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Let's keep this conversation going with Richard hass He is President emeritus over at the Council on Foreign Relations and a senior counselor with Centerview Partners. Richard, fantastic to have you with us. So, I mean, as evidence by what we're seeing just in the past couple of minutes, there's a lot of ambiguity over what happens next, what happens at eight pm tonight, And you know, as you watch these you know, this back and forth play out. Apparently
Aroun isn't even talking anymore at this point. I mean, what is your gut instinct about what we see transpire over the next five to twenty four hours.
Well, what's just as important as what happens tonight is what doesn't happen tonight. Clearly, the pace of diplomacy is picking up. It's not direct between Irun and the United States, but Pakistan is in a critical position. It's one of the few countries, think about it, there's good relations with the United States, with Iran and with China, so that
puts them in a special position. They've been one of the few countries that Iran has continues to ship oil to through the Strait of Hormus, and the idea that they're essentially trying to buy more time is realistic. There's no way you can get a deal done between now and eight o'clock to deal with the nuclear issue, the Straight or anything else. So to ask for a couple of weeks to maybe try to get the straight open either way, I think.
That's essentially a good sign.
In large part, I'll be straight with you, I simply don't see the upside of the United States carrying.
Out the threats that President Trump made.
I simply don't see what, if anything positive we get for it. But I do think it could lead to a much more destructive, wider war.
So maybe we do see some more time bought before eight pm tonight. But you think about it, We've seen a lot of extensions over the past couple of weeks, and all the while we've seen the rhetoric really on both sides escalate, And certainly that social media posted to be got from President Trump this morning maybe takes the
cake there. But when it comes to the off ramp, I think that's where a lot of people struggle what the theoretical off ramp would be given that you know, tensions are so high right now.
Look, there's any number of potential off ramps here. There's probably three priorities. One is to stop the war, Two is to open the straight. Three is to place some sort of a verifiable ceiling on Iran's nuclear program.
Those are the three goals.
Again, there's no way you can get them done quickly, but I would think the most urgent is to get the straight open and to get some type of a cease fire or hopefully more than that, and then over time, I think you can address the nuclear program through negotiations, and I think that's all optimistic but not unrealistic.
Well, I am curious about just kind of the deliberative strategy, if at all, that we're seeing out of the US side of this, and to who's really driving this, because there seems to be a lot of reports basically saying with military leaders, I guess trying to push back on some of the requests that Trump is making behind closed doors, not in defiance, but just you know, I guess a nod to the reality of how they need to carry
out their missions here. We know that whatever I guess, ballistic missile drone capabilities, they have have not been completely eliminated based on the couple of jets that we lost over the weekend. Here should that be a mission that maybe should be a little bit more at the forefront to make sure that that threat is eliminated.
Eliminated as too ambitious. Roan can continue to produce drones. Look what Ukraine does. Every basement is a drone factory. So the idea that you're going to eliminate their physical military capability to interfere with shipping or their ability to hit a desalinization plan or an energy refinery simply not possible.
Missiles you'll never find all of them.
You can degrade, you can diminish military capability, but if your goal is to effectively disarm, then you're talking about perpetual war.
There has been a lot of debate, and I'm going to get too much into the ethics of it, but at least from a strategy standpoint, this idea of some of the degradation we've seen to civilian infrastructure, The idea that even if we somehow win this war and we somehow get the Iranian regime to capitulate, there is some concern here that we have maybe demoralize a lot of the rank and file people on the ground, who, in theory, we would need to some degree to support whatever the US's aims are post war.
Well, first of all, we're not going to get the Iranians to capitulate.
They've got a lot of leverage.
Hopefully we can get them at some point to agree to a piece at most to compromise. But the idea that they're going to capitulate I put off to the side.
I put off to the side any hope of a regime change.
If anything, the regime's probably in a stronger place now than I was five weeks ago. Look, in any foreign policy endeavor, particularly in war, you've got to set achievable, reasonable objectives. God, there has to be some close connection between your ends and the means that.
You're prepared to employ to bring them about.
So the most ambitious aims are simply non starters. Realistic aims are the ones I talked about to put a ceiling on Iran's nuclear program, probably through the diplomacy, and to reopen the straight or fore moods.
I think those are both essential. The good news is they're potentially feasible.
As well, and Richard, I want to go back to what you said that you know, if anything, the Iranian regime is stronger now, in a stronger position, because you think about again what we got from the President this morning posting on truth Social that in his view, we have complete and total regime change. It sounds like you disagree with that.
Well, it's preposterous.
You still have the revolution in charge of Iran that came in seventy nine. Some individuals killed, obviously, from the Ayatola to several military and intelligence leaders, but the regime, the system is still intact. You've got political leadership, clerical leadership, You've got a military leadership. You have the regular army, you have the Revolutionary Guards, you have the besieged, the pew of the neighborhood community, people with who go out
in the streets with sticks. This is a regime that's heavily institutionalized. This is not Venezuela. We're not talking about removing a slice and everything crumbles. This is a deeply institutionalized, institutionalized, religious, political, and military establishment. So we should for the time being accept the unfortunate fact that the regime is going to stay. The Iranian people are going to be the losers, and we've got to deal with the government we have, not the one we want.
Do you think it's a plausible scenario that the US actually walks away from this.
Well, again, the President could declare victory and quote unquote walk away.
I think that would be a big mistake. That's what I would call. We broke it, you own it.
We have the challenge of opening up the Strait, we have the challenge of the nuclear program. So I think walking away from it, quite honestly, would be irresponsible.
The good news is there's a lot of space.
Between walking away from it on one hand, and doing what the President talked about bombing bridges and power plants. There's a lot of space for certain limited military operations. More important, there's a lot of space for diplomacy that should be our focus.
Richard, always a pleasure, always great insights. Richard Haass, President Emeritus at the Council on Foreign Relations, now a senior counselor with Center View Partners.