Latest / Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott / Expert Offers Analysis of Israel & Iran (and U.S.) Conflict

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Expert Offers Analysis of Israel & Iran (and U.S.) Conflict · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: If I passed the hour.
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  Speaker 2: It is show fifty three to ninety nine of The
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  Speaker 2: Morning Show with Preston's Cock. Good morning friends, I'm Preston.
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: He is Jose. It's great to be with you. Were
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: I to read his entire resume, we'd be here for
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: ten minutes and we take up all of our time,
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: so I'm simply going to boil it down. He's an
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  Speaker 2: expert in terrorism, national security strategy, political theory, and military history.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: He's dean of Academics for the Institute for World Politics,
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  Speaker 2: and he's our guest doctor James Robbins.
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  Speaker 1: Good morning, sir. How are you welcome?
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  Speaker 3: Hey, good morning, how are you?
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  Speaker 1: I'm terrific. Let me put you in a room.
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  Speaker 2: You are sitting with the President of the United States,
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  Speaker 2: Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State. You are discussing the
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  Speaker 2: US role in what's taking place between Iran and Israel.
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  Speaker 2: What are the first words you're sharing.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I think the first words are we need to
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: counter proliferate, you know something. We're sitting in a situation room,
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  Speaker 3: some kind of Pentagonese like that, but basically getting down
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  Speaker 3: to making sure that Iran has no capacity to build
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  Speaker 3: a nuclear weapon.
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  Speaker 2: There is apparently a bit of a divide inside the administration.
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  Speaker 2: You've read the comments of Tulsa Gabbard. What are your
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  Speaker 2: thoughts when you hear her say they can't they're not
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  Speaker 2: producing a nuclear weapon. Yeah, they have the components, but
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  Speaker 2: they're not producing one.
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  Speaker 3: Well, it really gets down to what are the components?
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  Speaker 3: How did they get the components and why do they
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  Speaker 3: have the components? I mean they say, if the intelligence
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  Speaker 3: community assesses that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon,
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  Speaker 3: but they have the components, well, having the components is
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  Speaker 3: just as good. It's it's just as threatening to us
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: if they're putting the jigsaw puzzle together or not. Why
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  Speaker 3: would they have them? Why do they have these underground
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  Speaker 3: facilities like at four to zero where they're enriching uranium
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  Speaker 3: beyond anything that anyone would ever need except for some
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  Speaker 3: kind of military application. So I think that there may
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  Speaker 3: be some like technical issues inside the intelligence community or
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  Speaker 3: the IAEA where they come to a conclusion and cyc.
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  Speaker 3: Well they're not building a weapon, but they're building the
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  Speaker 3: capacity to build a weapon, so it's just as bad.
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  Speaker 2: Did the actions of Israel surprise you in any way,
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  Speaker 2: shape or form.
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  Speaker 3: Well, it's always surprising when a country just goes for it.
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  Speaker 3: But I think since October seventh, there have been a
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  Speaker 3: lot of surprises. You know, the attack by Hamas, the
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  Speaker 3: Operation grim Beeper, you know that the Israel pursued against Uspoula,
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  Speaker 3: the fall of Syria, I mean, the Assad regime in
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  Speaker 3: Syria that have been there since the nineteen seventies. Who
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  Speaker 3: thought that was going to happen? And there you go.
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  Speaker 3: So there have been a lot of surprises happening, and
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  Speaker 3: this is just the next one. Of course, this is
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  Speaker 3: the biggest one because Iran is the head of the octopus.
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  Speaker 2: I doctor Robbins, I have long talked on this program
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  Speaker 2: about a couple of things that I think are realities.
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  Speaker 2: One is, fundamentally, you can't allow a nation, even though
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  Speaker 2: it is just Hyperbolean talk. The fact is Iran is
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  Speaker 2: mentioned for years it's desire to eliminate the existence of Israel,
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  Speaker 2: that is in and of itself to me grounds for
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  Speaker 2: this type of conduct by Israel and to whatever extent
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  Speaker 2: the US gets involved. The second, though, is the importance
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  Speaker 2: of understanding the extremist view of the Qur'an and in
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  Speaker 2: that islamis that adhere to every single word Muhammad wrote,
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  Speaker 2: believe that lying whenever is necessary is an absolute acceptable
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  Speaker 2: way to negotiate. And isn't that, in fact the reality
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  Speaker 2: we're living with right now?
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  Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I think that's definitely the reality. When we're
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: talking about Iran. They have no problem lying to us
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  Speaker 3: and taking advantage of us or doing anything that they
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  Speaker 3: want with us. They have agenda. It's to have a
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  Speaker 3: regional hegemony and then to export their Shia revolution to
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  Speaker 3: other countries. But they've really been on the ropes recently.
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  Speaker 3: All of their proxies are either gone or they're severely
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  Speaker 3: severely frayed, whether it's Hamas or the Huthis or Hbala
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  Speaker 3: or the Asad regime in Syria which has gone. I mean,
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  Speaker 3: the Iranians have suffered huge setbacks over the last eighteen
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  Speaker 3: months or so, and this is the next logical step.
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  Speaker 3: I mean Prime Minister Netanyahu really you really have to
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  Speaker 3: respect the fact that he decided just to go for it,
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  Speaker 3: because one by one he was taking out these challenges
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  Speaker 3: and now this is the final one.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: Joining us.
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  Speaker 2: Doctor James Robbins Institute for World Politics, this is his world.
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  Speaker 2: He's an expert in these subjects. He's a prolific writer,
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  Speaker 2: author and right now maybe leading the resume moving forward.
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  Speaker 2: Guest on The Morning Show with Preston Scott, what do.
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  Speaker 1: You think.
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  Speaker 3: That's a great honor?
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: You said to your publicist, who what? Huh? Hey?
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  Speaker 2: What is the line here? We've got members of Congress saying, look,
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  Speaker 2: the president can't just declare war. We can't be having that.
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  Speaker 2: What is the line? What should the US militarily be
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  Speaker 2: postured to do, and what line should be established unless
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  Speaker 2: we're attacked?
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  Speaker 3: Well, number one, we've been in conflict with Iran for
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  Speaker 3: a long time. I mean, this is this isn't like
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  Speaker 3: some new thing the going all the way back to
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  Speaker 3: the Hostage crisis, the Carter administration. You know Hesbala blowing
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  Speaker 3: up our marines in Beirut, that was an Iranian operation,
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  Speaker 3: Kobar Towers, the Operation Praying Mantis with Ronald Reagan, which
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  Speaker 3: is a huge military operation against Iran, and then all
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  Speaker 3: the things during the Iraq War where the Iranians were
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  Speaker 3: supplying weapons to the people who were killing us, and
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  Speaker 3: you know, on and on. You can just find many examples.
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  Speaker 3: So this isn't like some war that came out of nowhere.
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  Speaker 3: If we're involved in it, where do you draw the line.
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  Speaker 3: I think that if the United States is engaging in
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  Speaker 3: airstrikes and short term military operations things like that, then
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  Speaker 3: you're not really going to have to get Congress involved
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  Speaker 3: in this kind of thing. The president has the ability
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  Speaker 3: as commander in chief to respond to contingencies like this,
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  Speaker 3: and that's what he's doing. I think if the war
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  Speaker 3: really got involved, or if you're talking about ground troops,
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  Speaker 3: which were definitely not talking about in this case, then
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  Speaker 3: you might want to get Congress involved. But the people
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: who say the president doesn't have the power to do this,
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  Speaker 3: they should go back and study the constitution better.
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  Speaker 2: Early on, when Israel took its first actions in this
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  Speaker 2: latest I guess I don't know what you'd call a
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  Speaker 2: conflict that's lasted generations. Obviously, it was clear to me
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  Speaker 2: that Israel was in essence taking the high ground by
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: removing any ability for them to shoot service to air missiles,
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  Speaker 2: knock down radar installations, and so forth. We now hear
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: claims of complete air supremacy over Iranian airspace. Is that
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  Speaker 2: how you read the situation? And is that in fact
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  Speaker 2: the smartest first move?
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  Speaker 3: Oh? Yeah, that's definitely the kind of thing that the
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  Speaker 3: United States. Does you go in there, You make sure
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  Speaker 3: they don't have air assets going to come after you.
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  Speaker 3: First thing you do is take out the air defenses
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  Speaker 3: and their early warning radar things of that nature so
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  Speaker 3: they can't even see you. Take out their aircraft on
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  Speaker 3: the ground, preferably so that they can't come up and
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: shoot you down. And then as their air defenses pop up,
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  Speaker 3: you know, the ones that you haven't already eliminated, you
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  Speaker 3: try to get them. We have seen Israel suffering from
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  Speaker 3: the surface to surface missile launches that have been hitting
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  Speaker 3: Tel Aviv and Haifa in other cities. Although Israel's intercepting
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  Speaker 3: a lot of those, but some still get through, and
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  Speaker 3: it's very disturbing to see the damage that's happening in Israel.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, that could be the United States, but I
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  Speaker 3: think Israel's doing all the right things right now, and
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  Speaker 3: they just have to keep degrading and tridding the missile
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  Speaker 3: capability of Iran and then see what happens. I mean,
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  Speaker 3: I think really the endgame is a popular uprising in
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  Speaker 3: Iran that takes down the regime, because until that regime
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  Speaker 3: is out, we're still going to have the same threat.
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  Speaker 2: It's interesting because that points to one of the other
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  Speaker 2: big differences here. Israel targeting military targets strategic targets, Iran
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  Speaker 2: just blasting away hitting any civilian target they possibly can.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly, and as it always has been, because Iran's
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  Speaker 3: sort of leading practical move is terrorism. Right, They've always
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  Speaker 3: attacked civilian targets and just try to create mayhem, whether
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  Speaker 3: they're doing it with missiles, whether they're doing it with
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  Speaker 3: car bombs or whatever. The Israelis have very strict rules
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  Speaker 3: of engagement. They're not going to go into some place
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  Speaker 3: and just take out civilians. If the terrorists and bad
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  Speaker 3: guys are hiding in their hospitals and things like we
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  Speaker 3: saw in Gaza, then there may be some what they
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  Speaker 3: call collateral damage of innocent people getting in the crossfire.
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  Speaker 3: But Israel is extremely conscientious about trying not to have
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  Speaker 3: that happen, telling people to evacuate, for example, if they're
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  Speaker 3: going to attack a building or an area, and they
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  Speaker 3: really trying to minimize that, unlike our enemies who want
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  Speaker 3: to maximize that. That's their whole game is to maximize
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  Speaker 3: killing anyone they can.
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  Speaker 2: You mentioned the Iranian people need to rise up and
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  Speaker 2: overthrow the leadership of the country, which obviously is the
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  Speaker 2: iatola the quote supreme leader. What's your hunch on that
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  Speaker 2: versus him slipping on a bar of soap, if you
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  Speaker 2: know what I mean?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I mean either way of course. The United States.
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  Speaker 3: You know, I don't think that we want to create
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  Speaker 3: a martyr, right The President said, you know, we know
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  Speaker 3: where he's hiding. We're not going to kill him yet.
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  Speaker 3: I thought that was interesting. You really have to take
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: the President literally if he says something like that, because
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: it means that maybe we would. But I think it
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  Speaker 3: just from a standpoint of stability and long term viability,
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  Speaker 3: it would be really good if the Iranian people themselves
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  Speaker 3: rose up and took care of the job so that
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  Speaker 3: no one's blaming outsiders anything like that. Just hey, people,
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  Speaker 3: freedom is there for you. Why don't you take it?
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  Speaker 2: Doctor Robins, thanks for the time today. Look forward to
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  Speaker 2: having you back sometime as the news unfolds, and I'm
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: sure it will.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much, Oh my pleasure.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you, Doctor James Robbins with US Institute for World Politics.
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  Speaker 2: I'm going to take a second here. Listen to this PhD.
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  Speaker 2: Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, taught National Defense, taught
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: at the National Defense University, Marine Corps University. Senior editorial
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  Speaker 2: writer for foreign affairs for the Washington Times. To work
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  Speaker 2: has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, National Review. Special
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  Speaker 2: Assistant to the Office of the Secretary of Defense. In
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  Speaker 2: two thousand and seven, awarded Chairman of the Joint Chiefs
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  Speaker 2: Joint Meritorious Civilian Service Award. And I'm just that's just
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  Speaker 2: a handful of things on the man's resume. Yeah, eighteen
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  Speaker 2: past the hour