Inside Trump's 'Project Freedom' plan to open the Strait of Hormuz — Global News Podcast

[0:00] Welcome to the Global News Podcast from the BBC. I'm Celia Hatton and today we're joined by our [0:04] diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams. Paul, today we're talking about the US war with Iran and [0:10] Donald Trump's attempts to guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz. So my first question to you is, [0:17] is the United States getting desperate to end this conflict? [0:21] I think there's a high level of impatience. Whether it's desperation yet, it's hard to know, [0:28] but clearly Donald Trump is already sensing that this is going on much longer than he [0:35] anticipated. You remember when he launched this war back at the end of February, he talked about [0:38] four to six weeks. Well, we're way over that now. This is not a never-ending war. Pete Hegseth is [0:46] perfectly right when he says, don't compare this with Afghanistan or Iraq, but they thought this [0:51] was going to be quick. They thought this was going to be easy and it is neither. And so we are now [0:57] seeing a kind of running series of improvisations, which the administration likes to present as all [1:05] part of the plan. But it's hard to see how this really is part of the plan, because at the moment [1:12] we have a situation in which the impacts on the global economy continue to escalate. The Iranians [1:18] continue to resist pressure to open the Strait of Hormuz, an issue which was never an issue before the war [1:25] itself, and which has now become a war aim of the United States to get that reopened. And whether [1:31] it's his obscenity-laden social media posts from a while ago, or this latest move to start escorting [1:41] vessels through the Strait, you do sense that this is just something that he's finding incredibly [1:46] irritating. [1:47] Okay, so that's Donald Trump. You also mentioned Pete Hegseth, the US Defense Secretary. We've heard [1:54] him today claiming that there is a red, white and blue dome over the Strait of Hormuz to indicate that [2:02] the United States is in control. Is it? [2:04] No, I mean, it clearly is not. You know, Pete Hegseth, like his boss Donald Trump, has a tendency [2:12] to use inflated rhetoric, and you have to kind of aim off for that a lot of the time. But it is clear [2:18] that, you know, what they are trying to do is to unblock the Strait. It has been some perhaps weeks in the [2:27] making. This would have required quite a bit of careful military planning. I think it was reported [2:34] that American warships had quietly gone through the Strait, probably hugging the coast of Oman, [2:40] in other words, as far away from the Iranian coastline as they could get, to make sure that [2:46] there was a passageway through that is clear of mines, because that is the thing that prevents [2:51] any commercial vessel, frankly, any vessel from wanting to pass through that contested [2:57] area, the presence of mines. So they must believe that they have a small, narrow corridor [3:03] where that threat has been removed. The other threats continue to exist, whether they are [3:09] Iranian fastboats, missiles fired from the Iranian mainland, but not mines. And now we've seen, [3:18] you know, two vessels, according to the Americans, essentially escorted through. They're not describing [3:24] it quite as an escort mission, but essentially escorted through with U.S. military protection. [3:30] To call it a red, white and blue dome, which rather sort of invites a comparison with missile [3:35] defense systems, like the Israeli Iron Dome, is perhaps misleading, because it really only offers a [3:43] degree of protection. Now, we are led to believe that there were other threats that presented themselves [3:51] in the course of the first day of this on Monday, including Iranian fastboats, including, according to [4:00] the Americans, a cruise missile, all of which the Americans say they dealt with. So in that sense, [4:05] it's a success, but it was two ships. And as the Americans themselves say, there are 1,150 commercial [4:12] vessels still holed up in the Gulf. They've been there for more than two months. Those 22,000 mariners [4:19] are really desperate for this to end. And the reason that they are still there is because it is Iran [4:27] that controls who goes in and out of it. It is not really the Americans. Now, the latest move [4:32] slightly shifts the balance a bit, just as the American blockade acted as a kind of counter to [4:39] the Iranian blockade. But the fundamental fact is that the Strait of Hormuz remains blocked. And [4:47] nothing that the Americans have done so far has changed that. [4:51] Does this tell us anything, Paul, about the changing nature of modern warfare? You know, [4:56] the Iranians are using small boats. They're using drones. They're using these really cheap forms of [5:01] military technology in order to counter the Americans, these massive sort of almost floating [5:07] cities that the Americans have brought into the area. Is this really telling us that the Iranians [5:13] have been quite creative in how they use the limited assets that they've got? [5:16] Extremely creative, as pretty much anyone who knows anything about Iran would have anticipated. [5:23] And it's well known that they've been preparing for a moment like this for some time. [5:27] You know, the Americans, they say, you know, that there are more resources now. Pete Higgs said this [5:33] today. There are more resources available to Donald Trump now than at the beginning of the war. I think [5:38] three carrier strike groups, you know, huge numbers of aircraft and troops and so forth. And they're a [5:46] little disparaging about the nature of the Iranian threats, particularly the fast boats. But those fast [5:52] boats do pose a challenge. And the Iranians, by all accounts, have hundreds, if not thousands of them. [5:59] And so, you know, the Iranians have demonstrated, perhaps even to their own surprise, an ability to [6:06] control events in that particular stretch of water, which the Americans for all of their military, [6:13] undoubted military might, have not been able to really come up with a solution for. And of course, [6:18] it's not just the American economy and the American public who Donald Trump has to worry about. It's [6:23] the global economy and the global public, all of whom, in one way or another, and sometimes in [6:28] multiple ways, are suffering as a result of a war, which he and the Prime Minister of Israel, [6:34] Benjamin Netanyahu, decided to go into. And so far, the impacts have been entirely negative for pretty [6:41] much everyone. [6:44] Just staying on the negative effects, I mean, we have to acknowledge the fact that the Iranian ports are [6:47] still under blockade as well. So Iran is suffering throughout this period, isn't it? Is Iran also, [6:55] I mean, from what you know about what's going on behind the scenes in terms of the peace process [6:59] and peace talks, are those still continuing? [7:02] Yeah, I mean, you're absolutely right to highlight the pressure on Iran. I mean, [7:06] it is having to improvise and it's very good at improvising. You know, we've heard reports of, [7:10] you know, oil being shipped by rail to China, of increased trade over the Caspian Sea to Russia and all [7:16] of these sorts of things. So yeah, let us not pretend for a second that this is not being felt [7:22] in Tehran. It clearly is. And yes, there is still a diplomatic process that is going on. We don't [7:29] see it and we don't hear much about it. Pakistani officials continue to say we are passing messages [7:36] to and fro, you know, until as recently as what, the end of last week, even to the weekend, we were [7:43] hearing of new Iranian proposals, which were being dismissed by Donald Trump as not satisfactory. [7:49] So there is a back and forth. Now, does this latest shift in the dynamics with Project Freedom, [7:57] does that put a spanner in the works of all that diplomacy or will it continue regardless? I think [8:05] we're likely to see efforts to keep that dialogue going, to chip away at the things that differ [8:10] between them, whether it's how many years that Iran would be prepared to suspend uranium enrichment, [8:17] how sanctions might be lifted, how Iranian frozen assets might be unfrozen, all of these things, [8:23] which are the kind of nuts and bolts of a deal, I think are still being thrashed out. And it is not, [8:29] it is still not impossible that they will reach some kind of deal, which might address the easy stuff, [8:38] but possibly will leave the really tough stuff, the nuclear stuff for a later date. And in fact, [8:45] that is what we think the last Iranian proposal included. I think that was unsatisfactory to [8:50] Washington. It wants to be seen to have fixed this problem, the problem which it, you know, [8:55] accused the previous administration of Barack Obama of failing to properly address. So the idea that [9:03] they would put that off, it would be a tricky one for the Trump administration to swallow. So [9:10] there is a lot of finessing that still needs to happen before any kind of deal can emerge. [9:16] Is it possible, though, that Donald Trump might go for a deal with Iran that he might not originally [9:22] have wanted simply because he's under pressure to address other items on his agenda? I mean, [9:29] for example, he's due in Beijing in nine days' time. Reportedly, huge U.S.-China deals are on the [9:36] line, are hinging on that trip of Donald Trump meeting with Xi Jinping, China's leader, the leaders [9:42] of the two world's largest economies, in order to kind of boost their economic growth, their twin [9:47] economic growth. But I would imagine that it's also tricky for Donald Trump to make that kind of trip. [9:53] It's a trip. He's also already delayed once in order to travel to Beijing while possibly U.S. troops [10:01] are in harm's way. We could see troops going back to the United States in coffins while Donald Trump [10:06] is in Beijing. Yeah. The time pressures on Donald Trump are acute in a way that perhaps they are less [10:12] acute for the regime in Tehran. Clearly, the visit to Beijing is a huge deal and much hinges on it, [10:21] as you rightly suggest. And the idea that he could go there and still be the leader who is contributing [10:30] to the economic pain felt by his Chinese hosts, that's not a good look at all. And it doesn't matter [10:36] what President Xi says in public, in private, that's got to be a major bone of contention. [10:43] And certainly from the point of view of any negotiations that might take place while they're [10:51] in Beijing and what deals might emerge, this cannot be the kind of the right fruitful kind [10:58] of environment for any of that stuff. And of course, beyond that, you've also got a president looking to [11:05] elections, midterm elections, where his party, the Republican Party, could face a wipeout, [11:11] could lose both the House and the Senate later in the year. Ultimately, I think he will have to make [11:19] a deal, a deal which he perhaps thought that he would essentially dictate to a defeated Iranian [11:28] regime when he launched this operation, when he and the Israelis set out to kill so many senior members [11:34] of the Iranian regime to take out large parts of their law enforcement apparatus. [11:43] He thought this was going to be a deal dictated by Washington and Israel involving essentially the [11:50] complete capitulation of the Iranian regime, if not its complete disappearance. It's not going to [11:55] disappear. That much is already clear. And it is still trying and in some ways succeeding to dictate [12:04] the terms of whatever deal emerges from this. There will be a deal. It will be an unsatisfactory [12:11] one for Donald Trump's point of view. He'll sell it. I'm sure they'll sell it as a victory. [12:20] They will say that we have put Iran back in its box. It no longer represents an existential threat to [12:27] the state of Israel. The Strait of Hormuz is reopened. The global economy is recovering. All of these [12:32] things can be sold and will be sold. But it's not the process and it's not the deal that he expected. [12:40] Thank you, Paul. Our diplomatic correspondent, Paul Adams. And if you'd like to hear more from [12:45] the Global News Podcast, click the link below. [12:47] Thanks for watching.