00:00What do you make of these ongoing Iranian attacks at the Gulf states?
00:05And how critical is the risk of escalation coming through from a Gulf state's response to these oncoming attacks?
00:18We're already seeing escalation.
00:20So initially in the first couple of days, we saw Iran striking the U.S. military establishment in the Gulf
00:28countries.
00:29It increased it to attacking oil refineries and now the consulates and then attacking other parts of Kuwait.
00:37And so we were already seeing escalation.
00:39But if you take a step back and think about what is happening, it's not just the energy crisis, but
00:46it's kind of a strategic reorientation of the role of the Gulf countries.
00:50We saw something really critical happen about 10 hours ago where satellite images, for example, showed that the ANFPS-132
01:00phase array radar in the Odeid Air Force Base in Qatar was destroyed.
01:06Now, this is the satellite imagery where the radar actually is the one that's supposed to intercept.
01:13And so the major military part, U.S. military part meant to protect in this area has already been destroyed.
01:21I think the UAE foreign ministry put out a statement yesterday that is really important for us to look at
01:27where, and I quote, he says,
01:29The UAE voices its firm rejection of the use of the territories of the country in the region as arenas
01:34for settling scores or expanding the scope of the conflict.
01:38We saw similar statements from the foreign ministry of Qatar.
01:41We saw a similar statement come from the crown prince of Saudi Arabia.
01:45And so what became increasingly clear is that the grand bargain that Gulf countries struck with the United States for
01:54decades, that if they host American military bases, they will have security, is not rendering the deal as complete as
02:02they thought it once was, where we saw that the attacks on the military establishment is leading these countries to
02:09become increasingly insecure, drawing them into a conflict that they didn't agree to be in.
02:15Yeah, and becoming vulnerable due to the very presence of those U.S. assets.
02:20What is the likelihood, in your opinion, of some of these states choosing to get involved militarily in the war?
02:30They might get militarily involved to protect themselves because we heard a couple of accusations today from some Gulf leaders
02:38that the U.S. is not responding as swiftly as they think it should.
02:43But if they pull themselves in a more strategic response, then Iran could leverage some more of its power.
02:53We have been talking about Iran being significantly weakened while its ballistic missile capacity has been weakened and its naval
02:59fleet has perhaps been destroyed.
03:02Its capacity to actually produce more Shahid drone missiles very cheaply is still possible.
03:08And so Iran could be in this for the long haul.
03:11What we do know about the United States bases in the UAE and in Qatar is that they're running low
03:18on munitions, running low on cruise missiles, on tomahawks, on Patriot missiles.
03:25And so the U.S. was not really prepared for the long haul, even though President Trump said that he's
03:31in it for four to five weeks and we're ready.
03:34We saw an emergency appropriations bill go through today to actually resupply through Congress to actually resupply some of these
03:41missiles.
03:42And so these Gulf countries might have to actually step up because the U.S. is not ready for a
03:50four to five week war or even beyond that.
03:54Yeah, so interesting what you're saying there.
03:56Would you then describe this as a war of attrition and just to see who can hold out longer?
04:04And one thing that we've noted and earlier on the show we were talking about is that the intensity and
04:10frequency of the incoming missiles and drones to the Gulf states has started to diminish in the last couple of
04:18days,
04:19which suggests either that Iran are beginning to run out or they're spacing it out because they do see this
04:26as a protracted conflict.
04:28Well, there were strikes in the past couple of hours.
04:31However, it's about whether Iran is willing to take the long haul.
04:35Look, they're in a corner.
04:36They have nothing to lose.
04:38Now, is the U.S. ready for the long haul?
04:41If you look at the American public, 60 percent of Americans, according to a CNN poll from yesterday, disagree with
04:48this war.
04:49We saw four American service members killed.
04:52And the fact that there is friendly fire deaths harkens back to a time period where the U.S. engagement
04:59in 2003 in Iraq was full of friendly fire deaths.
05:03The U.S., the American public is not willing to go through a long drawn out war.
05:09For example, today there are primary elections in three key Republican states.
05:13And it looks like the Republican incumbents are going to lose those elections, meaning that the American public doesn't have
05:20the stomach for this war.
05:21And so while the American president might be saying we're in it for the long haul, it's not clear that
05:27someone like him who cares about poll numbers, who cares about the price of oil and who cares about the
05:33stock market.
05:33And we saw that it's been the greatest drop in the single day since 2005 that he's going to be
05:40in it for the long haul, even if he says he is.
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