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Vance and Trump BRUSH OFF wartime concerns despite plunging approvals · INSIGHT TODAY

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  Speaker 1: Donald Trump has named a new acting Army secretary after
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  Speaker 1: the sudden resignation of Army Secretary Dan Driscoll earlier this week.
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  Speaker 1: He's chosen Adam Tell, an official who oversees the Army
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  Speaker 1: Corps of Engineers, bypassing the Army undersecretary who would typically
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  Speaker 1: fill this role. Washington Post is reporting while Tell is
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  Speaker 1: a relative unknown at the Pentagon, he is well-known on
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  Speaker 1: Capitol Hill. However, after serving for decades as a Republican
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  Speaker 1: congressional staffer and White House liaison— Tell is viewed in
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  Speaker 1: the Pentagon as having a good relationship with Pete Hegseth
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  Speaker 1: and takes the position following months of tension between the
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  Speaker 1: Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, and Driscoll. This now leaves
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  Speaker 1: the army without a Senate-confirmed leader as new intelligence reports
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  Speaker 1: assess that Iran has grown more confident in its abilities
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  Speaker 1: to attack targets in the Middle East and prolong Donald
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  Speaker 1: Trump's war of choice in Iran. Let's bring into our
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  Speaker 1: coverage MSM military analyst and retired Army Lieutenant General Mark Hertling.
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  Speaker 1: He's the author of If I Don't Return, a father's
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  Speaker 1: wartime journal. Tom Nichols is also with us. He's a
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  Speaker 1: staff writer at The Atlantic and professor emeritus at the
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  Speaker 1: Naval War College. Tom, General Hartley, we started this conversation yesterday.
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  Speaker 1: What's amazing is that they still, in the sixth, maybe
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  Speaker 1: beginning the seventh month of this, can't manage to say
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  Speaker 1: the same thing. I want to show you something that J.D.
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  Speaker 1: Vance said, and then Trump defending Vance.
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  Speaker 2: The phrase, an end to the war, I want to
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  Speaker 2: push back on that just a little bit, because major
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  Speaker 2: combat operations are currently not ongoing, and they haven't been
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  Speaker 2: ongoing in a very long time. I wouldn't call it
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  Speaker 2: a war. Right now, there is no active shooting.
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  Speaker 3: I'll tell you what, a lot of people don't call
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  Speaker 3: it a war. I call it a military conflict because
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  Speaker 3: it's small potatoes for us. It's not a big thing.
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  Speaker 3: I heard what he said, and it was interesting because
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  Speaker 3: I think that there's a lot of truth that we're
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  Speaker 3: not fighting right now. I can understand what he's saying.
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  Speaker 3: It's a military conflict, but it's very intermittent. I could
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  Speaker 3: see somebody not calling it a war.
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  Speaker 1: Again, This is not the conversation happening in the country.
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  Speaker 1: This is not the conversation happening around the tables where
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  Speaker 1: men and women of the military have been deployed for
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  Speaker 1: much longer. And Trump's words, quote, not long enough when
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  Speaker 1: it came to the USS Abraham Lincoln. These are not
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  Speaker 1: the conversations happening for the families that The Wall Street
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  Speaker 1: Journal yesterday reported would be deployed through 2027. What is
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  Speaker 1: your sense, General, of why this is the debate Trump
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  Speaker 1: and Vance are having publicly when the men and women
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  Speaker 1: of the military are living a life that is consistent
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  Speaker 1: with a military that is at war?
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  Speaker 4: If it's a debate, Nicole, it's a pretty dumb one,
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  Speaker 4: first of all. The vice president, who is a Marine veteran,
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  Speaker 4: although he was a public affairs veteran, specialist within the
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  Speaker 4: Marine Corps. So I'm not sure he may or may
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  Speaker 4: not know what combat is. But for him to say
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  Speaker 4: something like that and then the president to back it
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  Speaker 4: up by changing the definition to a military conflict, I'm
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  Speaker 4: not sure what a military conflict has in terms of
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  Speaker 4: a difference with a war. You know, there are times
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  Speaker 4: in combat when you're not fighting, which is what the
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  Speaker 4: president said. You're, you know, you're sleeping or eating or
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  Speaker 4: perhaps resting in the rear area. But you tell any
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  Speaker 4: of the individuals, the 50,000 individuals that are in the
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  Speaker 4: Middle East, the brigade of paratroopers that are somewhere in
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  Speaker 4: the Middle East, or you tell their mothers or fathers
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  Speaker 4: or their wives or husbands that they're not in a war.
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  Speaker 4: And I think they would all disagree with you. There's
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  Speaker 4: a chance for people getting hurt, as there has been already,
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  Speaker 4: although the president said only 18 killed. That's small potatoes,
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  Speaker 4: which is also infuriating. But all of the comments that
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  Speaker 4: are trying to obfuscate the fact that we're in a
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  Speaker 4: conflict that continues on with no end in sight and
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  Speaker 4: no political objective, perhaps the only reason this isn't a
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  Speaker 4: war is because it doesn't have a political objective, and
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  Speaker 4: yet we're still sending the military to fight it.
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  Speaker 1: Tom Nichols, the Trump administrator, or Trump and Vance talk
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  Speaker 1: about it as though they're the only people or the
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  Speaker 1: only side that will determine whether it's a war or not.
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  Speaker 1: Here's how the Times reports Iran's state of being today. Quote,
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  Speaker 1: A more confident Iran emerges after six months of war
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  Speaker 1: with the U.S. Quote, the report, some current and former
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  Speaker 1: officials said, suggests that any agreement to fully end the
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  Speaker 1: war will be hard to reach. There are a few
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  Speaker 1: signs that Iran is ready to make any sort of
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  Speaker 1: deal with the U.S., contend to exacerbate President Trump's political
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  Speaker 1: problems ahead of the U.S. midterm elections, according to some officials.
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  Speaker 1: Your thoughts?
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  Speaker 2: Well, you have two states flying their flags today. with
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  Speaker 2: identifying each other as enemies, fighting with each other. Now,
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  Speaker 2: you know, maybe I'm just an old retired war college professor,
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  Speaker 2: but I'm pretty sure that's war. You know, and there
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  Speaker 2: are military excursions that are not war when, for example,
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  Speaker 2: fighting anti-terrorist operations or, you know, escorting ships or doing
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  Speaker 2: things like that. When you're fighting another state and you
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  Speaker 2: are pummeling their military forces and they're striking back. And
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  Speaker 2: you are seeking, as the president said, to gain their
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  Speaker 2: their unconditional surrender. I think most you know, you don't
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  Speaker 2: have to be an intellectual or a scholar. Most people
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  Speaker 2: know that's war. And the fact that they are trying
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  Speaker 2: to downplay this tells you that they know that they've
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  Speaker 2: been losing it. And again, I know it upsets people
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  Speaker 2: to hear that, and it doesn't make me happy to
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  Speaker 2: say it. But the reality is Iran is achieving its
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  Speaker 2: strategic objectives, and the United States is not achieving any
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  Speaker 2: of its strategic objectives. That's called losing. And it doesn't
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  Speaker 2: surprise me at all that the administration doesn't know what
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  Speaker 2: to call this, wants to keep down to soft peddling
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  Speaker 2: it and downplaying it as, you know, an excursion, a conflict,
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  Speaker 2: a bit of unpleasantness, whatever they've decided to call it now,
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  Speaker 2: because this is really a disaster of the first order.
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  Speaker 2: And I want to just come in behind one other
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  Speaker 2: point Mark was making. It's not just infuriating to hear,
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  Speaker 2: you know, the 18 dead and hundreds wounded is small potatoes.
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  Speaker 2: This is a country that's the size of a chunk,
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  Speaker 2: a big chunk of Western Europe with more than 90
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  Speaker 2: million people in it. This is one of the biggest
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  Speaker 2: expeditions the United States has undertaken in the Middle East.
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  Speaker 2: This place is like two and a half times the
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  Speaker 2: size of Iraq. And somehow to say, well, this is
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  Speaker 2: just small potatoes for us. That is, once again, the
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  Speaker 2: president just wish casting and trying to make it all
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  Speaker 2: go away because he and Hegseth have screwed this thing
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  Speaker 2: up from the very beginning.