# Let's be Honest - There is No Real Strategy for Iran | EYES ON GEOPOLITCS

An episode of [The Team House](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1492797340), 16 Mar 2026, 1 h 00 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/clrtpod.com/m/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/70647969/no_strategy_for_iran.mp3

We break down the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, the debate over whether they were strategically sound, and what the administration may have failed to plan for next. The conversation covers Karg Island, the Strait of Hormuz, naval shortfalls, NSC process problems, and why tactical success could still lead to a much bigger regional war. Mars Men⬇️ For a limited time, our listeners get 50% off FOR LIFE, Free Shipping, AND 3 Free Gifts at Mars Men at https://mengotomars.com/ Jon Hackett's Book:⬇️ https://a.co/d/082z28uY Support the show on Patreon:⬇️ https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse Subscribe to our new newsletter!!!! https://teamhousepodcast.kit.com/join Whitefish Security Summit ⬇️ https://whitefishsecuritysummit.com/ New merch, patches, and stickers! ⬇️ https://theteamhouse-shop.fourthwall.com Check out Mick's new podcast here:⬇️ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/at/podcast/pub-and-porch-applied-stoicism/id1836955475 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1k3QPmkAMwnGJxMLDwUSSd?si=n6piIu8XRcag1Z0K43A3bQ Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@UCd0Hq6QFk8CoTu5j-VU0Ong Find Mick Mulroy here: Fogbow ⬇️ https://fogbow.com/ Lobo Institute ⬇️ https://www.loboinstitute.org/ Twitter ⬇️ https://x.com/mickmulroy?s=21&t=-Ze3F_Ix2vlJ18KFvORTCA LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/ Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.social Mick’s publications ⬇️ https://www.loboinstitute.org/publications/publications-of-michael-mick-patrick-mulroy/ Find Marc P here: https://x.com/Mpolymer Find Andy Milburn here: Twitter ⬇️ https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8 LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023 Substack ⬇️ https://amilburn.substack.com/ Andy’s book ⬇️ https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-Operations Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.social Find Jason Lyons here: LinkedIn ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?u Bluesky ⬇️ https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.social "Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio" 00:00 — Start 02:00 -- Did the U.S. and Israel make the right call striking Iran? 04:00 — Kharg Island 07:45 — Military wins vs. political strategy: is the administration actually planning ahead? 18:50 — Why the U.S. keeps getting pulled back into the Middle East 19:50 — Strait of Hormuz risks, naval shortfalls, and the mine warfare problem 47:45 — NSC process failures, Rubio’s dual role, and why strategy may be breaking down 49:10 — Did the Venezuela op create false confidence for a much bigger war with Iran? Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

## Transcript

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[2:12] Speaker 4: Thanks a bunch. All right, hey, everybody, welcome to another
[2:18] Speaker 4: episode of Eyes on Geopolitics. I'm here with Mick Molroy.
[2:21] Speaker 4: Jonathan Hackett, Mark poly Moreopolis and myself Dimitric on Tacos.
[2:25] Speaker 4: We have two Marines versus two Greeks. The ky jelly
[2:30] Speaker 4: is about to be Uh.
[2:34] Speaker 2: Don't drop the soap.
[2:36] Speaker 3: Come on, of course, Mick, what is what is? Ky jelly?
[2:38] Speaker 3: Makes puritanical values? All right?
[2:42] Speaker 4: Anyway, A lot going on, I know, jokes, I hope
[2:44] Speaker 4: everyone's having a good day.
[2:46] Speaker 3: Uh.
[2:47] Speaker 4: A lot happening week three of the uh, you know,
[2:51] Speaker 4: the war in Iran.
[2:54] Speaker 3: Lots happening.
[2:55] Speaker 4: We have a couple of meuse heading that way Marine
[2:57] Speaker 4: expeditionary units. It's about five thousand ish marines. We also
[3:04] Speaker 4: had a lot of a lot of bombing on Crag Island,
[3:08] Speaker 4: which is like the central hub of Iranian oil. About
[3:12] Speaker 4: ninety percent of it goes through there or stops there
[3:15] Speaker 4: before it goes to wherever to the endpoints.
[3:19] Speaker 3: No real end in sight. It seems like these rare.
[3:23] Speaker 4: And we also have Israel planning on invading Lebanon, southern Lebanon.
[3:30] Speaker 4: So a lot is happening right now. Guys, Where are
[3:33] Speaker 4: you at with this? What are you guys tracking? Exactly?
[3:40] Speaker 5: Greetings from Montana, where we finally got snow after we
[3:44] Speaker 5: got done with all our winter training, right that is snowed. Yeah,
[3:49] Speaker 5: So where to start? I would say, ultimately, from my perspective,
[3:57] Speaker 5: I support the attacks that appreciated the nuclear program, the
[4:02] Speaker 5: was sig missile program in the Navy. I think that
[4:05] Speaker 5: is where the US should have hung attack. They should
[4:09] Speaker 5: have acknowledged it was a war of choice. I think
[4:12] Speaker 5: every attempt to try to claim it was an imminent
[4:16] Speaker 5: threat has been proven not to be the case by
[4:19] Speaker 5: the intelligence community. I seebms kind of like a decade away.
[4:25] Speaker 5: And then of course the issue of the Secretory Rubrio
[4:29] Speaker 5: brought up about like, well, Israel's going to attack them, so
[4:32] Speaker 5: they were going to attack us, so we had to
[4:33] Speaker 5: tag them. I just think that shows a lot of coordination.
[4:36] Speaker 5: And I was just reading a Wall Street Journal article
[4:39] Speaker 5: this morning that basically said there wasn't an NSC process,
[4:44] Speaker 5: not that the NSC got it wrong, that there really
[4:46] Speaker 5: simply wasn't. It was just the key principles without any
[4:51] Speaker 5: input from anyone else. And you know, it's what arm
[4:56] Speaker 5: of the bridge now. But I think it would be
[4:58] Speaker 5: a good idea to we state the whole concept of
[5:02] Speaker 5: the interagency policy deliberations and with significant injects by the
[5:08] Speaker 5: intelligence community when it comes to making overall plans, because again,
[5:13] Speaker 5: although I support the strikes, I you know, it can
[5:18] Speaker 5: be the right thing done the wrong way is still
[5:20] Speaker 5: the right thing. And I think that's where we're at,
[5:22] Speaker 5: is what I'm trying to get at now. The question
[5:26] Speaker 5: is going to be, so we just thought about the
[5:28] Speaker 5: fact that we might need a MEW to take carg Island,
[5:31] Speaker 5: because it's really no way to put to explain that
[5:35] Speaker 5: any other way is that we didn't think this through,
[5:39] Speaker 5: or that asset would have already been in the regent.
[5:41] Speaker 5: It wouldn't be getting shifted from what we claim to
[5:43] Speaker 5: be a higher priority region and in the end of
[5:47] Speaker 5: Pacific to go to the Middle East. And then we
[5:50] Speaker 5: of course should get down to why carg Island is
[5:53] Speaker 5: so important, and then I'll kick it to you guys.
[5:56] Speaker 5: Carg Island was one of the reasons why we're on
[5:59] Speaker 5: submitted and on a walk over. Once it started being
[6:02] Speaker 5: targeted substantially, they got scared, super scared. Nine of their
[6:08] Speaker 5: processing of their oil goes through there. It looks like
[6:12] Speaker 5: the idea is we've hit the military targets so softened
[6:16] Speaker 5: it we could use them MEW BLT telling the landing
[6:21] Speaker 5: team to go in there and seize it, and then
[6:24] Speaker 5: we put it at risk to the regime if we
[6:27] Speaker 5: were to target the actual energy, there's nothing to bargain
[6:29] Speaker 5: with right like it's all over. So the concept, my
[6:33] Speaker 5: understanding from talking to my friends who are you know,
[6:37] Speaker 5: working the issue, is the only way to actually use
[6:41] Speaker 5: it as a bargaining chip is to seize and hold it.
[6:43] Speaker 5: There's a lot of concerns that come from that. The
[6:46] Speaker 5: Marines will be very vulnerable. This is technically boots on
[6:50] Speaker 5: the ground, to use an overused phrase, So there's a
[6:53] Speaker 5: lot I'm not saying that this is just a simple decision,
[6:56] Speaker 5: but that is the concept behind it, that we seize,
[6:59] Speaker 5: hold and then say let everything through or we won't
[7:03] Speaker 5: ever give you your the resources you need to fund
[7:07] Speaker 5: your own regime. So I'll stop there. But I think
[7:11] Speaker 5: that's going to be the biggest discussion as the MEW
[7:14] Speaker 5: gets closer and closer to the area of operations, and.
[7:18] Speaker 6: If I could kind of zoom in the operational level
[7:20] Speaker 6: a little bit on there with carg Island. When we
[7:24] Speaker 6: think about this island and seizing it, there's a key
[7:27] Speaker 6: challenge that is a major planning factor that has to
[7:30] Speaker 6: be considered because this MEW what would have to physically
[7:34] Speaker 6: pass through the Straits of Hormuz if they want to
[7:36] Speaker 6: project close by, And that's a challenge because seven hundred
[7:40] Speaker 6: and fifty kilometers separates Carg Island from the straits, So
[7:43] Speaker 6: they're going to be at risk for seven hundred and
[7:44] Speaker 6: fifty kilometers moving around the straits up to Carg Island
[7:48] Speaker 6: if the MEW wants to be close enough to the
[7:50] Speaker 6: island to take it with a close in seizure. That
[7:54] Speaker 6: means the other alternative is launch air assets carrying troops
[7:59] Speaker 6: over into the straits into the island, which, in my
[8:03] Speaker 6: view of it is probably that second option is more
[8:05] Speaker 6: likely to happen, where the amphibious readiness group, which is
[8:08] Speaker 6: three vessels would probably stage off of Fujiera. And I'll
[8:11] Speaker 6: say why Fujera in a second here or Moose Scott.
[8:14] Speaker 6: Mos Scott's one thousand kilometers away. Fuuja is seven hundred
[8:17] Speaker 6: and fifty klometers away.
[8:18] Speaker 5: That gap of.
[8:21] Speaker 6: Kilometers between Fujera and Moscott. It's like a kill zone
[8:23] Speaker 6: in space, a huge amount of space. You don't want
[8:25] Speaker 6: to be that far away. You don't want to be
[8:26] Speaker 6: in Moose scott and have to project Osprey's and other
[8:29] Speaker 6: tactical aircraft that far or from Jordan, from Wafax Salty
[8:33] Speaker 6: Air Base, or from other air bases. Turkey's not going
[8:36] Speaker 6: to be amenable to this. We've already talked about why
[8:38] Speaker 6: in the past. We can talk about it again, but
[8:39] Speaker 6: you're gonna have to rely on golf partners or standoff
[8:42] Speaker 6: forces actually fly to the island. That introduces additional risk
[8:46] Speaker 6: into the mission profile, because rather than launching an amphibious
[8:50] Speaker 6: raid from the ship, you have to launch it in
[8:52] Speaker 6: a more traditional troop carrier method where the troop carrier is.
[8:57] Speaker 7: Exposed the entire time.
[8:58] Speaker 6: We've heard Hegseth this week say that the drone capability
[9:01] Speaker 6: has been reduced ninety ninety five percent. Even if that's true,
[9:04] Speaker 6: they started out with thirty thousand drones, and I bet
[9:06] Speaker 6: they've been producing drones since the war started. So that
[9:09] Speaker 6: means even if they reduce it to five percent of
[9:11] Speaker 6: the amount of drones, it only takes one drone to
[9:13] Speaker 6: strike a US troop carrier to dramatically change the trajectory.
[9:17] Speaker 7: Of this conflict.
[9:18] Speaker 6: Because US policy is very sensitive to American casualties as
[9:22] Speaker 6: it should be. That's how we are designed, and we
[9:23] Speaker 6: care about our troops. And if one troop transport gets down,
[9:27] Speaker 6: if one, you know, twenty four marines go down in
[9:30] Speaker 6: Persian Gulf because of a shut head drone, that's just
[9:33] Speaker 6: one drone. If that cost a few thousand dollars, that
[9:35] Speaker 6: could ultimately change a billion dollar, ninety degree change in
[9:39] Speaker 6: this conflict. The island of Pujerra itself can only hold
[9:42] Speaker 6: about two and a half billion dollars worth of oil.
[9:45] Speaker 6: That's the way that the capacity works there. So we'd
[9:47] Speaker 6: basically be sacrificing two dozen marines lives for about two
[9:50] Speaker 6: billion dollars of oil, which is about the tenth of
[9:53] Speaker 6: the amount of oil that normally passes through that straight
[9:55] Speaker 6: Was it worth it? And that's going to be the
[9:57] Speaker 6: question that's going to be asked as we look at
[9:59] Speaker 6: the planning of this.
[10:01] Speaker 2: You know that there's there's something I think overall on
[10:04] Speaker 2: this that that I wanted to raise with everyone here
[10:06] Speaker 2: is you know, as we watch you know, these painful
[10:09] Speaker 2: press conferences, I mean Secretary of Hexath with you know,
[10:12] Speaker 2: his kind of JV football run run speeches which are
[10:14] Speaker 2: kind of getting to be interminable and I can't even
[10:17] Speaker 2: watch them. But then you have General Kane come up,
[10:19] Speaker 2: it seems a little more sober and realistic, and I
[10:22] Speaker 2: think that's what you should focus on. I almost think
[10:24] Speaker 2: we're all not we but you know, the administration is
[10:28] Speaker 2: kind of drunk in military math. And if you you know,
[10:31] Speaker 2: if you go through this and you know, you can
[10:32] Speaker 2: make a case that the US is doing very well
[10:35] Speaker 2: right now in terms of military objectives. It's it's not finished.
[10:38] Speaker 2: I don't think we've actioned the nuclear program at least
[10:41] Speaker 2: I haven't seen any of that. But you know, when
[10:42] Speaker 2: we're talking about treading the Iranian navy, the military, I
[10:45] Speaker 2: mean clearly they're killing you know, thousands of Iranian troops
[10:49] Speaker 2: and HIEROGYC and others, and so you can make that argument,
[10:52] Speaker 2: but I mean, it's it's almost remarkable because we saw
[10:54] Speaker 2: this in Afghanistan with really kind of rosy projections, and
[10:58] Speaker 2: what we're missing instead of hexeth there is you know,
[11:00] Speaker 2: where's Mark Rubio, who is not just the Secretary of State,
[11:02] Speaker 2: he's a National security advisor. And you know, we were
[11:05] Speaker 2: joking before the show all the memes of him with
[11:06] Speaker 2: all of his various outfits are kind of hysterical, but
[11:09] Speaker 2: he has too many jobs, and ultimately I would be
[11:12] Speaker 2: much more comfortable if we had someone actually talking not
[11:14] Speaker 2: just on military matters, but on strategy, because on the
[11:18] Speaker 2: on the political dynamics, on diplomacy, on strategy, I don't
[11:21] Speaker 2: know if we're winning, especially when the Iranians seemed to
[11:24] Speaker 2: be in it for the long haul. It's an existential
[11:27] Speaker 2: uh uh you know, fight for them, and ultimately they're
[11:29] Speaker 2: going to try to outlast us, and they'll do so,
[11:31] Speaker 2: you know, in two ways. One is, you know, economically,
[11:35] Speaker 2: whether it's it's squeezing the straight straits of Hormuz and
[11:38] Speaker 2: and and gas prices going up, or attacks on civilian
[11:41] Speaker 2: targets in the Gulf, or god forbid a pretty significant
[11:45] Speaker 2: uh you know strike in which US forces are killed,
[11:48] Speaker 2: which would have a huge political effect in the United States.
[11:50] Speaker 2: And so you know, I think, you know, Nick, I
[11:54] Speaker 2: had lunch with Dan Shapiro a couple of days ago,
[11:57] Speaker 2: former US Ambassador to Israel, and I think he had
[11:59] Speaker 2: the same job you had at the Pentagon in the
[12:01] Speaker 2: last administration. He was very much like John and and
[12:06] Speaker 2: maybe not like d as he's hanging out with AOC
[12:09] Speaker 2: in Brooklyn, But it's very much like us in terms of, hey,
[12:12] Speaker 2: you know, you can make a case for this, but
[12:15] Speaker 2: the administration hasn't. They didn't go to the American people,
[12:17] Speaker 2: they didn't go to Congress, and they certainly didn't seem
[12:20] Speaker 2: like they planned. And so my question on this entire
[12:23] Speaker 2: you know, affair, it's not an excursion, by the way,
[12:26] Speaker 2: which I thought was preposterous what Trump said, but it's
[12:29] Speaker 2: you know, perhaps it's the right thing to do, but
[12:31] Speaker 2: we have completely and I'm sorry to say this, incompetent people,
[12:34] Speaker 2: not at the Pentagon, but in kind of the overall
[12:36] Speaker 2: civilian leadership, you know, executing this. And that's what gives
[12:40] Speaker 2: me a lot of pause. And on that note, you know,
[12:42] Speaker 2: it's okay if we criticize this, I mean, you know,
[12:45] Speaker 2: you have you know, Haigsith went out and so did others,
[12:47] Speaker 2: and Jake Tapper from CNN just did a brutal takedown
[12:50] Speaker 2: of Ari Fleischer, the former Bush press spokesman's press Secretary's
[12:54] Speaker 2: kind of comments saying that, you know, it's it's unpatriotic
[12:56] Speaker 2: to criticize this. Well, that's what we're supposed to do,
[12:59] Speaker 2: That's what a Democrats, he does, and those of us
[13:01] Speaker 2: who are actually I think correctly criticizing this like we
[13:05] Speaker 2: have on this show today, do so from you know,
[13:08] Speaker 2: a position of knowing what we're talking about, having been
[13:11] Speaker 2: in war and seeing the consequences, but also from the
[13:15] Speaker 2: right place and like, hey, maybe we should have done this,
[13:17] Speaker 2: but you know, the execution of this is all screwed
[13:20] Speaker 2: up for so many different reasons. And so just that
[13:23] Speaker 2: idea of kind of the reliance on kind of you know,
[13:26] Speaker 2: when I say military math, it sounds really good, but
[13:28] Speaker 2: there's so much more to it. What do you guys
[13:30] Speaker 2: think of that? Is that a fair criticism of just
[13:33] Speaker 2: the focus on, you know, how many strikes, how much
[13:36] Speaker 2: ordinance we've dropped? Like, where's the grand strategy here? I
[13:38] Speaker 2: don't see it.
[13:41] Speaker 6: Of relying on these numbers. If we rely on these
[13:43] Speaker 6: numbers the way we are and say that this is
[13:46] Speaker 6: the measurement of success, we actually dig a hole for
[13:49] Speaker 6: ourselves because the question then becomes, well, how many weapons
[13:51] Speaker 6: do we still have, how much supply do we have?
[13:53] Speaker 6: How much can Israel still shoot down? And this has
[13:55] Speaker 6: become a big controversy in the Israeli press, talking about
[13:58] Speaker 6: the amount of interceptors they have it's kind of a
[14:01] Speaker 6: no no thing to talk about because the reality is
[14:04] Speaker 6: they don't have many and if we continue measuring and
[14:07] Speaker 6: making that the headline that we've conducted x amount of
[14:10] Speaker 6: strikes will be our own numbers will begin to look
[14:12] Speaker 6: like failure soon if we can't actually continue striking at
[14:16] Speaker 6: the rate that we want. It's almost like the Enron
[14:18] Speaker 6: collapse when Enron was baking its books and they couldn't
[14:21] Speaker 6: admit that they actually didn't make that much revenue this month.
[14:24] Speaker 6: It's a very similar thing where well, now that's the
[14:26] Speaker 6: number you've said is your success, and you can't meet
[14:28] Speaker 6: that number anymore.
[14:29] Speaker 7: Now, what.
[14:32] Speaker 5: Yeah, It's kind of like that famous dialogue between the
[14:35] Speaker 5: former US Army colonel and former Vietnamese Army colonel where
[14:40] Speaker 5: the US guy says, you know, we beat you in
[14:43] Speaker 5: every battle that we fought, and then the Vietnamese colonel said,
[14:48] Speaker 5: that is true and entirely irrelevant. Right, So we have
[14:52] Speaker 5: to I mean, I do think we should have defined
[14:54] Speaker 5: this from a point of view of from military objectives
[14:58] Speaker 5: and not an absolute one, right, because to John's point,
[15:02] Speaker 5: we're never going to get complete eradicate, eradication of their
[15:06] Speaker 5: ballistic missile program, for example. But we can say we've
[15:10] Speaker 5: brought it down as much as we can and we
[15:11] Speaker 5: think it's you know, any continuation is not worth it,
[15:15] Speaker 5: and then we can do a pause. Right, we don't.
[15:18] Speaker 5: We have to wait to see what Iron does, but
[15:20] Speaker 5: we could offer a you know, a ceasefire essentially and
[15:24] Speaker 5: see if they're willing to do so, and if they're not,
[15:27] Speaker 5: then they keep attacking us, then we have, you know,
[15:29] Speaker 5: have to make the decision. But we've defined it very
[15:33] Speaker 5: amorphously to include regime change, which was I would have
[15:38] Speaker 5: guessed that if there was a normal NSC process, the
[15:41] Speaker 5: intelligence community set would have said, do not use that
[15:45] Speaker 5: as an objective. It's not going to happen. It's just
[15:48] Speaker 5: not going to happen. We have no even prospect of
[15:52] Speaker 5: putting a large ground force in and if we don't,
[15:56] Speaker 5: not that I would ever adgate for that, but there's
[15:59] Speaker 5: a zero percent chance of the regime falling because there's
[16:01] Speaker 5: no other armed element that could actually facilitate that. Even
[16:05] Speaker 5: you know, the talk of the kouragins et cetera is
[16:07] Speaker 5: not even close. So I would have thought I would
[16:11] Speaker 5: have taken that off even a discussion. Obviously by the
[16:15] Speaker 5: way to Fish.
[16:16] Speaker 2: Trump is the one who actually raised that and is
[16:18] Speaker 2: in a true social bust in the middle of the
[16:19] Speaker 2: night and everyone's like, oh my god, he just advocated
[16:21] Speaker 2: for gin. That was that was two weeks before, weeks
[16:23] Speaker 2: before the war started. And so there's start from the beginning.
[16:26] Speaker 2: I would agree that would not be something in a
[16:28] Speaker 2: regular NSC process in which anyone would have advocated that.
[16:31] Speaker 2: But you're almost reactive to that now, and so now
[16:34] Speaker 2: we're kind of and and by the way, there's also
[16:37] Speaker 2: the blood of Iranians who stayed on the streets on
[16:39] Speaker 2: our hands. I mean, I really do believe that, and
[16:43] Speaker 2: you know, and so that's where we kind of are now.
[16:48] Speaker 5: Yeah, sorry, go ahead, finishing The last part is, you know,
[16:50] Speaker 5: the idea of this unconditional thrender, like it's going to
[16:53] Speaker 5: be Japan and you know, like nineteen forty five. I mean,
[16:56] Speaker 5: they're not going to do that. They have no reason
[16:58] Speaker 5: to what are they going to surrender to an aircraft?
[17:00] Speaker 5: I mean, I just would hope to your point, Mark,
[17:06] Speaker 5: it's American to criticize policy. We on this show criticized
[17:09] Speaker 5: the policy that led to the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
[17:14] Speaker 5: And we're gonna critique this too, and that's America. And
[17:17] Speaker 5: you know, for those that don't like it, maybe they
[17:20] Speaker 5: should rethink of what they think of freedom of speech.
[17:23] Speaker 5: But I want us to be successful, because you know,
[17:26] Speaker 5: I'm all about the US being successful in this. I
[17:29] Speaker 5: hope they can redefine or at least they can counch
[17:33] Speaker 5: it how they want to find something that we can
[17:35] Speaker 5: actually meet militarily and then start looking for an off
[17:39] Speaker 5: ramp and then if if we get it, we get it.
[17:42] Speaker 5: And I think they can claim, you know, they did
[17:44] Speaker 5: something that many administrations said they would do, but we're
[17:48] Speaker 5: willing to do. So they did it, and it essentially
[17:52] Speaker 5: reduced the capacity of this regime militarily at least stantially.
[17:58] Speaker 5: But we're going to have to redefine it and have
[17:59] Speaker 5: to potentially even acknowledge that things like regime change wereever
[18:03] Speaker 5: really in the cards. So it'll it'll have to be
[18:06] Speaker 5: a little bit of humble pie. But I still think
[18:08] Speaker 5: there's a way that the United States can define this
[18:11] Speaker 5: that this will be successful.
[18:13] Speaker 2: Ultimately, John, John, I want to ask you a quick
[18:17] Speaker 2: question about which and this this seems to everyone seems
[18:20] Speaker 2: to have forgotten the the NSS strategy, the national security strategy.
[18:23] Speaker 2: So literally, there was a document that was put out
[18:26] Speaker 2: several months ago, and go back and encourage viewers to
[18:29] Speaker 2: read this d maybe you can actually post it because
[18:32] Speaker 2: it literally says and it's a it's a withering critique
[18:34] Speaker 2: from the Trump administration on all the previous administrations. It
[18:37] Speaker 2: essentially says, get the fuck out of the Middle East. Uh,
[18:41] Speaker 2: And I mean and and whether it's ground forces, where
[18:44] Speaker 2: all the things that we're doing now. It was a
[18:47] Speaker 2: blistering criticism and yet we are there in a capacity
[18:52] Speaker 2: far beyond what any other president has done. Mick, you
[18:54] Speaker 2: mentioned that maybe maybe Trump did do more than anyone
[18:57] Speaker 2: thought possible on Iran, Yet we are going specifically against
[19:01] Speaker 2: his national security strategy, the strategy of the Pentagon every
[19:04] Speaker 2: the morning with a pivot to Asia. I mean, John,
[19:06] Speaker 2: we just pulled a mew out of out of the Pacific,
[19:10] Speaker 2: and so I just I want both of you guys,
[19:12] Speaker 2: but maybe John Firs just talk about that just first,
[19:16] Speaker 2: because there is this incredible dichotomy. I mean, and again
[19:19] Speaker 2: it's the American public as no appetite or as no
[19:21] Speaker 2: kind of attention span. But I think those of us
[19:23] Speaker 2: in the national security space are like holy shit, like
[19:26] Speaker 2: we have. We've gone like we went on the we're
[19:28] Speaker 2: in full nuclear Middle East mode now when we've just
[19:31] Speaker 2: been told for the last year at how you know
[19:33] Speaker 2: all the shit we did in the past for both
[19:35] Speaker 2: you guys, you know we're not doing anymore and here
[19:37] Speaker 2: we are on dohn steroids.
[19:40] Speaker 7: Yeah.
[19:40] Speaker 6: Actually, when I was working with counter threat finance people
[19:43] Speaker 6: at agency, they would always say, fall the money, see
[19:46] Speaker 6: where the dollars are being spent, and that will help
[19:47] Speaker 6: you figure out where the kind of center of gravity
[19:49] Speaker 6: of someone's thought processes. And if we look at our
[19:52] Speaker 6: own dollars being spent in our own centers of gravity, right,
[19:55] Speaker 6: from like a red hat perspective, where's the US spent
[19:58] Speaker 6: dollars the most since nineteen seventy eight, let's say, or
[20:01] Speaker 6: nineteen seventy three perhaps, and on security assistance in particular,
[20:05] Speaker 6: the number one recipient of security assistants since nineteen seventy
[20:08] Speaker 6: nine by law is Israel, number two Egypt, and number
[20:13] Speaker 6: three is Jordan. Right, And there's there a policy reasons
[20:16] Speaker 6: for that. Congress sets that spending, so whether the president
[20:20] Speaker 6: wants to do something somewhere else, that spending forces them
[20:23] Speaker 6: to do something where the dollars are supposed to be spent.
[20:26] Speaker 6: And I think that's a very important kind of baseline
[20:28] Speaker 6: to star wars to understand why does the Middle East
[20:30] Speaker 6: keep pulling us back? It's because policy is designed for that.
[20:34] Speaker 6: Dollars are spent there. True, we spent a lot of
[20:37] Speaker 6: money in Ukraine. We spent a lot of money in
[20:39] Speaker 6: Japan and South Korea, for example, and even in Africa,
[20:42] Speaker 6: especially during twenty seventeen through twenty twenty one, relative there
[20:45] Speaker 6: was a lot of special operations work in Africa. But
[20:48] Speaker 6: the congressional decision is that the US will spend money
[20:51] Speaker 6: on Israel number one, Egypt, and Jordan, and that has
[20:54] Speaker 6: to happen and will happen by law.
[20:56] Speaker 7: So until that.
[20:57] Speaker 6: Changes, it's very difficult for the president's policy to actually
[21:00] Speaker 6: shift somewhere else. And I remember twenty thirteen, the pivot
[21:03] Speaker 6: to Asia that Secretary Clinton mentioned. Everyone was making the
[21:06] Speaker 6: big kuha, like, oh, here we go, We're moving to Asia.
[21:08] Speaker 6: Then we get pulled right back to Afghanistan, right back
[21:10] Speaker 6: to the Middle East, because that is our statute says
[21:15] Speaker 6: we will do that, and we will spend six billion
[21:17] Speaker 6: dollars a year, and no country is allowed to be
[21:19] Speaker 6: given more security assistants than Israel. That's our laws. They
[21:22] Speaker 6: say that this is not a surprise or some political statement.
[21:25] Speaker 6: I mean, this is the truth. And I think that's
[21:27] Speaker 6: very important for people to understand. You know, why is
[21:29] Speaker 6: there this magnetic pull. It's because our laws say so.
[21:32] Speaker 6: And if we don't like that, we need to vote
[21:34] Speaker 6: people into office that will do something different. And until
[21:36] Speaker 6: we do that, Congress is going to continue making these
[21:38] Speaker 6: resolutions that are one hundred to zero in support of
[21:41] Speaker 6: Israeli policies in the Middle East, and that means our
[21:43] Speaker 6: dollars are going to be spent.
[21:44] Speaker 7: That way too. Again, if I like it right now.
[21:48] Speaker 6: I know, but hey, even AOC voted for that too,
[21:52] Speaker 6: So I mean this is a major thing in Congress
[21:55] Speaker 6: that where the dollar's going, well, they're going there, and
[21:57] Speaker 6: that means we're going there. Our troops are going to
[21:59] Speaker 6: go there. And if it's very interesting to look at
[22:02] Speaker 6: the Pacific angle right now, the US just asked for
[22:06] Speaker 6: will President Trump just asked for China and Japan to
[22:09] Speaker 6: send ships to the Middle East to help secure the
[22:11] Speaker 6: Straits of horror moves, which is very fascinating because we
[22:13] Speaker 6: just pulled a mew out of Japan the thirty first U,
[22:16] Speaker 6: which is designed to protect Japan and the First island
[22:19] Speaker 6: chain from a Chinese excursion toward Taiwan. And now we're
[22:22] Speaker 6: asking that potential adversary to also send troops with us
[22:26] Speaker 6: to the Middle East. I mean, it's just kind of
[22:28] Speaker 6: interesting to look at that. But the reason the US
[22:30] Speaker 6: is asking that is because the US can only secure
[22:33] Speaker 6: ten percent of the daily transits through the Strait of
[22:35] Speaker 6: horor moves with our naval assets that we have. That's
[22:39] Speaker 6: important to think about because we have half the number
[22:41] Speaker 6: of ships now than we had in nineteen eighty eight
[22:43] Speaker 6: when we did Operation Praying Mantis and successfully defended the
[22:46] Speaker 6: Kuwaiti vessels that were US flagged. We have half the
[22:49] Speaker 6: number of ships now. True, our technologies have improved, but
[22:53] Speaker 6: there's not much to do against these mines because we
[22:55] Speaker 6: just decommissioned four of all four of four of our
[22:59] Speaker 6: d mining vessel no longer exist, so we lost that capability.
[23:02] Speaker 6: We have zero percent of that capability. We have two
[23:04] Speaker 6: literal combat ships that can help with that. They're not
[23:06] Speaker 6: designed for that, they're not task organized for that, and
[23:09] Speaker 6: those ships have had their own problems coming into production
[23:11] Speaker 6: into use. Besides the mind ling issues, those ships are
[23:14] Speaker 6: kind of looked at within the Marine Corps Navy as
[23:16] Speaker 6: a little bit of a disaster zone.
[23:18] Speaker 7: So those are the things we have to de mind.
[23:20] Speaker 6: Now we're asking our potential adversary to come help us,
[23:23] Speaker 6: and we're asking Japan to basically make itself naked for
[23:26] Speaker 6: its navy against potential Chinese incursion to come help us
[23:29] Speaker 6: with our operation in the Straits that Japan probably didn't
[23:32] Speaker 6: agree with in the first place.
[23:35] Speaker 5: Yeah, on that point, Jonathan's point. So the Adventure class
[23:40] Speaker 5: minesweepers were decommissioned. I think it was like last year, right,
[23:46] Speaker 5: the last one. That's literally terrible timing. They were designed specifically,
[23:51] Speaker 5: they didn't have metal holes, they were silent, they had
[23:54] Speaker 5: all this special kind of radar. That's what they did.
[23:56] Speaker 5: I mean, that was their sole mission. They gave that
[23:59] Speaker 5: mission to the as Jonathan thaed thelatoral combat ships I
[24:02] Speaker 5: think the Independence Class. But they do it with drones, right,
[24:06] Speaker 5: It's really not the ship itself at least my understanding.
[24:09] Speaker 5: And again we're marines, not naval officers, but they basically
[24:16] Speaker 5: gave it to a multi purpose platform. And so the
[24:18] Speaker 5: question and people and I've talked to people that really think,
[24:21] Speaker 5: I think know this. They're concerned that they haven't nearly
[24:25] Speaker 5: been as tested obviously as the ones we decommissioned, and
[24:28] Speaker 5: this might not go as smoothly as we had hoped.
[24:32] Speaker 5: But it wasn't made. The decision was made before this conflict,
[24:36] Speaker 5: So it's not really casting as persons anybody. It's just
[24:38] Speaker 5: we've got to deal with that. But to your other question, mark, yes,
[24:42] Speaker 5: I mean, as I've mentioned before, I'm more of a
[24:45] Speaker 5: Reagan era Republican as far as national security. So this
[24:50] Speaker 5: idea that we were going to withdraw from the world,
[24:53] Speaker 5: stop being the leader of the free world, focus on
[24:57] Speaker 5: homeland security, which is to be frank, I mean, every
[25:01] Speaker 5: country focuses on homeland security. If you want to be
[25:04] Speaker 5: that exceptional nation, you've got to go beyond that. Right,
[25:07] Speaker 5: Literally every country focuses on its own security. And now
[25:11] Speaker 5: it's proven already in a matter of months, to have
[25:16] Speaker 5: not been the right decision, and the people who wrote it,
[25:20] Speaker 5: including the National Defense Strategy so specific to the military,
[25:25] Speaker 5: are now on Capitol Hill defending the war in Iran.
[25:30] Speaker 2: Bridge goal.
[25:32] Speaker 5: Yeah, like three weeks later, it's right. So the the
[25:37] Speaker 5: and maybe not to put it down all on process,
[25:41] Speaker 5: but the process of the NSC is what creates the
[25:44] Speaker 5: national security strategy, and then of course the component of
[25:49] Speaker 5: the NSC that's specific to the defense, civilian and uniformed
[25:53] Speaker 5: creates the defense strategy. It just doesn't seem like there was, Uh,
[25:58] Speaker 5: there's obviously not a consistency. And it's almost like we
[26:01] Speaker 5: tossed the whole thing already, you know, within a month
[26:04] Speaker 5: of passing it. So we'll have to see. I'm sure
[26:08] Speaker 5: the counter argument being like, no, we got to take
[26:10] Speaker 5: care of her on so that we can then do
[26:12] Speaker 5: our strategy. But I think it's pretty clear and to
[26:15] Speaker 5: other Jonathan's other point on the fall of money, the
[26:20] Speaker 5: Middle East is always going to be important to us.
[26:21] Speaker 5: Let's just accept it. Let's just accept it. With the
[26:24] Speaker 5: US tax payer pays enough to our national security that
[26:27] Speaker 5: we should be able to do all the above, right,
[26:30] Speaker 5: all the above. We can do it. We can do
[26:32] Speaker 5: it diplomatically, intelligence, militarily. We can be the you know,
[26:38] Speaker 5: exceptional country, the indispend indispensable nation around the world, and
[26:42] Speaker 5: we should view it that way. Yes, we have priorities
[26:45] Speaker 5: like we always have, but this idea that we can
[26:47] Speaker 5: only focus on ourself and dominating the western hemisphere is
[26:52] Speaker 5: just not what does not live up to the what
[26:55] Speaker 5: the United States I think true mission is, which is
[26:59] Speaker 5: to essentially be that leader of the.
[27:01] Speaker 2: Free will that the notion on the MEW just one
[27:05] Speaker 2: one quick thing for both of you guys. Jhonathan maybe
[27:08] Speaker 2: jump in here, because I think that there's a couple
[27:10] Speaker 2: of things here. One is I think Mick you mentioned
[27:11] Speaker 2: that it certainly appears that it's amazing because the problem
[27:15] Speaker 2: set of the Straits of Hormuz should have been first.
[27:17] Speaker 2: And I mean, look the Pentagon, you know this. You've
[27:19] Speaker 2: stared at this fricking problem set for several decades. So
[27:22] Speaker 2: the idea that we're unprepared for this is quite extraordinary.
[27:25] Speaker 2: Or perhaps there was a recommendation UH to the civilian
[27:30] Speaker 2: leadership that wasn't taken on this, But I find that
[27:32] Speaker 2: remarkable and that we're a place now where and I
[27:36] Speaker 2: don't understand why it's not more of an issue where
[27:39] Speaker 2: it's is it Is it getting baked in that there
[27:41] Speaker 2: actually might be US ground forces the MEW is going.
[27:44] Speaker 2: Is that a faint? Is that is that a threat
[27:46] Speaker 2: to the Iranians? Or is it actually if you look
[27:48] Speaker 2: at the Straits of Hormuz militarily is this going to
[27:51] Speaker 2: be required? Because it's so difficult. So but here we
[27:56] Speaker 2: are not Not only has there been you know, we've
[27:58] Speaker 2: expended a huge amount of money on this. The region's
[28:00] Speaker 2: a bit of a mess. We're actually talking about putting
[28:03] Speaker 2: US forces on the ground. I mean again, just if
[28:07] Speaker 2: you kind of sit back and think, well, wait a second,
[28:09] Speaker 2: you know, during the Trump campaign or the initial stage
[28:12] Speaker 2: of the Trump administration, this is actually unfathomable. What's occurring
[28:15] Speaker 2: right now? I guess maybe you're The question on that
[28:21] Speaker 2: is also a political question too, is that the American
[28:23] Speaker 2: people are going to are they going to be okay
[28:25] Speaker 2: with this? And because likely there will be American servicemen
[28:28] Speaker 2: and women who die if we go down this word
[28:30] Speaker 2: I cannot imagine. And just you take a look at
[28:33] Speaker 2: you know, the air to air CASEY one thirty five crash.
[28:35] Speaker 2: I mean, bad shit happens, or drones hitting our people
[28:38] Speaker 2: in Kuwait. Probably there will be casualties if we do this.
[28:41] Speaker 6: I mean your thoughts, yeah, I mean on the political question,
[28:46] Speaker 6: the people have spoken through their representatives and senators whether
[28:49] Speaker 6: or not they want to stop this war, and they
[28:52] Speaker 6: the Congress decided not to make a resolution to stop it.
[28:56] Speaker 6: So I mean, based on our system, that's the output
[28:58] Speaker 6: of our system that those who are elected chose to
[29:01] Speaker 6: allow this to continue, which is, you know, whether we
[29:04] Speaker 6: agree that or not, that's how it's designed to work.
[29:06] Speaker 6: If it's working properly.
[29:07] Speaker 3: Of course, we can all admit it's bullshit.
[29:09] Speaker 5: It's okay, you can approval. It's approval. That's whether you
[29:13] Speaker 5: should look.
[29:14] Speaker 3: Yeah.
[29:14] Speaker 4: But I mean, like the latest polling is like it's
[29:16] Speaker 4: at like hovering around thirty percent approval for this. It's
[29:19] Speaker 4: like the American people do not want this to go on,
[29:22] Speaker 4: and they definitely. I'm an American citizen. I don't want
[29:25] Speaker 4: fucking boots on the ground. Let's go covert, full full force, baby,
[29:30] Speaker 4: you know what I mean, Let's do that. Not interested
[29:32] Speaker 4: in Marines getting fucking killed on carg Island or more
[29:37] Speaker 4: casey went thirty five people crash. Not interested at all.
[29:41] Speaker 4: It's no benefit to us whatsoever as a country.
[29:44] Speaker 3: Zero.
[29:45] Speaker 6: I think the two indicators you can kind of analyze
[29:47] Speaker 6: from this with the with the Marines. So first of
[29:49] Speaker 6: all the fact that the Marines were not positioned there
[29:53] Speaker 6: or chopped there, like change of operational control from the
[29:55] Speaker 6: Pacific to the fifth Fleet in Bahrain before the conflict
[29:59] Speaker 6: started kind of indicates that that was not part of
[30:01] Speaker 6: the initial planning, first of all, and second of all,
[30:05] Speaker 6: moving the Marines from the seventh Fleet to the fifth
[30:08] Speaker 6: fleet is a strategic decision, not an operational decision, which
[30:12] Speaker 6: signals to me that they will be probably used. This
[30:15] Speaker 6: isn't likely a faint because the amount of things behind
[30:18] Speaker 6: the scenes that have to occur for the Marines to
[30:20] Speaker 6: move from one to the other and be positioned somewhere else.
[30:22] Speaker 6: It's not simply a military objective that's being achieved here.
[30:25] Speaker 6: It's also a political and strategic objective that requires a
[30:28] Speaker 6: lot of thought and planning to do at the level
[30:30] Speaker 6: that needs to move in there. So that kind of
[30:32] Speaker 6: signals to me that yes, they will be used. And
[30:34] Speaker 6: looking at carg Island, I mentioned earlier the distance between
[30:38] Speaker 6: the Straits and carg Island, there's another distance that's really important,
[30:41] Speaker 6: and that's the distance between carg Island and Abadon. Abadon
[30:45] Speaker 6: is the primary mainland part of the entire oil production
[30:49] Speaker 6: for Iran, and it's not very far away from carg Island.
[30:53] Speaker 6: And if the government right now the US government is
[30:55] Speaker 6: looking at an incremental approach to kind of solving this
[30:57] Speaker 6: problem that they've created in the Straits. They'll put marines
[31:01] Speaker 6: maybe on carg Island, and then say, well, it's only
[31:03] Speaker 6: one hundred kilometers to Abadon, that's not too far. Maybe
[31:07] Speaker 6: we take Abdon. Maybe we also take Boucher, because Boucher,
[31:11] Speaker 6: if you'll remember from the nuclear strikes, is a primary
[31:13] Speaker 6: location of Iran's nuclear program where there is currently uranium underground. Well,
[31:17] Speaker 6: that's even closer than Abadon. Well, that's another great point
[31:20] Speaker 6: to project forces onto the mainland. And the reason I'm
[31:23] Speaker 6: mentioning this is because of something we all remember from
[31:25] Speaker 6: Afghanistan and Iraq, which is Mission Creep. Yeah, once you've
[31:28] Speaker 6: got the forces there, right, absolutely, once you've got the
[31:31] Speaker 6: forces there, it's only one more step. Well, it's just
[31:34] Speaker 6: a little bit. It's almost like a gambling problem or
[31:37] Speaker 6: or an addiction. You know, we'll just have one more
[31:38] Speaker 6: cigarette before I quit, you know. And if they're right
[31:41] Speaker 6: there in front of you, it's very tempting to use,
[31:43] Speaker 6: especially if it gets short term domestic wins. And we
[31:46] Speaker 6: can say, well, we took hard easily, we took Maduro easily,
[31:50] Speaker 6: We can do Cuba. You know, like these things suddenly
[31:52] Speaker 6: become easy in your mind psychologically because of successes you
[31:56] Speaker 6: just had in somewhere in other realm.
[31:58] Speaker 2: Mac mech just the thing I think sometimes, and this
[32:02] Speaker 2: is like instinctive we always want to give. And I
[32:04] Speaker 2: say this with respect. You want to give the US
[32:07] Speaker 2: military a pass on this because I think there's a
[32:10] Speaker 2: criticism of the civilian leadership. But you can't give the
[32:13] Speaker 2: military a pass or the Pentagon if it does look
[32:15] Speaker 2: like as both of you have suggested that you know,
[32:18] Speaker 2: the MEW was never activated, that the straits of hermus
[32:20] Speaker 2: was not considered. You know, there there are there's there's
[32:23] Speaker 2: big fights on social media. You have people like you know,
[32:25] Speaker 2: John Spencer who can't ever see anything go wrong that
[32:27] Speaker 2: any administration or Israel ever does. And he's been howling
[32:31] Speaker 2: the last couple of days saying that you know, all
[32:32] Speaker 2: of us who are saying that there was no planning
[32:34] Speaker 2: for for the straits of our moves don't know what
[32:36] Speaker 2: we're talking about except we have our own eyes and
[32:39] Speaker 2: you can see. So so how did the Pentagon? Let's
[32:42] Speaker 2: I mean we can focus in a little bit on
[32:43] Speaker 2: the military too. I know these are your old brothers
[32:45] Speaker 2: and sisters. But you know, how did this happen again
[32:49] Speaker 2: or or was advice not taken? But I but you know,
[32:52] Speaker 2: you do have to kind of look at the Pentagon
[32:54] Speaker 2: planning on this and say, okay, you know this is
[32:56] Speaker 2: a problem. Say we've stared at forever. What are your thoughts?
[32:59] Speaker 5: So I think, I mean, I don't know, to be
[33:02] Speaker 5: to be frank, to be clear, but it looks like
[33:05] Speaker 5: it was decided by a very small handful of people,
[33:08] Speaker 5: and again referencing this Wall Street Journal article without a
[33:12] Speaker 5: lot of input beyond the chairman when it came to
[33:16] Speaker 5: the military side, because the military would have taken the
[33:19] Speaker 5: guidance and to be prepared for missions and started doing
[33:25] Speaker 5: That's what the Chairman's office does, right, the global integrator,
[33:28] Speaker 5: they would have started doing things to facilitate not only
[33:31] Speaker 5: what they expected the campaign to go, but also the
[33:36] Speaker 5: branch plans and contingencies that have to plan for the
[33:39] Speaker 5: idea that the that the muse just now and it's
[33:41] Speaker 5: two weeks away, right, something like that. I mean, not
[33:45] Speaker 5: just it's impossible to say that that was that that
[33:48] Speaker 5: indicates anything other than they didn't plan for this, right,
[33:52] Speaker 5: I'm sorry it just is what it is. I don't
[33:54] Speaker 5: think the chairman could even right.
[33:56] Speaker 4: It's kind of wild that, like like it's like they
[33:59] Speaker 4: decided to open up a sandwich shop, but instead of
[34:02] Speaker 4: a sandwich shop, they're going to fucking war five guys. Like,
[34:06] Speaker 4: let's just start a business, you guys, it'll be fun.
[34:09] Speaker 5: It's deep with a form new command a friend of
[34:14] Speaker 5: mine on how this would go, and I'm not gonna
[34:17] Speaker 5: go through it because I don't want to give any
[34:19] Speaker 5: information away. You know, the top lines are this, it's
[34:24] Speaker 5: difficult to get there and Jonathan already hit it. Uh
[34:26] Speaker 5: you know basically have to traverse seven hundred kilometers of
[34:29] Speaker 5: Iranian coastline to get there unless you fly, but fly.
[34:32] Speaker 5: I've got its issues. But it's also staying there right,
[34:36] Speaker 5: you know, being able to protect your force when you're there,
[34:39] Speaker 5: which is going to just be you know, bombarded, and
[34:42] Speaker 5: then like what if it doesn't work? That was the
[34:45] Speaker 5: biggest It was a more of a strategic question from
[34:48] Speaker 5: my friend that I was talking to. It's like, okay,
[34:53] Speaker 5: so we're going in with the idea that it's going
[34:54] Speaker 5: to put so much pressure that are on it's going
[34:56] Speaker 5: to capitulate and open the straights removed and super peace.
[35:00] Speaker 5: What if we get there, the Mariines are getting bombarded.
[35:02] Speaker 5: They've they've successfully taken the island. They've done everything militarily
[35:05] Speaker 5: successful as we would expect braines to do, and Neurn
[35:08] Speaker 5: just blows them off, you know what I mean, Like
[35:11] Speaker 5: they just nope, we're still going to block the straight
[35:13] Speaker 5: through our moods and uh, we're still going to keep
[35:16] Speaker 5: attacking our partners and allies.
[35:17] Speaker 3: And I have a question about a bad question.
[35:21] Speaker 2: Yeah, let me just jump in right here, I got
[35:22] Speaker 2: I got a bullet guy, all right, bye? Thanks Mark,
[35:25] Speaker 2: Can you leave this open or now?
[35:27] Speaker 7: No?
[35:27] Speaker 3: You're good?
[35:28] Speaker 2: Okay, Sorry guys.
[35:29] Speaker 5: Bye, take care of bro.
[35:32] Speaker 4: I have a question about Crag Island about like, let's
[35:35] Speaker 4: say the Marines do take it.
[35:38] Speaker 3: Are they assuming that?
[35:40] Speaker 4: Is there like a thought process that like, you know,
[35:42] Speaker 4: we're gonna have twenty five hundred marines there, it's Iran's
[35:45] Speaker 4: like central hub of like distributing oil. They're less likely
[35:49] Speaker 4: to attack it because they're gonna fucking destroy their entire economy.
[35:54] Speaker 3: Is that like a thought process that's going on?
[35:56] Speaker 6: Well, the important thing is that these ballistic missiles have
[35:58] Speaker 6: different range, so they can't use their long range ballistic
[36:02] Speaker 6: missiles to fire on carg Island unless they reposition their
[36:05] Speaker 6: transporter or erector launchers further away. So this is already
[36:08] Speaker 6: a problem that the regime will be thinking through. But
[36:11] Speaker 6: that number of marines you mentioned twenty two hundred, two
[36:13] Speaker 6: thousand and five hundred, that's not the amount of the
[36:15] Speaker 6: Marines that will take the island because the way the
[36:18] Speaker 6: Marine Expeditionary Unit is designed it is to be an
[36:20] Speaker 6: air and ground task force, So there's an air combat element,
[36:23] Speaker 6: a ground combat element, and a logistics combat element, plus
[36:26] Speaker 6: some other sustainment elements around that. What you'd probably see
[36:30] Speaker 6: instead is a battalion landing team, which is five hundred
[36:32] Speaker 6: and fifty Roffey people actually physically seizing, holding, and sustaining
[36:36] Speaker 6: on that island, while you'd have other people kind of
[36:39] Speaker 6: in these rings of distance around it to protect sustained, resupply,
[36:43] Speaker 6: deploy redeployed, do reception, staging, armor, movement, integration, all these
[36:46] Speaker 6: things that go into what's called the rapid planning process,
[36:49] Speaker 6: a rapid response planning process that the MEW uses to
[36:52] Speaker 6: plan for exactly this type of contingency. So the MEW
[36:55] Speaker 6: can do it operationally. It's part of their doctrine to do.
[36:58] Speaker 6: That's why the marine is rene. It's being sent there
[37:00] Speaker 6: because it's literally the only entity in our entire Department
[37:03] Speaker 6: of Defense that can do exactly this operation as their
[37:06] Speaker 6: primary mission objective.
[37:08] Speaker 5: Right.
[37:09] Speaker 6: The question is, as you asked, is what are they
[37:11] Speaker 6: safe after that? What does that mean after that? Well,
[37:13] Speaker 6: the regime has like four thousand mines right now, the
[37:17] Speaker 6: transits before the war started, we're around one hundred and
[37:19] Speaker 6: forty plus transits per day around the Straits. So if
[37:22] Speaker 6: you do the math on that, they can still put
[37:24] Speaker 6: the Straits at risk regardless of what we do in
[37:26] Speaker 6: a card island for a very long time in terms
[37:28] Speaker 6: of combat time. Right, So even if we did, it
[37:31] Speaker 6: takes us two weeks to get there first of all,
[37:33] Speaker 6: so there's a lot of things happening in those two weeks.
[37:35] Speaker 6: Then they actually seize and hold the island, which takes
[37:37] Speaker 6: a few days to do. Now we're talking about next month.
[37:41] Speaker 6: The regime could then deploy more mines. They're not sophisticated devices.
[37:45] Speaker 6: They can deploy more mines. They're magnetic, they don't really
[37:47] Speaker 6: require very much to be used, especially with small boats
[37:51] Speaker 6: that they have The other very important thing we haven't
[37:53] Speaker 6: mentioned yet is the Hoho thies have not been active,
[37:57] Speaker 6: and so if countries try to move somewhere else while
[38:01] Speaker 6: while the US is trying to do this chess piece
[38:03] Speaker 6: movement in the Straits. For example, Fujera, which I mentioned
[38:05] Speaker 6: at the beginning of the show. It's important because there's
[38:07] Speaker 6: actually a land based pipeline across the Saudi the Peninsula
[38:12] Speaker 6: that can move a small amount of oil to Fujera
[38:14] Speaker 6: and then send it out. There's another one across Saudi
[38:16] Speaker 6: Arabia as well, but that's not quite in the discussion
[38:18] Speaker 6: right now. But the Houthis can target that Fujera port
[38:22] Speaker 6: from the south to north right.
[38:24] Speaker 7: So even if we.
[38:24] Speaker 6: Put troops outside Fujera to protect the mew that's been
[38:28] Speaker 6: deployed inside the gulf, that back element, that rear element,
[38:32] Speaker 6: could now be at risk by the Houthis on the
[38:34] Speaker 6: other side. So these are like very important things to
[38:36] Speaker 6: think about as we're thinking of what happens when those
[38:38] Speaker 6: marines actually land on the island. It's not just the
[38:40] Speaker 6: island that's now a thing to consider for force protection.
[38:42] Speaker 6: It's also the things in the rear area that we
[38:44] Speaker 6: consider to be the rear area that the enemy can
[38:46] Speaker 6: then open up and harass US in the rear area.
[38:49] Speaker 6: Hate to use the Vietnam comparison, but this did happen
[38:52] Speaker 6: in Vietnam when we were doing operations into North Vietnam,
[38:55] Speaker 6: and then the North Vietnamese activated forces in South Vietnam
[38:58] Speaker 6: to bring the fight to US US in our rear areas,
[39:01] Speaker 6: which threw us off balanced numerous times in many of
[39:04] Speaker 6: their North vietame successful operations against US, and we had
[39:07] Speaker 6: superior forces at that time as well.
[39:11] Speaker 5: Yeah, I think they had struck Fujaira yesterday, right, I mean,
[39:14] Speaker 5: I saw certainly social media posts that. And then of
[39:18] Speaker 5: course the Huthis can also put other you know, the
[39:21] Speaker 5: Red Sea, bob Elmande, all other places. This hasn't gotten
[39:26] Speaker 5: as bad as it could get exactly, and we could
[39:29] Speaker 5: end up with although I agree with Jonathan and my friend,
[39:33] Speaker 5: we can take the rains, will take the island. If
[39:36] Speaker 5: task the question is how do we get them out
[39:37] Speaker 5: of it?
[39:39] Speaker 7: Now?
[39:39] Speaker 5: If everything works fine and they and it's basically a
[39:43] Speaker 5: tick for tack, then I guess that's how we get
[39:45] Speaker 5: them out of it. But if they don't concede and
[39:47] Speaker 5: they don't really seem to be willing to concede anything.
[39:51] Speaker 5: The other point, and I think we've talked about this before,
[39:54] Speaker 5: is this whole mosaic defense of an right. They they
[39:58] Speaker 5: are designed that if they take significant threat to the regime,
[40:01] Speaker 5: which this obviously was, they operate very independently, like thirty
[40:05] Speaker 5: one different provinces, different commanders, different intelligence collection capability, delicious
[40:10] Speaker 5: special type operations. I mean, this is what they are
[40:14] Speaker 5: designed to withstand. So I don't necessarily know how we
[40:18] Speaker 5: could ever get to a point where they would unconditionally surrender.
[40:22] Speaker 5: I think there'll always be somebody that's in the regime,
[40:25] Speaker 5: even if we keep decapitation strikes. So we're in a
[40:29] Speaker 5: position where again why I'm advocating for the US to
[40:32] Speaker 5: set our own objectives, to determine when we met it,
[40:35] Speaker 5: and then you know, lotterally do a pous if necessary,
[40:38] Speaker 5: and see if it can decompress the whole situation where
[40:41] Speaker 5: we're I will follow. But if they if the whole
[40:43] Speaker 5: idea is to put military pressure enough to get the
[40:46] Speaker 5: regime to have some kind of signing of surrender, it's
[40:51] Speaker 5: just it's putting a task on the military that's ill
[40:55] Speaker 5: defined and really unachievable, right. I mean, if you're going
[40:59] Speaker 5: to fight and symmetric war, you have to be willing
[41:01] Speaker 5: to take more pain than the other and that's what
[41:03] Speaker 5: they've clearly decided to do. And they've clearly decided to
[41:07] Speaker 5: take as much pain as we can give them.
[41:09] Speaker 6: Yeah, there's another Vietnam era quote that the Americans win
[41:14] Speaker 6: or they what is it? They they lose if they
[41:17] Speaker 6: don't win, and the other side wins if they don't lose. Yeah,
[41:20] Speaker 6: because it's about attrition. Americans are not designed to support attrition,
[41:23] Speaker 6: because we have a democratic process that puts pressure every
[41:25] Speaker 6: four two to four years on what our war policy is.
[41:29] Speaker 6: And if that war lasts longer than two to four years,
[41:32] Speaker 6: you're almost guaranteed to shift in how the war is
[41:34] Speaker 6: going to be executed in a way that misaligns with
[41:36] Speaker 6: the original objectives of that war.
[41:38] Speaker 4: I want to ask you guys about the There was
[41:40] Speaker 4: a Bloomberg report about the US Army sending ten thousand
[41:43] Speaker 4: interceptor drones developed like in Ukraine to the Middle East
[41:48] Speaker 4: to combat Irans, like Missilan drones.
[41:50] Speaker 3: They call it. They're from AI enabled company Mayre Ops.
[41:53] Speaker 3: It's called.
[41:55] Speaker 4: It costs about fifteen grand each and you know, I
[41:59] Speaker 4: love this idea. Why the fuck didn't we have that
[42:02] Speaker 4: like three months ago there before? We just are three
[42:05] Speaker 4: weeks ago.
[42:06] Speaker 5: I think that is a verb that actually catches bees
[42:09] Speaker 5: in the air or something. I think I thought it
[42:12] Speaker 5: was like an acronym, but it's not. It's actually named Yeah,
[42:17] Speaker 5: it's time for the United States to wake up to
[42:18] Speaker 5: the realities that are we're seeing in Ukraine right, low
[42:22] Speaker 5: cost but efficient lethal options instead of thinking that everything
[42:27] Speaker 5: has to be probably dating myself here a Cadillac that
[42:31] Speaker 5: we spent an incredible amount of money on and uh
[42:34] Speaker 5: and somehow that gives us the superior advantage and every
[42:37] Speaker 5: conflict we fight, it's just simply not the case. And
[42:40] Speaker 5: this this you know, the assassin's mace concept that I
[42:43] Speaker 5: think everybody used that term because it sounds cool that
[42:45] Speaker 5: the Chinese have. It's basically, you know, fight something that's
[42:49] Speaker 5: one hundred percent cheaper to kill something that's one hundred
[42:51] Speaker 5: percent more expensive. The United States needs to realize that's
[42:55] Speaker 5: that is a that is a concept of war fighting
[42:58] Speaker 5: that we need to embrace. I know that there's like
[43:01] Speaker 5: a desire to have every you know, district in the
[43:04] Speaker 5: country participate in the building of some massive new weapon system.
[43:09] Speaker 5: And I'm not saying that all of those weapon systems
[43:11] Speaker 5: are not a good idea, but we have to have
[43:14] Speaker 5: a balance. And this is really proven that this war
[43:16] Speaker 5: of attrition is we're going to run out of interceptor
[43:20] Speaker 5: missiles here surelytte.
[43:22] Speaker 6: A great comparison is the one shot head costs thirty
[43:25] Speaker 6: thousand dollars to make, which is one of these one
[43:27] Speaker 6: way attack durones thirty thousand dollars. One tomahawk is three
[43:32] Speaker 6: point six million dollars per tomahawk and just I mean
[43:36] Speaker 6: orders of magnitude different, and the outcomes can almost be
[43:40] Speaker 6: the same depending on what the target is that you
[43:41] Speaker 6: strike with this either device.
[43:45] Speaker 4: Yeah, so my question is, like, why didn't we plan
[43:48] Speaker 4: to have like five thousand of these drones down there
[43:51] Speaker 4: dispersed across all of our bases ready to intercep instead
[43:56] Speaker 4: of using patriots And you know that cost probably I
[43:59] Speaker 4: don't know what a patriot is. A one point three
[44:01] Speaker 4: mil I think I read you know that isn't quite
[44:04] Speaker 4: a base. Yeah, yeah, we got the thads too. The
[44:07] Speaker 4: thads are like insane insanely more expensive, So like, why
[44:10] Speaker 4: not have five eight seven thousand drones ready to rock
[44:15] Speaker 4: at all our bases dispersed in the region, especially before
[44:18] Speaker 4: we're about to you know, we decapitated a regime that
[44:22] Speaker 4: now is completely out of control, right, Like you mentioned
[44:25] Speaker 4: the mosaic doctrine, Like we don't even know who to
[44:28] Speaker 4: negotiate with, Like how long will it take if we
[44:30] Speaker 4: did reach a deal with the top brash for like
[44:33] Speaker 4: the rest of the thirty one provinces still like, oh yeah, okay,
[44:36] Speaker 4: we're going to back off now.
[44:38] Speaker 5: It's a good point. I mean, we don't even know
[44:40] Speaker 5: this current status of the Supreme Leader. I mean, I
[44:44] Speaker 5: don't think it's a conspiracy there to say, hey, how
[44:47] Speaker 5: come he didn't do a video or speak right? And
[44:50] Speaker 5: then I've talked to an a Ranian who was like,
[44:53] Speaker 5: and by the way, the grammar was horrible, and this
[44:56] Speaker 5: person's pretty educated, and it didn't I mean, I didn't
[45:00] Speaker 5: read the or know this to be true, but I'm
[45:03] Speaker 5: pretty sure based on what this person said. Is like
[45:06] Speaker 5: the person a used terrible grammar, b used a lot
[45:10] Speaker 5: of more Arabic words than they would have expected, and
[45:13] Speaker 5: obviously didn't appear on camera or audio like there's something
[45:18] Speaker 5: going on there.
[45:19] Speaker 3: Well, he was injured in the initial attack, right, yeah.
[45:22] Speaker 5: But maybe more far more injured than we might know.
[45:26] Speaker 5: And then the question that I've also heard from people
[45:28] Speaker 5: who followed Mostaba's career is he pretty much does what
[45:33] Speaker 5: the IRGC tells him to do. Is what is what
[45:36] Speaker 5: I would sum up like half an hour conversation. So
[45:39] Speaker 5: it's it's the IRGC that's in charge, and it's an
[45:43] Speaker 5: amorphous group, Like, so who are we going to negotiate with?
[45:47] Speaker 5: Essentially is the point of your question?
[45:50] Speaker 7: Uh d?
[45:50] Speaker 5: And I don't know that we have an answer to that.
[45:53] Speaker 4: I mean, he was pretty coo clear before these bombings started,
[45:55] Speaker 4: the attack started, and then basically is alive.
[45:59] Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, who do you think? Lauren Johnny and Collieboff
[46:05] Speaker 5: Colliboff that's the speaker, right of the part.
[46:08] Speaker 6: So you've got the Speaker of Parliament and the Supreme
[46:10] Speaker 6: National Security Council leader. But these these guys are old
[46:14] Speaker 6: IRGC guys from the Iran Iraq War and they're the
[46:17] Speaker 6: kind of lever polars that have been the lever polars
[46:20] Speaker 6: for decades. And everybody else that was killed was someone
[46:23] Speaker 6: beholden to these two guys.
[46:25] Speaker 7: So the fact that these two guys are still alive.
[46:27] Speaker 6: It's like we almost got the opposite outcome that we
[46:29] Speaker 6: were looking for with the strike deck that we used,
[46:31] Speaker 6: which could have been just because we didn't have enough
[46:34] Speaker 6: human on the ground to actually validate the targets at
[46:36] Speaker 6: the very opening when we were doing the triggered strikes
[46:38] Speaker 6: to actually hit those those large scale first three strikes
[46:41] Speaker 6: on day one. Because as far as the strikes that
[46:44] Speaker 6: I've worked on, we know, if we want to have
[46:46] Speaker 6: that one individual in there, we're going to make sure
[46:47] Speaker 6: we know who else is in the room with them,
[46:49] Speaker 6: because if we you know, there's strategic effects if you.
[46:52] Speaker 7: Kill the wrong people at the wrong time.
[46:54] Speaker 6: And it seems that we just drop bombs on large
[46:57] Speaker 6: gatherings of folks during Ramadan, which is actually, you know,
[47:00] Speaker 6: strategy I have used as well, because you get the
[47:02] Speaker 6: most bang for your buck when they're all having silkh
[47:05] Speaker 6: or dinner together. But if you don't know who's in there,
[47:08] Speaker 6: you might end up eliminating the ones that you actually
[47:10] Speaker 6: wanted to survive for a specific amount of time to
[47:12] Speaker 6: get a specific end state out of after that straight.
[47:18] Speaker 4: So you're saying John that don't plan a war on
[47:22] Speaker 4: the back of a Napkin with five guys.
[47:25] Speaker 7: What you're saying six guys, six guys.
[47:27] Speaker 3: I'm sorry, Yeah, I'm sorry.
[47:28] Speaker 7: Yeah.
[47:29] Speaker 5: I mean they're they're critical people, but those sorties they
[47:32] Speaker 5: should be informed, right, I mean.
[47:33] Speaker 3: But who's the only one that's like actually, like General Kane.
[47:37] Speaker 5: Right, jen O k And I think you know I
[47:38] Speaker 5: was doing the best you can. But the other guys, uh,
[47:42] Speaker 5: save say the Secretary of State, they go from talking
[47:46] Speaker 5: about domestic policy to I mean they don't have time
[47:49] Speaker 5: to be.
[47:49] Speaker 4: An expert on all of this stuff. I totally agree,
[47:52] Speaker 4: got excuses for But that's why you need a ro NSC. Yeah,
[47:55] Speaker 4: Like that's why you need that robust NSC. You're an executive,
[47:59] Speaker 4: you're not in the weeds. But like, yeah, you shouldn't
[48:02] Speaker 4: just be like like again, this isn't starting a business.
[48:06] Speaker 4: This is actually going to war. That's gonna that's killed
[48:09] Speaker 4: thousands of Iranians. You know, we have one hundred and
[48:12] Speaker 4: fifty plus injured Americans plus like now I think it's
[48:15] Speaker 4: over twelve dead and there's no end in sight. It's like,
[48:20] Speaker 4: these are huge decisions that you're in charge of. Like
[48:23] Speaker 4: anybody with the wrinkles in their brains would understand that, like,
[48:27] Speaker 4: I need to get as much information from as many
[48:30] Speaker 4: experts as possible before I make a commitment like this
[48:32] Speaker 4: that will lead to people dying and you know, potentially
[48:38] Speaker 4: hundreds of billions of dollars, forget even the oil like
[48:40] Speaker 4: in our economy, like just the actual money that it
[48:43] Speaker 4: costs to sustain operations. And I'm a dummy, and I
[48:47] Speaker 4: know that, Like you know, you would think that people
[48:49] Speaker 4: in charge would be like, Yeah, let's get as much
[48:51] Speaker 4: information as humanly possible. Get smart guys in the room,
[48:55] Speaker 4: like Mick and John and Andy and like you know,
[48:58] Speaker 4: and tell us the truth so we can make an
[49:00] Speaker 4: actual decision, not get dogged walk by Israel.
[49:03] Speaker 6: The challenge when military planners are presenting these options, they're
[49:07] Speaker 6: in their advisor capacity, and they're saying, here is the
[49:11] Speaker 6: most likely outcome, here's the most dangerous outcome. Here are
[49:13] Speaker 6: some black Swan events to look out for. We recommend
[49:16] Speaker 6: against the most dangerous option. We recommend against this particular avenue.
[49:20] Speaker 6: And then the decision maker will look at that and say,
[49:22] Speaker 6: I'm ignoring your advice. I'm taking the most dangerous option.
[49:24] Speaker 6: Plus I'm tacking on these other political outcomes because I
[49:26] Speaker 6: want to do that. That's not against the current administration.
[49:28] Speaker 6: That's how every administration works. That's how it works at
[49:31] Speaker 6: the embassies. When we're at the country team meeting with
[49:33] Speaker 6: the ambassador and the senior defense officials says sir, I
[49:37] Speaker 6: don't think that this is a good idea to do X.
[49:39] Speaker 6: And the ambassador says, thank you for that, I'm doing X.
[49:42] Speaker 6: And there isn't much you can do about it, because
[49:43] Speaker 6: then they'll come back to you and say, now, plan
[49:45] Speaker 6: for X, even though you just told them that was
[49:47] Speaker 6: a bad idea. And here's all the reasons why. You
[49:49] Speaker 6: have to put all those reasons why to the side
[49:51] Speaker 6: and use them as contingencies and then plan for how
[49:54] Speaker 6: you're actually going to execute this thing that you just
[49:56] Speaker 6: told them was a bad idea.
[49:59] Speaker 5: And in these meetings the past have been recorded, I
[50:02] Speaker 5: mean not necessarily reported like verbatim, but there's notes and
[50:06] Speaker 5: minutes and what we agree to and what the Defense
[50:09] Speaker 5: Department agreed to, and part of it is to hold
[50:11] Speaker 5: us accountable for later, and part of it is just
[50:15] Speaker 5: so everybody goes on record, right, where did you stand?
[50:20] Speaker 5: Did you think it was a good idea, did you
[50:22] Speaker 5: think it was not a good idea, and with the
[50:25] Speaker 5: idea that we hope that we get better as we
[50:27] Speaker 5: go back and look at the decisions made and say,
[50:30] Speaker 5: you know, the Bay of Pigs or what have you
[50:34] Speaker 5: don't see that happening now. I don't know what the
[50:36] Speaker 5: current status at the NSC is, but to have the
[50:39] Speaker 5: Secretary of State be both the National Security Advisor and
[50:41] Speaker 5: Secretary of State means there's not a National Security Advisor
[50:44] Speaker 5: or a Secretary of State. It's got to be. It
[50:47] Speaker 5: has always been a robust It was robust the first
[50:49] Speaker 5: Drump administration, especially when General Master was there. Yeah, he was.
[50:58] Speaker 5: I thought he was very president, had a strategy for everything.
[51:02] Speaker 5: Army officer of course, right, I thought he was very good.
[51:06] Speaker 5: But he was a good example of like a robust,
[51:08] Speaker 5: engaged national security apparatus that the president could to Jonathan's point,
[51:15] Speaker 5: they can rely on or not, but it's there and
[51:18] Speaker 5: chances are they would at least take it into consideration decisions.
[51:23] Speaker 4: Do you think that there's anything that has anything to
[51:26] Speaker 4: do with like how well the Venezuela operation went, even
[51:29] Speaker 4: though it's like totally night and day. You know, a
[51:31] Speaker 4: two hour jaysuck operation and the Dada night compared to
[51:35] Speaker 4: sustained air operations, Like do you guys think that because
[51:39] Speaker 4: that went so well and like, you know, as well
[51:41] Speaker 4: as a possibly could be.
[51:42] Speaker 3: There was one guy who was injured.
[51:46] Speaker 4: That added into the calculus of like President Trump and
[51:50] Speaker 4: whoever else to be like, yeah, we could totally fucking
[51:52] Speaker 4: do This's just be fucking easy where the United States.
[51:55] Speaker 7: Like.
[51:58] Speaker 5: President Trump referenced it several times. I think the whole
[52:00] Speaker 5: idea that he can find somebody in the regime that
[52:04] Speaker 5: he can work with and then put pressure on them
[52:06] Speaker 5: to capitulate is what he did in Venezuela. It's just
[52:10] Speaker 5: an entirely different country. Again, I think that would have
[52:13] Speaker 5: been something that would have been identified in the discussions
[52:16] Speaker 5: about this. It would have been like, yeah, you could
[52:20] Speaker 5: very well end up with somebody who's more extreme than
[52:22] Speaker 5: the actual person that you took out in that case,
[52:25] Speaker 5: the former Spring leader. And it looks like that's what happened.
[52:29] Speaker 5: And that's what you know from what I've seen from
[52:31] Speaker 5: open reporting, that's what the IC said was going to happen,
[52:33] Speaker 5: not to you know, tout something that's not in our
[52:37] Speaker 5: own interest, but it seems like that's what they said
[52:40] Speaker 5: was going to happen, and that's what is happening, and
[52:43] Speaker 5: it's unlikely to change. So we have to deal with
[52:46] Speaker 5: the current situation, not the one we want or the
[52:48] Speaker 5: one we try to present, the one that's actually is.
[52:51] Speaker 4: And if you guys were listening, we did say that
[52:53] Speaker 4: too before this popped off as well, John did, So
[52:57] Speaker 4: if you want, you.
[52:57] Speaker 7: Guys should be making some money on Polly Market with
[52:59] Speaker 7: all might.
[53:00] Speaker 4: Yeah for real, I know with all he called the
[53:02] Speaker 4: who the new boss was going to be called everything.
[53:05] Speaker 4: John's secretly very wealthy from all those predictions.
[53:08] Speaker 5: You can bet on all this stuff.
[53:10] Speaker 7: Yeah, oh yeah, there's actually gonna have.
[53:12] Speaker 6: The CFTC just put out a new guidance on how
[53:14] Speaker 6: and or how not to bet on events like assassinations, wars,
[53:20] Speaker 6: things like this that are morally questionable.
[53:24] Speaker 7: There are some prohibitions, but.
[53:25] Speaker 6: They're very hard to regulate these what they're called event contracts.
[53:29] Speaker 6: And yeah, it just came out like two days ago
[53:30] Speaker 6: about what you can actually do. The problem is someone
[53:33] Speaker 6: from Unit eighty two hundred before the war started, made
[53:36] Speaker 6: like five hundred grand off of what happened, and then
[53:40] Speaker 6: some people at the Pentagon, like three to four people
[53:42] Speaker 6: at the Pentagon also made a bunch of money on
[53:43] Speaker 6: the war before it happened. So now this is being
[53:46] Speaker 6: considered insider trading, which is a huge problem now because
[53:50] Speaker 6: it's not actually regulated as a securities market. So now
[53:53] Speaker 6: we need to reinterpret how we understand what securities market
[53:56] Speaker 6: means as far as event contract fitting.
[53:59] Speaker 5: Wow, it's just shocking it's even legal.
[54:04] Speaker 4: Yeah, anything else, guy's sticking in your crawl in terms
[54:09] Speaker 4: of what like have we touched on, missed anything?
[54:12] Speaker 6: Yeah, I'll mention one thing that I think should always
[54:14] Speaker 6: be mentioned during this war, and that's the Iranian people
[54:16] Speaker 6: because these are ultimately the ones that have to bear
[54:19] Speaker 6: the cost of whatever happens. Whether the US succeeds or fails,
[54:22] Speaker 6: that's kind of not as important in my mind as
[54:25] Speaker 6: what happens to the Iranian people because they're the ones
[54:27] Speaker 6: that they got this war. Many of them support it,
[54:31] Speaker 6: but you know, the outcome is important because remember in
[54:33] Speaker 6: two thousand and three when we invaded Iraqi, Iraqis were
[54:35] Speaker 6: on the street cheering the fact that Saddam Hussein was goun.
[54:37] Speaker 7: We all remember these videos. But because of.
[54:39] Speaker 6: Decisions that outsiders made about the inside, that cheering turned
[54:44] Speaker 6: into gunfire very quickly, and it's very important that we
[54:47] Speaker 6: don't lose sight of the fact that the people that
[54:49] Speaker 6: we need to win.
[54:50] Speaker 7: Over are the Iranian people, and that can quickly go sour.
[54:54] Speaker 6: That's almost ninety million people that right now support us.
[54:57] Speaker 6: That could be almost ninety million people that don't.
[54:58] Speaker 7: Support us if we don't.
[55:00] Speaker 6: Smartly execute the especially the exit from this conflict, if
[55:04] Speaker 6: there is such an exit. And the important thing to
[55:07] Speaker 6: note there is in the last couple of days, the
[55:09] Speaker 6: regime has been putting out a lot of propaganda out
[55:12] Speaker 6: in the media about if you protest, we're going to
[55:14] Speaker 6: kill you. Then the IERGC intelligence organization, which is actually
[55:17] Speaker 6: the premiere it's almost like the CIA inside of Iran
[55:20] Speaker 6: because they don't have domestic and foreign separation and their
[55:22] Speaker 6: intelligence operations, that's who's actually been putting these messages out,
[55:25] Speaker 6: and they've been arresting dozens of people over the last
[55:27] Speaker 6: few days and charging them with crimes against the regime,
[55:31] Speaker 6: about propagating anti Islamic et cetera, et cetera, et cetera,
[55:34] Speaker 6: however you want to describe it, What basically they're charging
[55:37] Speaker 6: them with is trying to go out in the streets
[55:39] Speaker 6: and protest, because we've kept saying that we want to
[55:41] Speaker 6: enable these people to go out and do a regime change,
[55:44] Speaker 6: but ninety five percent of the Internet is cut off,
[55:46] Speaker 6: and the regime itself has said the five percent of
[55:48] Speaker 6: the Internet that's on is only for.
[55:50] Speaker 7: People who support the regime.
[55:51] Speaker 6: So they are themselves saying that ninety five percent of
[55:53] Speaker 6: the country doesn't support theming. That's that's crazy, but they're
[55:55] Speaker 6: saying that, and that's really important from an outsider perspective,
[55:59] Speaker 6: How do you want to win this conflict? How about
[56:01] Speaker 6: you put up a mesh network low Earth orbit satellites
[56:03] Speaker 6: direct to sell communications so that people can get on
[56:05] Speaker 6: their phone and say, hey, meet me at five pm
[56:07] Speaker 6: at the square so we can go protest, right, or Hey,
[56:10] Speaker 6: that barracks was blown up.
[56:11] Speaker 7: There are weapons there.
[56:12] Speaker 6: We can go take those weapons and start going out
[56:14] Speaker 6: on the streets and fighting back. That component is missing,
[56:17] Speaker 6: and that component, in my opinion, is necessary if we
[56:19] Speaker 6: actually want to keep those people on our side.
[56:22] Speaker 7: As we exit from this. However we do exit.
[56:26] Speaker 5: Concur Radio Free Europe later free World, we still need
[56:32] Speaker 5: the funder that. Yeah, exactly. The concept is where I'm
[56:37] Speaker 5: hitting that is that we still need to be that
[56:40] Speaker 5: chatting the city on a hill that. I know it
[56:42] Speaker 5: sounds a little Polyanish, but that's the way I viewed
[56:46] Speaker 5: the United States. So and I think it was directly
[56:48] Speaker 5: to Jonathan's point that we need to be that beacon
[56:51] Speaker 5: for them and not just treat them like they're just
[56:53] Speaker 5: a pawn in this thing. We support them until we
[56:56] Speaker 5: decide that it's easier to deal with and throw them
[56:59] Speaker 5: under the bus.
[57:00] Speaker 6: And it seems like that's where a divergence between US
[57:02] Speaker 6: and Israeli strategies happening, because Israel is striking police checkpoints.
[57:06] Speaker 6: They're striking very low level tactical you know, uh, vehicle
[57:10] Speaker 6: checkpoint areas where cars have to pass through, and they're
[57:12] Speaker 6: doing that because what they're trying to do is remove
[57:14] Speaker 6: the place where the actual enforcement actions are happening against
[57:17] Speaker 6: the people so that the people can come out and
[57:19] Speaker 6: do things. They're using very interesting AI enabled drone swarms
[57:22] Speaker 6: right now with facial recognition to actually identify some of
[57:26] Speaker 6: the guys that were killing people in January the actual
[57:29] Speaker 6: person and then go kill them with a drone. So
[57:31] Speaker 6: that's a huge divergence between what we are doing with
[57:34] Speaker 6: these standoff munitions from a distance. Israel is actually in
[57:37] Speaker 6: there on the ground, removing the real problem, which is
[57:41] Speaker 6: regime people with guns from the streets.
[57:45] Speaker 5: So exactly dismantle the Islamic Republic.
[57:50] Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, interesting times, guys. All right, this was great
[57:58] Speaker 4: as usual. I want everyone to check out the links
[58:01] Speaker 4: down in the description. The white Fish Security Summit is
[58:04] Speaker 4: happening in a couple of weeks, so check that out.
[58:06] Speaker 4: That link is down in the description. John Hackett, of
[58:09] Speaker 4: course is incredible books Iran Shadow Weapons and Theory of
[58:12] Speaker 4: a Regular WARF.
[58:13] Speaker 3: What's the other.
[58:14] Speaker 7: Book called Theory of Irregular War?
[58:18] Speaker 4: Yeah, those links are in the description as well. Mark
[58:22] Speaker 4: p of course down there. And if you want to
[58:23] Speaker 4: help support the show, go to patreon dot com slash
[58:26] Speaker 4: the Teamhouse. You get both Eyes On and Teamhouse episodes
[58:30] Speaker 4: at free and early. I uh yeah, as always, guys,
[58:34] Speaker 4: great show.
[58:35] Speaker 7: Hey, great talking to you guys.
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