Iran War debate: Will the blockade bring Tehran to its knees? — UpFront

[0:05] Joining me to discuss the latest developments on the war on Iran is journalist Samira Moyodin, [0:11] founder and editor of On The Line Media, and John Fredericks, who's the host of the John [0:16] Fredericks radio show. Thank you both for joining me. Welcome to Upfront. Thank you, [0:21] Reedy. Thank you very much. Let me start with you. Let me start with you, Samira. As of the [0:26] recording of this show, President Donald Trump has unilaterally and indefinitely extended the [0:32] ceasefire with Iran. But at the same time, the Strait of Hormuz remains closed. What comes next? [0:40] I mean, it's anyone's guess what comes next. I think this administration is erratic and chaotic, [0:45] and you have to keep refreshing every 10 minutes to see what dangerous delusions Donald Trump has [0:53] now. I think that, you know, it was just minutes ago that he said he's given shoot-to-kill orders [1:01] for any speedboats of the Iranian Navy that are seen trying to put landmines down. That's the latest [1:09] thing that I read. And the fact that he's right now, actually, he's hosting Israel and Lebanon [1:16] negotiations at the White House. So this White House administration has a lot on its plate, [1:22] and I think that it is, again, I use the word delusional if it thinks that it is going to win [1:28] this war against Iran. So far, it has been a quagmire, and I think that will continue. [1:33] John, what do you say to that? [1:36] Well, I think the time for the Iranian regime is running out. The blockade is starving them [1:43] of money. They're losing, we understand, about a half a billion dollars a day. They can't go on this [1:49] way. None of their oil is getting out. We're seizing ships. And now, what President Trump just [1:53] said moments ago, as Samira alluded to, is he said, hey, fire on the gunboats and sink them [2:01] and kill anybody on it. So this thing is going to escalate. Right now, what President Trump has [2:08] to do is the rhetoric has to start meeting action. And he did that today by saying, you see a boat, [2:15] they're firing, they're laying a mine, you sink it and you kill them. Bingo. Done. As long as these [2:21] Iranian ships can't get out of there, the IRGC doesn't have any money. They're eventually going [2:27] to starve themselves to death. They can't get revenue. They can't ship the oil out to China. [2:32] The money they're losing every day is going to basically put a stranglehold on the regime, [2:38] and it's a matter of time before this whole thing collapses. And American can go in there, [2:45] meet their objective, which is to extract the uranium that could end up on a nuclear warhead [2:52] on an ICBM. That's the purpose of this whole thing. You know, just to pick up off what John [2:58] said there, Iran is not going to surrender. And I think this is what people don't understand [3:03] about the Iranian government. It's not going to surrender. Iran is a country that went through [3:08] an eight-year war of attrition with Saddam Hussein, who was being armed to the teeth by the rest of [3:15] the world, who suffered chemical weapons. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians were killed. This isn't [3:21] going to be a cakewalk, and it hasn't. Look, the United States and Israel have bombed more than 13,000 [3:29] sites in Iran. That didn't make Iran surrender, nor did it make the Iranian people surrender. We have [3:37] been witness to nightly protests happening in the streets since this war. The impact of this war has [3:45] actually seen a rallying around the flag effect, which I don't think is what the United States was [3:50] aiming for. This is a big mistake, and it will get even bigger. I know that John mentioned that Iran is [3:56] running out of money and, you know, China and all of that. But the fact is that Iran has shown through [4:02] this war that it is a global economic power and that it can cause a lot of trouble for the rest of the world. [4:10] John? Well, look, one thing I agree with Samira on is the Persian nation has a 2,000-year history, [4:18] the United States, 250 years. So there is a big difference there. I don't think we're looking for surrender. [4:25] I think what President Trump is looking for is to get the enriched uranium out of there. And we're going to do it [4:31] one way or the other because to allow this regime to get the possibility of a nuclear warhead on an ICBM [4:40] where they can basically terrorize and hold blackmail the entire globe, President Trump is just not going to [4:47] allow that to happen. John, hold on. You seem quite emphatic about the objectives of this war, [4:52] and I know that you speak to President Trump regularly. But he contradicts himself, doesn't he, [4:57] on social media? He's often sent contradictory messages calling for regime change. Then it's not [5:03] about regime change. What else did he say? We won't be taking the oil. Then two days later, [5:07] the U.S. should take the oil. J.D. Vance is going to Islamabad. Then he's not. Surely that harms U.S. [5:14] credibility. Well, the only credibility that matters is meeting our objectives. Look, [5:18] if you understand President Trump, if he says he's going to do something, he's going to do it. [5:24] Now, part of what makes him very difficult to predict is his unpredictability because things change [5:31] from one day to the next. So who's ever in control of the Iranian regime, which I believe is the IRGC, [5:38] they don't know from one minute to the next what he's going to do. That confusion leads to a better [5:46] opportunity for the U.S. to meet its objective. Look, patience. The American people here, they're going to need [5:53] patience. This is not going to be three days, two weeks, a month. We're going to need patience. And there is [6:00] comfort in the uncertainty. You have to be able to gain comfort in uncertainty. The American people, the fake news [6:07] media, the left-wing media, they all are rooting for the Iranians to win. I mean, I've never seen, we're in a country [6:15] where half our country is hoping that the Iranians win and we lose so the Democrats can win. That's the environment [6:22] that we deal with here. But when you get inside the administration, they don't pay attention to that noise. [6:28] And I think President Trump, what he said today, you see a speedboat, sink it, kill them. End of story. [6:35] Shoot to kill. That's what's coming next. And no tankers are getting out of there. [6:40] So eventually, eventually, they've got to move their ships. [6:44] We've already done shoot to kill. We killed 168 schoolchildren on the first day of this war. [6:51] These types of bellicose statements, you know, if John has a window into Trump's mind, maybe there is [7:00] some method to Trump's madness. But I just don't see it. All I see is an administration that is a white [7:06] Christian nationalist administration that has a drunkard named Pete Hexeth at its helm that makes, [7:13] you know, proliferations about religiosity and God and the military. And this is a very dangerous, [7:19] dangerous path that we are down. If you want to talk about facts and truth, the fact is that Raphael [7:26] Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in June of 2025, when the first time [7:33] America bombed Iran with two 30,000-pound bombs, where Trump used the word obliterated, I'm quoting [7:42] him, he said, we've obliterated their nuclear capabilities. And now we're supposed to believe [7:48] just six months later that those nuclear capabilities have ramped up again. This is a total fallacy. [7:56] This war was launched under the auspices of a lie, and it continues to be fought under the auspices [8:04] of a lie. Iran was a threat to no one. The point of this war is to decimate Iran's domestic [8:13] capabilities. Why else would you bomb petrochemical plants, civilian infrastructures, bridges, steel pants, [8:21] plants, manufacturers, schools, public health centers, universities? What is the point of that? Is that to [8:30] get rid of the government? Is that to hurt the IRGC? No, that hurts the 17th largest country in the world [8:37] that is the size of Western Europe. What Israel and America want is a servile client state like they have [8:45] in Syria and Lebanon. Iran just won't allow it, and that is the problem. Okay, so let me ask you this, [8:52] John. You are quite positive about the outcomes, as you've been saying, but the reality is that Iran [8:58] effectively controls the Strait of Hormuz, which impacts global supply chains and oil. At the same [9:04] time, the US, we've spoken about it, has imposed this blockade on Iran's ports and is planning further [9:09] economic sanctions. But so there's a standoff here, right? There's a standoff who really holds the [9:15] cards, the US or Iran. It's not a clear victory for the United States under the circumstances. [9:21] Well, you know, Samir, there you go again, right? We're trying to debate the facts, and you're calling [9:28] us, you're calling our Department of War Secretary a drunkard, and you're calling us a white Christian [9:35] nation. Yeah, we are Christian. I'm a Catholic. Yeah, that's that's fine. I'm a Christian. You got me on [9:40] the Christian thing. I do believe in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So you got me on that. But [9:51] look, here's the here's the bottom line. First of all, as far as the bombings you talked about, [9:56] you know, there's a there's a word for that. It's called war. See, we're in a war. And when you're [10:02] in a war, you bomb and people die, right? So we're in a war. And these things are going to happen. [10:08] As far as whether or not they they have uranium, they can have a bomb. One of the main thing we've [10:15] said is, hey, we can end this tomorrow. If you let us in, inspect everything and take out the [10:19] uranium, the enriched uranium. And they refuse to do that. Obviously, they were working on a nuclear [10:25] bomb. That's why they won't give it up. Otherwise, this thing would already been over. As far as the [10:31] Straits of Hormuz, look, they don't have a single card here. As soon as we go in there, we take these [10:36] islands. That thing's done. We're going to run the Straits. It's over. Right. So and as far as a [10:43] client state, nobody's talking about that. We don't want the IRGC to have access to a nuclear bomb [10:50] so that they can threaten the globe and do blackmail or annihilate Paris. I mean, that's what they're [10:59] going to do. So we can't allow that. And if they didn't have it, they let us in and take out what [11:04] they don't have. So your argument doesn't make any sense. OK, so Samira, I know you want to respond [11:09] to that, but I must ask you this. Three ships were reportedly attacked in the past week by Iran [11:14] in the Strait of Hormuz. And this is after the U.S. extended the ceasefire. An advisor to Iran's main [11:21] negotiator said on X, and I quote, Trump's ceasefire extension means nothing and that the continuation [11:27] of the siege is no different from bombardment and must be met with a military response. It does [11:34] seem as if Iran is no longer interested in talking. Look, Iran, let's back up a bit here because [11:42] Iran was negotiating and they were bombed during those negotiations. That happened in June and it [11:49] happened in February and then again it happened in March. People seem to have a little bit of amnesia [11:57] about this. It is the United States here that is not the good faith actor, the two real estate agents [12:03] that are negotiating one of the biggest deals that apparently encompasses the entire world, [12:10] including Paris. This is the clown show that we're dealing with here. Israel and the United States [12:18] here are not good faith actors or negotiators. All they want is to be able to control not only the [12:25] straits of Hormuz, they want to control Iran's domestic capabilities. The facts are that Iran, [12:33] unlike Israel, is a signatory to the nonproliferation treaty. The facts are that Iran and Iranians have a [12:41] right to nuclear energy and that is what they have been producing. Now, we hear these statements, [12:48] particularly from someone like Benjamin Netanyahu, who since 1995 has been saying Iran is months away, [12:55] from a nuclear bomb. We've been doing this for 20 years. When are we going to stop this pretending? [13:03] Okay, John, let me ask you this. There's a lot of discussion over whether Israel dragged the United [13:09] States into this war. I want to just make reference to what the former Secretary of State and somebody [13:15] who was central to the Iran deal that was negotiated during the Obama era, John Kerry. He recently said [13:22] that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been lobbying the United States to go to war with [13:28] Iran. And he said, I quote, President Obama refused, President Joe Biden refused, President George W. Bush [13:35] refused. The only president who agreed to this, obviously, is President Trump. So what are your [13:42] thoughts? Former presidents refused to go to war and this one didn't. First of all, nobody cares what John Kerry [13:49] says. The JCPOA is completely discredited. It did nothing. Benjamin Netanyahu did not talk President [13:57] Trump into doing anything. Remember, we had President Trump 1.0. He was equally as able to talk to [14:07] Netanyahu and he didn't talk to him anything. So nobody's telling Trump what to do here. He's got his own [14:13] advisers telling him what is going on. He doesn't want the IRGC and the Iranian regime, the murderous [14:22] regime. And that's what they are. They're a murderous regime. They've murdered hundreds of thousands of their [14:27] own people. Look, that's that's their business. You guys want to stand around while they're hanging. [14:32] Well, that number just keeps going up. Hit the millions. And they're machine gunning down. [14:37] Hundreds of thousands. If you guys want to tolerate that, not my business. I'm not here asking for [14:43] regime change. I could care less who runs around. You already had regime change, according to Trump. [14:49] I care about, well, I care about them not having a bomb. That's it. Obviously, they were working on it [14:58] close enough. So the cost of that is incalculable. So President Trump made this decision. [15:04] So obviously, this decision wasn't made in a day. It was not to placate another prime minister of [15:10] another country. President said 50 years of this is enough. I'm going to end it. And that's what he's [15:16] going to do. Samira, last thoughts. Look, as I come back to this, what we're all subject to, [15:23] this is an administration that is unhinged, erratic and chaotic. And it's bringing the rest of the world [15:30] into its dirty little fold. You talked about President Trump 1.0. We didn't have Hexeth [15:37] during 1.0. This is an unhinged department of war, as it's now called. And the fact is that since [15:44] February, we've seen four military commanders fired in the U.S. administration. And that speaks [15:52] volumes about what is going on right now. John? I mean, now you're going to run our war [16:00] department, Samira. I mean, I really like being out with you. I'm not trying to run the war department. [16:05] I'm just speaking facts. You want to decide what military commanders we have from a foreign land. [16:12] It's never happened. It's never happened like this, ever. And that's because there are people who know [16:19] this is a mistake. It's a massive mistake. Your favorite word is unhinged is your favorite word. [16:25] Let me tell you what's unhinged. When the Iranian government is murdering tens and tens of thousands [16:33] of their own people. I thought it was hundreds of thousands. Is it now tens? I don't care. How do you get more [16:39] unhinged than that? I mean, these are crazy people running this country. They're all crazy. And so we don't want [16:47] them to get a bomb. And they're not going to get one under this president's watch. And there's [16:52] certainly not going to be billions of dollars being flown in there on pallets so they can then [16:57] fund the Houthis and their other terrorists. They were nowhere near a bomb. They were nowhere near a bomb. [17:02] That is a lie, what you're saying. They were nowhere near a bomb. Well, they give up the Iranians. [17:08] The head of the IAEA said that in January. He said it in June. Somebody pays it in the IAEA. [17:14] Remember? It was obliterated. These are bureaucratic [17:18] globalist organizations. Okay. You think we stand around and worry about what the U.N. says? We could [17:23] give a rat's tail. What we're interested in. Look, if you weren't going to get a bomb. Of course not. [17:27] You've decimated international law. You don't care about anything. We'll leave it today then. You don't care about [17:34] them not having a bomb. You want the oil. You want everything. And that's it. You kill. And you will kill [17:40] whomever and whatever stands in your way. That is who you are. That is who you have always been. [17:46] Samira Moedin, thank you very much for joining us on Upfront. And John Friedrichs, thank you for your time. [17:52] Thank you. I enjoyed it. Thank you.