'It's a war crime': Veterans react to Trump's Iran presser

[0:00] and joining us now ms now reporter alex tabbitt who's been talking to veterans in miami [0:05] michael steele general barry mccaffrey peter baker and kian tajbox are still here with us [0:11] alex tell us what was their reaction to that well we've been hearing a varied reaction a mixed [0:18] reaction from many of the veterans who are here at american legion post 31. there are about 170 [0:24] veterans who frequent this watering hole veterans from the marine corps from the air force [0:31] from the u.s navy from the coast guard and from the army 170 different vets and their family [0:39] members who come here to talk about politics to talk about life to to share their opinions and [0:46] they have a bunch of different opinions on this war and on the president i want to introduce you [0:51] to ed gorman uh ed you're an air force vet you told me you voted for president trump [0:56] three times i did what do you make of the press conference that we just watched [1:00] and the details of the press conference that we just watched and the details of the press conference [1:01] that we just watched and the details that we learned about this rescue mission i really [1:04] didn't learn a whole lot more than i already knew they threw out some numbers which i didn't know [1:09] about but other than real details as to how this came about i didn't really learn a whole lot and [1:17] have you told me that if you were a reporter in that press conference you would want to know what [1:22] the goal of this war is did you get any light on that question no no i did not ed thank you so much [1:36] rick shemek rick uh is an air force vet as well he's also the commander here rick we heard [1:42] president trump uh being asked about blowing up civilian infra infrastructure the bridges and the [1:49] power plants and he argued that's not a war crime i mean what do you make of president trump's [1:54] rhetoric on that issue do you think that is the way the commander-in-chief should be conducting [1:59] himself in this war i'm totally against it it's not an it's not it's a war crime i mean how do you [2:06] win a war by destroying the country it's just he even said it it would take years to rebuild the [2:14] infrastructure that he wants to blow up tomorrow so let's hope they negotiate and this never [2:20] happens and rick i also heard when secretary hagseth was praising president donald trump [2:26] about this rescue mission saying that this rescue mission couldn't have been done without him [2:32] here we go again what do you make of secretary hagseth and his leadership right now [2:38] it's the same as before he's a cheerleader he's a cheerleader but i was impressed by general kane [2:44] and by uh them telling us in cia uh the details of the rescue i was very impressed that was very [2:53] american thing to do well rick thank you so much as you can hear antonia there's patriotism there's [3:01] also a lot of questions that a lot of these veterans are still asking are still wondering as [3:10] we go into the second month antonia incredible reporting alex thank you michael mr chairman i [3:15] want to go to you and get your reaction to what we just learned there from the veterans that alex [3:21] tabbitt was talking to look uh you you have to have mad respect for our veterans i think they [3:27] were honest in their assessment i think they were correct in their assessment uh we have not learned [3:31] anything new uh in terms of uh what the end game is uh again the goal posts have moved uh we'll see [3:41] what the next 24 hours will bring i mean they're all still wondering okay you are our primary [3:46] target what are we doing to increase the number of veterans that we are reaching out to is that [3:49] a question of who's going to be fighting in the next 24 hours i think this is something that i [3:52] had a lot of conversations with the president about for me but i think that's where all of this [3:56] discussion comes into play is you know there's a lot of debate and i think that's what there's a [4:00] lot of talk about how we're going to have a wonderful had a lot of debate and i think that's [4:05] going to have a wonderful conversation about what our veterans are going to have and i'm not going [4:08] to let that start in the middle of our conversation today is this um you know you don't win in the war [4:10] you don't win in the war [4:11] you don't win in the war [4:11] is talking about from my perspective comes from an individual who has a sort of a video game view [4:18] of how all this should play out and for him will play out. But the reality on the ground is very [4:24] different. And I think earlier to General McCaffrey's point and others about the disclosure [4:30] of sort of methods and sources for how our military performs, Donald Trump likes to brag. [4:38] He likes to brag to show that, oh, I'm in the room and I know stuff you don't know. So let me [4:44] tell you stuff you don't know. Well, you know what, Mr. President, some of that stuff you should [4:48] just keep your mouth shut on because we don't need to know it. Because if we know it, then that [4:53] means our enemies know it. And the next time a service member goes down, the result could be [5:00] very, very different because they know now your methods. General, I want to go to you to get your [5:06] reaction to the president disclosing some of that methodology, [5:09] but also, [5:10] just more broadly to the fact that we're approaching this deadline tomorrow night. He has [5:14] doubled down on it, not walked it back at all. He used the term back to the Stone Ages. Again, [5:21] he described the entire country as potentially being taken out all in one night. He described [5:27] every power plant burning and exploding. He described different timelines, whether it would [5:34] take 20 years potentially for them to rebuild or even 100 years for them to rebuild their country [5:39] after what he is thinking. [5:40] There's no way he's thinking about what the President is doing right now. He's just talking about [5:47] what he actually has to do, what he must do to make sure every country is safe and that he has [5:50] the power to change what he wants to do. He's talking about the way things are changing in [5:52] local conditions and the way of doing to them. General, are we at a precarious moment here? [5:56] Well, that's for sure. I think we're in great peril as a nation. The civilian leadership, in [6:02] the absence of input from Congress, is leaving us at the whims of policy by dictate. But, look, [6:08] flyer was professional. It was complex. It was daring. It was successful. It's a comment on the [6:16] professionalism of the United States Air Force, the CIA, the joint JSOC forces that went into the [6:24] ground. Absolutely magnificent. And it is common. We always go after our missing in action. So that [6:33] was good. And the rest of the conference, two comments. One was, the president sounds a little [6:39] bit unhinged, jumping from one subject to another. It's somewhat of a babble factor, anger, attacking [6:48] in the media in the room, attacking former presidents. Astonishing to hear it. The other [6:54] thought, I got to tell you, I've been in thousands of meetings in my life, business, military, [7:01] politicians. [7:03] Not for profit. I've never heard a group of people who are so apple-kissing, groveling in [7:12] their veneration of the leader, except possibly Kim Jong-un. It's really embarrassing as a [7:20] professional soldier for me to say that. [7:25] Keon, I want to go to you next, because you are an Iranian-American. I can't really imagine what [7:30] it would be like to hear someone saying they want to send my [7:34] president to the United States Air Force. [7:35] Back to the Stone Ages, the prospect of a hundred years worth of work to rebuild, [7:42] wanting to have every power plant up in flames. For you, what was going through your mind as you [7:47] were listening to this press conference, seeing the president's rhetoric and his posturing? [7:53] Well, Antonia, I think the first thing that struck me when I heard that [7:57] was I was not hearing a clear distinction being made by the president that the targets [8:05] that the military is going to be using, the military is going to be using, the military is going to be [8:06] using, the military would attack, would be carefully chosen, would be discerning that they would be [8:15] related to the military capacity of the country, and that they would, of course, go out of their way [8:24] to avoid civilian targets, areas, and infrastructure. And I just didn't hear that. There was a question, I think, from a reporter. [8:36] to avoid civilian targets, areas, and infrastructure. And I just didn't hear that. There was a question, I think, from a reporter. [8:37] asking him specifically about that, and whether, indeed, the U.S. military would make this clear distinction. [8:48] And his answer was vague. His answer was not clear. Now, my hope, so that really worries me. [8:59] I mean, I've lived in Tehran. There are two Irans. There is an Iran, which is being, [9:07] you're going to have to go to a criminal universization of the Iran organization that's [9:10] bestowing majority of the Iranian population that's being ruled by really, a fanatic repressive [9:17] dictatorial regime, which is holding the the Iranian Population hostage. But there is Iran of [9:25] 80-90 million people who have extremely well developed institutions. You know, Iran is held as one of the highest [9:33] performing public health bureaucracies in the entire Middle East. And you can let me put it some other way, [9:37] East that provides wonderful public health services. Now, these aren't part of the repressive [9:42] apparatus, but they are hospitals, they are the training grounds for all the nurses and so on and [9:50] so forth. And similarly, in terms of transportation and networks and all the other things which are [9:56] the everyday life of a country. So I would have hoped to see a greater discernment and, let's say, [10:05] insistence that, of course, we will try to do that. Now, having said that, I am a professor [10:15] of international relations, so I do have to have a very realist hat, unemotional hat. [10:21] Two things come to mind, which I hope to be the case. One is that this is a kind of bluster, [10:28] this is a kind of exaggerated rhetoric, a kind of hyperbole that President Trump has used, [10:35] and he's... [10:35] He's used it before about blowing North Korea into smithereens or whatever it is. [10:41] And so I think there is some of that, and I hope that doesn't lead into military targets. [10:48] The second point I would make, and this is a sort of hard-nosed analysis, is that, in fact, [10:55] the question of infrastructure, and I am assuming the military is taking this very seriously, [11:01] is that it depends on what kind of infrastructure. That is to say, [11:05] some military, some dual-use civilian targets are actually permitted under the laws of war, [11:13] and that's something we can talk about more later. [11:15] Absolutely, more later. It does require intense study. Military lawyers very much have to be [11:20] involved in that. It's not something the president is supposed to decide by social media posts. [11:24] I will note that the Iranian Red Crescent reports that 67,000 civilian sites, more than 67,000 [11:31] civilian sites, have already been struck, including schools, health facilities. There's [11:35] the British... [11:35] that the president himself has bragged about, essentially. A music school was struck the other [11:40] day. Peter, I want to go to you on this. You're hearing Kian describe the bluster, and he's very [11:48] much right that that is sort of a routine with the president, not necessarily a surprise from [11:53] him in a press conference like this. But I do have to wonder, you also hear from the veterans that [11:59] Alex Tabet spoke to, including one who voted for him three times, that this is not playing well [12:05] with them. [12:05] Politically, for Republicans, both down the ballot, who are going to have to defend what [12:11] we're hearing from the president today, what he may do tomorrow, and the continued ramifications [12:16] domestically that may come, how they are metabolizing all of this and what they're [12:21] supposed to do with it? [12:23] Well, it's a good question. I mean, look, the president likes to talk tough. He likes to beat [12:27] his chest. As Canada said, it's possible this is just bluster, and the professional military [12:31] wouldn't go along with, you know, things that are explicitly war crimes. Remember, this is the [12:37] olden days. And the dispute, though, that he had with those six members of Congress who put out a [12:41] video last year saying, reminding the armed forces that you're not supposed to obey illegal orders. [12:47] He tried to prosecute them, the president did, tried to prosecute them for stating [12:50] the law as it currently stands. That got thrown out of court because there's no basis for [12:57] criminally prosecuting people for that. But that shows you where the president's mind says. [13:03] Now, the officers around him, the generals around him, they know that they're just going to work. [13:07] crime and what's not a war crime. And the question becomes, how much is this bluster, [13:11] how much has this become a confrontation with those officers? [13:15] We don't know what's happening. The conversation is happening between the Pentagon and the White [13:18] House right now. We do know the secretary of defense just fired the Army chief of staff. [13:23] We don't know exactly why. We have had some reporting suggesting some possibilities there [13:28] about promotions and interference and so forth. But what we have is a uniformed military officer [13:34] corps leadership that is very devoted to following the laws of war, because they spent their entire [13:40] careers learning them and incorporating them into their ethos. And I think that's a little [13:46] of what you heard in that, you know, in that hall today from those interviews. [13:50] These are people who, in the military, when they were there, they were taught the laws of war. They [13:54] were taught they had to obey them. And they were taught to obey them not just because it's the [13:58] right thing to do, but also because we want other people to obey the laws of war when it comes to [14:03] our troops. If that airmen had been captured, they would have been able to do the same thing. [14:04] If they had been captured, we wouldn't count on Iran to follow the laws of war, [14:07] but we would at least have the high ground to say, you have to follow the laws of war. [14:11] And if you don't, you will pay a price. If we're seen as violating the laws of war, [14:15] at the same time, I have heard military people talk about this all the time, [14:18] we lose the ability to demand treatment, fair treatment, legal treatment of our own people.