00:00Well, President Trump, meanwhile, has ramped up threats against Iranian civilian infrastructure
00:04ahead of a deadline that he has set for Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
00:09Now, this follows Tehran's rejection of the latest ceasefire proposal on Monday.
00:14We have a plan because of the power of our military where every bridge in Iran will be
00:23decimated by 12 o'clock tomorrow night, where every power plant in Iran will be out of
00:31business, burning, exploding and never to be used again.
00:35I mean, complete demolition by 12 o'clock.
00:38And it'll happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to.
00:43Well, let's get to Bloomberg Politics editor Laura Davis.
00:47And Laura, can you tell us a little bit more about this threat from the president?
00:51Because, of course, we have previously seen threats made and then walked back.
00:56What's likely to happen this time?
00:59Yes.
00:59So this is the latest deadline he set out, which is Tuesday at 8 p.m. Washington time.
01:04And he suggested that if there is no deal with Iran by that point, the U.S. military would
01:08move very swiftly to drop bombs on civilian energy sites, as well as bridges and other
01:14infrastructure within Iran.
01:16You know, the demands that he's put on this time is that he wants to see the Strait of
01:22Hormuz opened.
01:22This is different from even just a week ago where he was suggesting that, you know, opening
01:26the Strait of Hormuz would be up to European allies and the U.S. was moving away from that
01:30specific point of contention.
01:32So he's reversed his demands on kind of what he's looking for in a deal.
01:38And also, oh no, this is this Tuesday at 8 p.m. deadline is just the latest in a series
01:42of deadlines that Trump has set out for some sort of forcing action.
01:46These are all self-imposed deadlines that Trump himself has made.
01:50You know, he in the past has essentially, you know, as those deadlines have gotten closer,
01:53have delayed all of them.
01:55He said he's not going to do that this time and that he's going to hold firm on that 8
01:59p.m. deadline.
01:59But, you know, we're still, you know, roughly about 24 hours out from that.
02:03So a lot could change between now and then.
02:06How much of a difference does it make to Iran?
02:08We're hearing that they rejected the ceasefire proposal again.
02:13Yes, we have continued to, you know, see the U.S. put out various proposals and Iran
02:18reject them.
02:19There have, you know, been intermediaries involved in these talks.
02:23But, you know, Trump has continued to insist that these talks with Iran are going well
02:28and he could see a deal in sight.
02:29But then when Iran comes to respond, you know, they say, look, we have no deal.
02:33We are not involved in this.
02:35They've indicated that the U.S. has not been a reliable narrator, a reliable negotiating
02:39partner in all of this, you know, calling Trump unreasonable on many effects.
02:44So there was a discussion of a 45-day ceasefire that would, you know, kind of create more
02:49time to come up with some broader deal.
02:51Iran rejected that and said any ceasefire needs to signal a permanent end to this war.
02:56So that plan was quickly swiped off the table.
03:00Laura, to that point, I mean, what are we to make of some of the shifting rhetoric out
03:04of the White House?
03:05Because it was about a week ago that we saw President Trump saying he didn't care about
03:08the Strait of Hormuz.
03:09That was for Europe to deal with later.
03:12And now, complete with expletives, it's a central demand.
03:15So which is it?
03:18This is really unclear.
03:19You know, the demands, the rhetoric, what Trump's key objectives here are changing almost
03:23every other day when we've seen exasperation.
03:25Emmanuel Macron of France, for example, has expressed, you know, some disdain at Trump's
03:31shifting goalposts here and that it's not clear at all what the U.S. wants.
03:34This has made exiting this conflict even more difficult because there's not a clear plan
03:39of objectives.
03:40You know, there's sort of the military goals, but then also the diplomatic goals.
03:44Those have proved to be much more difficult for Trump to find an off-ramp here.
03:48We've continued to see U.S. allies who have wanted to distance themselves.
03:52As far as possible from this conflict, partially because they haven't been able to get a straight
03:56answer from Trump on exactly, you know, how long this conflict will last, what exactly
04:00kind of help they need, what objectives he is looking for to end this war.
04:04And that just continues to signal and worry allies that this could end, that this could
04:08go on for some time because there isn't some sort of clear plan of what Trump could do.
04:14Of course, Gulf allies in the region are also worried that there could be an abrupt withdrawal,
04:17something Trump has also suggested.
04:19You know, right now we are more in, you know, the phase of Trump's thinking where he wants
04:24to stay in this longer rather than shorter, but it all really remains to be seen.
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