How shaky is the Iran-US ceasefire? — The Bottom Line

[0:00] Hi, I'm Steve Clemens and I have a question. Will the U.S.-Israel war on Iran end in a historic [0:05] diplomatic outcome or just more war? Let's get to the bottom line. After 39 days of nonstop bombing [0:18] and late night social media posts threatening to wipe out Iran's civilization, U.S. President [0:23] Donald Trump announced that Iran's 10-point ceasefire offer was a, quote, workable basis for [0:29] diplomacy. Both sides declared victory and the Strait of Hormuz was on track to reopen. But then, [0:34] within hours of the ceasefire, Israel ramped up its attacks on Lebanon, killing more than 300 people [0:40] in one day. Iran then shut down most shipping in and out of Hormuz and insisted that any ceasefire [0:46] include Lebanon. Against this backdrop, U.S. and Iranian officials are now holding talks in Pakistan's [0:53] capital, Islamabad. So what are the chances for a real deal? Or do peace and stability remain highly [0:59] unlikely? Today, we're looking at the issues from two different perspectives. In a moment, we're going [1:04] to be speaking with Nader Hashemi, who teaches Middle East and Islamic politics at Georgetown [1:09] University. But first, we're talking with John Bolton, former U.S. National Security Advisor [1:13] to President Trump in his first term and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. And he's [1:19] author of The Room Where It Happened, a White House Memoir. Ambassador Bolton, thank you for joining [1:24] us. Look, you've been a long-term advocate of regime change in Iran. How do you see things going now? [1:30] Well, my objective for some time has been changing the regime in Tehran. And military force was [1:39] certainly one way to do it. I don't think this operation has been particularly well planned from [1:44] that point of view. And I think that the political impact of the war on Trump domestically is having [1:51] a very negative effect on his political fortunes, and especially looking toward the midterm election. [1:57] So whatever chances there were, I think, of achieving regime change or diminishing hourly, [2:03] as Trump tries to get a way out of the conflict so he can attend to domestic political concerns. [2:12] But I'm interested from your perspective, or I know that you sometimes talk to Israeli Prime Minister [2:17] Netanyahu. What would finishing the job mean? Because there don't seem to be many targets left that [2:23] are militarily valuable. I'm just interested in what an ongoing prosecution of this conflict might [2:29] have looked like. Well, real regime change in Iran requires getting rid of the Ayatollahs and the [2:35] Revolutionary Guard and their ideology. I think Trump is just completely wrong to say that he's achieved [2:41] regime change, although the regime itself has been damaged in a very significant fashion, not just the [2:48] former supreme leader, but hundreds of top leaders. The instruments of state power, like the Revolutionary [2:54] Guard, like the Quds Force, like the besieged militia, have been damaged. But to do this right, you have to [3:01] plan in advance. You have to build a case for the American people on why regime change is justified. I [3:07] think there is a compelling case to be made. Trump didn't make it. He didn't prepare Congress. He didn't prepare [3:13] the allies and not just the NATO allies. He didn't prepare the Gulf Arab allies or Japan, South Korea, [3:20] and others in the Pacific who depend on Gulf War. Most importantly of all, he didn't prepare the [3:26] opposition. He didn't help them establish better communications, stronger leadership capabilities, [3:34] provide them with weapons if that was necessary. Trump had made it very clear he wasn't going to put [3:40] substantial American boots on the ground. I take that as a given in his thinking. So the role of the [3:47] opposition inside Iran in conjunction with the military action becomes all that more important. [3:53] And Trump, on all these fronts I've just mentioned, as near as I can tell, did very little, if anything. [3:58] Do you think, Ambassador, that this is any kind of a learning moment? We did regime change in Iraq. [4:05] We saw regime change in Syria, but it wasn't done by invasion. You've seen regime change in other [4:11] other places. But there's always tended to be a lot of blowback, huge costs, stress on alliances. [4:17] And these tend to be multi-decade exercises that the American public quickly tires of. And I would argue [4:28] sometimes generally don't produce the results they were intended to do. So I'm just interested. Is this a [4:32] learning moment where we have to go back, even with some of the assumptions you have about what [4:37] you've advocated on regime change and take another look at that? Well, I think you have to look at [4:43] each situation on its own. In the case of Afghanistan, we the mistake we made was leaving [4:50] Afghanistan in the summer of 2021. The Trump deal with the Taliban and the Biden administration carrying it [4:57] through. I don't think that made the situation in Afghanistan any better for the people there, [5:05] certainly not for us. Iraq is more complex. I think the overthrow of Saddam Hussein was carried [5:11] out very successfully. I think the mistake we made was not regime change. It was an aborted effort at [5:17] nation building. I think this underscores, and that did provide a lesson, how to proceed in Iran, [5:24] which is have the population affected, make its own decisions about what sort of governance and what [5:31] kind of regime it would want going forward. But we're nowhere close to that. As I say, [5:38] whatever you can discern from publicly available information, there's been next to no contact, [5:43] except maybe with the Kurds in passing, with any of the opponents of the regime inside Iran. So [5:50] there's no guess what comes after. And I will say also in the case of Iran, the biggest concern for [5:56] the United States from the get go has been the Iranian nuclear program. And that too remains [6:03] unresolved. You talked about the stress on allies and allies, very key allies of the United States who [6:11] were not consulted, that you were even surprised by the president taking this action. My question to you [6:17] is once you know all of these issues and you see the doubts building up out there and the lack of trust [6:22] among key allies, does NATO survive this? Well, I think it's a close question. Trump, from the time he [6:31] took office in 2017, has not treated NATO well. He doesn't understand it. He basically thinks it's [6:40] a system where we defend Europe, they don't pay for it, and we don't get anything out of it. I mean, [6:45] if that's the way NATO really worked, I wouldn't favor it either. But it's not a fair description of [6:51] the alliance. I think Trump made a big mistake in not consulting NATO and the other allies before [6:56] this war. But I think Europe has unfortunately made some mistakes here too. This does concern them. [7:03] This should have been something that they could have done more to help out on. And in fact, [7:10] the irony is many NATO countries, Germany is a prominent example, are helping and doing it very [7:15] quietly. So I think there are a lot of factors here. But I do think you can put this down largely to [7:23] to poor allied maintenance by the Trump administration. And he hasn't improved his [7:29] disposition even after meeting NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Wednesday. So I think it's going to be a [7:36] tough three years. I urge the Europeans to grit their teeth and remember life goes on after Donald [7:42] Trump. The Soviet Union tried to split NATO in the Cold War. And one reason among many they lost the Cold [7:49] War was they failed to do it. We shouldn't do their work for them. On a scale of one to 10, [7:54] how likely do you see the Iran conflict with Israel and the United States resuming in short order? [8:02] I think it's very low, maybe two or three. I think the Iranians can sense very clearly Trump [8:11] wants out. Their internal debate is probably how much can we squeeze out of him? How many [8:18] concessions can we get? So all eyes will be on J.D. Vance, who has already made it clear, [8:24] or his staff has through leaks to the press, that he opposed Trump's military action. We'll see if he can [8:31] deliver what he delivers out of the forthcoming negotiations. It could have a dramatic effect [8:36] on his presidential chances in 2028. We've already seen the president unsanctioned or desanctioned oil [8:45] on some of Iran's ships around the world to try to create some flow of energy to various places in [8:52] the world. He's also talked about splitting tolls with the Iranians over the Strait of Hormuz, [8:57] talking about other lifting of sanctions as part of a trade deal or a negotiated deal on this. Do you [9:04] think Iran could actually come out way ahead in terms of this deal with President Trump in ways [9:11] that we haven't really contemplated? Well, I'm very worried about exactly that. It was a mistake to [9:17] lift sanctions on Iranian oil or Russian oil, as he also did. I'm sure what he was trying to do was get [9:22] the global price of oil down, but that's providing money to our adversaries, especially Iran, to use [9:28] in the war against the United States. There's simply no way a toll system on the Strait of Hormuz [9:35] is acceptable to the Gulf Arabs and indeed shouldn't be acceptable to the U.S. or anybody else. We've [9:41] spent close to 80 years now since the end of World War II trying to make sure that no outside power and no [9:48] power in the region dominates the entire production of the Gulf area. Not the Soviets during the Cold War, [9:55] not Saddam Hussein when he invaded Kuwait in 1990, and not Iran today. This notion that you can choke off [10:05] a geographic choke point and earn money off of it is just unacceptable. This is one of the things, freedom [10:12] of the seas, freedom of navigation, that was a principle of American foreign policy before we were even a [10:18] country. And we cannot abandon it here. We've seen Israel basically in kind of a permanent war situation [10:25] in its neighborhood for a very long time. But where does Israel reach a point of, an equilibrium point [10:34] of contentment with the moment when it comes to its safety and security? Or is this going to be a [10:38] permanent story? You know, in terms of how the U.S. got into the war, Netanyahu has believed in regime [10:46] change in Iran, probably longer than I have. And he was saying these things to Trump in the first term. It [10:52] obviously didn't have an impact, nor did my arguments have an impact. So whatever it is that persuaded Trump in [10:59] the second term, it's not the delta between what Netanyahu was doing in the first term and the second term, [11:04] because I think he was saying exactly the same thing. There was some other factor. I think Israel has, since the October 7, [11:12] 2023 attacks, has really inflicted substantial damage on Hamas and Hezbollah, which were the two [11:18] most proximate terrorist threats that Israel faces. Together with the U.S., they've inflicted substantial [11:25] damage on Iran. I think in Israel, they understand when Trump calls an end to the war against Iran, [11:32] that's Israel's end to the war against Iran as well. So that point of equilibrium, or at least [11:38] of status, could be coming fairly soon. I think it is actually encouraging that Israel is talking [11:45] directly to the government of Lebanon. I'm glad the Lebanese government is doing it. They both face [11:50] a common threat from an armed Hezbollah. That's why we passed Security Council Resolution 1701 back in [11:57] 2006 to disarm Hezbollah and make it a regular political party. I don't know whether that's really [12:03] in sight or not, but that could be what Israel's objective is here, and it's still worth pursuing. [12:09] Well, we'll have to end it there. Really appreciate you joining us. Former U.S. National Security Advisor [12:14] John Bolton, thank you. Thank you, Steve. Glad to do it. Now we turn to Nadar Hashemi, director of the Al-Walid [12:22] Center for Muslim Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, and he's author of several books on Iran [12:27] and the region including Islam, secularism, and liberal democracy toward a democratic theory for [12:33] Muslim societies. Nadar, thank you so much for joining us. You've just heard my conversation with [12:38] former National Security Advisor John Bolton, and to put it in a kind of tight nutshell, [12:43] he basically says this should have been about regime change. We got it all wrong. President Trump got [12:48] it all wrong. We're going to limp out of the situation, and Iran's going to still be holding the [12:52] cards. What are your thoughts? Well, I think he's right that we've got it all wrong, [12:57] but not in the way that he has presented it to you. In other words, this call for a more robust [13:02] military intervention to promote regime change has, objectively speaking, done the exact opposite. [13:08] The Islamic Republic of Iran, I would argue, internally now is much more stronger. It's more [13:14] cohesive as a regime. It's presided over a transition from a former Supreme Leader to a new one, and [13:22] critically, it has survived this massive American and Israeli military assault that sought to, you [13:29] know, topple the regime effectively, and it's still standing. But critically, internally, where the [13:33] Iranian regime was on very shaky ground just at the beginning of this year with these massive protests [13:39] that took place, and the Islamic Republic had to crack down very brutally on them, the tide of nationalism [13:44] has kicked in as a result of this, you know, American and Israeli assault. So all of these talk and these, you know, [13:51] what Bolton was saying about, you know, we need regime change. If anything, the regime is actually, [13:56] I would argue, at this point, much more on solid ground than it was before this war started. [14:00] One thing Bolton said, which I think is very important, is that regime change isn't accomplished [14:05] by guns. It has to come with an uprising of the people. It has to come up with new leadership. It has to [14:11] come up with the displacement of the IRGC. So, you know, let's be clear, when Bolton and American sort of [14:17] war hawks talk about, you know, a regime change and a democratic opening, they don't really mean [14:25] democracy. They don't want democracy. What they want is effectively the Islamic Republic of Iran [14:28] to turn into another United Arab Emirates, where there's going to be a pro-American, you know, [14:32] dictator in power that will work very closely with the United States. If you're serious about supporting [14:38] democratic forces in Iran, then I think you have to sort of do some basic things. You can't starve [14:43] the population. That's not conducive to, you know, democratization. But critically, democracy requires [14:49] a set of preconditions internally in Iran, but also externally in Iran. The threats of war, [14:55] the threats of sort of bombing Iran back to the Stone Age, destroying Iranian civilization, [15:01] all of those external sort of, you know, threats that the United States has been using against Iran [15:06] for a very long time undermine democracy. I just want to point one. [15:10] By the way, which anyone, you know, with international legal experience would say, [15:14] those terms said so broadly are war crimes. [15:18] Well, it's much worse than that. What Donald Trump said about civilizational [15:21] erasure is tantamount to the threat of genocide. Okay, so that's what, that's the language. That [15:26] doesn't, that's not conducive to internal democratic reform. I think if one wanted to be serious about [15:30] this, we have to go back to the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement. At that moment, when it was reached, [15:36] democratic forces in Iran celebrated that agreement, largely because it removed the threat [15:41] of external attack on Iran, and it created better external and internal conditions for people to [15:46] organize and mobilize. The point here, I want to make, uh, Steve, the last one is there's no quick fix [15:50] here with respect to Iranian democracy. This is what Bolton and all of these war hawks in the United [15:54] States and in Israel think that you just bomb it, arm, arm some opposition groups, and you're going to get [15:58] sort of, you know, Reza Pahlavi to fly into Tehran. Well, we now know that was one of the four, uh, [16:03] parts of a four-part plan that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu laid out for President Trump. [16:08] We're seeing reporting on that right now. It, it was pretty clear to me that the information [16:11] that he's getting on Iran is coming from, um, Netanyahu and the Netanyahu choir here in Washington, [16:16] D.C., and from the Iranian monarchist crowd. This is exactly what they're saying. I don't believe, [16:21] uh, you know, almost 40 days into this war that the vast majority of Iranians, you know, want to see [16:25] their civilian infrastructure. Mention the Iranian monarchist group. Say, say more. Well, this is, um, [16:30] a group that revolves around the son of the former dictator, you know, who's living here in Washington, [16:34] D.C., in Bethesda, Maryland, on stolen money that he's taken from, you know, Iran when his family [16:39] fled. And he has very close sort of, uh, political and intelligence coordination with, uh, pro-Israel [16:45] hawks here in Washington, D.C. Uh, and so these people aspire to sort of, uh, promote regime change [16:52] in Iran, effectively to roll the clock back to 1979 when you had a pro-American dictator that had close [16:57] alliances with, uh, America's allies in the region, critically Israel. This is what they aspire to do. [17:02] They know they don't have a strong game within Iran. The only way they hope to bring this about [17:07] is through what John Bolton was saying to you earlier, through some sort of massive military [17:10] intervention. In fact, if you listen closely to what Bolton is saying, he effectively wants a repeat [17:14] of the 2003 Iraq war. He wants a land invasion, and then he hopes that Reza Pahlavi and these monarchists [17:19] can return to Tehran on the back of an American or Israeli tank. I don't think that's going to happen. [17:24] Let me ask you about the orchestration around peace talks or whatever your equilibrium talks [17:28] or cease-fire talks. First time, uh, we were in the middle of talks with Iran about its, uh, nuclear [17:35] aspirations, um, that then the 12-day war broke out. Like, during those negotiations, um, I know the [17:41] Iranians were deeply shocked that they would be attacked, uh, in the middle of those. Then, before this [17:47] kinetic war happened, we were in negotiations again with Iran right during this, uh, and there were many [17:52] reports that thought they were going to, uh, towards an outcome that might have been positive [17:57] both sides. Now we're about to begin talks again in Pakistan with both U.S. and Iranian, uh, players. [18:03] What are your views on the likelihood of a conflict breaking out in the middle of those negotiations? [18:08] Um, well, I'm glad you mentioned those two moments because I think on the Iranian side, [18:13] they're, they're thinking we've been here before. Why would we trust the United States to negotiate in [18:16] good faith when literally twice over the last year in the middle of negotiations, they launched a war [18:21] against Iran. So I, I suspect they're very aware that this could happen again. The likelihood of [18:25] another war breaking out, my view is that it's probably, um, um, much lower than most people [18:31] realize. I mean, you were speaking to John Bolton about this on a scale of, you know, one to 10, [18:34] he says about, it's about two or three. I agree. Because ask yourself, what more can the United States [18:38] and Israel accomplish after 40 days of bombing? Are they just going to return to sort of that type of [18:43] policy that sort of deeply affected the global economy, deeply destabilized the Middle East? I don't see [18:48] what is gained by, um, you know, reproducing that policy bombing Iran again. I suspect Donald Trump [18:54] probably is just going to try and get the best deal he can out of Iran. Iran is not going to negotiate [18:59] on many of its red lines related to its nuclear program critically over the Strait of Hormuz. So I [19:04] suspect we're going to be in somewhat of a stalemate, which things as they stand right now are going to [19:08] remain sort of the status quo for the foreseeable future. And what that means for Iran geostrategically [19:14] is a huge win because they've asserted hegemony over the Strait of Hormuz and there's no one who [19:18] can dislodge them. And so that represents a major shift in regional balance of power [19:22] and the regional global balance of power in favor of Iran. Let me ask you a question about [19:27] the average citizen in the greater Gulf area. You know, there are something like half a billion [19:31] people in this broader region and they've, you know, seen the tensions between Israel and Iran [19:36] and the United States and Iran for a long period of time, but they haven't really felt part of that [19:40] equation. Now, in some cases, they're being attacked and they're seeing their facilities and [19:45] infrastructure attacked in this war. They are in the equation. What do they want to see in the future? [19:51] Do they want to see an Iran that's returned to power? Do they want to see Israel remain the kind of [19:58] broad regional superpower? What's their appetite? Look, they're very worried about the future, [20:04] stability of the region. I think at the grassroots level, we very focus on what's happening at the [20:08] grassroots level. When we talk about these issues, the emphasis is always on sort of what, you know, [20:12] leaders and, you know, Arab state, you know, political leaders are saying at this moment. [20:18] But at the grassroots level, I think most people in the region are looking at this war through the [20:22] prism of the genocide in Gaza and through the prism of Israel is doing in Lebanon right now. [20:27] They're seeing an Israeli state backed by the West in the United States just wreaking havoc on the entire [20:32] region. After Lebanon, after sorry, after Gaza, they've gone after Lebanon, and now they're trying to [20:37] topple the regime in Iran in a sort of completely unhinged way. I think this completely destroys [20:43] any future prospects for what's called the Abraham Accords. Any Arab leader that tries to suck up to [20:48] Netanyahu would be, suffer a huge public relations disaster internally. But at the same time, I think [20:53] people are sort of thinking about their own economic future. How are they going to sort of live in this [20:57] sort of chaotic environment, knowing that Donald Trump is completely unhinged, and he's unable to reign in [21:03] his closest ally in the region, Benjamin Netanyahu, because there was allegedly sort of an understanding, [21:09] at least from the Pakistanis and Iranians, that the ceasefire was supposed to include Lebanon. [21:13] Netanyahu said absolutely not, and he's continuing to bomb Lebanon. So if Donald Trump can't restrain [21:17] this Israeli prime minister, it doesn't bode well for the future of U.S. policy in the region. So I think [21:23] people are very worried about where this is headed. I think this is, you know, Steve, a pivotal point in the [21:28] politics of the region. I think many people are going to view the United States and Israel and also [21:33] their, you know, their own leadership in the in the Arab world with a lot of skepticism. There's going [21:38] to be a lot of anger, a lot of resentment. And I don't think things are going to go back to how they were [21:43] on February 28th when this war began. You know, the United States has been trying to defang Hamas, [21:49] Hezbollah, and Iran for 40 some odd years and trying to do this. And I'm just interested in, if you kind of look [21:56] beneath it, not to I don't want to rationalize this, but many people basically say that some [22:02] part of the original sin here was Israel's expansionist policies, taking more land, the displacement [22:09] of people, et cetera. I'm just interested in whether or not the realities, the DNA of the drivers of this [22:16] instability, the creation of these resistance groups that have attacked Israel and kept us going, [22:20] whether or not defanging that, that act, that belief is even possible. And is are we anywhere [22:28] closer to, you know, a different future for the region that somehow begins to see one side or the [22:36] other either win or some accommodation by both sides? I think the one of the predictable results of [22:42] recent events, not just since this war began with Iran, but going back to October the 7th, [22:47] is that militant groups, resistance groups, people who are angry with the political status quo, [22:53] they'll have a much easier time recruiting people to their narrative because they're going to tell [22:58] their followers. And there's a lot of unemployed youth in the region who have no prospects for a [23:03] political future, no prospects for an economic future. They're going to be more susceptible to [23:08] joining those resistance groups and looking at the West and saying, this is just total hypocrisy [23:13] on the part of these liberal democracies that have effectively backed these types of catastrophic [23:17] wars. And so this does speak to these underlying issues of instability that really go back to the [23:23] Israel-Palestine conflict. Just think about it. If there was a stable sort of political settlement in [23:28] Israel-Palestine where Palestinians and Israelis could coexist in some sort of meaningful form, [23:32] either in one unitary state or in two independent states, how better the region would be? How weaker [23:37] these types of militant groups would have a much more difficult time recruiting people if that issue [23:42] was resolved. And the problem with that is fundamentally here in Washington, D.C. There's no appetite, [23:46] there's no willingness, at least among both political parties here, to provide any sort of, [23:50] you know, serious leadership to solve this longstanding unresolved issue of Israel-Palestine. And the [23:55] longer it burns, the more it destabilizes the region. Well, we'll have to leave it there. Georgetown [23:59] University Professor Nader Hashemi, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you. So what's the bottom line? [24:06] Hopium is not a real strategy, I'm sorry to say. The old world where folks at least talked about one humanity, [24:13] with common purpose, talking about things like rules and laws to help with migration or even [24:18] climate change. That's all gone. Now it's every nation for itself. And they operate through cold-eyed [24:23] calculation of interests. When those interests don't align, there's conflict. President Trump can [24:28] keep saying Iran has no cards, but that's just false. Iran has powerful cards. And that's why the U.S. [24:35] declared an end to the war, at least for now. Most of the time when powerful countries like the United [24:41] States try to create regime change, well, they end up prolonging the regime they wanted to change. [24:45] Nobody wants to see their people destroyed for the sake of an external enemy. We've seen this story [24:51] over and over and over again. The hubris of conquerors. It just never really works. And that's the bottom line.