Ex-CIA Agent John Kiriakou On Israel, Iran, Mossad, Middle East & More

[00:06] I want us to jump straight into it. I know it's it's uh reminds me of the Ukraine war, the guys of war. Sometimes these things are unfathomable until they happen and then they just become the norm, which is what concerns me. But uh a whole lot of discussion. Absolutely correct. I I want to start with a a great summary you did on your channel, I think yesterday. It's a 5-minute video for memory. And you kind of gave an overview of how this all started and where we're at today. I'd love you to give this overview now, but also update us on the developments in the last 24 hours, like every day counts. Um just for the audience on your take on

[00:38] it um what led to it where we're at now and what you expect to happen next and then we can start digging into all the points. Oh, sure. This is an immensely complicated uh situation. It needn't be, but it is. And if if it's okay with you, I want to start with the most important point up front. One of the most valuable lessons that I learned in years at the CIA, especially in years at the CIA working on the Middle East, is that if you really want to understand US policy,

[01:09] it's that you must watch American naval movements. We can threaten, our politicians can be belligerent and give speeches on Capitol Hill, but if you really want to see what the American government is planning to do, watch the movement of naval assets. Uh in in 2000 um I'm sorry, forgive me. In 1990, when Iraq invaded Kuwait, uh we were very serious about pushing Iraq out of the country. But until then, we had

[01:40] never put an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf. And the reason why that had never happened is that the conventional wisdom was that the Persian Gulf was too shallow and there wasn't enough room for an aircraft carrier to move around. It takes an an extraordinary amount of space to just turn the thing around. Well, by February of 1991, we had six aircraft carrier battle groups in the Persian Gulf. I said a couple of weeks ago on my own podcast that

[02:10] I didn't think this was going to amount to much, at least not in the near term, because we weren't moving our naval assets. Well, we're moving our naval assets now. Uh just yesterday, President Trump ordered two more aircraft carrier battle groups led by the USS Nimitz uh into the region. There were already two carrier battle groups in the region, and there was a third one in the Indian Ocean. Now I'm worried. I'm worried because it's unclear exactly

[02:43] what US policy is. So, with that said, and that aside, what I said in this short video was that we don't have to love the Iranians. We don't even have to like the Iranians, but we ought to be able to sit down and negotiate a deal with the Iranians. Now, I am absolutely 1,000% not a fan of Barack Obama. It was Barack Obama who put me in prison after I blew the whistle on the CIA's torture program.

[03:14] But, the JCPOA, also known as the the Iran nuclear deal, actually was working. And the the structure by which it was uh negotiated was the same exact structure with which we negotiated Iraqi inspections uh during the 2002 to let's say 2005 period, where um international inspectors led by the IAEA, the

[03:44] International Atomic Energy Agency, uh would go to the the sites. They would inspect the sites at random, unannounced. They would seal the sites with lead seals, and they installed very sophisticated cameras that that analysts watched in Geneva. I'm sorry, in in Vienna, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to make sure that that these uh areas were not being breached or violated. That's the same deal that was included in the JCPOA.

[04:16] What put the United States in a tough spot with the JCPOA is that once it was negotiated and approved, it opened up trade, granted limited trade, between Iran and the United States a little bit, but more importantly, the UK, France, Germany, and Japan. We also have a law in this country, and this is the fly in the ointment, that if another country trades with Iran,

[04:48] that we are compelled to put sanctions on that country. So, everybody jumps into the JCPOA. Donald Trump is elected president. He pulls out of the JCPOA. That immediately triggers this other American law saying that we now have to sanction the British, the French, the Germans, and the Japanese. Well, we're not going to do that. They're our most important trading partners. And so, it turns out that pulling out of the JCPOA really didn't get us anything that we didn't have, and in fact, is

[05:19] forcing the Treasury Department to violate US law by not imposing sanctions on our allies. So, you have all of that stacked on the one side. And then, topping it is ongoing Iranian support for the former regime in Syria, for Hezbollah, and more immediately for Hamas. It's one thing if you want to support those countries and entities uh uh

[05:51] diplomatically. Nobody cares. You're going to stand up at the United Nations, give a speech. Everybody's going to smile and nod and listen to their translations and then you go about your business. But providing them with with rockets and grenades and mines and and digging equipment and secure communications, that's an entirely different issue. Um that's where the United States is budding heads with Iran. It's and it's as though it's as though the two sides

[06:22] just simply can't understand the other's position. I get that the Iranians want to support Palestinian human rights. Lots of people want to support Palestinian human rights. That doesn't mean lots of people want to send weapons to Hamas. Um conversely the United States just and and I I say this with 20 years of foreign policy and intelligence policy experience. The United States just doesn't understand why the Iranians can't move on from the

[06:53] American overthrow of the Iranian government in 1953 and the US response to the Iranian revolution 1979. It's just like we we need to your Katie each other. And that's that's fine if it doesn't mean that you that you periodically end up clashing militarily. And now we're in a position where we're going to have to make a decision here in the United States as to whether or not we want to rush into support the Israelis or not. And let me add one more thing

[07:25] Mario if I'm if I may. Starting with Ronald Reagan literally every single time that Benjamin Netanyahu came to the United States to see an American president he would ask us to bomb Iran. Every single time. And every president from Ronald Reagan onward said no, we're not going to bomb Iran for you. It doesn't make any sense for American policy, right? There there is no such

[07:57] thing as permanent friends, the old the old saying goes. Only permanent interests. And it was not in US interest to bomb Iran. Well, now we've kind of been put into a corner where Netanyahu went and did it unilaterally. He received now the Iranian response. And his his response is to call out the United States and say Israel's threatened. The threat is existential. You have to help me. So, we're kind of in a tough position

[08:28] right now. That was a a great overview. And I've got a a list of questions on all the points you've made. Can you expand your overview to also include the situation on the ground right now? The initial strikes by Israel, what your thoughts are on those. Iran's response. Um or lack thereof. And you can also include Hezbollah and the Houthis, especially Hezbollah's distancing. Oh, sure. Um the bottom line is there's no way the the Israelis can lose this fight. They're they're so far superior to the

[08:59] Iranians in every respect that they just can't lose this fight. With that said, the number of surface-to-air missiles that the Israelis possess is finite. The the Iron Dome can't last forever. It can last for about a week and a half. And we're already at day six. After that, they're going to need uh US assistance. Now, there have been rumors that it's been Americans manning missile batteries and that the Iron Dome responses that we're seeing in the sky

[09:29] are not exclusively Israeli uh rockets. They include American rockets. There are Patriot missile batteries there and there are Americans manning those batteries. So, it's probably the Israelis probably have a little bit more than than 10 days worth of worth of rockets. You could see, almost like flipping a switch, when the Israelis realized, "Oh, crap, this is going to last a little bit longer than we thought." in that

[10:01] they they began targeting civilian uh installations in Iran. The first few days, they were hitting IRGC headquarters, they were hitting the Quds Force headquarters, they hit the the uh nuclear sites, exactly the targets we expected them to hit. But now they're hitting um Press TV, the Iranian national broadcaster, they're hitting the sewer system and the water treatment facility for Tehran. They're they're hitting

[10:33] sites that while technically illegal under um under international law, would force the Iranians to sue for peace or to ask for intervention, some sort of a middleman. Um Again, with that said, Israel's a nuclear power. Iran is not a nuclear power. The Israelis, of course, would not use a nuclear weapon unless unless they were threatened with the destruction of Israel, which is not

[11:05] happening. It's not a threat. It won't be a threat. Uh but they they can't keep up this fight forever. On the last point you made regarding Iran pivoting to hitting Press TV, the sewer system, the water treatment facility, is that because of a change of strategy? Because initially Iran's Israel said, "It's going to be a 2-week war. Prepare for a 2-week war." Then, well, I think they quickly they shifted it to it's going to be many weeks. Um I'm curious to see is that just their audacity based on their success and maybe the the objective changed from

[11:35] destroying their nuclear capabilities or forcing them to the negotiation table to pivoting to a a regime change, which is a lot more significant. You know, isn't that Don't you just want to take politicians and and strangle them sometimes? I hate when I hear those words regime change. I hate it. I still remember in 2001, 20 of my CIA colleagues standing around a TV watching George W. Bush give a give a press conference and for the first time he used the term regime change and we all groaned out loud like, "Oh, no."

[12:06] Instead of a 6-month war, this is going to be 20 years. And it was 20 years. The Israelis risk doing the same thing, just getting themselves overly committed where they just can't they can't win a long drawn out war. Look at it this way, too. Israel has about 10 million people. Iran has about 90 million people. And unless you have such incredible air superiority that you can just bomb them back into the Stone Age, which they

[12:37] don't, you can't win a long-term war. The longer this drags out, the worse it is for Israel. Just over the last couple of days, Mario, the Israelis have said well, two things. One, the Israelis and the IAEA said that um it turns out that there has been no uh leak of radioactivity at the sites that Israel bombed on the first day. They thought there was a leak, turns out there's not a leak. Secondly, the Israelis are asking the United

[13:09] States for bunker buster bombs. Bunker busters can um can penetrate up to 200 ft deep. What is that? About uh 65 m deep. The Israelis don't have bunker busters, the Americans do. And so they're asking us to either give them the bunker busters or bomb Iran ourselves. And we can't because we risk triggering the Russians and the Chinese. With whom these the uh Iranians have

[13:40] very close relations. So, we've we've held off so far. Um but the Israeli goal, because they didn't knock out the the nuclear sites on day one or day two, is now to change the entire regime. Now, one of the reasons why we might be seeing this hubris right now is because whether you like the Israelis or not, you have to respect the efficacy of their uh intelligence operations over the past

[14:12] year or so. This this thing with the pagers against uh against uh Hezbollah, absolute brilliance. Absolutely brilliant long-term operation, lots of moving parts, and it was completely successful. You have to appreciate the way they have completely taken out the Hezbollah leadership. You have to appreciate the way they worked with the Turks, and the

[14:42] Turks and the Israelis hate each other. But they worked together to overthrow the Assad government in Syria. So, I think the Israelis are coming off a string of wins. But in this case, they bit off a little more than they could chew, and now they're turning to the United States for assistance. Hm. Do you think they did bite off more than they can chew? Cuz they seem to be chewing it pretty well. You look at the Iranian response, they started off with 200 missiles, and now we're down to about 10 missiles, a 90% drop.

[15:15] I don't know if they've Would you agree like they haven't bitten off more than they can chew unless they're looking for a regime change, which is a possible cuz I look at the regime change is a either an if it's become an objective, that's pretty scary. If it's just a a nice-to-have, you know, we we our objective is to destroy the nuclear program. But if we collapse the regime, that's a great bonus, but it's not an objective. We don't have to achieve that. Uh I think that the what that I think that's what makes the difference on whether they bit off more than they could chew or not yet. Would you agree? I would agree. One of the things that I

[15:47] think we haven't really calculated yet is how far the Iranians are willing to go um apart from the battlefield. Again, one of these situations where whether you like Iran or not, whether you respect Iran or not, whether you side with Iran or not, the historical fact is that the the Iranians commit acts of terrorism around the world. They have against the United States and against a slew of other countries. So, if your goal is regime change now,

[16:17] and the Iranian government calculates that it cannot defeat the Israelis, I would bet money on the fact that the Iranians then turn to terrorism. So, rather than to fight the Israelis on the battlefield, how do you protect every diplomatic uh facility that you have around the world? How do you protect every Jewish cultural center around the world? Are we going to see repeats of what we saw in the 1990s in Argentina, for example? Are we going to see embassy bombings? Are we going to

[16:48] see kidnappings of prominent Jewish businessmen, let's say? Or what does it mean for the United States? There was a There was an incident in the 1990s where uh the United States had been in some sort of a skirmish with uh the Iranians, and the Iranian response was to murder seven American oil workers in Karachi, Pakistan. How do you protect against something like that? You can't. So, if the if the Israelis are are serious about regime change. By God, they better accomplish it soon.

[17:21] Or they're in for something bad outside of the battlefield. Beyond the the closing or the attempted closing of the Strait of Hormuz, cuz that would obviously I want to say the global economy but severely harm it, but it could get a lot worse than that and that is striking US interests and European interests around the world and that could lead to global destabilization. And as you said, China and Russia wants to stand idle, you know, Russia and I think it runs under Russia's nuclear umbrella at one point. They also have a defense pact. China and

[17:52] Iran is part of BRICS. China and Iran have a lot of business relations. So I think if they're looking for regime change and it becomes an existential threat for Khamenei, it could end up being very ugly for the world cuz right now the world is dismissing the impact this could have on the economy. The markets are doing relatively well and the world seems to be moving on, but it could get a lot of a lot worse if Iran is not given an out. I think you're exactly right. I think that is exactly right and I'm so glad that you brought up the Straits of

[18:23] Hormuz. I should have written myself a little note to bring this up. Many many of your viewers I think are probably too young to remember when the Iranians tried to close the Straits of Hormuz in the in the mid-1980s. Ronald Reagan was president of the United States at the time. And what Reagan did was unprecedented in our relations with Persian Gulf countries. He ordered the US Navy into the Strait of Hormuz to escort oil

[18:53] cargo ships through the straits. And the straits are very narrow. They're only about 20, what is it, 25 km where they go north and then south to go around the the um Musandam Peninsula of Oman. And so um this was considered by the Iranians at the time to be an act of war. Right? You you're almost in Iranian territorial waters, not quite, but almost. You have to sort of thread this needle as you're escorting these oil tankers through the

[19:26] straits. We could do that again. We might be forced to do that again. This time, it might be a little bit more hostile because in 1985 and 1986, you didn't have Iranian naval vessels firing rockets at American ships. We don't know if that's going to happen, you know, in in the near future or not, but it's something that's going to have to be taken into consideration. So, in the event that the Iranians try to close the Strait of Hormuz, the US Navy is already there, and it will escort every one of those

[19:58] oil tankers through. Going to Russia and China, how involved do you think they could get? Man, this this is really the the proverbial $64,000 question. Um Iranian relations with Russia and China are far far closer than they have been at any other point where the US and Iran have faced conflict. As you said correctly, Iran's a member

[20:28] of BRICS now. That's a big deal. Uh Iran falls under the Russian nuclear umbrella. That's also a big deal that we had didn't have to deal with in the past. China's the wild card here for a couple of reasons. First of all, the Chinese Tibet aside, the Chinese generally do not have an imperialist foreign policy. They've had little border skirmishes with the Vietnamese, a couple of skirmishes with the Indians, but they're generally not one to project military power abroad.

[21:01] They have one permanent military base overseas, which crazy as it might sound, they share with the United States. That's Camp Lemonnier in in Djibouti. So, on the face of things, I wouldn't expect the Chinese to commit troops or or planes or anything like that. I would expect them to commit troops, but not combat troops. Troops to

[21:31] replace Iranian troops. Let's say Iran is in the Iranian government's in the in danger of falling. I could see the Chinese sending we'll call them peacekeeping troops for the purpose of this conversation. That would free up Iranian troops to go fight the fight. I could see that happening. But, I think that the more immediate threat to the West would be from Russia. If the Russians aren't overextended in Ukraine, then it's a possibility they could they

[22:03] could do something more substantive to help the Iranians. And do you think that significantly weakens uh Russia's position in the war in Ukraine? Cuz Iran is no longer supplying weapons to Russia. I do. I do. And we know, of course, that the that the Russians are reliant at least in in part on North Korean troops. There have been there have been rumors that there are Chinese troops on the ground. So, yeah, I think it would it would weaken Russia. And the Russians have been talking just over the last couple of days about Odessa. And, you know, we all thought that

[22:34] Odessa was off the table. Now, maybe it's not off the table. Do you think they could also leverage the negotiations? So, Putin leverages the peace negotiations with Trump. Um and uh China leverages the tariff negotiations to try to twist America's hand or Trump's hand Trump's arm into forcing or pressuring Israel to stop the war. That's a great question. And I think the answer is yes. And I think I think Putin I I Putin knows Trump better than Trump knows Putin. And I think Putin understands that Trump

[23:05] is motivated motivated by the prospect of of a grand deal, a grand, you know, overarching agreement. An agreement that might include Ukraine and tariffs and Iran and whatever else Putin might be interested in at any given time. Uh I think it's a way to sort of suck Trump in. Yes. Mhm. Another way of looking at it, just thought of it now, is that Trump this could be Trump adding a good card to his hand by

[23:37] adding a piece in Iran as part of the the chips that um Trump could offer Russia in the negotiations. So, that could be that could work in Trump's advantage. So, Israel, one could argue, not saying I agree with it, but one could argue that Israel is somehow, at least for now, doing a favor for the US. It helps Trump if they reach a deal now. If Trump reaches a deal now with Iran, uh Trump could declare victory. The US not get involved. They got a deal with Iran. Um if that deal played a role in Trump's negotiations with Putin, it gave him leverage there. So, that could end up being a positive

[24:07] for the US. And on the other hand, if this war does drag on, if they are looking for regime change, I think that's a loss for literally every party involved. I couldn't agree more. Let's break down I'm going to read out an analysis here and get your thoughts on it. It's a long one. I don't know if I'll read it all, but it's an interesting analysis. I might break it down into different parts and get your thoughts on it. And that's Israel's success with this operation. She's been um pretty outstanding to see. So, Israel's preemptive military operation against Iran appears to have severely crippled Iran's missile command

[24:38] structure and its capacity to retaliate following a complex deception campaign led by Israeli intelligence. So, let's go through that one first. So, do you think the the deception that happened beforehand, including Trump talking about a peace deal, he thinks that an agreement will be reached? I think Netanyahu promised Netanyahu uh pretended that his son had a wedding or maybe his son didn't have wedding and pretended he's going to have a meeting in the US. Do you think all these were part of a disinformation campaign against Iran? And there's also been rumors that I'm not sure if it's in the analysis, that

[25:08] Um okay, this this is on as well. According to sources familiar with the operation, Mossad initiated a targeted disinformation effort days before the strike using falsified communications through Iranian channels that triggered what appeared to be an emergency meeting. The ruse successfully drew the entire leadership of Iran's IRGC Air Space Force, including the commander general, his deputies, and key technical personnel into a fortified bunker outside Tehran where they were taken out. Um First, do you think that's all plausible? Second, what does that say about Israeli

[25:38] intelligence? That just seems insanely concerning for any enemy of the Israel. There is no better intelligence service on Earth than the Mossad. They are the best. Even at the CIA, we used to just shake our heads in in wonderment sometimes at some of the things that the Mossad accomplished. Look at the Look at the the the pager operations for a moment. I I gave I gave an interview to a Russian network after this operation.

[26:10] And the the questions were completely loaded. Like, isn't this a crime against humanity? Yes. Uh should they be punished? And I said, you have to understand from the perspective of an intelligence officer, this plan was a stroke of genius. Can you imagine the work that went into reverse engineering the supply chain for for for pagers?

[26:40] Not only do you have to identify what kind of pagers Hezbollah Hezbollah's leadership is using, but you have to reverse engineer the entire supply chain either take over manufacturing or intercept the manufactured pieces, load bombs or plastic or whatever they used into every single unit making sure that they continued to work properly. And then

[27:10] have them distributed to the right people once they got to Lebanon. This This had to be years in the making and it had to be an operation where literally everything went right at every step of the way. So when I hear reports that that they used falsified communications to to essentially lure the Iranian intelligence leadership to one location so they could hit it and take it out take them out. Absolutely, I believe it 100%. They're

[27:41] that good. How are they that good for such a small country? Because they can't lose. If they if they lose, they cease to exist. You know, in the United States sometimes you do something stupid, you make a stupid decision or or your policy makers make a stupid decision and you end up being bogged down in a conflict like Afghanistan that lasts for 20 years. Okay, you learn a lesson, you move on. If the Israelis lose they cease to exist.

[28:11] And so they can't lose. They'll do literally anything to ensure victory. That's why we we we toss around terms like war crimes or crimes against humanity. Yes, often times they are war crimes or crimes against humanity and yes, in a perfect world they would be prosecuted in some international venue. But they're not because they don't care what the rest of the world thinks. It's all about survival. You've also seen the reports I'm sure

[28:42] about a drone factory and explosive drone factory within Iran. Do you think that's possible not just trucks being smuggled in, similar to what Ukraine did in Russia, but an actual factory within Iran, as well as um Mossad commandos in the country? Yeah, I believe it. I had I had a conversation with a with a former CIA colleague of mine just a few days ago. We talked about that. And I said uh I said the balls that the that the Israelis have, they've essentially moved intelligence operations into Iran proper and set up

[29:15] like they own the place. And he said, "You know, that's the thing. It's so it's so gutsy that even the Iranians probably thought, 'Well, nobody would have the guts to actually come here and open up a factory.' Right? But the Israelis did. The Israelis did. One of the first things that I said, as soon as the first wave of Israeli missiles were flying, was that the Israelis have an incredible network of spies in Iran.

[29:48] A network that dwarfs what any of us had previously thought. And conversely, the Iranians have to clean up their society because they are utterly and totally infiltrated by Israeli intelligence. It does feel like it's a movie. And and I can't even imagine how Khamenei, the supreme leader, would be feeling right now to have his name mentioned a couple of times by Trump saying that he stopped Israel from assassinating him. Or I think Trump's official said that. And Netanyahu, there was an ad that came with a chessboard. I'm not sure if

[30:19] you've seen it. An Israeli ad that hinted that Khamenei could be next. And I think Netanyahu said that if we get rid of Khamenei, we might win the war. I'm paraphrasing here. And plus, all his close advisers are gone. There's barely any left. That must And to make it even worse, it reminds me of the movie uh I forgot what it's called, the one with Leonardo DiCaprio, where you just don't know who to trust anymore. Uh Jack Nicholson was the main actor. He's the the the leader of some mafia group and he just was at a position The Departed. Yeah, and he he he started questioning each one of his close con-

[30:51] confidants about who is the rat. And then it it gets even more complex where Jack Nicholson was a rat for another agency. So, this has feeling like could the former president Ahmadinejad been a rat? It just it would get into his head a psychological warfare to another level for the supreme leader. Oh my god, yes. You know, there's really there's a famous Israeli story where in the 1960s they hired a the Mossad hired a a guy. He had volunteered actually to um to join Mossad and he didn't make the cut.

[31:22] Uh but it turned out that his Arabic was so good. It was native Arabic, unaccented Arabic that they later approached him and said, "Hey, remember you tried to apply with us? We have a job for you." They sent him to Syria with money and secure communications. He so ingratiated himself with the Syrian leadership that that in 1965 he was he was considered for the position of deputy minister of defense of Syria. And the whole time he's an Israeli

[31:52] citizen. He's Jewish pretending to be a Syrian Arab. And he's reporting back to uh to Mossad. He made a mistake one one night. Um the Russians secretly went to the Syrians and said, "You've got a mole. We're not sure who it is, but there's a mole." And so, the Russians triangulated his transmissions and they were able to narrow it down to a couple of houses. The Syrians finally raided the house and arrested him and he was he was hanged in the public square, but he's a he's a

[32:24] great hero in Israel today. Um what's his name? Eli Cohen? Something like that. Um his his widow is still is still living. Uh but th- this is what the Israelis do. When I was at the CIA, the Israelis did an operation that was just brilliant. This is This is the period where, you know, you wanted to move a satellite, it would take 6 months to move the satellite, right? And the Israelis really, really wanted to know what was going on in the port of Benghazi. And so, an Israeli intelligence officer

[32:54] called the harbor master in Benghazi and said, "Hi, I'm a French businessman and I represent the interests of a group of other French businessmen. And because we invest so much money, we need to know exactly what ships are in port and what the bills of lading say." Uh so, we're looking for somebody we can hire as a consultant. Do you know anybody that would like to be a consultant because we have so much money, we can pay pretty much anything." And the harbor master, of course, says,

[33:24] "Yeah, I'll I'll be a consultant for you." And they said, "Okay, we're going to call you every morning and then you tell us which ships are in port and you tell us everything that the ship is carrying." And so, he did. And this went on for years. And they would wire some money into his account, you know, every few days. And they didn't need to move satellites. They didn't need to to infiltrate the the harbor master's office on the ground. They already had the harbor master himself. And so, for years they knew when Syrian

[33:56] ships were in Benghazi, when they had when they had weapons or ammunition on them, they had everything they ever wanted. And all it took was a phone call. That was it. Reminds me of the way you can easily plant a virus within any system by just coming up with the research that was done. But you just drop a USB in a parking lot and someone will eventually pick it up. Write something on it. Come find out that someone will pick it up and place it in his makes it seem how easy it is, especially for for an intelligence like Mossad, to be able to

[34:26] infiltrate pretty much anything. But they just took it to another level. There's another report as well that Israel's using AI to be able to spot whenever So it came out today whenever Iran was about to fire missiles and the rocket launchers have been prepared, Israel through AI was able to tell which specific movements were the preparation for a missile to be launched and strike those missile launchers either before being launched or right after being launched. And that continues to deplete Iran's capacity. Um which is again just another another crazy capability if if true. Um

[35:00] So we continue next piece of analysis get your thoughts on. There was absolutely no one alive to give the command to strike back. That was after the Israel strike struck. So then they struck that bunker when they got that important meeting of all the senior commanders. Moments before the strike began that bunker was hit in a precision air strike before Israel's main strike started. Eliminating Iran's top missile command. Israeli officials say the goal was clear, prevent the launch of what was believed to be over a thousand ballistic missiles aimed at Israeli territory. There was no one alive to give the command to strike back. Immediately afterward Israel

[35:31] launched a sweeping campaign across Iran and other strategic areas hitting missile sites, infrastructure and air defense. The operation had been years as you said had been years in preparation. Mossad sleeper cells embedded in Iran since as early as 2007, decades had smuggled hundreds of drones and military equipment into the country using commercial trucks. These assets remained dormant until activated in the hours before the operation. How effective when you take out military commanders? I've had two different arguments being made. One is like, you know, similar to when you mow the grass, new grass will grow. The other one's like, when you kill a

[36:02] commander at that at those positions of that seniority, there's a lot of know-how and also a lot of clout and respect that they have. When that is eliminated, it severely hampers the ability for Iran to fire those missiles. The people that make the decision to fire the missiles have just been targeted. Um is it really that difficult for an organization like the IRGC to be able to respond once commanders were were assassinated at such speed? Not necessarily.

[36:33] But it does delay the decision-making. And that's what the Israelis were counting on. You know, IRGC is like any other organization, whether governmental or non-governmental. You take out the leadership and there are going to be others that immediately rise up to positions of leadership. I I was joking with a friend the other day that that we killed at least a dozen number threes in al-Qaeda in the in the period that that I was still in the CIA fighting al-Qaeda. There's always going to be somebody else to take those positions. But what the Israelis were counting on here

[37:04] was that it would take a day or two or five to replace those commanders. And that extra period of time what is what allowed the Israelis to to take out even more of the leadership or more of the hardware that the leadership would have used to to respond to the initial Israeli attack. And I'll continue the rest of it and then kind of make some of the points you've made already. As the assault began, pre-positioned drones were launched to disable Iran's air defense grid and blind its radar systems. That's the drone that either from the factory

[37:35] and or the trucks that were smuggled in. Which I've heard that smuggling in trucks is relatively easy. Oh, yeah. Are you in Are you in Israel or here? Oh, that's an ambulance. No, no, I'm in Washington. Okay, okay. I'm Making sure you're okay. Sirens are It's probably a military parade. No, I'm kidding. Um so, Yeah. So, so Iran has a massive border. Smuggling people or equipment in is relatively easy. When you look at countries like the US, which is obviously more significantly more advanced than Iran, not being able in Europe not being able to deal with

[38:06] immigrants, illegal immigrants, and wanting to build a wall, um then the argument could be made that Iran's large border, and especially the the the destabilization of Syria and other countries around Iran, makes it very difficult for Iran to secure that border. And that's a massive advantage for Mossad. You you are 100% correct. If if you look well the the border with Afghanistan is essentially unprotected. It's just too it's too rugged, it's too mountainous, it's too much of a desert. You just can't control that gigantic a border. In

[38:37] Balochistan, so we're talking about southeastern Iran and southwestern Pakistan, uh not only is that border almost impossible to protect, but it's also where separatist groups live on the Pakistani side. And so smuggling is a very big problem. But smuggling it is also a problem in the Gulf. It's something that I saw myself. You would think that it would be utterly protected and protectable

[39:07] uh in the Gulf because the Gulf countries are so advanced and so sophisticated. But if you go out you walk every morning to the to the harbor in Kuwait City, for example, or in Manama, the capital of Bahrain, or even in in Dubai or Sharjah, which are both right on the water. Um and you see hundreds and hundreds of dhows. Dhows, d h o w s, are those those old-style wooden boats that are that are uh common

[39:38] in the Persian Gulf. And normally you see them docked in the morning with fruits and vegetables and fish and shrimp, and they're just independent uh fishermen, smugglers, but fishermen selling their wares early in the morning. Well, nobody even bothers to inspect those boats. Nobody bothers to pay any attention to them. And so, how easy would it be to put drones on them or to put missiles? I would venture to say it would be very easy, and it would

[40:10] complement the the smuggling operations that are taking place in places like Balochistan, for example. So, if if the Iranians are worried about smuggling, and they're focused on Balochistan with this strange separatist group, the Balochistan People's Liberation Army, whatever it's called. Um their their attention is is uh

[40:41] diverted from the Gulf. And I wouldn't be surprised at all if some of those things got in right under their noses from the Gulf. So, we continue. And by the way, I just want to give a shout-out to Open Source Intel for for this analysis. As the assault began, pre-positioned drones, we talked about this. It's estimated that over 15% of Iran's ballistic missile arsenal was destroyed in the opening wave. So, that's just the missiles, not the launchers. Nearly all critical air defense systems in and around Tehran were neutralized in the first hour, which obviously we're seeing with Israel's complete air dominance.

[41:12] At the same time, Israeli strikes targeted top nuclear scientists involved in the regime's advanced enrichment program. Iran's ability to respond collapsed. What was expected to be a massive retaliation was reduced to just 150 ballistic missiles launched 20 hours after the Israeli operation began. Spread across three waves, a fraction of what we had anticipated. And I remember I was talking to a former It was a former intelligence officer in in wildest we're doing it live. We're talking live. And while the the Iranian response was happening, and he said, "Mario, you know, he was um speaking

[41:43] about, you know, he's warning about Iran's capabilities, not to underestimate Iran. And while the retaliation was happening, he's like, he I expect for this to really make a difference. I expect at least 1,000 missiles to be launched by Iran, if not more." And we saw it hasn't even hit 1,000 with with 4 days in, and it's now dropped to about 10 at a time. Um so, what does that say about Iran's capabilities or lack thereof after Israel's attack? And could Iran Does Iran have certain capabilities other than um going guerrilla style and targeting the Strait of Hormuz or going, you know,

[42:14] the terrorism path. Does it have other military capabilities that we haven't seen yet that they're kind of holding back, holding back trying to get some sort of deal? No. I don't think so. I think the Israelis are so superior to the Iranians militarily that in this case what we see is what we get. There there is no secret weapon. Uh, there is no second stash of uh, of missiles or um, or drones or launchers or or anything. As you said,

[42:45] and I think this is absolutely correct, the fact that they can no longer defend Tehran says a great deal. And then last thing it says is the the um, an attack of um, 40% of missile launches were also um, destroyed with Israel's attack. Um, now what happens if Israel goes down the the um, something that no one would have expected a week ago and that's assassinating the leader himself. Would that work in Israel's advantage or that could that backfire? No, I think it would backfire. One of

[43:16] the things that I've learned over the years is that um, Ayatollah Khamenei is very popular, personally popular. And um, I think that to to plunge Iran into even a temporary chaos where where a new supreme leader would have to be chosen, uh, does nothing but but bring the Iranian people together and unify them. Uh, when I when I read the same articles that you read saying that Donald Trump

[43:48] apparently had talked the uh, Israelis out of assassinating uh, Ayatollah Khamenei, I thought that was quite fortuitous. I think that would be a step too far. It doesn't And it doesn't get the Israelis anything. It's not like he's a military commander, you know, moving divisions from here to there to to the third place. He's just a He's just a figure. He's a He's a you know, theocratic figure and a rallying

[44:18] point for Iranians. Taking that away doesn't really do anything militarily. But isn't that a crossing international law because you're not, as far as I understand, you're not meant to target the leader of another nation-state during war. And that would also put Netanyahu's life in danger as well. Is that another concern? Not that you know, Israel's already crossed a few lines with the pager attack and striking the TV station. Um but that seems to be a much bigger red line. I I would agree with that. I think it's

[44:49] it's too much even for Donald Trump, it's too much to target another leader. talking about President Trump, um how involved do you think he was? Do you think he was he knew about the attack that the the the um the details, strategies, and and the plan, Israel's plan, Israel's objective, Israel's targets beforehand? Did he give the okay, or do you think he was caught blindsided? Blindsided. I think he was probably informed in

[45:19] advance. That would have been the norm uh to as a courtesy to inform the United States uh that such an attack was was occurring. But I'll tell you something that the Israelis do. Um the United States does not work hand in glove with the Israelis at all times. Uh contrary to to popular belief. When I was when I was still in the CIA, my last job at headquarters was as executive assistant to the CIA's deputy director for operations. And we were preparing to

[45:51] fight uh the Iraq war. We were preparing to cross the border in the coming days. So, this is four or five days before we actually initiated hostilities. And the Israelis came to us and said, "We really want to be a part of this attack." And we said, "Absolutely not. There can't be any Israeli involvement, especially on the ground. It'll unify the Arabs against us. You have to stay out of it." Well, within 24 hours,

[46:23] all of Iraq's um electrical towers in the western desert began tipping over. These were you know, we've all seen electrical towers that go for miles and miles and miles and you see the the cables running along the top. The ones in Iraq had three legs, right? So, three legs, let me turn my hand there like that. Three legs to keep them up. The Israelis would blow up one leg and the tower would tip over. And I remember the deputy director saying, "Those damn Israelis, we told

[46:55] them to stay out of it. But they so wanted to attack Iraq just in a small way, just to be a part of it, that they disregarded everything that we said." So, I think in this case they they wouldn't have wanted to really anger the United States. Uh we had already told them we wouldn't attack Iran for them. But I think they probably gave us a heads-up that this was coming. And usually a heads-up like that comes 3 4 5 hours before the actual event.

[47:28] Why wouldn't they listen to the US? That's surprising to me. I thought the US had a lot more influence over Israel considering that they're the support that they're biggest ally, they're supporting them a lot in the UN, but also militarily and financially. A lot of it has to do with Benjamin Netanyahu as a person, as a leader. Uh Netanyahu is incredibly arrogant. Uh and believes that not only does he know better than every American president, but that because he lives it every day that that he lives in this dangerous

[48:00] neighborhood called the Middle East um that he understands better than any American president could understand. And it infuriates him that president after president after president has refused to attack Iran on behalf of Israel. And so I think that he calculated that if he acted unilaterally the United States eventually would be forced into moving into Iran to support the the

[48:31] Israeli position. And and we might even get there. You know, Donald Trump is so hard to read because he'll he'll say one thing and then he'll say exactly the opposite thing, you know, sometimes an hour later, sometimes in the same sentence. And so you really don't know what American policy is. And I think that Netanyahu believes that he can influence whatever that policy ends up being. Interesting. Um Do Do you think Trump is genuinely looking for a peace deal right now or

[49:02] that ship has sailed? You've got Israel talking about potential regime change and operation I think is rising lion and potentially targeting Khamenei which and they targeted the chief negotiator as well. So if they're looking for negotiations, shouldn't he be the only one that that is left alive even more important than the supreme leader, not as important but second after the supreme leader if they're looking for a deal. Um do you think there's a genuine disconnect between Israel and the US or is it all part of a strategy where Israel makes it seem like they're willing to go all the way to give Trump more leverage in the negotiations.

[49:33] I think the latter is probably the case. I have a friend at the White House who told me to never underestimate Donald Trump's desire to win a Nobel Peace Prize. He's still angry that Barack Obama has a Nobel Peace Prize. And And why he initiated talks with the North Koreans, for example. That's why he keeps talking about a grand deal. That's why he said that he could influence the Russians into ending the Ukraine war within 24

[50:03] hours of taking the oath of office. Uh none of those things have happened yet. But um but I think he really is optimistic about some grand deal that is going to make him the peacemaker of the Middle East. Now, if there is some kind of a deal, it's going to be with a rump Iran. You know, maybe it's it's going to be with some temporary government who that takes over after the the collapse of the present one. Who knows?

[50:35] Who knows what it's going to look like. But I think he he really believes he can make a deal and he should be rewarded for it. That's a great North Star to have if he's really aiming for that. It's a great objective and that's a good, you know, good news. Um which goes to the second second part of the question which you already hinted on is how much influence does he have over Israel? And kind of links to it Yeah, another question is how involved do you think the US will get? Ooh. Um I think he does have influence over

[51:05] Israel, but not as much as he probably thinks he does. Benjamin Netanyahu is very stubborn and is very, very willing to act unilaterally. Uh Disagreements with American presidents have never held him back in the past. Um Yeah, you know, the second part of your question is the one that I think is is unanswerable. We We really don't know what it's going to look like. We really don't know. Because we haven't really heard from the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Emiratis, the Bahrainis.

[51:35] We haven't heard from The Jordanians haven't said a word. The Egyptians haven't said a word. I think they're all panicked at the idea of what this might look like at the end. And so they're waiting waiting to see how it plays out before making their own positions known. Yeah, I think Saudi's position is really tricky cuz Saudi would benefit from a weaker Iran, but also I think Saudi would lose more and would be more at risk from a destabilized Iran or regime change. How much influence does Saudi have and also how strong is Saudi militarily? Oh, no. If If you compare it to let's say Israel.

[52:06] Not that they're they're not enemies and they're talking about obviously being part of the peace accords, but Sure. putting that aside, I'm just curious how strong that other military power is. It's not. It's not. There There's an ongoing joke in the Middle East that that it it's hard to find any Saudis in the Saudi military. They're all Pakistanis. All of them. Uh the only ones who are Saudis are the generals. The leaders. Literally. I had a I had a great friend when I was living in Bahrain. I was I

[52:38] was assigned to the State Department at the American Embassy in Bahrain. And I had a friend who was the He was a Kuwaiti American who was the head of American Express for the Gulf. And he got drafted by the Kuwaiti military. And so I said, "I thought you were Kuwaiti. You're drafted into the Kuwaiti military." He said, "Oh, no. It's a big joke." So, he goes to Kuwait. On the first day, he said every everybody was there. It was about 30 people and about a third of them were sheikhs. And then the second day, about half of them showed up.

[53:09] And the third day, he was the only Kuwaiti who showed up for training. And then after that, he just quit. He just walk out, fly back to Bahrain. So, what they do is they just replace all these people with Pakistani volunteers. And that's who fights the wars for the Saudis and the Kuwaitis and and others in the Gulf. not that it obviously is relevant to this discussion um cuz Saudi's not an enemy of Israel, but Saudi doesn't stand a chance in front of Israel either. Not a chance. Not a prayer. Egypt? Egypt? Uh the Egyptians are different. Hosni

[53:41] Mubarak used to say that Egypt was safe safe just because of its overwhelming population. Egypt has what? 180 million people? So compared to 9.8 million for Israel. Nuclear weapons aside, the Egyptians are perfectly fine just the way they are. How about Turkey? What role does Turkey play in all this? We talked about how Turkey and Israel despite hating one another, they

[54:11] you know they work together when it comes to Syria. What about in this case? Turkey's really an enigma in this whole thing. For many many years, for decades, the Turks and the Israelis had very close relations, very close diplomatic relations, close military relations. And then President Erdogan flipped that about 15 or 20 years ago. Conversely, the Greeks had traditionally very close relations with the Arabs to the point

[54:42] where all of the Palestinian terrorist groups Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine uh PFLP General Command, Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Abu Nidal Organization, they all had a presence in Athens. So if the Turks are going to be with the Israelis, the Greeks are going to be with the Arabs. Then the Turks flipped. And they began challenging the Israelis. Well, if the Turks are going to be pro-Arab, then the Greeks felt they had to flip. So now the Greeks and the Cypriots are

[55:14] pro-Israel. And the Turks are pro-Arab. And they're like watching each other to see what the other one's going to do next. But with that said, the Turks and the Israelis work together to overthrow Bashar al-Assad. And they work together very smoothly and very quickly. I know a lot of Middle East watchers because we've spent our entire adult lives watching these issues develop. I don't think anybody expected Assad to

[55:44] fall apart in 1 week. And I think in a great part it was because of the Turks. Um how how capable is the Turkish military when you compare it to somebody to Israel? It's quite capable. It's very large. It's very well trained and remember it's a part of NATO. So it has almost exclusively American French and British weapons. Yeah, there's one interesting thing there. One of the things the Saudis used to do

[56:15] just for the purpose of maintaining good relations with the Russians and the Chinese. The The Saudis are almost exclusively the users of American weapons and weapons systems, right? And American jets. But they'll buy Russian systems or Chinese systems and then never take them out of the crates. They'll buy them so they can maintain good trade relations with the Russians and the Chinese and just keep them in a warehouse somewhere never to be used.

[56:46] So they've got the equipment. They just don't do anything with it. The Turks on the other hand have Western equipment but then also have been dabbling in Russian equipment just to maintain good relations with the Russians. So I think the Turks are very well provided for and very capable. Politics is just so confusingly interested. Interesting. Um but Turkish capability military capability should not be ignored and

[57:17] again, I know this is not even a worst case scenario. I think it's not something that should even be discussed but just for for for people to understand the strength of Israel in the region, does Turkey stand a chance against Israel militarily? Again, nuclear weapons aside, Nuclear weapons and NATO aside. And NATO aside, yeah, the the Turks are the Turks are tough and strong and mean and very capable. Yes. Interesting. I know you said keep in mind, too, if I can make one one other point, keep in mind, too, that the

[57:49] Turks are very well skilled in in guerrilla warfare, anti-guerrilla warfare, because of so many years of fighting the the PKK. Yeah, true. Um Hezbollah Hezbollah Hezbollah surprised me when I was talking to the IDF spokesperson 2 days ago, and that was one of the biggest surprises for the IDF is that they expected Hezbollah to be one of the first proxies or the only proxy left along with the Houthis to respond, and they didn't. Um I was told that they faced pressure from the the day after the Israeli attack, the Lebanese government, with the support of Saudi

[58:19] and the French, um warned them that they will interfere if Hezbollah backs Iran. So, does that mean that Iran's grip over their most important proxies loosening, or is that just strategic so Iran has a final card they can play? I think it's a combination of the two, actually. Um on the one hand, the Iranians still have Hezbollah as a proxy. On the other hand, they can't supply Hezbollah anymore,

[58:49] because Assad's gone. Couple that with the fact that Hezbollah was was decapitated by these Israeli operations. I still shake my head like, what an incredible absolutely incredible intelligence operation this was. I I still can't even fathom the work that went into decapitating Hezbollah like they did, but remember, not only did they do this this Pager operation, they also detonated explosives in cell phones, and they bombed Hezbollah and took out the

[59:21] leadership, the second-level leadership, and the third-level leadership. So, for all intents and purposes, at least for the next next 6 months, there is no such thing as Hezbollah. Not really. It's going to have to reconstitute itself. But, they're in no position right now whatsoever to launch anything against the Israelis, especially when they can't be resupplied. Exactly. I I think What does that mean for Lebanon? If this is true, which I think it is,

[59:51] is that a positive thing for Lebanon cuz now they're forced to be more pro-Western and Western countries countries that have been aligned with the West have prospered more in the Middle East. Yeah, I I think so. I hate to say it like that, but but yeah, I think that's probably the bottom line. Lebanon is a failed state. It's a basket case. It shouldn't be because it has a remarkable constitution, one that gives equal authority to to all of the religious groups in the country. But, it doesn't work.

[1:00:23] It doesn't work, and you have essentially a state within a state in the form of Hezbollah that has its own foreign policy, that has its own military. Excuse me. And and it doesn't take orders from the central government in Beirut. Well, now that's been pushed aside. And so, I think that this is a period where we're going to go into a period of at least 6 months of an uneasy peace in Lebanon, where the central government is not going to have to worry about cleaning up a mess

[1:00:55] that Hezbollah creates for it on the southern border. And then if they pass that 6 months, it could lead to a period of prosperity. Obviously, it just depends on so many factors in the Middle East. Talking about these factors, I'm trying to understand the regional impact this could have. The risks of a radiation leak, is that a genuine risk and could that impact neighboring countries, including uh Dubai where I'm at now? Cuz I've also heard by experts that the um the nuclear enrichment that Iran is doing um the stage that it's at now, it's not like a nuclear,

[1:01:25] um, reactor that we saw in Chernobyl or in Japan, for example. So, that risk, for example, for countries like the UAE is not really that significant. I think it's not that significant. We've We've seen, um, We've seen reports that are at odds with one another over a leak coming out of the the very first wave of Israeli attacks. Um, that there that there was a leak uh, yesterday were heard, there is not a leak, there was an IAEA uh, group on the ground saying that they can't detect a leak. In the event that there was a

[1:01:57] leak, um, I don't think Dubai would be, um, affected because it's not like Chernobyl, for example, where entire swaths had to be, you know, depopulated. Or or areas that Cuz countries like Dubai, if if it's not a radiation leak, how about, um, the UAE, uh, Qatar, Saudi being targeted by Iran? So, instead of Iran targeting the US cuz they don't want the US to get involved, seemingly, um, they would instead target Israeli allies or US

[1:02:27] allies as a way to put pressure on Israel. Is that a possibility? Cuz I did speak to someone that was based in the in Abu Dhabi, and they said that that was a concern when they were there years ago that Iran could target it when there was a lot of tension. Now, I think it's just a whole different ballgame. Is that a genuine concern? I I don't think so anymore. I I would have said the same thing from the period where I was living in Bahrain. There was no greater threat to the Bahrainis than than Iran. They were obsessed with Iran, as were the Saudis at the time, because

[1:02:57] fully 35% of of Saudi nationals in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia are Shia Muslims, like uh, most Iranians are. Uh, but today, Iran has been just decimated over the last few days. I don't think they pose a threat to anybody outside of Iran, not right now. And uh, you know, relations have changed, too, Mario, where where you know, the the Saudis and the Iranians at any given moment were on the brink of war, right? It It things could

[1:03:29] change like flipping a switch. And that's just not the case anymore. Under Under Mohammed bin Salman and listen, we can have a whole conversation about Mohammed bin Salman and whether he's a great leader or a deranged maniac, you know, or something in between, we could have that talk. But he's actually played relations with Iran very smartly. And so, there's been this uh this detente between the two countries. They've exchanged ambassadors again. Relations seem to be good and getting better. And of course, whatever the

[1:04:00] Saudis do, they drag the Bahrainis along with them. The Kuwaitis generally sit out these things. They're unaligned. Um nonaligned. Uh the Emiratis and the Saudis work very, very closely together on these issues, especially surrounding Iran. And the Qataris you know, the Qataris are always just going to be the Qataris. They're just going to be independent of everybody else. I've got news for you. It just happened now. Um a massive oil tanker in the Strait of

[1:04:32] Hormuz, it's called the Adeline, uh went up in flames after colliding with Front Eagle in the Gulf of Oman right next to planet's busiest oil artery. 24 crew had to be pulled to safety as the upper deck burnt. Front Eagle was carrying 2 million barrels of Iraqi crude oil to China. Adeline was empty but still ignited chaos. Officials have said it wasn't security related but with electronic interference, naval buildups, and a full-blown regional conflict above the waterline, safe passage is getting dicey. Tehran's hinted at blocking the straits. So, we don't know if it's Iran or not. So, Iran is not taking responsibility, but

[1:05:02] we're starting to edge closer to that you know, kind of worst-case scenario of Iran getting desperate. And that's why the concern goes back to the initial part of the discussion is that if we if Iran gets desperate, this could really get ugly regionally. That's why I asked the question is could they strike these allies? Is when you put Khamenei's life in danger, you know when when we talked about President Putin and whether he would use a nuclear weapon. Most people agreed that that's unlikely. And obviously NATO calculated it as such as well. They kept pushing that line. Um and one of the arguments is if his life one of the reasons he would use a

[1:05:32] nuclear weapon is is if his life was in danger. Khamenei's life is in danger. Could that lead to Iran using a nuclear weapon? I know they don't have one, but could they have a dirty bomb or maybe a small nuclear weapon that they could, you know, kind of transport to another to to to It doesn't have to be Israel, just another country, a US ally, maybe the US through a briefcase. Could they have some sort of plan for a scenario like this that could be very very ugly for the world? Or will Israel have so much intelligence that they would know about it in advance and calculate for that?

[1:06:02] Yeah, I I I can't see the Iranians developing even even a dirty bomb related to the nuclear program. Um and even if they had a a nuclear bomb or some sort of small nuclear device, there's no delivery system for it. They just haven't developed a delivery system yet. You know, the the earliest the earliest that Benjamin Netanyahu began talking about Iran developing a nuclear bomb, I saw this in the New York Times the other day, was an interview he gave in 1992

[1:06:36] saying that Iran is 6 months away from a nuclear bomb. 1992, he's been screaming this for decades. Decades. And it's just it's never been true. As recently as March of this year, Tulsi Gabbard, the the American Director of National Intelligence, testified on Capitol Hill that the Iranians do not have a nuclear weapons program. They had one that Ayatollah Khamenei

[1:07:08] uh froze in 2003, and the consensus of the US intelligence community, all 18 members of the US intelligence community, is that there is no Iranian nuclear weapons program. So, how does that How does that Isn't that contradicted by the IAEA report just a day before Israel struck Iran? Well, not necessarily, because what the IAEA is saying is that the Iranians had been enriching uranium at 35%. They upped that to 67%. That's not weapons grade. Weapons grade

[1:07:39] is 95%, but it's very easy to go from 67 to 95. It's very difficult to go from 25 to 95. But, if they went from 35 to 65, which is more difficult, or 25 to to 65, doesn't that mean that they could have changed their strategy, and now they're looking to enrich it as a you know, one Again, another argument that could be made is Gaddafi gave up his nuclear ambitions, is dead. North Korea, Kim Jong-un, did not give up his nuclear ambitions, he's alive, and North Korea's untouched. Um could

[1:08:10] Khamenei looked at all of his proxies being destroyed, Israel's threat escalating, so then he was starting to seek a nuclear weapon as a way to to have that kind of last resort of nuclear deterrence, so Israel doesn't strike Iran. Is that a possibility, and could that not I wouldn't say justify, but maybe give one reason for Israel to strike Iran, or do you think it was all a kind of Iraqi uh weapons of mass destruction moment No, I think you're right. I think that it's a possibility, and it would give

[1:08:40] justification, actually on both sides. It would give justification to the Israelis to attack, but it would give justification to the Iranians to do whatever was possible to protect themselves. Look at the situation between um India and and Pakistan. The The consensus in the CIA was that if there was going to be a nuclear exchange, it was not going to be the US and Russia, the US and China, it was going to be India and Pakistan.

[1:09:10] Pakistan is Listen, I lived in Pakistan. I worked there. I worked with Pakistan intelligence and military officials. The country's not stable. It's just not. And there's always a danger of nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands. Well, the world just accepts that. So, I think that the Iranian calculation is that the world is just going to have to accept that the Iranians one of these days are going to have a nuclear bomb. They probably don't intend to use it offensively. It's a deterrent against the Israelis, and I think the Iranians

[1:09:42] genuinely believe that that is the only thing that can keep them safe. And you think the Israelis genuinely believe that was an existential threat for Israel, and they had to get rid of it considering the narrative out of Iran? Cuz I think there's mistakes when it comes to this war. I feel like there's mistakes done on both sides. Oh, yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. There's no understanding of the other of the others' position. None whatsoever. He's a threat to me. I'm a threat to him.

[1:10:13] And then we just see where the cards fall. But I think you're right that Is that because there's no way of them like there was no one that could guarantee security for Iran and Israel for to give them both peace of mind. Could that be a possibility? Cuz one would look at it one that wants to oversimplify and this is not deep into this political world. They'd be looking at it like, "Hey, why can't both uh countries make an agreement say, 'Hey, we will not uh attack you with a nuclear weapon. You let us build it.' Or we will build it halfway and you let us be there. And if we build it more, you'll stop us." It just seems like a deal could be reached.

[1:10:44] Right. What Why Why didn't they? Like I know it's a lot more complex than that. There's a lot of moving pieces even when it goes all the way to Ukraine, China. A lot of people influence every single decision made, you know, Ukraine and Russia. Ukraine is just a you know, almost a proxy for NATO, for example, a way to weaken Russia. So, I just think it's way too complicated for Iran, and then I would link that to how much do you think Russia and China played a role in influencing Iran's decisions leading up to the war. You're right, it's complex, but that

[1:11:15] would really be the the best outcome. And if the United States had better relations with with Russia and with China, I think that would have been not just a possibility, but a really wonderful development in in modern history. Yeah, you just have these superpowers guaranteeing sovereignty and survivability. Yeah, I think it's well said there. And how about the risk of a long-term war? Um what are the factors you'd be looking at right now to determine whether this will end soon or this could end up dragging

[1:11:47] on for 6-12 months? Ground troops. President Trump said yesterday the United States has 34,000 ground troops at nine different facilities in the Gulf. Um 34,000 is a lot of troops, but it's not enough to fight a war. If the United States began supplementing those 34,000 with another couple of hundred thousand, then we're in for a fight, a long-term fight. But there's no indication that the US is at all interested in sending ground troops to the region. And the Israelis just don't have the

[1:12:17] wherewithal. Remember, Israel has fewer than 10 million people, and there are 90 million in Iran, so it it would be suicide if the if the Israelis tried to do something more than what they're doing now. Um I think I think you're absolutely right on that point, and it goes back to the point of what is Israel's objective. Is it just to weaken Iran militarily, destroy their nuclear program, or seek a regime change? Um you know, last couple of topics I want to cover um with you

[1:12:48] is um the possibility for a peace agreement. I know we talked about it earlier. I want to kind of dig into it further cuz that's what everyone's, you know, hoping for. Um what would you put the probability at now looking at the narrative coming out of Israel and the narrative coming out of Trump and the narrative coming out of Iran which seems to be desperate considering the messages they're sending across through the through the intermediaries. Cuz initially they said, "No peace deal unless they stop." So like now they're like, "Peace deal if the US doesn't get involved." Um it does seem like desperation, I think you'd agree. I do agree. I do agree. I don't think

[1:13:19] there's going to be a peace deal, but that doesn't mean that there's not going to be a ceasefire. And for for the Israelis a peace deal would have to include some sort of diplomatic recognition. Right? And can you imagine any Iranian embassy in Jerusalem? I can't. Uh you know, the Shah's not in power anymore. So in terms of a formal peace deal, not a chance. But I think that that a a ceasefire is likely.

[1:13:49] Where you know, let's say the Israelis promise not to to stop bombing, not to kill any more members of the Iranian leadership, and the uh Iranians will, let's say, stop supplying Hamas and uh and Hezbollah with with weapons and weapons systems. That's probably going to be it. Now the Houthis, we haven't had a chance to talk about the Houthis. Mhm. Um man, we could do a whole show on the Houthis. I've been to Yemen five times.

[1:14:20] And every time I go, it's worse than the previous time. The last time I went, I was the chief investigator on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and I went um in 20 11. And uh no no, this was my previous trip. 2009, I was in a cab going from the airport to the hotel. And and now you can't do that. By 2011, it was a convoy of armored cars that took me from the airport to the to the hotel.

[1:14:51] But anyway, I get in this cab and I said to the cab driver, um so how are things? And he said, "Oh, things are bad right now. You know, we're fighting these Houthis, but the Saudis are helping us. The Saudis are bombing them with drones." And I said, at the time, remember this is 2009, I said, "The Saudis don't have And then I thought, oh my god. The Saudis don't have drones. We have drones and they're 16 miles away

[1:15:22] in Djibouti. And I thought, oh my god. So I got back home and I said to John Kerry, he was my boss, I said, "You know, I think we're I think we're bombing uh we're bombing Yemen. It's an undeclared war." He's like, "What?" And I said, "Yeah, you know, they're using drones against the Houthis, but the Saudis don't have drones. They didn't get drones until a year later. And because Barack Obama was president, John Kerry wanted to be Secretary of State, he never raised it at the White House.

[1:15:52] And so we just, you know, watched it unfold. But we were involved way back then in 2009 bombing the Houthis. The Houthis The Houthis are gutsy people because they have nothing to lose. Nothing. And so they're perfectly happy to express solidarity by attacking cargo ships, oil tankers, the US Navy, whatever it is. And no matter how many times we use million-dollar missiles

[1:16:24] against their $10,000 drones, they don't seem to care. Well, now that the Israelis are just cleaning the place up with the Iranians, I'm wondering if the Houthis back off. The The Iranians The Iranians um I'm forgive me, the Israelis The Israelis killed a member of the Houthi leadership. Uh, just a day or two after the bombing of, uh, of Iran began. They haven't said who that leader is,

[1:16:55] and we haven't heard a single word about the Houthis since this thing came out or from the Houthis. So, I don't know. They may have cowed the Houthis on top of it in the meantime. That's a big achievement if that's the case. So, then you have the Houthis and Hezbollah, there's no and obviously Hamas is decapitated as well. So, Iran's lost all its proxies and it's lost its military might. So, they are really being pushed into a corner, which goes back to the what will they do, you know, the Putin example with the nuclear weapon. What will Iran do when they're in that corner? Um, And the So far, this is, uh, this is an

[1:17:28] Israeli victory, no matter how you package it, so far. Yes. Yeah. Like if you compare to other military interventions by the US in the Middle East, nothing compares to the success that Israel's had so far. Agreed. Um, and if you compare to what Russia had in Ukraine, it's just like complete, um, you know, opposing outcomes. Russia planned for one thing. I remember when I was sitting with President Lukashenko and he said, "Mario, Putin really didn't plan for this long-term war, which I think all of us knows. It's meant to be a quick operation." Now it's into this multi-year war. We'll see what the outcome is.

[1:17:59] Israel planned for something and they got I think they got even more than they bargained for. Like it worked with 100% success rate. What happens to One thing that was heartbreaking is like I think the Iran situation we could talk about objectively and and blame both sides, etc. Uh, and um, same for Hezbollah, you know, Hezbollah started striking Israel earlier. The Houthis, same thing, they decided to ally themselves with Iran and and Palestine or or Gaza and Hamas and strike Israel. Israel responded. Hamas, obviously in the beginning with October 7th,

[1:18:29] you know, unquestionable, Israel had the right to to respond and defend itself. But then the war is still ongoing right now and people talking about ethnic cleansing, etc. What happens to Gaza now that Iran's completely obliterate obliterated? They don't seem to have any allies left, so I'm just really and it seems the Arab world's relatively silent on this. Is it pretty much over for Gaza? God, I hate to say it, but yeah, I think it is. When I was stationed in Saudi Arabia 1991, the Saudis asked us to deliver a message

[1:18:59] to the Israelis and they said that they were interested in building a port, an airport, and uh uh sewer system sewage system for for Gaza if the Israelis would allow them to do it to help develop the Gaza economy and to allow, you know, Gaza Palestinians to to earn a decent living. The Israelis said absolutely not. Absolutely not. And since then, they restricted, you know, the amount of

[1:19:31] water that enters Gaza, they restricted the the number of hours of electricity per day. The Gazans finally elected Hamas because they were so frustrated with with Israelis with the Israeli leadership. And and then Hamas for reasons that will never be clear to me decided that attacking civilians was the way to go. Do you think Iran knew about knew about October 7th attack and okayed it?

[1:20:01] Oh, I think so. I think they probably did. What a What a terrible mistake. Terrible mistake. For for the world, but especially for Palestinians. Especially. You know, Palestinian the Israelis the Israelis historically have accepted the casualty figures that come out of the the Gaza Ministry of Health, okay? So, the Israelis are conceding that 90% of the casualties in Gaza are civilians.

[1:20:32] 90% That's unacceptable. It's a crime against humanity. And there's no there's no payment that the Israelis have to make. They're not signatories to the ICJ or the ICC and they don't care how many people they kill. So, what happens to the possibility of a two-state solution? And again, what happens to Gaza? Where Where do you see Gaza in 5 years' time if there is a Gaza? Yeah, I think Gaza's going to be at least as devastated as it is today

[1:21:04] because the truth is the Israelis continue to to control it. They're not going to allow the reconstruction of Gaza. They're just not. You know, the official policy of the United States is we continue to support the two-state solution. Maybe maybe we need to be looking at a three-state solution. You know, the the the West Bank, Gaza, and Israel proper, yeah. It's something that looks like Bosnia with, you know, little little patches of

[1:21:35] land. And like what what what you guys you know, I I I was with in Yugoslavia not long ago, former Yugoslavia, with uh President um Vucic and the President of Kosovo as well, uh Serbia and Kosovo. Until now, there's wounds that haven't healed. Till now, Bosnia um I think the I can't remember the guy's name, Dodik. Uh they're still, you know, Bosnia could split into two. There's still risks of a a a a a regional war a war within Bosnia. Crazy. A civil war there. And that's decades after NATO's intervention. Um yes,

[1:22:08] again, the Middle East is just such a mess. Um Last uh couple of questions uh on my side, John, I appreciate your time is uh where do you see this in, let's say, 12 months' time considering where things are are at right now? And you can offer different scenarios. Oh, I think that uh I think we're going to enter into uh some sort of ceasefire agreement, peace agreement probably in the coming weeks between the Israelis and the Iranians,

[1:22:40] but I don't see any real changes in Gaza. There's there's no one to help the Gazans anymore, right? The Syrians are gone, Hezbollah's decapitated, the Iranians are in chaos, the Houthis have just thrown up their their hands. I think that on a humanitarian level, it's going to actually be worse for Palestinians in 12 months' time. And for the region, do you think it could lead to more peace now that that power struggle between Iran and their allies and their proxies

[1:23:11] versus Saudi and their proxies, allies, or Western allies, that's pretty much come to an end. Has Israel potentially done a favor for the region excluding Palestine? How how crazy is that, right? But yeah, it seems that way. It it seems that way. As soon as Assad ran to ran to Moscow, the Saudis reestablished diplomatic relations with Damascus. That was huge. And as I said, whatever the Saudis do, the Bahrainis do. And the the Emiratis are joined at the hip with the Saudis. So now there's

[1:23:43] this new age of diplomatic relations, they're going to help to rebuild Syria, everything's going to be fine, but they have to smash Hezbollah. Right? I think that's what's going to end up happening. And uh And then once that happens, I I can't even believe I'm going to say the words, but I think I think the Saudis are going to finally establish diplomatic relations with Israel. It's a business decision. And what happens so so one more

[1:24:15] question, I know I said this is it, but there's a lot of countries neighboring Israel that are really worried right now that Israel's ambitions are beyond Gaza and Palestinian territory. You know, they're they're still in Syria, they're still in Lebanon. Could that lead to the acquisition of more territory? You know, when they you declare war on another country, you know, you look at most wars, World Wars, the winner ends up taking up more land. That's like kind of the price that you get. Could the cost be that Israel keeps certain land in in Syria and like

[1:24:45] the Golan Heights in Syria and and in Lebanon? Number one and number two, do you see peace between those countries and Israel? Is there a possibility that Lebanon and Syria do prosper moving forward and does Israel want them to prosper? Then again, this is a point that's heavily debated right now. I don't think Israel wants them to prosper because when there's internal chaos, that helps to keep the Israelis safe. When there's internal political chaos. You know, the Israelis don't want them to be unified because then they could turn their attention to Israel. Number one. Number two, I think the Israelis well, the Israelis already have annexed

[1:25:16] the Golan Heights. So, Golan is not going to return to Syria. Right now, the the Israelis have taken another 20 km or so beyond Golan. That's unacceptable. And I think probably the Israelis are going to have to pull back out and give it back. But I wouldn't be surprised if there's some sort of informal agreement between Jolani and Syria, the new the new leader of Syria and the Israelis, even if it's sort of an under the table deal negotiated with the Americans,

[1:25:47] that the Israelis stay on their side of the line and the Syrians will stay on their side of the line. And for Lebanon? You know, poor Lebanon. Such a nice country and such a terrible situation. I I don't I don't see any good news for Lebanon. I really don't. Heartbreaking. John Kiriakou, really appreciate the time spent in credible discussion. Your expertise on the on the region has been has been refreshing. So, I appreciate your time, sir. Thanks so much for the invitation. It's a real pleasure to meet you.