Latest / FDD Morning Brief / The Ceasefire War | feat. Lt. Col. (Ret.) Conricus, RADM (Ret.) Montgomery, and Behnam Ben Taleblu

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The Ceasefire War | feat. Lt. Col. (Ret.) Conricus, RADM (Ret.) Montgomery, and Behnam Ben Taleblu · FDD Morning Brief

• 0:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: Good morning, it is Wednesday.
• 0:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: It is June 10th, the multi-front war in the Middle East is now 977 days old and man is it heating up.
• 0:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm your host Jonathan Shanzer, welcome back to the FTD Morning Brief.
• 0:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: All right, I'm gonna just quickly review what has just happened over the last couple of days to get us up to speed, and then we're gonna get right to our conversation.
• 0:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: it starts with what I've been calling the ceasefire war.
• 0:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: A bunch of ceasefires that don't hold Donald Trump continues to try to get the Iranian regime to agree to a deal and they continue to refuse.
• 0:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: Then we start to see the heating up of the scene on Israel's northern border.
• 0:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: His Bala Iran's most powerful proxy starts firing or continues to fire rather rockets, as well as
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: Extremely dangerous and pv drones that have had a deadly impact on military and civilian targets alike Israel responds Not surprisingly after a certain point any country would Israel starts attacking Dahia beat southern suburbs of Beirut hitting command and control centers as well as other important targets associated with his ball up
• 1:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: Iran then claims that this is a ceasefire violation.
• 1:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: They claim that Lebanon is part of their ceasefire, which was not exactly holding in the first place because of their infractions.
• 1:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: But nevertheless, they call this a ceasefire violation.
• 1:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: Iran begins to attack.
• 1:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: Islamic Republic begins to attack the Israelis.
• 1:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: The Israelis shoot down a bunch of ballistic missiles.
• 1:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: Then Israel scrambles to respond.
• 1:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: They put refueling aircraft into the skies and begin to scramble their fighter jets.
• 1:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: Trump then makes the announcement that Israel has to hold back.
• 2:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: He says Israel does should not actually engage in hostilities.
• 2:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: So then what happens next?
• 2:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: Not entirely clear.
• 2:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: Either Israel defies the president of the United States or negotiate with them for response and then strikes targets across three different jurisdictions inside the Islamic Republic.
• 2:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: After that,
• 2:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: the Islamic Republic announces an end to that round of violence.
• 2:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Israel then returns to fighting his ball and Lebanon seemingly having made the proclamation that what happens in Lebanon stays in Lebanon.
• 2:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: The Islamic Republic gets no vote.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: That look like maybe a victory for Israel will talk about that in a minute.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: Then yesterday, news of a downed American chopper,
• 2:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: Both of the service members in that helicopter were apparently fine, they were saved.
• 2:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: We'll talk about the rescue operation, which I think was interesting in just a minute.
• 2:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: But then Iran tries to deny its culpability in doubting that chopper.
• 2:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: Trump was not having any of it, and he ultimately responded with attacks across Iran.
• 3:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then Iran responds,
• 3:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: across the Gulf, and even attacks to Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, this appears to be a new development.
• 3:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: There have been a couple of missiles that have fallen in Jordan, but not an intent to attack.
• 3:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: So look, escalation gets escalation.
• 3:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's what we're looking at right now, and that all, it gets a sit wrap here at the FDD morning brief.
• 3:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: So we're going to right now bring on three
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, guys.
• 3:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: We want to introduce our panel here in Quack Order.
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: We've got first Mark Montgomery retired rear admiral the Navy with 32 years of service.
• 3:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: He commanded a carrier strike group.
• 3:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: He is also served in senior roles at European Command in the NSC.
• 3:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: He served as policy director for the Senate Armed Service Committee under Senator John McCain.
• 3:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: Today, he leads FDD Cyber Center and he runs some of FDD's most effective work in support of Israel, Taiwan, and Ukraine.
• 4:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: We also have Jonathan Cranriquez,
• 4:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: a occasional host here of the FDB morning brief and a base you see often in the media.
• 4:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: He's a retired lieutenant colonel in the IDF with combat experience in Lebanon and Gaza and an even more hostile battle space the UN.
• 4:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: Jonathan served as the IDF's international spokesperson from 2017 to 2021.
• 4:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: He was called up again after the October 7th attacks to serve in the
• 4:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: And last, but certainly not least, we have Batman Ben Talibu.
• 4:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: After you see your fellow and director of our flagship Iran program, he's a frequent flyer on all the major news networks.
• 4:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: He's fluent in farcee.
• 4:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: He tracks the Iranian regime's leadership, rhetoric, weapon systems, like few others in this space.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: So gentlemen, welcome to all three of you.
• 4:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: Great to have you on the program.
• 4:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: Mark Bunk-Garmary, I want to start with you
• 4:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: I just want to try to understand what's going on here from the perspective of the US military.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: Maybe just explain about what happened with that down chopper and how that rescue operation took place and then from there, just a little bit about what you're seeing with the targets that the US is currently striking.
• 5:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, thanks for having me, uh, Jonathan, the, um, I'll first say, you know, we don't know exactly how the chopper was, uh, taking down whether it was like a blind impact on something or, um, or actually a targeted weapon.
• 5:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: I will say that it probably was a very low explosive weapon or blind impact because otherwise it's very hard to put a helicopter safely in the water and get both pilots out.
• 5:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: if you had, you know, 50 or 100 kilos of explosive go off in your plane.
• 5:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, setting that aside, the rescue was really interesting, you know, and Ukraine, I've seen unmanned ground vehicles, you know, things that look like small little John deer, you know, rider tractors with, with carts behind them, be used to pull people, you know, frontline infantry wounded,
• 6:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: or dead, you know, back to Ukrainian positions.
• 6:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: But this is the first time I've seen a maritime version of that.
• 6:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: So the course here has been in the Gulf for a version of it has been part of Task Force 59 in the Gulf for years.
• 6:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: you know, doing sensor work and probing work, and this is a very unusual case.
• 6:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: This only works because both pilots were clearly not injured or significantly injured, because you have to haul yourself up onto a vehicle not really made for combat, so our combat search and rescue.
• 6:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: at some point I wouldn't be surprised to hear that a helicopter got involved and extracted the tube from the course air, we'll have to see.
• 6:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: But if it was the closest thing and you want to get people out of the water, it's a great utilization of it.
• 6:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that was unusual.
• 6:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: In terms of the counterstrike, I think
• 6:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: President Trump, until his true social post about an hour ago, was trying as hard as to keep a lid on on weapons exchanges.
• 7:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: In other words, he was leaning on Netanyahu to not counter strike it, and then what he did to not do it a second time.
• 7:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: And he was successful in that second time over the weekend.
• 7:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: In this case, last week, they were firing at Navy ships.
• 7:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: We did proportionous strikes against
• 7:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: and some weapons launch points.
• 7:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: Last night, the 20 strikes were proportionate in the sense of the same type of targets, disproportionate in the sense that there was a higher number of strikes.
• 7:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: But you know, we did, we hit 20 targets, I'm going to, I guess we hit 19 or 20 targets and did actual damage.
• 7:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: Their counter strike back against Jordanian airfields reportedly hasn't damaged things.
• 7:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have to see if that's true.
• 7:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: That really does get the president the choice of whether he responds or not to that.
• 7:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: because, you know, a part of proportion to disproportion is we're getting through and you're not.
• 7:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: But from his true social posts, it sounds like he's about ready to step it up and do more strikes.
• 8:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: Disproportionate in this case would mean attacking like economic targets, you know, like the pectochemical plaque that the Israelis had allegedly hit or gas field production facilities, things like that.
• 8:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm hoping I think he wants to try to keep a lid on it.
• 8:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: That was
• 8:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: We'll have to see what happens over the next 24 hour.
• 8:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: All right, well, I got another question for you and I think this one's really important.
• 8:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we've watched Donald Trump, you know, hold back.
• 8:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, really he has shown incredible restraint up until now.
• 8:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: A lot of people are saying and I think they're not wrong to note that this has, this is closely associated with our arsenal.
• 8:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: that we just simply can't afford to burn down certain munitions.
• 8:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I mean, you and I have talked, I think the assessment broadly speaking is probably plenty of attacking munitions, offensive munitions, that we're probably just more concerned about air defenses, because the regime seems to have just an endless supply of drones and missiles.
• 9:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: Um, and we have to, I mean, we're not only just protecting American assets in the region, but we're also protecting, oh, I don't know, eight, ten Arab countries that we can consider allies in and they're important, um, oil partners or just important defense partners.
• 9:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so defending all of these skies starts to really be attacks on our arsenal.
• 9:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: Is that a fair assessment or do we need to understand more?
• 9:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: So a couple of things first, I think part of his restraint is also that he's not restrained in his application of economic power in terms of the blockade operations.
• 9:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I still believe that he thinks that hey, look, if I stop them from doing, you know, they're,
• 9:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, 90% of their exports via shadow fleet ships that he'll put pressure on them.
• 9:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I do think he's still keeping that maximum economic pressure on it.
• 9:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: In terms of the munitions, I think that we probably are a little short on offensive precision wall range strike.
• 10:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Things like jazz and VR and Tomot, but they're really not necessary for this.
• 10:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: As you pointed out, the shorter range mid range,
• 10:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: off let's just strike JDMERs things like these are weapons we have literally a hundred a thousandths of so we're okay on the on the defense of munitions I think we're you know patriot and that are both being monitored pretty closely there we've expended quite a bit between the twelve-day war and this on that we've expended quite a bit of that inventory
• 10:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Patriot a lower percentage, but a higher number, a lower percentage of our overall numbers because we have more Patriots.
• 10:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have really increased our Patriot production and that's going to start evidencing itself over the next 12 to 18 months.
• 10:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: But in the very, you know, exquisite moment right now, we're probably at a lower level that we were definitely in a lower level than what if that's an issue.
• 10:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: But even more important.
• 10:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: is we still did not have the ability to shoot down effectively, shoot down drones, fired at short range.
• 11:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: Remy by that is she had drones attacking by rain, Kuwait, Qatar, certain parts of Saudi Arabia and UAE.
• 11:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: And until we fix that hole in our sway, which really is probably getting is going to involve getting systems from Ukraine in the short term.
• 11:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're going to probably
• 11:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: because our aircraft can't get behind them in time for the short range mission like we can for an attack on Jordan or Israel, where we have three or four hundred miles following a small 159 drone, you know, a slow, hundred and fifty-nine drone.
• 11:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: So the real worry for me isn't the lower low number of munitions, it's the the capacity issue, it's the actual capability issue, the inability to shoot down and that she had drones and short range
• 11:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
• 11:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 11:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for that summary.
• 12:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to turn back to you in a bit.
• 12:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: But first, I want to turn to Jonathan Conrique.
• 12:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: Jonathan, obviously, this is a bunch of pretty traumatic events over the last couple of days in Israel as well.
• 12:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: As I see what unfolded, I think that these really won the battle on two fronts.
• 12:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: Maybe more.
• 12:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm curious to get your take on this.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: Doesn't mean that there isn't more fight that Israel has in its near and long-term futures.
• 12:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: It looks like the Iranians tried to assert themselves in Lebanon and to claim that this was their sphere of influence, these rallies refused to stand down and in fact stood up to the Islamic Republic.
• 12:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: Not only is it continuing to fight in Lebanon and it looks like it's prevailed with the president to be able to do that, but also refused to be told that there was no response to the Islamic Republic after those missiles came in.
• 12:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: Of course, these really neutralized those ballistic missiles.
• 12:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: There was no significant damage, but nonetheless, we saw in Israeli response.
• 13:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: And what we saw in the aftermath of that was these on a group of public saying, well, we consider this incident over.
• 13:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: That looks like sort of a surrender in that round.
• 13:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: Am I getting this right?
• 13:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: How do these really see it right now?
• 13:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so good morning, Jonathan and everybody, pleasure to be back here.
• 13:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would add to what you already said.
• 13:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think two important data points.
• 13:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: One is that after Israel was told not to retaliate and after the Iranians,
• 13:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: fired at the Israel 30 ballistic missiles all of whom were either intercepted successfully or were allowed to explode in open areas in various parts of Israel.
• 13:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: So no damage.
• 13:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the important point is that what's happening now in southern Lebanon and central Lebanon and in other places is that the idea of continues to target his bala infrastructure in personnel and commander.
• 14:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: The first thing that Israel wanted to achieve is to continue and to preserve its freedom of action against his balah context here being that northern Israel is a war zone.
• 14:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: As you said in the beginning, it's a ledger, the deceased fire, but if you're in northern Israel, it's anything but it's a war zone.
• 14:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: Most of northern Israel is evacuated and the Israel continues
• 14:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: casualties from mostly from drones that risk-balized making effective use of the same type or same technology of drones that we see deployed in Ukraine by Ukraine and by Russia.
• 14:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it's drones that are difficult to intercept and we see his bala using them against military and against civilian targets as well as rockets being fired at northern Israel.
• 14:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And the Iranian perspective here is, I think, understandably, they're in under quite a lot of pressure.
• 15:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: They're angry and they're frustrated that their most important asset is being attacked by Israel and nobody really is stopping his ballad from being degraded in Lebanon.
• 15:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's why they intervene, then they tried really to establish a new equation here to which Israel said not we're not going to have it and so far it appears as if that equation isn't going to hold and Israel is going to continue to pursue limited military goals against his bala as part of a bigger strategic process with the Lebanese government.
• 15:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: probably with the US and on the US leadership and that is to squeeze his balam militarily politically and hopefully financially as well.
• 15:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: So that's going on.
• 15:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: Second piece I would say that yes there is you know some frustration and what Mark said before about you know we are getting through the aliens aren't that's true with Israel as well and I'm of course very happy that
• 16:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the whole issue of the proportionality and what Israel can and cannot do in order to defend itself after it is being attacked.
• 16:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's of course an important topic that Israel wants to be clear about, to preserve its rights to defend itself and its freedom of action, to pursue its security and the safety of its people and its sovereignty.
• 16:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's an important thing moving forward.
• 16:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think an important message that came out of Israel, Chief of Staff, Al Zamir, is said very clearly.
• 16:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: We are ready and locked and loaded to continue, not only to conduct operations against Iran, but to enhance and to strike targets that are many more targets and more severe ones all over Iran.
• 16:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's an interesting statement that is, you know, timely.
• 17:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: It should tell people in the region and across the Atlantic where Israel weighs and usually General Zamir isn't one for fast and loose torque.
• 17:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's a man of substance and not a politician.
• 17:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: And when he says something like that, I tend to listen and I'm sure that the Iranians do too.
• 17:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so I don't want to just jump right on that point.
• 17:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: So it looks like the Israelis may be gearing up to start striking the Islamic Republic again.
• 17:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: They have been restrained by the president who's been in pursuit of this ceasefire deal that's not been a ceasefire throughout the last several months.
• 17:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: But the Israelis have been sideline.
• 17:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the assessment was at least among some that there were tensions.
• 17:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean at one point we heard reports of Donald Trump yelling at BB about how he was,
• 17:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: I guess their interests were not aligned, let's just put it that way.
• 17:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: Are we seeing the realignment of U.S. and Israeli interests after this pause and fighting?
• 18:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: Do we expect the Israelis to be invited back into U.S. operations where the two air forces will once again fly winged to wing where the Israelis can be a force multiplier?
• 18:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: Is that the assessment here or is do you think that what we're going to see is and I do want Mark to weigh in on this in a bit?
• 18:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: Or do we see the Israelis
• 18:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: having to stay in their lane, which means, hey, you just keep going after his Bala, you do what you need to do there.
• 18:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: Let's create leverage and pressure so that maybe his Bala capitulates in the Lebanese government has more leverage.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Maybe that's what's going on.
• 18:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, tell us how we're supposed to read this from an Israeli military perspective.
• 18:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, from that perspective, I think it's pretty clear that Israel is eager, pulling at the leash, if you'd like, to get going against the Islamic Republic, to continue military pressure against and to continue to degrade their military and what's left of their nuclear capabilities, and whenever an opportunity will be presented, I think Israel will be quite eager to be part of it.
• 19:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: it also depends on like the old saying the enemy has a vote.
• 19:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: So if the Iranians are smart and calculated and don't attack Israel, then Israel would have one less reason to do so.
• 19:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: And the Americans would have one less reason to allow Israel to be part of any future American kinetic activity.
• 19:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I doubt that the Iranians will be that patient and smart, because we've seen them lash out and strike targets far and wide.
• 19:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it's difficult for me to imagine that the Iranians will engage kinetically with other countries in the region and spare Israel, which will be an invitation for Israel to do just that.
• 19:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: And final point would be that, you know, we're looking at the region and a dynamic here.
• 19:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: with coming elections in Israel in a few months, still unclear when, but that's, you know, it casts a very long shadow and decisions made in Israel.
• 20:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: Again, significant domestic pressure in Israel on this government to do more, to defend the state of Israel, to defend its sovereignty and very importantly, to get achievements on the battlefield and diplomatically for all of the hard work and sacrifice that we've been done.
• 20:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Last point, you know, it's a lot of military achievements, but diplomatically speaking, I am concerned by growing tensions and by Israel's diplomatic standing, which is odd in terms to how you look at the achievements on the battlefield and the
• 20:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Good, Israel is doing against Hizbalah, against Hamas, against the Iranian regime.
• 20:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: It is unfortunate to see that Israel diplomatically isn't using the same creativity and tools as it is on the battlefield.
• 20:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: A perennial problem.
• 20:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: Uh-huh, no doubt.
• 20:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: Um, okay, back now.
• 20:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to turn you.
• 20:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for being patient.
• 21:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: Tell us what's going on right now.
• 21:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we've heard rumors of Ahmed Wahidi being killed.
• 21:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: We've heard about rumors of the the news supreme or extreme leader, which type of Hamini being killed.
• 21:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: We see a bit of chaos in disarray within the regime and yet they continue to engage a superpower trying to draw it more into conflict.
• 21:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: What is the calculus of this regime?
• 21:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: great to be with you John good morning and good morning gentlemen and viewers and listeners.
• 21:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: In essence this is a regime that is more cohesive but more course at the same time so there's a smaller cabal or smaller group of people making the most important decisions that matter and those decisions that matter are inherently more risky so now these days you know we see
• 21:51
  [SPEAKER_03]: with respect to the threats that it levees, even though you will hear a lot of noise, a lot of noise on social media, a lot of noise on a run-in-traditional media, a lot of noise on hard-line media.
• 22:00
  [SPEAKER_03]: When you look at the behavior, unfortunately, and this is the tough spot, both for Israel and America, which will mean the conflict is set to grow, not set to diminish in the coming months.
• 22:09
  [SPEAKER_03]: When these guys have been threatening, even though they have been weaker, they have actually carried out their threats.
• 22:14
  [SPEAKER_03]: In the month of February, they said that any war, the regime would internationalize it.
• 22:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: They did that, unfortunately.
• 22:20
  [SPEAKER_03]: In the run-up to the strikes against northern Israel for the incursion against Lebanon, due to the Hezbollah attacks on northern Israel.
• 22:26
  [SPEAKER_03]: which have been sustained.
• 22:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: These longer Republic said, if there is no linkage, we will strike.
• 22:31
  [SPEAKER_03]: And for the first time ever in history, these longer Republic afforded ballistic missile fire from its own territory to a non-state actor.
• 22:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: And then now, most recently in response to the downing of the Apache helicopter by these longer Republic, the regime said that if they were struck that they would respond and they did respond and unfortunately in that instance,
• 22:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: they got to close the round.
• 22:53
  [SPEAKER_03]: So we have to wait and see what impact the presence to eat and what impact the presence potential change in policy might have, but this is a more course more brittle and more dangerous core at the helm of these logical public today willing to play to the edge because they feel like they have nothing to lose.
• 23:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: And also Jonathan just mentioned that important word, they have been trying to change the equation.
• 23:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, they have introduced this word during their first missile attack on Israel back in April
• 23:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: and they have failed each and every time.
• 23:25
  [SPEAKER_03]: And unfortunately, what's left of this hard-line cabal, this rump regime is our friend, Rish Kolberg likes to call it, they believe that there's also no way out but through.
• 23:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: So when in doubt escalate and we're seeing that on the battlefields of the Middle East today.
• 23:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so Mark Montgomery earlier noted the economic pressure.
• 23:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think he's not wrong to flag that that it's significant right now.
• 23:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: Are we seeing that start to bear out as we watch the Islamic Republic?
• 23:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: Can you see signs of buckling because of the massive economic pressure that we've placed on this regime?
• 24:00
  [SPEAKER_03]: We absolutely see signs of stress.
• 24:02
  [SPEAKER_03]: There's major macroeconomic indicators, the inflation rate.
• 24:05
  [SPEAKER_03]: whether you're looking at core subsidized items such as food staples that are traditional to the Iranian diet that the government sponsors or gasoline prices, major urban centers where there's gasoline cues, for example, I just want to say one thing, you know, we're talking about all the guns and bombs, but Mark mentioned that pressure on this rate of war moves in the blockade.
• 24:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, this is where the regime irms the hearts of its revenue prior to the commencement of hostilities Iran was exporting about 2.1 million barrels per day per our estimates per what we purchased in terms of tanker tracking data from tanker trackers.
• 24:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: The regime in the month of May meaning the full month that the blockade was in effect exported only 64,000 barrels of oil per day.
• 24:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: If this is sustained, dealer, no deal, war, no war, these laminate republic will be the one that is put to the choice.
• 24:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: And while we haven't seen the second, third order, social, potentially political protest and, you know, potential elite fracturing effects of this economic campaign, because it simply hasn't been given enough time yet.
• 25:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: The short-term impact is huge.
• 25:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: The medium-term impact, if there is a real pause and pushing away from the table, if the fog of war dissipates, the economic impact at the President's pressure campaign, can have and will have, will be tremendous.
• 25:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: Alright, thank you for that.
• 25:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I know Beth, you may need to go.
• 25:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: Mark Montgomery, I've got one last question for you before we wrap up.
• 25:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to just ask you about the question of Israel joining and whether we actually have an alignment of interests again after what appeared to be maybe a misalignment for a time or at least some questions or tensions, are we back to where we were at the beginning of this thing on February 28th, where the Israelis are going to be welcome partners or
• 25:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think on the military level, we're fine for planning.
• 25:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: And most of our planning's been reasonably geographic, a little bit of integration on the edges and scenes, shared in for me, Intel, making sure about air defense systems being shut down.
• 25:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like I noticed that I think these really syntax of air defense systems,
• 26:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: over the weekend, you know, where, you know, what we say, we just heard an air defense system.
• 26:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's a missile, a launcher, there's a radar, there's a fire control system.
• 26:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: We don't always destroy all three in an initial strike.
• 26:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: We destroyed two out of three.
• 26:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: They Lego and Jigsaw puzzle a system back together, and this rail is just removed it.
• 26:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: That kind of integration is happening all the time already no matter how much Netanyahu and Trump yell at each other.
• 26:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: And for operational planning purposes, target selection, things like that were fully integrated and were made integrated.
• 26:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: Do I think President Trump's going to remain mad at Netanyahu?
• 26:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, because I think this event is irrepebably hurting his midterm chances in a way that the president tends not to blame himself.
• 26:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Um, so that Yahoo is a is a is is a culpable and available person for him to blame.
• 26:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I think you'll continue to but militarily I think we're fine.
• 27:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're well, you're you're you're you're understated.
• 27:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: Mark Montgomery for a change.
• 27:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: All right, gentlemen.
• 27:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to thank you both.
• 27:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Beth and I'm Ben Talibu was already checked out here.
• 27:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to thank you both for joining us today.
• 27:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the special set rap version of the FTD morning brief.
• 27:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, Jonathan.
• 27:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thanks.