00:00What are the strategic objectives? What is Donald Trump trying to achieve here?
00:05Is it to curtail Iran's nuclear ambitions? Is it to seek regime change to allow the country to move
00:13into a new chapter? Is it to prevent the support of proxy forces across the Middle East? If it's
00:20any of these things, then clearly we've yet to achieve that mission. It's one of the reasons why
00:25Britain, as America's closest security ally, is concerned about the thinking behind the utility
00:32of mighty force. There's no doubt about it that America's superior military might is second to
00:38not, the best in the world. But as we saw, whether it be in Vietnam, Afghanistan, or indeed Iraq,
00:44you have to say, where does it take you? What is the political objective that you're seeking to
00:48achieve? And what we're seeing is Iran's ability to be able to stand up to the world's hegemon and
00:55to say, I'm willing to survive. Yes, economically, militarily, they have been set back, massively
01:01set back. But the regime is still there. In fact, the regime has been empowered because the IRGC
01:08is now more in control of the decision making itself. So we're in a very difficult place here
01:14with the international community wanting to support our closest security ally, but really scratching
01:20our heads and trying to understand what on earth Donald Trump is trying to achieve.
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