00:00This was not a war that was necessary, advisable, thought through, planned, or supported inside
00:13the United States.
00:14Israel has wanted the United States to wage this war for decades.
00:20I shouldn't say Israel, I should say Mr. Netanyahu.
00:23Donald Trump bragged if this is, of course, a war that never should have happened.
00:32It's even too dignified to call it a war of choice.
00:36I would call it a war of whim because this was not a war that was necessary, advisable,
00:46thought through, planned, or supported inside the United States.
00:56To put it bluntly, Israel has wanted the United States to wage this war for decades.
01:07I shouldn't say Israel, I should say Mr. Netanyahu, who is the Prime Minister of Israel.
01:12When the war started, he said in a tweet, he wrote in a tweet, this is my dream of 40
01:20years.
01:21And I had to apologize to many people because I had been saying that it was his dream for
01:2730 years, which I knew because he became Prime Minister 30 years ago.
01:34But I didn't know the pre-Prime Ministerial passion for war with Iran.
01:39This is something that has been in Netanyahu's head for a long time.
01:47It's a disastrous idea.
01:50Donald Trump bragged, if I could put it in quotation marks, that while the other preceding
01:58six presidents had said no, he stood up and said yes.
02:02But I think what we could say is the six preceding presidents had the good sense not to do this,
02:09even though Israel was urging it.
02:11And Donald Trump did not have the good sense to avoid this disaster.
02:17We have a pretty good account, as I'm sure everybody here knows, of how the decision was
02:23made.
02:23There was a meeting of Netanyahu and the head of Mossad with Trump and his team, as it were,
02:34his Secretary of Defense, rechristened Secretary of War, Mr. Hegseth, his son-in-law, Mr. Kushner,
02:44his friend and fellow real estate advisor, and now our leading special envoy, Mr. Witkoff,
02:54the head of the CIA and the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and his chief of staff, Susan
03:03Wiles.
03:03Not many other people.
03:06And Netanyahu came and said, this is a sure thing, one day, take out the leadership, people
03:17will rise in the streets, and the next day you'll be in charge, Mr. President.
03:23And Trump could not resist an appeal like that.
03:29But what we're told in the news is that everyone else in the room either said, this is farcical,
03:35this is absurd, or grumbled under their breath.
03:40Nobody spoke in favor of it with the possible, I think Hegseth probably did speak in favor
03:46of it.
03:48But nobody else did.
03:50Others said, including the Vice President, I disagree, but I will support you, Mr. President.
03:58And this was the general sentiment in this small meeting.
04:04And Trump has eliminated any kind of systematic interagency analysis, feedback, or deliberation.
04:17We're in a deinstitutionalized environment in the United States.
04:22We don't have rational decision making.
04:26And normally, under our Constitution also, but normally a president would also consult with
04:34senior congressional leaders, even as a political precaution, but also to get advice.
04:40And Trump did not do that either.
04:45So I think the starting point in asking how do we get out is to understand how we got in.
04:51We got in on a completely flimsy, indeed, as somebody said, farcical rendition of what would
05:01happen, which is that you would kill the leadership that was meeting, apparently to discuss the next
05:14phase of negotiation with the United States, which was ongoing, and where the Omani mediator
05:23leader had said great progress was made and we will meet in Vienna the next week.
05:30So they were meeting precisely about negotiations that were now to be bombed rather than to be pursued.
05:39And the decision was taken by one person.
05:44I regard a lot of what the Trump administration does as illegal, as unwise, as unconstitutional.
05:53As I said about the tariffs last year repeatedly, and the Supreme Court finally validated that,
06:01I would say the same with this decision.
06:04So getting out is, well, in a way it can be as easy as getting in.
06:11The United States should just stop what it's doing, which is threatening Iran and blockading,
06:22at least partially, the Gulf region and Iranian ships and just stop what was a disastrous, mistaken,
06:38illegal, unwise operation that never should have occurred.
06:45And the United States could certainly say to Israel, we're stopping, you're stopping, period.
06:54Because Israel can't do anything without the United States.
06:58And the idea that Israel commands the United States to do things is not right, although behaviorally it looks like
07:07that.
07:08Because the United States at any moment could tell the Israeli leadership, no, we're not doing it, and you're not
07:16doing it, and that would be the end of it.
07:19I don't think that this should wait for any kind of negotiated outcome between the United States and Iran.
07:27I don't see that as in the works, nor do I see it as necessary.
07:32What I do believe is that the United States should end the blockade and go home.
07:39And Trump can say it was a great victory.
07:43He can say whatever he wants.
07:45And Trump can say it was a great victory.
07:45And the United States should end the war.
07:46I think what he said was that the United States should be a great victory.
07:51When the United States should be a great victory.
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