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[SPEAKER_04]: Welcome to a new edition of the Spy Talk podcast.
[SPEAKER_04]: We got a great guest today.
[SPEAKER_04]: The former Pakistani ambassador to the United States who's ain't a Connie who's going to be talking about, of course, the Iran War.
[SPEAKER_04]: And he is in Abu Dhabi.
[SPEAKER_04]: And he's very familiar with the players in the negotiations and the Gulf States and so on.
[SPEAKER_04]: So he's got a lot to say about that.
[SPEAKER_04]: Meanwhile, the story of the week in Washington, the two Washington is talking about, of course, to catch the tell story about his alleged drunkenness and so on, and the Atlantic magazine, there've been a lot of pushback on that story, because of his use of anonymous sources.
[SPEAKER_04]: I just want to point out to people who don't follow the mechanics of reporting if these aren't.
[SPEAKER_04]: sources who are anonymous to the reporters and editors.
[SPEAKER_04]: These are these are people who the reported editors know They know them all by name and they have various degrees of trust in their and their information But they cannot reveal their identities because they
[SPEAKER_04]: want or demand protection.
[SPEAKER_04]: Now, the story of a, it tells a less drunkenness and ability to function and so on.
[SPEAKER_04]: That's been the talk of the town, but the newer times kind of recycled their reporting on the FBI.
[SPEAKER_04]: back in January, in which they quoted many FBI officials on the record, who talked about the destruction of the FBI under Kashbichel and for while Dan Bongino, and it was really disturbing for our neck of the woods, the security aspect here.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's reported that 25% up to 25% of FBI agents have been detailed to work on immigration cases.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is on top of all the firings over the people involved in the January 6 cases.
[SPEAKER_04]: A number of the former FBI people have raised red flags about
[SPEAKER_04]: uh... whether this has hurt the national security and i say so here we are war with the run i'd dare say that if and i hope sure hope it doesn't happen but if there were uh... an Iranian terrorist spectacular here that has were had to a really role in this administration and rightfully so so like what do you what do you think about that you've been covering FBI for decades yeah look uh... i mean
[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, certainly, as you point out, there have been multiple well-sourced on the record accounts of how Patel has completely disrupted the work of the FBI fired senior officials with years of experience because they somehow were involved in one way or another.
[SPEAKER_04]: in investigations into Donald Trump, we should just go if I, they were assigned to these investigations, they, these were the things they volunteered to do.
[SPEAKER_03]: They were assigned to these investigations for the most part, yeah, yeah, and, and look, these were investigations in which, you know, the search at Mara Logo was approved by a federal judge.
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to,
[SPEAKER_03]: to then turn that into misconduct by the agents who pursued it seems a bit bizarre, at least.
[SPEAKER_03]: But, you know, you mentioned people being diverted to immigration cases.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's not just immigration cases.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's the
[SPEAKER_03]: cases that Trump wants brought against his political enemies that has also been a major focus of this justice department, and we had multiple developments over the past week.
[SPEAKER_03]: First, Joe DeGenema, a U.S. attorney from the Reagan years, who was fairly well respected U.S. attorney,
[SPEAKER_03]: 2020 election denial campaign has been brought in as a top as a senior counselor at the Justice Department to oversee these investigations into former CIA, ODNI and other officials who worked under President Obama on the Russia collusion.
[SPEAKER_03]: whatever.
[SPEAKER_03]: The intelligence assessment that concluded that Russia did interfere in the 2016 election and B did so in order to favor Donald Trump.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's been a burn Trump side for quite some time and he's determined to get he's going after John Brennan.
[SPEAKER_03]: A lot of developments on that will
[SPEAKER_03]: There's a feeling that these cases are coming to a head, one where another very soon.
[SPEAKER_03]: There were subpoenas issued in the District of Columbia for former CIA and ODI and I people that they were withdrawn.
[SPEAKER_03]: Now they're going to be voluntary interviews.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's not clear what that's all about, but all signs are that the investigations are going forward.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and it doesn't give us a lot of faith that these are conducted in good, good faith.
[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, to say the least, to say, you mentioned the ODE and I, just briefly, you know, Tulsi Gabbard has been invisible on the around war issues, but she's been very busy.
[SPEAKER_04]: In this arena of going after former Obama officials and so on people involved in the areas that Trump doesn't like, like the impeachment drive based on his pressure on Zelensky.
[SPEAKER_04]: to come up with dirt on Biden.
[SPEAKER_04]: She, as we noted last week, she's referred a couple of people, the inspector general for the intelligence community and the whistleblower in that Ukraine case to the justice department for prosecution.
[SPEAKER_04]: But meanwhile,
[SPEAKER_03]: Wait, can I just, but before we leave this, I just had one other point I wanted to make.
[SPEAKER_03]: When DeGenova was appointed to the senior position to oversee these cases, Todd Blanch.
[SPEAKER_03]: It was now the acting attorney general with Pam Bondi's exit.
[SPEAKER_03]: Todd Blanch, the same Todd Blanch, who was the personal lawyer for Donald Trump.
[SPEAKER_03]: on these cases that were brought against him, posted on X, a picture of himself, the Janaba, at several other senior people in the Justice Department, and what he said was, welcome to the fight.
[SPEAKER_03]: Now, you know, back in the day before pre-trop,
[SPEAKER_03]: Justice Department prosecutors were supposed to be there to do justice and not view their role as part of a fight against others, some other political entity.
[SPEAKER_03]: So I think that gave an interesting insight into how they look at things in this justice department.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's a fight, it's a war against their political.
[SPEAKER_04]: Meanwhile, fights, Karen brings up data on the fight over renewal of this surveillance law, which let's say loosely libertarians have opposed, because they see it as an intrusive violation to the Americans' private affairs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, actually, you know, it's it's interesting every week we talk about this because it's sort of on a loop of how much do we delay this how much you can stay in the middle of these this conversation without getting any resolution with a Trump administration wanted for this surveillance law that has been abused in the past and has a lot of loopholes that are there for abuse under section 702 what they wanted was an 18 month extension so they could just push it off to the future.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's happened now is they got a 10 day extension before some kind of vote can take place on what's going to happen next.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I just want to point out that, you know, we have a surveillance law that in good times, we're worried about.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we have a times where people are worried who's surveilling them, who wants to know their private information, who wants to know what they're saying to their friends.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a way of scaring.
[SPEAKER_00]: just people throughout it's not just you know other public servants it's not just people who are accused of crimes it's really opening up the surveillance conversation in a way that people find very scary and the right and the left seem to be having the same concerns over privacy who's going to collect the material who's going to look at it what's going to be used for.
[SPEAKER_04]: Let me ask you this, Karen, isn't there a way, is there a way to renew a law?
[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, many moderates and even Biden administration officials say, we need this surveillance law that keep track of terrorist threats.
[SPEAKER_04]: If this is not just some overreach like it's being done with the FBI, for example, under Casper tells that this is really important surveillance law.
[SPEAKER_04]: Is there a law that can be passed?
[SPEAKER_04]: that would protect Americans, secure privacy, and still get the bad guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the way it's played out every single time this comes up for a discussion is a warrant requirement that you collect what you collect.
[SPEAKER_00]: We know that you get things that the people that you weren't targeted over season, you're collecting Americans information, but if you want to look at it, if you want to look at it, you need a warrant.
[SPEAKER_04]: you need to say they say well there's not enough time for you know we're listening to a conversation.
[SPEAKER_04]: We got we got to stay in this conversation to keep listening.
[SPEAKER_04]: So you got to better maybe a new law or can this law be adjusted so that the government could more quickly get a warrant to continue listening to this conversation.
[SPEAKER_00]: First of all, we don't really know that it really takes that law to get a warrant, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: In this particular circumstance.
[SPEAKER_00]: Second of all, we have the FISA Court, which has been sort of a rubber stamp for whatever the government wants.
[SPEAKER_00]: So right now, that's sort of an issue.
[SPEAKER_00]: All you have to do with a warrant requirement is to not misuse the warrant, you know, the warrant requirement, which is sort of what you're suggesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: That it'll be misused, that it'll be delayed.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, a law enforcement knows how to respond to things at the local state and federal level of when they are oppressing circumstances.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what judges are for, that's what they do, that's how we think it out.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the I think that's just a false consideration and goes to the heart of they don't want to give up on this idea that they can surveil whoever they want whenever they want and collect the private information of Americans, it's not okay.
[SPEAKER_04]: And in this administration, we're worried about them over using more than we need to go after their political item.
[SPEAKER_03]: So we're in a second, Karen, they got a 10-day extension.
[SPEAKER_03]: When does that expire?
[SPEAKER_03]: On the 30th.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we'll be having the same conversation.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I'm saying, is this going to be like Trump's two to three weeks to the end of the war?
[SPEAKER_03]: or the ceasefire ends Tuesday, no Wednesday.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know I'm extending it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I so glad you brought that up because I've had that going through my mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, is everything just a state of limbo now?
[SPEAKER_00]: And we're just pretending we're making progress?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or are there ways we actually know how to make progress?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know.
[SPEAKER_04]: OK, before we get on to Hussein and Connie, I want to bring up one last thing here in our part of the world with the CIA agents we're killed in an automobile crash in Mexico.
[SPEAKER_04]: The President of Mexico is pretty upset about it.
[SPEAKER_04]: She said, we have the standing arrangements
[SPEAKER_04]: with US intelligence, but this was not on the books, and these guys should not, they were operating outside of their authority in the Chihuahua State which borders on Texas.
[SPEAKER_04]: So CIA has been involved in any drug operations in Mexico for a long time and a long time they were secret.
[SPEAKER_04]: I reported on this back in the day a decade at least ago that they were very closely with a Mexican naval unit to go after drug kingpins and so on very, very on the down low, very quiet.
[SPEAKER_04]: But now it's all public and Trump has been pushing for more involvement of US intelligence in Mexico going.
[SPEAKER_04]: And even he's talked about, well, he talks about a lot of things he's talked about, you know.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm using US military to, I don't know, fire missiles that trucking pins and so on.
[SPEAKER_04]: So, Joe, we've been blowing up boats that are supposedly carrying drugs, so why not just start dropping ICBMs so expensive, oh, I got, anyway, let's move on to the, the ongoing war.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's not going away, it seems to get more muddy by the moment.
[SPEAKER_04]: One person who's really well positioned to help us sort out all these issues is Hussein Hakani.
[SPEAKER_04]: It was a former Pakistani ambassador to the United States, who you and I might at least know quite well.
[SPEAKER_04]: over the years.
[SPEAKER_04]: But you're not only a former diplomat, he's also an intellectual.
[SPEAKER_04]: He's written several books about U.S. Pakistani relations, Pakistanis role in South Asia and so on.
[SPEAKER_04]: He's a really a well-informed and thoughtful person.
[SPEAKER_04]: So without further ado, let's bring him on.
[SPEAKER_04]: Who's seen Hokani welcome to Spy Talk.
[SPEAKER_04]: Mr.
[SPEAKER_04]: Ambassador, why was Pakistan so eager to involve itself in the U.S. Iran negotiations?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, there is, of course, the official explanation, which is that Pakistan is a neighbor of Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pakistan has good relations with all the Arab Gulf countries.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pakistan sees itself as a critical country in the Islamic world and it's the only country with nuclear weapons in the entire Muslim world.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it has the prestige that it that can be deployed for talks involving a major Muslim country like Iran and President Trump likes Pakistan's current leadership so that made it just the right party.
[SPEAKER_01]: to be able to do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: The other side to it is that Pakistan has faced a bit of international isolation since the discovery of some of the northern and Pakistan.
[SPEAKER_01]: The United States in Cliquet, the European political of it, India has a perennial problem with Pakistan and the Middle Eastern countries also objected to some of Pakistan's policies.
[SPEAKER_01]: So this is a great opportunity to wash it all off and come across as the savior of the world.
[SPEAKER_04]: a great opportunity to wash it all off.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yes, we want to get back to these questions of the implications of Pakistan's involvement and inching closer to President Trump getting closer to his affections.
[SPEAKER_04]: I also wonder whether what the implications are for the Pakistan India relations
[SPEAKER_04]: hardly needs repeating, who have been at war with each other intermittently for 75 years, do you think this will bolster Pakistan's militancy towards India?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, the head of Pakistan's military, who is now a field marshal, a field marshal, last in Monir, who probably hopes up, he would like to leverage Pakistan's new found international status with the wind.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what the Pakistan military has always wanted forever and ever.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's why they ever became friends with the United States.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are certain impediments to that, Jeff, and the problem is,
[SPEAKER_01]: Pakistan is not doing that well economically and when you don't have too much money then it's not easy to be a major military power, a projecting power becomes limited.
[SPEAKER_01]: Second even though President Trump praises them almost every other day in his true social posts, he hasn't really given them anything.
[SPEAKER_01]: He hasn't reopened military funding, FMS, he hasn't sort of put Pakistan on the very small list of countries that now receive American assistance and there are a lot of things in
[SPEAKER_01]: people say involves some of the people close to the president, but I don't think any of them will materialize within the two year, when a half year framework of the Trump presidency.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that substantive benefits of all of this are not going to flow to Pakistan, quick enough.
[SPEAKER_03]: So look, we've all experienced Whiplash over the last few weeks on negotiations, on, off, ceasefire, on, off.
[SPEAKER_03]: It looked like things were coming to a head this week, and then at the last minute, the Iranians indicate they're not even going to show up causing bans to cancel his trip to Second Trip to Pakistan as a professional diplomat.
[SPEAKER_03]: give us your take on these negotiations and whether there is any reasonable prospect of them going anywhere.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, if there were reasonable negotiations and if there were diplomatic negotiations then there would be prospects of them going forward.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what we see in Washington D.C. is not reasonable in us and it's certainly not diplomacy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Diplomacy sometimes involves passing messages and then waiting to head back.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't always immediately announce that I have said this and I am sure that this is going to be accepted.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Iranians have a sense of history.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Trump administration does not.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't if you remember Jared Kushner's comments in the New York Times when he described himself and with Kof as deal guys, we are deal guys who are different from historians and diplomats because all we care about is the deal and therefore we get it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Iranians don't.
[SPEAKER_01]: It takes two to have a deal.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Iranians pay more attention to history.
[SPEAKER_01]: And from their point of view, there's bad history between the United States and Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so the U.S. has an obligation to show them good faith.
[SPEAKER_01]: Also, they've shown, from their perspective, that in the last several days, that they are not easily intimidated.
[SPEAKER_01]: They'll take the last, they'll take the beating, that's their history as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: As long as they're standing or they're surviving, they've won.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so Trump's desire to proclaim victory has been the impediment to a conclusion, a positive conclusion to the negotiations.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, there are three elements, one Iran's nuclear program, almost everyone including Iranians would agree that Iran has to give something on that, sanctions and anti-Iranian sort of actions of the United States.
[SPEAKER_01]: and everybody agrees that America will have to make some concessions on that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then there's the question of the state of Hormors, which was fine and open until the soul chapter started.
[SPEAKER_01]: They're all the Gulf states and the United States and the international community wants Iran to make concessions and Trump is probably willing to split the difference.
[SPEAKER_01]: He likes the idea of tools being collected there which he can then share.
[SPEAKER_01]: Will it happen?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not too sure.
[SPEAKER_01]: But those are the negotiating points.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the professional negotiators have made progress according to my information from Pakistani sources in particular.
[SPEAKER_01]: But each time they make some progress there is a sort of
[SPEAKER_01]: negotiation, shattering, truth-social post.
[SPEAKER_01]: If what President Trump thinks is a deal is what Iranians think is a instrument of surrender, it won't happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Iranians are not going to surrender.
[SPEAKER_03]: When you say that your sources tell you that they have made progress, can you flesh that out at all and like what what have they made progress specifically on?
[SPEAKER_03]: And and and and then where do things go from here?
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean,
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think the Iranians have been willing to consider various limitations on their nuclear program.
[SPEAKER_01]: They want to continue a civilian program, but are willing to accept all kinds of restrictions on the potential military deployment of that program.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, will that satisfy Israel, will that
[SPEAKER_04]: who will announce a lot, like the Geo Little Bama God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, exactly.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the deal that President Trump did not like.
[SPEAKER_01]: So here's the problem.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, the deal with the GCPOA, where the Obama administration was in 2015, and it put off Iran's nuclear weapons program or Iran's nuclear enrichment program for 15 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: would end in 2030 if it hadn't been cancelled.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they run and say, okay, now if you do add another 10 years to that, you've deprived of nuclear enrichment for 25 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Trump administration wants to have in number, you know, President, my Trump is big on number.
[SPEAKER_01]: So he wants to be able to say, Obama got only 15 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: I got 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 or 100 or 200 or 900.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: So he wants to be able to say that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that doesn't sit well with the technical aspects of the negotiation, because the Iranians argue what if new technologies emerge through which enrich uranium can be used for cancer treatments, this, that etc.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's an ongoing argument, by the way.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the reason why the 15-year
[SPEAKER_01]: Secondly, we must remember Iran is a signature to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, so it can very easily be brought under some discipline there.
[SPEAKER_01]: The question is, can you trust it?
[SPEAKER_01]: And the response of the Iranians to that is, yeah, but can we trust the United States?
[SPEAKER_01]: Since 1971, since we've had the revolution, the Americans have never liked our very existence.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so if they don't like our existence, they've done everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: They are supported in the beginning.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you remember, soon after the revolution, they were all kinds of attempts, even before the hostages were taken.
[SPEAKER_01]: They were cool attempts.
[SPEAKER_01]: They were attempts to try and buy over the then president, if you remember,
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's a very interesting thing, somebody told me that when the Iranians start the conversation, they're talking points, take it all the way back, at least to 1953, if not to 500 BC.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Americans are not interested in any of that, especially the deal guys.
[SPEAKER_01]: All there is, okay, now we'll give you $2 billion.
[SPEAKER_01]: Two, okay, two and a half, three.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they're not interested
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that has been a bit of a difficult thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: But on the nuclear question, I think there has been some understanding on the Iranian side that they will have to accept some limitations, some restrictions, how they will be put in place.
[SPEAKER_01]: who will implement, help implement them, how will there be sufficient global confidence in it, especially of those who are worried about it, the Arab countries and Israel, those are questions that remain to be resolved.
[SPEAKER_01]: But more than any of that, Michael, this is about trust and I don't think either side trusts are the other.
[SPEAKER_01]: But both also want an out.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Iranians don't want more destruction.
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't want more people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Kail, they don't want more of the infrastructure destroyed.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a pretty, the country is not in a good shape anyway.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they don't want that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I don't think President Trump wants the disruption to the global economy that all of this has caused plus the reputational damage he has had with the Republican base which wanted him never to get into a war in the Middle East.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to come back to the role of Pakistan and sort of how, because I think you laid out beautifully, the differences, not just in terms of the specifics here, but the timeframe.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this has been a problem with the United States negotiating internationally in the Middle East and beyond for a long time, you know, the short-term versus the long-term, how you understand the historical backdrop.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I want to understand about Pakistan, as you said, Pakistan doesn't seem to be getting
[SPEAKER_00]: that the Trump administration might have promised that they thought they might have gotten financially economic and otherwise.
[SPEAKER_00]: My question about Pakistan is, what can they do given the fact that they're between distrustful two countries that distrust each other that are speaking at different language in terms of timeframe?
[SPEAKER_00]: that are not, they're willing to give a little bit here and there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the question is, I mean, bottom line.
[SPEAKER_00]: Is Pakistan the right negotiator for this?
[SPEAKER_00]: And if they are, what's the end game for Pakistan?
[SPEAKER_00]: What are they saying?
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the diplomats in Pakistan saying about?
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's our perfect scenario.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is where we'd like to get.
[SPEAKER_01]: is their perfect scenario is an indefinite ceasefire and talks continuing for as long as necessary till both sides just sort of back off.
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't want, they don't want a shooting war.
[SPEAKER_01]: They will be content with this running as long as, and does anyone in this group remember how long the negotiations with the Vietnamese continued,
[SPEAKER_01]: or how long or how long the negotiations continue with the Soviets and the Afghan government for the Geneva courts about the Soviet withdrawal.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean they're quite happy to
[SPEAKER_01]: to host something like that for a very long time because it keeps them getting good attention rather than bad attention.
[SPEAKER_01]: Every day the international media is discussing how Pakistan is facilitating to a very difficult protagonist negotiate rather than discussing
[SPEAKER_01]: been larger than having been there or Pakistan having been behind the Mumbai attacks in India or any such thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: So from their point of view that's that's good enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: But of course at some point they will have to develop an end game and my understanding is no one at this point has an end game.
[SPEAKER_04]: What's it like where you are in Abu Dhabi?
[SPEAKER_04]: What are people that you associate with who I assume are other diplomats and business people and so on?
[SPEAKER_04]: What's the chatter in Abu Dhabi?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, the biggest issue in not only Abu Dhabi, but all Gulf countries is the Iranian attacks on them, which took some of them by surprise.
[SPEAKER_01]: And basically, they feel attacked and they don't want
[SPEAKER_01]: any deal or agreement that does not take into account Iran's shall we say malign intent towards some of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, there are three islands of the UAE that are occupied by the Iranians since the days of the Shah.
[SPEAKER_01]: They would like those to be discussed as well in any future long-term settlement involving the Iranian regime.
[SPEAKER_01]: the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Bahrainis have always complained about Iran interfering in their internal politics and in their internal affairs.
[SPEAKER_01]: So everybody has concerns that are important to them.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to ask you about the leverage that any of the Gulf states might have on Iran, but first we have to step away for just a second for our sponsor.
[SPEAKER_04]: Okay, we're back.
[SPEAKER_04]: And that's her who Connie.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to ask you about the kind of leverage that the Gulf States can apply on Iran or for that matter, the United States to end this war.
[SPEAKER_04]: Do they have any power to do that?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, if you're talking about absolute hard power, perhaps not, but they certainly have tremendous influence, the economic influence of the Gulf States over the United States and over many other countries is significant and we saw even in this war that when they came under attack, everyone from
[SPEAKER_01]: the Trump administration to Ukraine, to President Macron or France, everybody rushed to say, we are even the South Koreans.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everybody said, okay, you guys need more anti-missile interceptors.
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll provide them.
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll be there to protect you.
[SPEAKER_01]: But other than that, very frankly, in a shooting war, right now, I don't think that the A, the Gulf States want to get involved.
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't.
[SPEAKER_01]: But they are hoping that their economical leverage and the fact that they are critical to the global economy because of their very important resource oil, everybody has an interest in their protection.
[SPEAKER_01]: So India, China, the United States,
[SPEAKER_01]: and Europe, everybody and Japan and Korea have an interest in their security.
[SPEAKER_04]: Does this mean to take this out of Diplos speaking into concrete terms?
[SPEAKER_04]: Does this mean they have or could have Trump backed into a corner that they have the power to demand
[SPEAKER_01]: they could, although at the moment, I think that the likelihood that they would want Trump to at least ensure that there are guarantees for their security moving forward that there is no deal, which is just a Trump deal.
[SPEAKER_01]: which is only, which only puts Trump first or America first without paying attention to the interests of every other party that is affected by Iran, that they would be, they would try and stop that rather than encourage a deal at any price or deal at any cost.
[SPEAKER_04]: Does this mean they would want Iran disarmed?
[SPEAKER_01]: the various restrictions on Iran's ability to attack any of them, uh, and that includes, uh, especially the missile program.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, that's a big, big ask.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, one of the bewildering aspects of all this is nobody's really clear who's in charge in Iran right now.
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, there seems to be or the IRGC seems to have to be the power center at the moment, but I'm wondering about the state of intelligence about real time intelligence about who's running around right now.
[SPEAKER_03]: Now Pakistan has notoriously powerful intelligence service, the ISI.
[SPEAKER_03]: And by the way, is Booneer the Field Chart Marshall, is he in charge of the ISI?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, he is the Chief of Defense Forces.
[SPEAKER_01]: He used to be Director-General of ISI at one point.
[SPEAKER_01]: But now he's the head off the whole bullet back.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, yeah.
[SPEAKER_03]: But do you have a sense that the ISI or has any insight into what's going on inside a ram right now?
[SPEAKER_01]: absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think they have better insight than those who are very far away and speculating.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, let me very honest, the assumption that, you know, like in the movies, you arrive on a different planet and you say, take me to the leader and once we get to the leader, everything will be done.
[SPEAKER_01]: That assumption is wrong for a country like Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: Iran thinks of itself as a civilizational state.
[SPEAKER_01]: not as a normal 200 year old, 250 year old country that has nothing to show for it beyond that.
[SPEAKER_01]: These are, there are houses in Iran where people live and very proudly say, my family has been living in this very house for the last 900 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: that is something that is not easily understood by those who have no desire to understand history.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean Henry Ford used to say history is bunk, all that matters is profit.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, very frankly, if that's the attitude you're going to approach Iran with, you will not understand Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: So
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, there is a chain of command in Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Supreme Leader is in charge.
[SPEAKER_01]: The IRGC has taken over, which basically means that the electricity civilian government is less powerful.
[SPEAKER_01]: That is something Pakistanis understand very well.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's most of their 78 year history.
[SPEAKER_01]: And
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, everybody in the region.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pakistan as well as the Arab Gulf countries, everybody advised against this operation.
[SPEAKER_01]: The only cheerleader for it was Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel.
[SPEAKER_01]: And there were assumptions on the Israeli side.
[SPEAKER_01]: that there will be a revolution.
[SPEAKER_01]: Another revolution in Iran is ready for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: We've seen that commentary in here is really newspapers where they are criticizing the head of Mozart for giving wrong assessments.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whatever happened, the fact remains that there is somebody in charge in Iran and if anything instead of toppling the regime, bringing it down,
[SPEAKER_01]: Basically, the system has consolidated and the voices for diversity and the voices for opening up are going to be crushed.
[SPEAKER_01]: They may be individuals today, perhaps President Trump apparently tweeted about eight people whose lives have been spared.
[SPEAKER_01]: There will be some individuals like that, but there will be a lot of people who will probably
[SPEAKER_01]: you know, lose their lives over the misassessment of the very people who misassessed Iraq's nuclear weapon program and and and and and I think that the real thing that Americans need to start thinking about is that unless we actually have a culture in which people understand other cultures and other civilizations and other people's history.
[SPEAKER_01]: and their relationships with one another, we will always keep making these mistakes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Vietnam was the same type of mistake.
[SPEAKER_01]: Iraq was the same type of mistake of Afghanistan where we fought the Taliban and then
[SPEAKER_01]: negotiated with them to leave them back in charge are all examples of the same.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's be realistic about it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Iran has a particular culture and in that culture no one turns on the country in a time when that country is being won.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm just wondering also a bit about the irony here.
[SPEAKER_03]: of Pakistan being the country that's trying to broker a nuclear deal that restricts Iran's nuclear program.
[SPEAKER_03]: Pakistan is a nuclear power on its own.
[SPEAKER_03]: It acquired its nuclear capabilities in stealth without any international agreement.
[SPEAKER_03]: Where is Pakistan coming off to tell Iran that it should restrict its nuclear program?
[SPEAKER_01]: absolutely, and if I were Iranian, I would turn around and say that to them, but right now the Iranians' real problem is the potential of being bombed through high heaven by Israel and the United States.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they'll turn to anybody who they think will help them get some time for them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And there is a version, there is a version of events in which Pakistan is actually being helpful
[SPEAKER_01]: by keeping this process of negotiations going.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it gives them time to take a breath.
[SPEAKER_01]: It gives them time to, you know, to consolidate their political system.
[SPEAKER_01]: We must also remember Pakistan is very close to China.
[SPEAKER_01]: China has takes here as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: China has been one of the big military backers of Iran.
[SPEAKER_01]: So in
[SPEAKER_01]: Pure grant strategy terms, I think you and I could end up discussing this forever, but this will not a very well thought out war from the American point of view and the assumption that, you know, something that required much more understanding of many more dimensions than yes you are right.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean there are many questions about Pakistan's role, but very frankly President Trump,
[SPEAKER_01]: think that Phil Marshall has the money, is his favorite Phil Marshall, although I keep wondering how many Phil Marshalls has he known in his life?
[SPEAKER_00]: But that makes me wonder.
[SPEAKER_00]: So essentially what you're saying is this war was a mistake of magnitude that it's really hard to put any of the pieces back in place where there's going to be a real resolution other than a stalemate that goes on and on.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you're a diplomat, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: You're used to situations where it seems like there's no kind of resolution.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you were
[SPEAKER_00]: in the diplomat.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a two-prong question.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you were the diplomat in the room, is there some idea you would propose that would take this other than a stalemate?
[SPEAKER_00]: Number one, and number two, has anything happened in the reporting on the negotiations that surprised you in terms of what Iran's response has been or the United States response has been?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think that a more conventional American administration would have dealt with negotiations more differently.
[SPEAKER_01]: They wouldn't have entered them without the preparation that was missing here.
[SPEAKER_01]: There was an assumption that we'll go with a set of proposals and that will be enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: Anybody who has negotiated with Iranians knows that you get a history lecture.
[SPEAKER_01]: at the moment you'd start talking to their onions, you know, you can't buy pistachios in a run without hearing the history of the of the pistachios cell.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, so that was definitely a huge mistake in terms of the negotiating strategy, but other than that, look, the U.S. demands up there, but they should always be a did you say the U.S. demands are clear,
[SPEAKER_01]: that they work clear to start with, they become muddled along the way.
[SPEAKER_01]: The problem is that demands and expectations are not the same thing, so you actually base your expectations on a realistic assessment of what you might get and then you demand anything and everything you might want.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, no one negotiates the end of their own regime, no one, ever.
[SPEAKER_01]: a regime change is not accomplished by a power alone.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just not possible.
[SPEAKER_01]: So regime change was an unrealistic demand, but demanding to nuclear program and curtailment of it are realistic and could have been framed much more in a much more reasonable manner.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Omanis who were helping negotiate before the war between the US and Iran on purely the nuclear questions say that they were close to a deal.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that my understanding is would have been a deal about giving up the enriched uranium, except some quantity for civilian purposes.
[SPEAKER_01]: uh... opening up sites for international inspections uh... and uh... and ending the pursuit of nuclear weapons and that would have been a deal it looks very much like the one that obama and his jiffy don't you don't remember because of that but yes that is true that it and trump wouldn't trump wouldn't want anything that resembles something that obama got
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, we have sort of already in the United States the Obama care, but we don't call it Obama care anymore.
[SPEAKER_01]: So the same thing could happen with the JCPOA.
[SPEAKER_01]: We could now call it the Trump
[SPEAKER_01]: plan for protecting the world from Iranian news and and give them a well-packaged dance proposed there.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that's yeah, remember remember it all started his fascination with Pakistan started with the very smart move on the part of Pakistan's current leaders.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have not been very smart in running the country in any other way, the economy is not doing well, the people are not happy, the elections, last elections have been described as being a total fraud, etc etc, but they are very smart in realizing that the way to Trump's heart is by praising him.
[SPEAKER_01]: and that's why they nominated him for the Nobel Prize, and they'll probably do it again.
[SPEAKER_01]: I would like to.
[SPEAKER_03]: But not just praising him, like the Pakistani Finance Minister signs a deal with world liberty financial, the crypto firm founded by the Trump and which cuff families,
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and have you seen the Roosevelt Hotel deal where the General Services Administration of the United States government is signing a deal with Pakistan, which owns the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan, which is a whole acre, I'm sorry, a whole city block between 45th and 46 on Madison Avenue.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm shocked that there's corruption in this deal with the Trumps.
[SPEAKER_01]: GSA, I mean, when has GSA signed hotel development deals in the past?
[SPEAKER_03]: So the goeshia by Whitkoff according to the New York Times, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, but here's my point.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's my point.
[SPEAKER_01]: None of these are going to really, the problem is doing anything that is relatively long-term in an administration that is itself relatively short-term is, is, is, is, is brought with risk.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so the Pakistan is a big clever.
[SPEAKER_01]: They did not do a deal with any of the companies of the Trump camp.
[SPEAKER_01]: They did it with the GSA, so the U.S. government is kind of involved.
[SPEAKER_01]: Similarly, that was a memorandum, understanding.
[SPEAKER_01]: Similarly, on the crypto side also, nothing has actually happened.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's still memorandum of understanding and potential promises.
[SPEAKER_01]: But hey, with somebody,
[SPEAKER_01]: who is quite happy with that.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a very good way to win his winning over and become the key mediator.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's what Pakistan is accomplished.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, we can only hope that all Greece results in a peace deal.
[SPEAKER_04]: And somehow, it gets us all out of place.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, that would be asking for too much, Jeff.
[SPEAKER_01]: But let's see if it can at least
[SPEAKER_01]: make the ceasefire a little more permanent and some of the immediate issues, the security of the Gulf States, the security and openness of the state of Hormos, and the threat from Iran's nuclear program.
[SPEAKER_01]: If those can somehow be limited,
[SPEAKER_01]: in the short term, then we will buy time for a future American president who is willing to listen to people, think things through and act not by a govern and not by Twitter but by actual policy, we may actually have some better future ahead.
[SPEAKER_04]: So, we're...
[SPEAKER_04]: We may have to look for another administration just could go on for another couple of years and this kind of stalemate But the you know the straight-of-war moves has to be unlocked at some point a long-report another administration comes in I wouldn't say anyway Mr.
[SPEAKER_04]: Ambassador, thanks so much for your very valuable insight.
[SPEAKER_04]: You're really in the cappard seat To analyze all this for us.
[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you very much for coming on this by talk about yes
[SPEAKER_04]: And that's it for this week's by-talk.
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[SPEAKER_04]: That's it.
[SPEAKER_04]: See you around.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm Jeff Stein.
[SPEAKER_04]: Am I close off?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Karen Greenberg.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thanks for listening.