The Iran War, Explained: Admiral Stavridis on Strategy, David Boies on Politics

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From the Wall Street Journal, headline US allies work on reopening

Hormuz after Trump pressure.

The lead of the story says the UK and European Union said they were discussing options

for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the vital waterway that Iran has effectively closed.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the UK was looking at deploying robot mind hunters.

The comments came after President Trump said that he and his team had asked seven countries

to help police the Strait.

Trump said that for any that decline, we will remember.

Admiral James Stavridis is a retired four-star US naval officer,

currently partner in Vice Chair of Carlyle,

12th Chair of the Rockefeller Foundation Board,

previously served for five years as the 12th Dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy

at Tufts and he led NATO in global operations from 2009 to 2013 as the 16th Supreme Allied Commander.

Admiral, welcome back, you sir are a combatant commander.

So tell me what does an operation like the administration is now contemplating look like?

It would be under US command, it would not be a NATO mission, Michael, it's important to remember

that this is beyond the the remit of a NATO operation. What this could be under is similar to what

I commanded in 2009 to 2013 just over a decade ago, the counter-piracy mission.

So think US three-star Admiral in command, in Bahrain, and that individual works for the Commander

of US Central Command, whom we've been hearing a lot about lately, Admiral Brad Cooper.

So three-star Navy Admiral Bahrain, probably a two-star British Admiral, maybe French Admiral,

the French are talking seriously about sending Charles De Gaulle, their aircraft carrier,

but a two-star probably from a European nation, and then a series of what are called Commodores,

these are commanders who have control over two or three individuals ships.

So if you think about the nations who've been approached, it's the nations who compose NATO,

but realistically, France, UK, Germany, Italy have immediately deployable ships.

It could be combined with a European Union commander, that might be the deputy,

the two-star who's currently commanding the EU forces, which are over in the Red Sea.

So you put all that together, you give them, you probably need a dozen to fifteen major

warships, you give them the kind of unmanned vehicles support that the Brits are talking about.

We also have that, we call it Task Force 59. So you put all that together, it's a maritime operation,

and you tell them, okay, go to it in the Strait of Hormuz, and the last piece of the puzzle,

Michael is, you add the minesweeping capability.

US has three lateral combat ships, the Brits have four minesweepers, the Saudis have three minesweepers,

other European nations have very good minesweeping capability.

That would be the front edge, cleared the Strait, take out the remaining Iranian resistance.

I'm painting a very simplistic picture. Every step of what I just said is fraught with

political, economic, and above all military challenge.

Admiral Stavridis, what you haven't mentioned are boots on the ground.

The USS Tripoli is headed to the Middle East, it has Marines attached on board.

What does that mean? Does it mean that there'll be some type of beach incursions so that the

shoreline is protected? If we stop and think about what US Marines do and are very good at,

they seize and control territory. Think US Marines, second world war,

you ogima, all of those kind of major operations, seizing islands across the Pacific.

It's built into the Marine DNA. So what are the Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf that could

be taken? There are two to the south. Abu Musa, there's another one down to the south,

I'm sailed by all these. But the one the Marines are going to be focused on, and I'm sure are

looking at planning is of course cargyle, and that's up in the northern part of the Persian Gulf.

And it's vital, Michael, because it's the economic heart of the Iranian economy.

So I think the Marines are more likely to be used to threaten or to actually seize cargyle,

but your point is well taken. If there were individual pain points along the land,

shore, say ballistic missiles, some kind of artillery even, minesweeping facilities. Yes,

the Marines could go ashore and seize those as well. Final point, the Marines don't only use

across the beach, small crap, like you'd think of saving private, Ryan, modern version.

They also, and believe me, they prefer to go by helicopter. And the Tripoli and other ships

in the region have plenty of helicopter capability to get in the shore also.

How can you prevent against an Iranian drone or missile? Because all it would take is one from

the shoreline. Yeah, I often say to people who will point out quite correctly, and I was part of it.

In the late 1980s, we escorted ships in and out of the Arabian Gulf. One big difference,

and Michael Smirconis just drew a line under it, is cheap drones that can be thrown in massive

numbers at the task force. So how do you prevent it? Well, the ships have a variety of different

systems that can knock down drones, close-in weapons systems. They have surface-to-air missiles.

But the key to stopping the drones is not to stop the individual drone that's coming in.

That's last ditch. What you want to do is find where the drones are coming from and

destroy that facility. And even better, and this, of course, is what US Central Command is doing

overall in the campaign. You destroyed the military industrial complex. Where are they building

them? Where are they putting them together? What are the critical logistic nodes as they are

transported? Where are they fueled? Where does that fuel come from? You understand that supply chain

that ends up with a drone hitting your ship. You reverse engineer it and you kill it. That's

easier said than done. But that's how you would protect against. And here's one other

interesting, almost ironic factor in the anti-drone war. Who's the best in the world that's

fighting drones right now? Well, that would be Ukraine because they've been doing it now for four

years plus. So the Ukrainians are in the midst of gearing up to provide additional anti-drone

technology and capability. They built little drones that are even cheaper than the Iranian drones

to knock down the Iranian-style drones. And they've been doing that because Iran has been supplying

these bigger drones to Russia for years. The Ukrainians know a lot, the Ukrainians know a lot

about that. I hope they quickly are brought into the fight here. From the Washington Post, Admiral

Stavridis, this is the Smirconish podcast from Sirius XM. When a trip to the hospital or pharmacy

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Syria's XM channel 124 and anytime on the Syria's XM app from the Washington Post Admiral

Stavridis. After two weeks of war against Iran, President Trump may soon be ready to declare victory,

but he confronts a challenge. Tehran also gets a vote and what follows is then a big picture

assessment of where things stand in a very base sense. Are we winning?

We are winning militarily in that the quad pack of objectives that the administration has

sort of settled on after moving around on a couple different fronts in terms of messaging,

but the quad pack is destroy their navy, destroy their ballistic missile capability, take out their

Iranian guard, their militias, and get after the remaining nuclear program, which I think

really boils down at this minute to their their stash of enriched uranium. Three out of those four

are basically shattered at this point. They can still launch some drones, they can still launch

some ballistic missiles, but we haven't gotten after the nuclear material. That's a very tough

nut to crack. So put all that together, I think militarily the campaign is like an eight out of

ten, maybe even a nine out of ten. There have been some some terrible mistakes that the

tragic attack on the girl school. We've had some two air refuelers perhaps have both had significant

damage when crash was lost 14, 13, 14 people. So yeah, there are tragic mistakes and missteps

here, but the campaign is somewhere between an eight or nine out of ten. That's the good news.

The bad news is overall the strategic campaign of taking down the regime of keeping the

straight of four moves open, ensuring Iran cannot continue to conduct mischief all around the

region. The Houthis are still in the field. It's not going as well, and I think that's the

dilemma that President Trump is wrestling with. He'd love to disengage from this war. He doesn't

have a signature accomplishment in it as yet. Two final questions for Admiral Stavridis. One,

do you see parallels? This this may seem like a foolish analogy, but it popped into my head,

and I told the audience I would ask you, any analogy between the Soviets in 79 in Afghanistan

and what's going on with the U.S. in Iran, insofar as it was an asymmetric battle. Here was the big

bad Russian bear coming into a force that was not so sophisticated, and yet was able over time

just to hang on and endure and finally cause the Soviets to give up. Yes, and we're in the midst

of March madness. You know the expression, hang around the hoop. Just continue to throw up

whatever you can. Engage, show you're not defeated, and sometimes an opponent will just

peter out and lose interest and walk away. The other obvious analogy, Michael, is you know this

is Vietnam. The big bad Russian bear, how about the big grand American eagle? We the big countries

get bogged down, and because it means so much more to the people of that nation than it does to

the big Russian bear, the big American eagle, the big Chinese dragon. Great powers have vast

interests, and when challenged hard in a small place, they can lose interest and walk away,

and I'll conclude with this. The third and obvious parallel is Afghanistan, where the United

States dominated Afghanistan militarily for two decades, and then finally, the Taliban were able

to using essentially asymmetric warfare with their flip flops and their AK-47s and their

hit and run tactics were able to cause us ultimately to lose interest and walk away. We need

to be careful not to let that happen here, and that doesn't mean getting bogged down in a huge

land war, but it does mean completing additional objectives, open the straight of our moves, figure

out how to get that control over that radioactive material. I think those are the two big ones on

the table. Final question, different subject, it pertains to military spending. Three or four days

ago, headline from CNN, use it or lose it, Pentagon spending binge set record in final days.

I'm sure you saw the stories. They talk about king crab and lobster tails and steaks.

What can you educate in two minutes or less about military spending, the Pentagon budget,

and why a situation like this arises? It arises every single year. At the end of the given fiscal

year, there's typically a challenge because it's almost impossible to manage $900 billion, the

largest organizational budget in the world full stop of one entity controlled by a single chain

of command. It's almost impossible, I'd say impossible, to manage that down to really small units.

So you do end up in some cases with shortages of funding and in some cases, surpluses,

and it's then incumbent upon the individual commanders down at the allocation levels in these

budgets to ensure that they're not spending it in ways that that strike an off note such as

you saw in that article. At the end of the day, if that article had said, and they scooped up all

that last minute money and they spent it on 22 additional standard missiles or Tomahawk missiles

or rebuilt a barracks in Washington state, that would be okay. An article like that hits the same

way you and I are old enough to remember the $250 hammers and all of this is of a piece. It's just

the size, scope, and scale of that budget makes it understandably very difficult, doesn't excuse

mistakes, but it shows more attention needs to be put on the Pentagon's inability to complete

and a simple audit. This is a pretty example of why that is. I thought it was a $70 toilet seat,

but your recollection is probably probably better than mine. No, no, it's both. It's both. You can

Google, Google both toilet seat and hammer and Pentagon, and I think you'll get an outrageous

story on both of them. Admiral, thank you. As always, we really value you and your contribution.

My pleasure, Michael. Talks in. Bye bye. Have a good day. Admiral James Stavridis is a former

Supreme Allied commander of NATO at Stavridis J or Admiral Stav. I was just on the website today.

Admiral Stav dot com. Admiral Stav dot com. You know today's poll question at sporkanish.com.

Are we winning the war? Are we winning the war? You heard his answer militarily. He gives it an

eight or a nine out of 10, destroying their navy, their ballistic missiles, the Iranian guard,

hopefully getting our arms wrapped around the enriched uranium. But of course, there's the whole

political side and what if they can just hang on like the Vietnamese or the Afghans, either in

79 when it was the Russians or post 9-11 when it was the United States asymmetric warfare,

sort of words of the day or the words of our time. This is the smorkanish podcast from Sirius

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David Boyz is one of the nation's brightest, most prominent trial lawyers. His client list crosses

the political divide. You remember that in 2000, he represented vice president Al Gore before

the Supreme Court in Bush v Gore. Later, he teamed up with conservative attorney Ted Olsen,

always a great guest on this program. We miss him. A former solicitor general under president

George W. Bush to challenge California's same sex marriage ban. He's also represented major

blue chip corporations like IBM and Oracle in high stakes commercial litigation. He's here today

because he just published an essay in the Wall Street Journal under the headline partisanship

on Iran is dangerous for America. It's a must read. Counselor, thank you so much for being here.

Before I even get into the thesis, I'm curious, what was the epiphany moment that caused you to say,

I need to write and to submit this to the Wall Street Journal?

I think it was shortly after the war started. I saw the divide

breaking down on a partisan basis. I was concerned that people who opposed president Trump

and who opposed this administration were not looking at the war on the merits. They were looking at

it as us against them kind of moment where we were criticizing people because they were

criticizing actions because they were being taken by people that we opposed. And I thought that

this was too important an issue not to try to come together where people who did believe that the

war was necessary. The ought to support it regardless of whether they generally supported

President Trump or not, regardless of whether they particularly admired President Trump or not.

This was a time where Americans had to focus on what was right for America, not what was right for

their particular political affiliation. And why do you perceive that it is right for America?

I think it's a very complicated issue. I think war always is. I think you have to begin with

a proposition. Do you believe it's acceptable for Iran to have nuclear weapons and the capacity

to deliver them to American cities? Every American president, a Republican or Democrat for the last

three or four decades, has said that it's not acceptable. I think the evidence is very strong and

I think we've seen some of that in this war that Iran's capacity to deliver weapons was rapidly advancing

that three or four years from now may be less. There are missile capacity, the ballistic missile

capacity, that now allows them to hit their neighbors, would allow them to hit London and Paris,

and perhaps New York and Miami. I think that as you saw that ability to deliver weapons increased

so rapidly. And you knew that they were very close. And we've said this for years. They were

very close to developing a nuclear bomb. They could do it in a matter certainly a month, some people

say a week, some people say days. And even if they hadn't didn't have a nuclear weapon, they could

load bomb with the so-called dirty bomb, which is not a nuclear device, but it contains radio

activity. If one of those hit one of our cities or hit one of our European allies cities, it would

cause enormous devastation. This is a regime that has said death to America. And it's not just

words. They've carried out terrorism as far as they could. Now that's been because of limitations

in terms of their capacity to deliver weapons. That's been limited to the Middle East. But as

their capacity to deliver weapons has increased, they become a danger not only to our allies,

but to our homeland. I think it's important for people who are evaluating David Boy's opinion

to appreciate and understand that you're typically not on the same page as the president.

Will you expand on that? I think that's fair. I think that on most issues, certainly most domestic

issues, I have been opposed to the administration's policies. I believe many of them are seriously

misguided. I think that they undercut a lot of the principles that both parties have adhered

to over time. I think some of his people that he has appointed have not reflected the character

of this country. I think that some of his appointments, we've seen an abandonment of science.

Although, in decades ago, I was Ted Kennedy's chief counsel. I'm very disappointed with a lot of

RFK Jr. has done at the health department. I think a lot of what's going on here in dangers

people's health in this country. I think in dangers, a lot of other things.

But I think that we only have one president at a time. I think that it's particularly important

that we support the president when we can. I think it's particularly important in this country

that has become as divided as it is, that we look for ways to work together. I mean, Ted Olson and I

disagreed on a lot of stuff. But when we agreed, we worked together and we were very close friends.

He was somebody who I miss not only professionally, but I miss personally.

He was, he was a wonder, this won't surprise you. He was also a wonderful radio guest.

From your words in the Wall Street Journal, quote, those of us who generally oppose Mr. Trump,

but who recognize the threat Iran poses need to support the military action, not because we owe

anything to Mr. Trump, but because we owe it to ourselves, our country, and our children.

If we oppose the war and succeeded in pressuring Mr. Trump to curtail it before the mission is

accomplished, we would have the satisfaction of defeating someone we generally oppose, which might

help ourselves politically, but America would be worse for it. What has been the reaction to what

David Boyz published on this issue from those that you were trying to reach, those meaning who

typically oppose Trump, but you were trying to say to them, this transcends the issue.

I think it's been mixed. I think there are a number of people who have, you know, said to me

or a longtime Democrat, you've opposed President Trump in the last election. You can't be happy

with some of the things he's done. How could you support him? But I think a majority of the people

that have reached out to me. And of course, that's not a good sample because the people that reach

out to you generally are people that are a little supportive of you. But there's been a very, very

large, positive response to it as well. So this is thoroughly unscientific, but Saturdays when I

host a program on CNN, there's every day, but Saturday in particular, there's a poll question

of the day revolving around the day's news and you inspired Saturday's question. I don't know if

David Boyz will appreciate or think that I got right the way I boiled it down to a sentence,

a fragment, but I ask this should opinions on the war in Iran transcend one's view of President

Trump. Let me stop there. Do you think that's a fair summation of what you were trying to get

I think that's a very fair statement. Okay. So 66,220 and typically our vote results come from a

left of center direction. I was surprised 63.99% of more than 66,000 who voted not scientific because

I don't control who's voting. But nevertheless, 63.99% agreed with that statement. And I've been

taking calls on today's program in furtherance of this. I was heartened by that because like you,

I think there are issues that transcend the here and now of are you for or against this person

and the wrote response to Trump both from those who are detractors and those who are devotional

I find frustrating. I do too and I think it's a reflection of how divided this country is.

And as I say in the article, I think I think the Republicans bear certainly their large share

of the responsibility for this kind of divisiveness. You'll recall at the beginning of the Obama

administration, the Republican Senate, George leader Mitch McConnell said his job was to make

Barack Obama one term president. I think when you approach people trying to attack them because

of their political affiliation as opposed to their ideas of what they want to do,

you begin to undermine the kind of country this has been. I mean, when I grew up, people were

proud to say, I vote for the man, not the party. Now in those days, the presidential candidates

were always men. And I think that reflected a sense that we want to work together when we can.

We may disagree with somebody seven times out of ten, but those three times when we don't disagree

with them, we ought to be trying to work with them for this country. And I think that's particularly

true when you talk about international affairs. I think it's particularly true that when we're talking

about our national security, we need to focus on what we think is right for this country, regardless

of who is out of getting it. You saw the Republicans condemn Bill Clinton for what they call

nation-building and then George W. Bush came in and undertook the greatest nation-building attempt

in probably our history. So we've got a history, unfortunately, over the last few decades of abandoning

the sense that we try to work together on where we agree. We fight, we disagree vigorously

when we do disagree. But when we agree, we historically have, and I think, need to try to work

together. I think you stated accurately in the journal piece, the truth of the veracity of our

division used to end at the water's edge that was never entirely correct. And Jeff Greenfield

wrote about that several years ago and pointed out that if you look at the data, it's when we're

attacked Pearl Harbor, September 11th, that yes, then we unite. So we do have our division and

we've already, we've always had our division. In the journal piece, the argument that I

thought that you made that should most resonate with Trump's detractors is that if this doesn't

resolve well, when a Democrat succeeds him, she or he is going to have to deal with Iran again.

Every American president over the last 30 years has left his successor with a more dangerous

Iran and a more complicated problem to solve. Because every American president has, by not

stopping Iran, has enabled Iran to get stronger. And the stronger Iran is, the more difficult it is

to diminish its capacity to attack the United States. And I think that one of the things that

regardless of whether you supported him or support him, one of the things I think you have to

recognize is that President Trump has done the right thing here and it was not easy.

This is a president who does not like war. I don't think any president likes war. But I think

President Trump particularly doesn't want war. War undermines the things that he really wants to do.

And I think you saw that in his first administration. I think you've seen that in the in the rhetoric

here. He likes to negotiate. He likes to threaten. He likes to force people to do things.

I mean, take in Venezuela. He tried to change the administration by taking out President Maduro,

but he didn't want to invade the country. He didn't want to undertake a large bombing campaign

with the potential for civilian casualties. This is a decision. He didn't come too easily. And it's not

a political, the good decision for him. He recognizes that. The administration recognizes that.

So it was a difficult decision. And if you, as I do, believe it was a necessary decision,

I think it's important to give him support. And if you look historically, as I say in the paper,

we particularly unite when our homeland is attacked. But if you take the instance of the Korean war,

President Truman undertook a very unpopular defense of South Korea, something that I think

people in retrospect believe was critically important in terms of stopping the spread of communism.

That was unpopular. It probably prevented him from running for re-election.

But you didn't find the opposition broken down about party lines.

There were Republicans as well as Democrats that supported what he was doing. And there were

Republicans and Democrats that opposed what he was doing. But I think that the key difference there

is that we weren't broken down so clearly on partisan lines. And that permitted him to finish the

job. Can I say, I think you're, you've made a more articulate case for what the administration

is doing than has the administration. So that's why I appreciate it. When an independent voice

comes along and studies something as complicated as this and reduces it to writing, it catches my

eye. And I know it interests our listeners and viewers. So thank you, David Boyz, for what you

wrote. And for the privilege of speaking to you about it today, I really appreciate it.

Well, thank you. It's been good to talk to you. I appreciate your approach to this.

I appreciate people who are trying to talk about the issues on the merits.

Thank you for saying that. Appreciate it. David Boyz, ladies and gentlemen, the piece.

It's already been linked at smurconish.com. Partisanship on Iran is dangerous for America. That's

the headline. Trump is doing the right thing for the US. And we Democrats should judge the war

on the merits. That's the sub headline for the essay.

When a trip to the hospital or pharmacy leads to a bill, no one saw coming. We're here to help.

Your health insurance provider is working every day with hospitals and drug companies,

so families can get the care they need at prices they can afford. That's why we're investing

in new technologies that make care easier to access, more predictable, and more affordable.

Helping bring down high hospital and prescription drug prices. There's more to do and we'll

continue fighting for you. Few things are as uplifting as the greatest moments in sports.

And nothing brings us together quite like Team USA at the Olympic Winter Games.

From NBC Universal's iconic storytelling to the innovative technology across

Exfinity and Peacock, Comcast brings the Olympic Games home to America,

sharing every moment with millions. When Team USA steps onto the world stage,

we're not just watching. We're cheering together. This winter, we're all on the same team.

Comcast, proud partner of Team USA.