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In an exclusive interview with India Today TV, top geopolitical expert Fareed Zakaria analysed the escalating West Asia conflict and its implications.
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00:04And as events in the West Asia conflict move at breakneck speed, I'm joined by a very special
00:10guest, journalist, author, anchor at Fareed Zakaria, GPS on CNN. Fareed, appreciate you
00:17joining us at this very difficult time in a way. But the fact is that the last 24 hours
00:23have seen lots of developments taking place. Let's go one by one with them.
00:30More Iranian top leaders linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards have been killed.
00:35Their national security official, top national security official Ali Larijani. Today, the
00:41Israelis are saying they've killed the intelligence chief. How do you see it? Is the entire Iranian
00:47leadership being decimated? And what does that then suggest? It does appear that Israel is
00:54targeting one by one the entire leadership structure of the Iranian state. And it is extraordinary
01:03that they are able to do this. My guess is what it means, Rajdeep, is that the regime will get
01:12more
01:12and more hard line. Because when something like this happens, who is going to take over? The people who
01:20have been warning about Israeli plans, the ones who can best respond to these attacks. You know, the people
01:30who want negotiations are not the people you go to when you're in a bunker fielding bombs. So you already,
01:39what you have seen is an IRGC coup of sorts, in that the younger Khamenei was the Revolutionary Guards
01:48candidate. So what you're seeing is now, I think, is Iran turning into a hardcore military dictatorship
01:56with a clerical facade. And I suspect that that will only intensify as this continues. Obviously,
02:05there is a possibility that the whole regime collapses. But, you know, in an army structure,
02:12there are many, many layers. And so for each layer you kill, presumably, there are, you know,
02:19there are colonels waiting to become generals and lieutenants waiting to become colonels.
02:23So what you're saying is that if this continues, carries on, the prospect in a way for an off-ramp
02:29solution would become even less. Who is there to have a dialogue with off-ramp? Is that one concern
02:35that either the regime completely collapses and there's a vacuum left, or as you say,
02:41the regime becomes even more hardline and threatens even more destruction?
02:46I think you have it exactly right, that the off-ramp solution depends on some credible negotiators
02:53with whom you could talk. Larijani was actually the main person whom the Arab states like Qatar and
03:03Oman had been dealing with. He had credibility in Iran. He had credibility with some of the Gulf Arab
03:11countries. Now that he's gone, they'll have to search for somebody else. And I think, remember,
03:18this is an Israeli strike, and the Israelis are really decapitating the regime. The Americans are
03:25hitting hard military assets for the most part, and they do not seem to be trying aggressively to
03:32decapitate the regime. So there's a kind of interesting difference here, which tells me that
03:37maybe the Americans are trying to leave the door open for some kind of off-ramp, but the Israelis
03:44are closing it. Now, maybe that's part of a good cop, bad cop routine. It may also be a bit
03:50of
03:50strategic incoherence. But does that mean, stemming from what you just said, that Israel is now driving
03:56in a way the war? Netanyahu is driving the war because his goal has been very clear that he wants
04:03this regime to be completely, to use his words, decapitated, carry out these assassinations,
04:09Ali Khamenei, Larry Jani, one by one, even as America, perhaps simply is not sure how far to go.
04:19I think Bibi Netanyahu has been driving this war from the start. I think the reason the United States
04:26jumped in, as Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, was that the Israelis were going to attack,
04:33and Trump decided that he wanted to, you know, in a sense, get in on the action. I think that
04:40the
04:40Israeli goals are, as you say, not just decapitation, but I think essentially the kind of destruction of
04:47the deep state in Iran, the military core of it, which means leadership, which also means assets like
04:55they've been attacking police headquarters, not just army headquarters, which tells you they're
05:00trying to weaken the capacity of the regime to actually govern Iran. And so that could lead to
05:06chaos. That could lead to a power vacuum, which from Israel's point of view, I think it's not the
05:12preferred outcome, but it's an acceptable outcome. It would mean Iran would turn into a kind of Syria for
05:18the next 10 years, and that kind of chaos takes an adversary off the battlefield for Israel. For the
05:26United States, I think you have it right again. It is unclear and has been unclear from the start
05:32what America's goal here is. President Trump began by talking very forcefully about regime change,
05:39very quickly switched to talking about a Venezuela-type operation, then switched to unconditional
05:45surrender. And now, you know, sort of almost by the hour changes. So it does leave him in a strange
05:54way with some flexibility, I suppose. He could declare that the goals have been achieved since
06:00he's outlined so many goals. One of them he could claim has been achieved. But there is a degree of
06:07strategic incoherence in the American approach, whereas the Israelis are dead clear.
06:11I'll come to the American approach in a moment also. But Iran today has also threatened energy
06:17assets in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and UAE, claiming that there has been an attack on their gas facilities.
06:22Therefore, the danger at the moment, as you say, the more Iran gets attacked in this manner,
06:27their leadership taken out, they could get even more reckless, to use one word, or certainly more
06:33aggressive, whichever way you look at it, and draw in even more countries into this battle. Is that a real
06:38threat? I think there's no question that as Iran fears, as the regime fears that it is, you know,
06:46going to be destroyed, it will go for more and more extreme measures. The question is, do they have
06:51the capacity? Remember, Iran is very weak. They really have been destroyed. Their military capacity
06:58substantially down. I mean, drone attacks even are down 75%, 80%. Missile attacks down 90%, 95%. But they
07:09can, you know, that's not 100%. They can shoot a missile here, a missile there, a drone here, a drone
07:15there. And if they start targeting oil facilities, that is going to change the nature of the escalation,
07:24moving it substantially higher. What will take oil to $150 a barrel, Rajdeep, would be attacks on oil
07:32facilities, which so far have been spared. And if the United States were to attack Iranian oil facilities, that
07:40would also have the effect of driving up prices. Because after all, Iran is a big supplier of oil on
07:45the world
07:45market. And you take Iran's supply off market, it will have the same effect as reducing supply anywhere does.
07:53Because we've got Donald Trump threatening to, or at least some Americans saying Donald Trump could
07:59well threaten to take over Khark Island, that he will also step up his offensive on Iran because he
08:07wants a shorter war. He cannot allow this to go on for too long. Given that, what is the end
08:14game,
08:14Farid? Are you seeing signs of an end game, given the fact, as you say, that Iran's military capacity
08:21has been substantially reduced?
08:24I thought, I saw a signs of an end game about a week ago, when President Trump was talking about
08:31the Venezuela
08:31option, when he was talking about how they wanted to talk to some of the people, but unfortunately, they had
08:37all
08:37been killed. That suggested the Americans were, you know, in the mood for some kind of negotiation. Subsequently,
08:46however, Washington has led Israel or acquiesced in Israeli strikes that have killed many of the
08:55possible negotiators. President Trump doesn't talk about that Venezuela option very much.
09:00And so one wonders what exactly he's thinking. I think Trump is always influenced by how he comes out,
09:08how this makes him look personally. And I think he probably was sensitive to the fact that a number
09:17of commentators were beginning to say, this is another example of taco. You know, Trump always
09:24chickens out. That Trump had talked big about regime change and now was talking about accommodating
09:30himself to the regime. Trump is very sensitive to these kinds of things. And so he may have switched
09:36course for that reason. But then what course are we on? It just feels still like a kind of bomb
09:43and hope strategy. The bombing is causing absolute devastation in Iran. Don't miss it. It's not just,
09:52by the way, military assets. You know, these bombs are very big and very powerful. You are
09:58destroying the infrastructure of civilian life as well. And so as this continues, my suspicion is it becomes
10:06harder to find people who are willing to negotiate and who have the capacity, you know, politically to
10:13negotiate. It's interesting what you said because, Farid, today the Wall Street Journal reports that Gulf
10:18nations want the U.S. to cripple Iran before ending the war. NYT quoting what King Abdullah said in 2015,
10:26telling the U.S. to cut off the head of the snake. So it almost seems as if there is
10:31now, just as there are
10:32hardliners emerging within Iran, there are hardliners in Israel and possibly some of the Gulf nations
10:37who just want this war to have a decisive end. And is that decisive end, therefore, a complete regime
10:44change? Well, you point out a very interesting shift in the Gulf states. My own sense from having spoken to
10:52many people there, including senior leadership, they did not want this war. They canceled the United States
10:58against the war. They said the Iranian nuclear program had been defanged. But once Iran began to
11:06retaliate against them, you know, targeting civilian facilities in the Gulf, that really radicalized
11:14them and made them feel, we cannot allow a wounded and enraged Iran to exist, given this history of
11:26them hitting our civilians. We have to, there has to be payback. There has to be a sense that Iran
11:32has paid
11:32an enormous price for unleashing this war on the Gulf. And so now you are right. They are, they appear
11:40to be
11:41in favor of much stronger, more punitive strikes. They don't talk about regime change. They talk about just a,
11:48you know, a really defanged Iran, you know, destroy all its ballistic missiles, all its missile capacity, all its military
11:56industrial capacity. But how do you, you know, where do you stop? This is, you know, where we are right
12:02now is that the
12:04United States and Israel are pummeling Iran. But it's not clear where you stop. Do you, do you run out
12:11of targets? I mean, they've,
12:12this has been the most intense air campaign in 20 years. This is like the Iraq war, the first weeks
12:21of
12:21the Iraq war. It's on that scale. Now, what happens, you know, at some point you are going to run
12:27out of
12:27targets that are really military, and then you get into dual use and civilian, and then you do have the
12:34possibility of a total collapse of the state and of a kind of civil war emerging or some kind of
12:41power
12:42vacuum and chaos. Because the civil war, as you said at the outset, could lead to a Syria-like situation
12:47where the state collapses and you have a extended period of a civil war. A regime change also has
12:55the uncertainty who is the new regime. Netanyahu keeps telling the people of Iran to rise against
13:02the regime. So does Donald Trump. But there's no sign yet of that, particularly given the scale of the
13:07bombing that's going on. Do you therefore foresee a possible scenario at all of are we now back at
13:15regime change once again becoming the goal number one? It's no longer about dismantling Iran's nuclear
13:21capability. That's probably already done. It's now taking out one by one, as we said, leaders of the
13:27regime and hoping that there is a more moderate leadership that emerges with whom Israel and
13:33the United States will be happy to deal with. I think that is the hope. But I think people are
13:40misunderstanding the nature of the Iranian regime. It is very deeply institutionalized. It has its
13:47tentacles into society. It's been around for 47 years. I mean, just think about the number of people
13:54who are armed within this state. 200,000 strong Revolutionary Guard. By some accounts, 500,000
14:04Basij, the paramilitary force. 400,000 strong army. Let's say even half of those people are willing to
14:12fight. They all have, you know, guns. Who is going to take power from them? They're not going to go
14:19into the
14:19night quietly. They're not going to hand over power to some Iranian Democrat. They are going to
14:26hold on with their guns, just in the way the Ba'athists fought in Iraq for 15 years. So that,
14:34to me, is the great danger, that you will get some kind of regime. Probably it will be one of
14:40those
14:40Revolutionary Guard commanders who will emerge triumphant. And then maybe he is more moderate,
14:46maybe he is not. But it's a very large gamble to assume that out of this, out of this massive
14:54bombing campaign will emerge a moderate Democrat. That just seems to me wishful thinking more than
15:02strategic planning. Just for a moment, let's look at the United States now. We've seen in the last 24
15:07hours the National Counterterrorism Chief John Kent resign and a very stinging letter saying this war
15:13brings no benefit to America. There was no imminent threat posed by Iran to America,
15:20virtually questioning the rationale for the war, questioning whether it's a just war in the first
15:25place. Do you get a sense, particularly with even domestic numbers not looking good for Donald Trump
15:31and those who support the war, could that have an effect on the way he decides the end game? You
15:37say
15:37he's sensitive to his own image. Is he also sensitive to public opinion? The fact that a top official of
15:43his within that Magas coalition also seems to have broken away. What's fascinating about Trump in the
15:51second term, Rajdeep, is that he is very sensitive to public opinion, but really only with his base. So if
15:59you
15:59look at his immigration actions, they have been quite unpopular. Even though he started out with the
16:06public with him on immigration, the heavy handedness with which they handled it led to it becoming quite
16:14unpopular. He persisted for the most part because with his base, it remains very popular. Similarly on
16:21tariffs, tariffs are unpopular in America. 65% of Americans are opposed to tariffs. But with his base,
16:28it remains popular. And so what I noticed in the numbers, you're right, there isn't much public
16:34support for this war. In fact, the lowest number of support for this war in 30, 40, 50 years,
16:43you really don't find it. I think it's under 50% for the first time. But if you look at
16:49Republicans,
16:50they support the war. Now that's partly because it's his war, but I don't see the pressure yet from the
16:57right. And that's why the Director of Counterintelligence is interesting. Tucker Carlson is
17:03interesting. There are figures within the right who are breaking ranks. But so far, as Trump always
17:10seems to do, he has his connection with his base. And Republicans, the last poll I saw, more than 85
17:17%
17:17support this war. But if oil prices continue to rise, if there is a sense across the world,
17:24and we are seeing it again with the NATO allies, they do not want to send their warships into the
17:28Strait of Hormuz. The British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, has been very clear, this is not our war
17:34at the moment to fight. Do you believe that will make Trump even more belligerent? At least that's what
17:39his responses have been. Or do you believe that eventually, he will have to find some kind of a
17:45way out? He cannot seemingly go against the tide of allies in Europe, or indeed in different parts
17:53of the world, most of whom would want a quick end to the war, particularly if it starts hurting their
17:58economies. So far, he doesn't seem to care much about what the allies think. As you say, it seems to
18:04get his back up and make him more defiant. The tragedy is, as you put it, Raj, that this war
18:12started by America, the effects are being felt much more strongly in other parts of the world,
18:18particularly in Asia and places like India, which are much more dependent on this imported oil. But
18:24if oil prices stay high, and again, we seem to be moving into a path where oil prices will stay
18:31high,
18:32and at some point, the destruction of the facilities, the shortage of production becomes
18:38very hard to restart quickly. So then you're looking at oil prices staying high for three to four months,
18:45at least. And that is going to cause a recession in large parts of the world. If it causes a
18:52recession
18:52in America, if it causes a substantial even downturn, a slowdown, I mean, that might get Donald Trump's
19:00attention. So far, nothing has, but that might get Donald Trump's attention.
19:05Because at the outset, Farid, Donald Trump had said four weeks. He expected this war to be four
19:10weeks. We are in well into week three. Could that be the timeline once we cross four weeks?
19:15Would Donald Trump have a rethink? Does Israel, on the other hand, decide how to end the war now?
19:21Given what we've seen, particularly in the last 24, 48 hours, this intensive,
19:24the intensification of these very precise strikes, does Israel decide when the war ends? Or will Trump
19:31decide after four weeks that I've achieved most of my objectives, I can perhaps call victory that I've
19:37decimated the Iranian leadership and slowly find a way out? Is it as simple as that?
19:43I think the key problem is the way Trump defined the war from the start, and the way Netanyahu defined
19:50the war from the start, it was clearly about regime change. So that shadow looms over the war. And if
19:57you stop bombing without having achieved that, it's clear you are settling for something less than your
20:04original objective. And then what is that new objective? How do you define what you have achieved?
20:11And will Iran stop the war? Will Iran stop all its, you know, even though it's a missile here and
20:19a drone
20:19there, what if it's enough to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed? So they have now entered into a much
20:27less,
20:28you know, we've entered into an unknown area. And this is such a perfect example of why you should go
20:37to
20:37war only when you have absolutely clear objectives that can be defined, that can be achieved, and then allow you
20:46to
20:46know when you can stop. This, I think what we are in right now, is a period of kind of
20:54a no man's land, where the
20:57United States and Israel are using military force, and hoping that there's some clarity will emerge, which allows
21:05them to declare victory and leave. Trump does have one superpower, which is that he can switch and turn
21:13on a dime and declare victory, and his base will be fine with it. Trump has that power with his
21:21base, where
21:22he can suddenly completely reverse himself, contradict himself, and he'll be fine. So that may end up being
21:30the magic power he uses to end this. But what you're saying is very clearly, as The Economist had a
21:36cover story, this is a war without a strategy. This has been war driven, perhaps some would say, by the
21:42desire of Israel to establish complete dominance and have a completely decapitated Iran, and Trump keen to
21:51sort of also secure his legacy. Am I correct? It does appear that way. And I think, you know,
21:57to be fair to the Israelis, the Israelis have a plan, they have a goal, and they don't mind if
22:03the
22:04result is the destruction of the Islamic Republic and the destruction of the Iranian state. The problem is,
22:12the United States has joined in without clear strategic objectives, without markers of success,
22:19and has articulated several different goals, all the, you know, simultaneously. And so it is American
22:27strategic and coherence that is really the kind of looming shadow over this war that makes one feel
22:35it has a kind of unending future or amorphous future. Because the Iranians have vowed revenge. I'm
22:43just reading what the Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has said. He said we are going to,
22:47the world is going to see repercussions they've never seen. Is that bravado? Or do you believe Iran
22:52still has the strength to prolong this war, as they did many years ago, when it came to the Iraq
22:57war,
22:58where everyone had written off Iran for a long time? I think it's bravado in the sense that just look
23:04at what they are doing. And you have to assume that they're doing the best they can, because they're
23:09under tremendous pressure. It's really very minimal. It is true, however, that they have found two
23:17vulnerabilities. The first is the passage of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. Even a small number
23:23of pinprick strikes or mines have the effect of scaring insurance companies. The whole game here is
23:31about insurance. As long as you can ensure that the insurance companies won't provide insurance, 75% of
23:39the traffic shuts down. And the second is that the Gulf has a lot of unprotected sites. And the model,
23:49the business model of Dubai and Doha to a certain extent is, come to Dubai, come to Doha, you will
23:57be
23:57as safe as you are in Europe, and you will have all these modern facilities. There was never a prospect
24:04of danger. And now that prospect is real. And so it's causing a certain kind of panic. Those two can
24:14be achieved with very minimal strikes. But don't mistake that for some grand Iranian strength. The
24:22Iranians are weak. But the weak can sometimes, through asymmetrical ways, keep, you know,
24:30disrupt things in a way that has significant effects. Given this asymmetrical war in conclusion,
24:36what about India, Fareed? Does India, how, can India really be neutral? India was accused in the early
24:43days by, in the early days of this war by its critics of being too far in support to the
24:48Israeli-American
24:50axis. Now we've reached out to the Iranians primarily because of our concerns, many believe,
24:55over oil moving through the Strait of Hormuz. What role, if any, does India have to play? Can we play
25:01even the role of any kind of a backroom negotiator at all? I doubt because I think the fact that
25:09Prime
25:10Minister Modi had that trip to Israel was so warm. Many people believe he was given some indication
25:19that there would be some, you know, some kind of intervention has, I think, led the Iranians to
25:27lose trust in India. And therefore, I don't think they could play that role of an honest broker. But
25:35look, India has to serve its own interests, and its interests are in ensuring that it has energy.
25:43And therefore, dealing with Iran makes perfect sense in trying to make sure that they can get
25:49energy supplies. India is deeply dependent on this. If oil goes to $150 a barrel, there's no question,
25:56the Indian economy will go into a recession, and a pretty bad recession. So for India, you know,
26:03it is now a matter of necessity to find a way to get energy. That is the number one, two,
26:10and three
26:10priority for India. I think it should worry less about playing some role as an honest broker.
26:17Look at how the Europeans and other Asian countries are reacting. They're all trying to keep a distance.
26:24None of them seem enthusiastic about joining in in any way in the American war effort. And they're all
26:31looking out for themselves. And, you know, perhaps that is the role for India as well.
26:36So therefore, in conclusion, what does these three weeks of war, what does it tell us about the state
26:41of global warfare? You've got all these bunker bombs and the kind of weaponry that's being used to
26:47try and virtually decimate, not just destabilize a country. And you've got the theater of war,
26:55despite the asymmetry expanding as Iran has shown by targeting the Gulf nations. What does it say about
27:02conflict in the 21st century and about any attempts being made to try and add conflict resolution?
27:10We've seen Ukraine, the war persisting for four years. And now we've seen the war here for three
27:16weeks showing no signs at least immediately of letting up. I think you're seeing something very
27:22profound, which is a revolution in military affairs produced by technology. The enormous asymmetrical power
27:31of small players to stay in the game, to inflict damage, to widen the conflict, to take it to
27:39civilian areas, all because of these autonomous vehicles, aerial drones, naval drones. Effectively,
27:50the human being is being taken out of the battlefield. Think about how this war is being fought. It's being
27:56fought by the Americans and the Israelis using smart missiles, incredibly precise targeting. It's being
28:04played by the Iranians with somewhat less smart, but flurries of drones. There are very few human
28:10beings involved. And that means that you have much greater capacity to inflict damage because you can do
28:18things that you wouldn't do if you had to use human beings because you'd put them in harm's way. And
28:23the
28:23Iranians have shown, as the Ukrainians have before, that even if you are weaker, you can keep the fight
28:30up, you can expand the battle. It makes you wonder about the economics of all of this. A $15,000
28:38Iranian
28:39drone is usually shot down by two Tomahawk missiles that each costs $2 million. So that's $4 million of
28:48hardware to shoot down a $15,000 drone. The economics of that suggests the world is going to see an
28:57absolute bonanza of drone production of every kind. And the future of war is going to be fewer humans
29:05involved, more machines, more smart machines, more AI. And whether that means war becomes more and more
29:12likely, that's the thing I worry about. Think about Pakistan and the Kashmir situation. If India and
29:19Pakistan could have regular, you know, deep, intensive strikes with very little fear of human
29:29beings being killed, will that result in more or less violence? You know, it's fascinating the way you
29:35put that, Fareed. Because the other concern is, while humans may be less involved in the actual warfare,
29:42they're the ones taking the decisions. And you've got these leaders like Netanyahu and Donald Trump.
29:48Many of their critics call them narcissists, obsessed with themselves, their own legacy. But these sort of
29:55strongmen leaders, does that worry you? We've seen it with Putin in Russia as well and across the world.
30:01leaders who seem to believe that they can change the destiny of nations. They don't care about what
30:07the United Nations says or any rules-based world order. Should that not worry all of us? If today
30:12it's Iran, who knows, it'll be some other country tomorrow. There's no question that what this reflects
30:19and represents is one more weakening of that rules-based international order. The United States,
30:25for the first time in decades, did not try to make this case to the United Nations, did not appeal
30:30to broad international principles, did not try to assemble a legal case as, by the way, did in Iraq,
30:37did not try to assemble a coalition as it did in Iraq. So this is a very big body blow
30:45in that way.
30:46And while there are leaders making the top decisions, Rajdeep, the future of war might be with AI that at
30:53the
30:53tactical level, actually human beings aren't making the decisions. The machines start making the
30:59decisions. And you have to let the machines make the decisions because they're faster and maybe better
31:05than humans. And if you don't do it, your adversary will and he'll win. So you don't want to let
31:11him win.
31:12That may be the future of war. Top down decisions from leaders, but bottom up, all tactical decisions
31:19made by machines. Fareed Zakaria, for giving us that wonderful overview of what are troubling times
31:28for the world. No one really wants conflict. No one wants to see civilian casualties. No one wants to
31:34see cities and states being bombed in this manner. I appreciate you joining us here and taking the time
31:40out. Thank you so much, Fareed. Always a pleasure, Rajdeep.
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