I think the next the thing we're really looking for is signaling by the United States on what the endgame is Because estrikes are easy right and they've gone a great publicity and sound bites But but the endgame itself the strategic goals for the United States. That's that's the tough part How do we define them and how do we explain what we're doing right now? Leads to leads us to those goals I have one more question because there's a bunch of people some people talking about you know

1:07:52Let's say Iran you know fractures and we as a civil war and you know Not unlike what happened in Libya Does Iran have a potential of becoming a terrorist like haven? More than it already is uh, I would say no and that's the reason is a lot of the terror you see from Libya Syria Afghanistan these are by Sunni Salafi jihadis groups that existed before those conflicts existed They were empowered by those conflicts because of the chaos and power vacuum and weapons especially in Libya Just freely floating out into the desert Iran is not like that and it's so multicultural. It's such a cosmopolitan state That you don't have the same conditions of this kind of homogenous Salafi jihadist You know receptive population that you had in northern Libya or in Tunisia for example It's just it's not a parallel And it's not just because of the religion. It's because of culture You know if you're in western Iran you're in a Kurdish area and within the Kurdish area there's different types of Kurds You know there there are even

1:08:53You know there's Christian areas. There's Jewish areas. There's Bahayis Totally separate from Islam and not only that you have lures and you have balochis and you have ahvazis Which are like historic thousands of years of history amongst themselves That are attached to Persian history but also with their own separate history And it's not it's not a similar Place like northern Libya that was colonized by European powers for a very long time And then suddenly the colonization was ripped out and now you've got this strong man rising up And then he's dead and now the weapons flow out It's not really a similar situation. I don't think cool All right guys, I mean that's all I got pretty much There was one bit of news that we didn't talk about it came out like probably a few hours before we started That the CIA and you know essentially like gave Israel Intel about when this meeting would happen with the Ayatollah and their senior Guys and that supposedly they delayed the attack To wait for this meeting to go down to happen so they were all congregate in the same place like delayed it

1:09:55They were supposed to go overnight and then they did it early in the morning and Iran Um, I don't know if that's a CIA doing like a curtain call kind of like you know Yes, he we you know we're doing and stuff like that but uh That went into like the timing of this Attack I just want to put that out there for the audience I think it makes sense especially because it's Ramadan and the timing of the attack was right after Suhwar which is the last meal during the evening So usually that's when people gathered together we did the same thing in 2016 and Mosul when we were retaking Mosul from ISIS A lot of our very heavy strikes were during Ramadan because the high-level leaders were all meeting with each other without any civilians Because they're picking you know they're at war right so they go meet with each other at night and then sleep in the same building We'd have sometimes buildings with 80 guys high-level commanders in the same building They just had breakfast and now they're going to bed and now we're striking And we actually did this a very similar things back then we would track their movements If we'd have a funeral that would go on we track where everyone went from the funeral over a few weeks And once they all gathered together for that breakfast two weeks later

1:10:56You got 20 more funerals Yeah Yeah Andy you have anything left in the tank All right guys listen as always a pleasure I want you guys to do us a favor listening Check out Andy Milner's book when the tempest gathers incredible memoir check out Jonathan's book orange shadow weapons Jonathan knows what the fuck's up with Iran He gets it he's screwed in If you want to learn something get that book that link is in the description as well The whitefish security conference Security summit is happening early April April 2nd to the fourth that link is in the description as well And any and all links you want to find us the links are down in the description patreon.com slash the team house Help support to show you get both eyes on geopolitics and the team house at free and early And you help support to show and keep the lights on so thank you very much guys a pleasure as always Yeah, thank you. Hey all the best guys

1:11:58I want to tell all of you today about a new newsletter that we're launching but encompasses both the teamhouse podcast The eyes on podcast and the high-side news outlet which I run with Sean Nailer The Newsletter is going to be once a week It's going to come into your inbox and you're going to get the most current podcasts on Ison in the teamhouse and whatever's Topical or current on the high side So it's another way for us to get the information out to you as social media algorithms are pretty iffy And you never really know what you're going to get So this is a once a week email. It'll slide into your inbox and it will have you know the greatest hits of that week It's really good The website for it is teamhousepodcast.kit.com slash join teamhousepodcast.kit.com slash join Go there and you enter into your email lists or you enter your email into The little thing on the website and you're good to go and that'll be it

1:13:01So we really appreciate your support and hope you'll consider signing up. Where's the link? The link will also be down in the description if you're looking for it there and that's teamhousepodcast .kit.kit.com .kit.kit.com