Did America Win or Lose the Negotiations with Iran?

Speaker 1: Did America win or lose in the negotiations with Iran? That’s the question.

Well, there are many people—Barack Obama, for example—who said that the deal wasn’t any different than the deal he cut with the Iranians many years ago that Donald Trump opted out of. That would be a shame, wouldn’t it? Spending all those millions of dollars on the war and the bombing and not being farther ahead. There are a lot of people looking at it multiple different ways, but I have to say, nobody can really evaluate whether or not we won or lost at this point in time because what we have is a 14-point memorandum of understanding that has yet to be fleshed out with all of the rules and all of the conditions that will be part of the 14 individual points.

I would agree with many people that the 14 points listed on the memorandum of understanding don’t deviate a tremendous amount from the conditions that existed before we started a war with Iran, with several exceptions. Let me just enumerate them if you don’t mind.

First, Iran no longer has a navy. They were a threat to their neighbors and to other independent organizations—that is, non-government organizations, independent businesses, and contractors who were taking products in and out of the Strait of Hormuz. So, their navy is no longer available to harass the shipping. That’s one good thing, I think.

Uh, they no longer have an air force. Their air force was something that was a problem for several of their neighbors because Iran, with 91 million people and a tremendous amount of oil revenue, was able to invest in defense and offensive weapons. Oftentimes that meant air defense equipment to protect themselves, and it also meant aircraft that were capable of offensive operations. And that doesn’t include the drone and missile manufacturing industry that they had in the nation of Iran.

With our bombing campaign—God bless you, thank you—with our bombing campaign in the nation of Iran, most of the air force is gone. Most of the anti-aircraft or air security batteries that they had, including the radar, are gone. And most of the manufacturing capabilities for both drones and for missiles—whether that’s short-range missiles or ballistic missiles—most of that infrastructure has all been destroyed. So, there’s no set of circumstances under which you can say, “Oh, it’s just like it was before the war.” No, no. Iran paid a heavy price.

But I think what people are failing to understand is: what was the primary, drop-dead, got-to-have, must-have, bedrock foundational principle that Donald Trump kept talking about with the negotiations with Iran? Oh, he didn’t want to see the sunset clause come into being with nukes. So, Donald Trump’s drop-dead mission was no nuclear weapons.

Now, I don’t have the 14-point memorandum of understanding in front of me, but one of the points says Iran will not build, manufacture, design, study, or try to develop or purchase any nuclear weapons of any kind. Nor will they be allowed to develop or try to use any equipment that is meant for nuclear enrichment, whether that be for peaceful power operations or whether that be for a nuclear weapon. So, the one thing that Donald Trump absolutely insisted that he get was no nuclear capability for the nation-state of Iran. And that’s one of the 14 points.

There are others in there. For example, as you pointed out, they’re precluded from using any money they get to support terrorist proxies in their area of the world, which benefits all of the Gulf States surrounding the Middle East because the Hezbollah, Houthi, and Hamas terror groups were all problems for not only for Israel, but also for all of the nation-states in the Gulf area. So, without those terrorist groups getting funding from Iran, that’s good for everybody concerned, right, Mike?

Mike (Speaker 2): Sure is.

Speaker 1: The one thing that it says in one of the points of the 14 is that the Gulf States—important to note, not America, but the Gulf States—will combine to create a $300 billion restoration account for Iran.

Now, you know, there are people who are interpreting that bullet point to mean the Gulf States are going to give a gift, much like Barack Obama did with his $1.7 billion worth of cash on pallets in the back of an aircraft, that they were just going to give $300 billion to the nation of Iran to rebuild the country. And I don’t think that’s the way it’s going to work at all. What Donald Trump is couching this as is a redevelopment fund, if you will, being funded by the Gulf States that are going to have the other Gulf states assist Iran in rebuilding.

That’s actually, in my estimation, a brilliant move on the part of the negotiators. Because as Iran wants to build, let’s say, a new electric power plant to produce energy to produce electricity, the $300 billion fund that’s funded by the nation-states of the Gulf will actually provide a way of communication and interaction between Iran and its neighboring countries. By the very nature of them working together, it has to improve relations between the nations.

What Donald Trump keeps saying is, if the UAE or Qatar wants to invest in Iran, why not? So, if they build a power plant, and then the electric bills that pay for the electricity coming from that power plant go to Qatar or go to the UAE or any of the Gulf states, that’s—I mean, it’s not much different than investing in building a mine, building a manufacturing plant, or investing money in the stock market. You expect to get a return for the investment that you make, and that’s how Donald Trump is couching this. Is it a gift or is it an investment? It’s probably a blend of both.

But you know, as I said to Mike when we were talking, many years ago in the United States of America—that is, pre-welfare days—when a man died and he left a widow and a couple of kids, the community typically pitched in. Through a church organization or local charity organization, they made sure that the widow and children would not be destitute. They would pool their resources and make sure that food, clothes, and other necessities were given to this family who was in need. The reality of that kind of support for people in need is it builds a sense of gratitude. It builds a sense of, “I have something because my neighbors willingly gave up something to help me.” And there’s a sense of gratitude and a sense of, “I owe my neighbors a debt because of the kindness that they’ve shown me.”

With the welfare system, that kind of “I owe a debt of gratitude to my neighbors” went away. That money coming from welfare, coming from the government, became, “Hey, that’s my money. I own it. I deserve it. It’s mine. You give that to me because it’s mine.” So, there’s no sense of gratitude.

And I think that these nations that are spending this $300 billion worth of investment money into helping to rebuild the nation of Iran—I think at least, again, it’s so hard because I think like an American. I don’t think like a Middle Eastern person, and I can’t honestly tell you how they would react to one of their neighboring nation-states helping them. I only know from my perspective, and that’s a Christian background, that I would be indebted to the people that help me. And I think that the Muslim tradition has a very similar kind of thing when somebody helps you.

By the way, I should note that the nation of Iran is predominantly a Shia Muslim nation, and the Gulf States surrounding the nation of Iran are typically Sunni Muslim nations. Now, all generalizations are false, including the one that I just made, but the point I’m trying to drive home here is that Sunni and Shia Muslims have been, you know, not friendly since Muhammad died. There’s been a schism between the Muslim world, and Sunnis and Shias do not necessarily like one another. So, that’s where a lot of the conflict comes from in the Middle East—that religious difference between the two. And if the Sunnis are, in fact, through investments and loans and dollars being made available to the nation of Iran to help with their rebuilding, it is my belief that there can only be improved relations between those nations. I can’t guarantee that’s going to happen; I just believe it will.

Mike (Speaker 2): Yeah. I think one of the problems some people have—I can imagine my friend that I talk about all the time, Richie, and others, and they have legitimate problems. If we remember back during the beginning of this, the people who were uprising in Iran, what did Trump say? Do you remember what Trump said?

Speaker 1: Regime change. He said help is on the way.

Mike (Speaker 2): Yeah, that never materialized, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to. I mean, it may happen over time, but I think that’s a legitimate criticism. You know, he gets out occasionally over his skis and then sees that maybe that’s just not the practical way to go about this.

But then again, you look at the naysayers in totality. I think his view—and I’m just guessing and theorizing—is that we’re going to make it somewhat like Venezuela. You know, he didn’t go in and destroy the country. He went in, pulled the bad guy out, and just killed the one Tren de Aragua guy. I looked it up the other day, like, what’s really happening in Venezuela? You don’t hear anything on the news, right? However, they are cooperating with us. That killing of the Tren de Aragua guy was a cooperative mission, a joint effort between the United States and their internal folks.

So, I think the point is, maybe Trump is looking at it like this: he did not want to destroy the entire country, which we could have done, because you’re going to end up destroying what we call dual-use facilities—things that benefit both the civilian and the military. It’s like bridges and roads, and some of the factories would be dual-use, right?

Speaker 1: Yep.

Mike (Speaker 2): They don’t just build missiles and bombs; they could be used to build things for the civilian population. And I think Trump also—the many times that he pulled back, everybody called him a coward, but he was doing this at the behest of the Gulf nations that Iran was pointing missiles at and launching them at.

Speaker 1: Yep.

Mike (Speaker 2): They are the ones that asked him to pull back because, I think like you said, we don’t think like they do. They realized that once this is over, you know, “you buy it” type thing. They realize because this is a neighbor, it’s going to affect them severely even though they’re just neighbors with Iran, because a lot of trade goes on between these folks, not just us. So, I believe that was one of the main reasons that Trump kept pulling back and not trying to destroy the entire country and get regime change. Just a thought.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Destroying the entire country would hurt the general population more than it would hurt the leadership. The people who suffer when there’s no electricity, the people that suffer when there’s no food in stores, the people who suffer when there’s no water… You know, you mentioned the desalination plants; he could have destroyed those immediately and they wouldn’t have had any water in the nation. The people who are going to suffer then are the general population. You don’t want to do that.

But here’s the thing, I want to make two points. One, when people say, “Well, there’s no change in the regime,” well, no, wait a minute. The top 20 or 30 leaders of the Ayatollah’s government—the most significant, the most diehard, the most stringent, and the most argumentative, the people who are shouting the loudest “Death to America”—are all gone. What did Donald Trump say? They’re down to their third-string set of leaders.

The IRGC is one group of people, and most of that leadership was left intact, but most of the Ayatollah’s regime—that is, all his right and left-hand men, the people that were doing the propaganda, and the people that were dealing with it—they’re gone. So, you have a new group of people, and these are younger people. And what do we know about younger people, even in our country? They’re less strident, I think, than some of the baby boomers and the older people that are running our government today. I think that’s an important point.

You know, when Donald Trump was negotiating with the Iranians, he was dealing with three or four or five different facets. He had the IRGC, he had the Ayatollas (what was left of them), and he had the moderates that were included in negotiations. So, they were dealing with multiple facets. In the old days, when Biden and Obama were dealing with them, they were only dealing with the Ayatollah and his designated representatives. So, not every part of the influencers in the country were involved in negotiations. And I think what Donald Trump has done by including all of the various influencers—from the hardline IRGC to the more moderate members of the government that are left—he’s gotten a buy-in and a commitment from everyone in the government. Everyone in a position of power and authority, even if they’re not the only person in power and authority. And I think what that means is, since everyone was involved in the decision, there is a better chance for a positive outcome than a negative outcome, compared to when you’re only dealing with one facet of the influential groups in Iran.

And there’s another factor at play, too, that I want to call out. When Donald Trump and his negotiating team were negotiating with the Iranians, who did they confer with? Who did they talk to? I’ll refer to an interview with Bibi Netanyahu after the memorandum of understanding came out. Bibi Netanyahu from Israel said, “This is not my agreement. I had nothing to do with it. I was not consulted on it.” Now, that may sound like sour grapes, but what it sounded like to me was a shift in the relationship between the United States and Israel.

Mike (Speaker 2): Mhm.

Speaker 1: Because prior to that memorandum of understanding that we executed this week with Iran, I would argue that Israel was our primary sounding board and our primary relationship in the Middle East that was forming our policy. What did Donald Trump do this time? While his negotiators were negotiating with Iran, he didn’t pick up the phone and share the progress of the negotiations or the outline of the negotiations with Israel. Instead, what he did was he took the information and he shared it with Qatar, and he shared it with the UAE, and he shared it with Syria, and he shared it with Saudi Arabia, and he shared it with… you know, fill in all the blanks of the Middle Eastern nation-states.

Now, I don’t believe that Donald Trump gave the Middle Eastern nation-states veto power over any of the negotiation points. What I do believe is that he made those nation-states, who were not necessarily America’s staunch friends in the past, feel more important, feel more integrated, and feel more included in what was going on with their enemy, Iran.

Remember, when we attacked Iran, Iran turned around and what did they do? They threw rockets and drones and all kinds of things at the other nation-states in the Middle East. So, Iran picked a fight with all of these other Gulf nations. That, I think, was a mistake on their part, but it also opened the door for the United States to include these nation-states in some of the negotiations.

And again, you know, the United States of America is the big dog. And you know, if you can’t run with the big dogs, you stay on the porch. I think most of these Gulf nations stayed on the porch for the most part. But when it came time for the negotiations, we conferred with these Gulf states and said, “Hey, is this all right with you? How do you feel about this? If we go in this direction, are you going to be okay with this? This is why we’re doing what we’re doing, because we’d like you to buy in and be part of this.” And that made these Gulf nations feel like they were equal partners in what was happening with Iran. That could prove to be a very, very important relationship-building process for the United States of America and the Middle East.

You know, what is one of the things Donald Trump said during these several weeks of negotiations? He said, “When this is over, I expect many of the other Middle Eastern countries to participate in the Abraham Accords.” Now, the Abraham Accords are a lot of different things, and I don’t want to talk about that right now—I don’t want to bog down with the details of that. But what it amounts to is a way for Arab nations, Muslim nations, and the nation-state of Israel (the Jews) to work together for mutual benefit: to do trade, to do intellectual property sharing, and to give an avenue to work together in many different areas.

And I think again, like I said, with Iran working with the $300 billion investment by other Gulf nations, you can’t help but be friendlier with people that you’re talking with, having conversations with, and doing business with, right? I mean, isn’t that what the whole economic change in policy was supposed to be with China once they became more of a capitalist society? How could they be against us? Well, that hasn’t worked out so good. But the bottom line is that when you’re working together on other fronts, in other areas of responsibility or expertise, it’s a lot harder to remain angry and ugly with one another and want to kill each other.

So, I think that what Donald Trump is doing with this memorandum of understanding is not only getting his primary objective—and we’ll see, because it’s going to be 30, 60, 90 days of negotiation for what that bullet point of no nukes, no purchase of nukes, no development of nukes, no nukes for peaceful purposes or for weapons purchases actually means. The language has to be worked out in which that’s defined, and, you know, it’s like Ronald Reagan said: trust, but verify.

So, the tricky part is going to be in the details. How do we retrieve the “nuclear dust,” as Donald Trump calls it? How do we get back the nuclear fissile material that’s buried? How do we get back the centrifuges and other parts of nuclear development equipment that they agreed they would no longer have and no longer pursue a nuclear avenue? That’s going to be important to figure out, and it has to be real.

You know, under the JCPOA, the international inspectors had to alert Iran when an inspection team was coming, and then Iran told them what they could inspect. They didn’t have free and unfettered access to everything. So, if we got intelligence from one of our human intelligence assets in the country of Iran and we knew that, you know, over on 27th Street there was a lab that was doing nuclear development, and we told Iran we want to come and see the lab on 27th Street, we weren’t allowed to do that. Iran said, “Oh, no, you can’t go there. You have to come to the one on 24th Street; we’ll show you that we’re not doing anything there.” Which is ridiculous, because if they can control what we can inspect, then it’s about worthless—it’s less than having any inspections whatsoever.

So, when people talk about how Donald Trump lost in the negotiations… what was it they said? Someone said early on in this conflict, “Iran very seldom wins a war, and they very seldom lose a negotiation.” But the point is that Donald Trump was not out-negotiated like Barack Obama and Joe Biden and the presidents before them. They negotiated deals that allowed Iran to get this close to a nuclear weapon.

And you know, for the most part, people were talking about Iran and when they would potentially get to a nuclear weapon, and if they got a nuclear weapon, what that would mean. Many people did not want to go to war with Iran over the possibility of them having a nuclear weapon. Well, here’s the thing: when Iran came to the negotiating table, they bragged. They told us they had enough nuclear fissile material to produce 11 nuclear warheads. Now, if Iran has 11 nuclear warheads, should the rest of the world be concerned? Remember now, this is the nation-state whose charter says “Death to Israel, Death to the United States.”

I’m not real concerned about them sending a nuclear-tipped missile to the United States, whatever delivery system they tried to use, because our defenses against those kinds of weapons are vast and superior to what Iran had. So, I don’t think Iran was going to send a nuclear weapon to our shores. What I do believe is possible—because up until Donald Trump became president, we had a pretty porous border, both the northern Canadian and southern Mexican borders—what I was concerned about is Iran getting a nuclear weapon, a nuclear warhead, a dirty bomb if you will, putting it in a trunk-sized or suitcase-sized carrying device, sneaking it into this country, and then putting it close to some sort of high-value target in their mind. Whether that would be Wall Street, the Capitol building, the White House, or whatever—getting that bomb into the country and then putting it close enough to destroy something that we held near and dear. And the bottom line with a nuclear weapon is that not only do you cause terrible devastation when you explode the weapon, but you also have to live with the half-life of that radiological contamination, and you can’t use that geographic territory for a very long time. You understand that, Mike? Right, that was part of your duties in the Air Force.

Mike (Speaker 2): Yeah. I thought the other interesting thing is not just that he didn’t negotiate with Israel on this, he kind of snubbed all of Europe because they didn’t participate with us. So, they didn’t seem to have any input into that either. And it made the Gulf states feel like we are too protective of Israel. I put this in like female psychological terms: they felt heard, you know? And let’s face it, when we have a grievance or a tough day, we all want to feel like we’re heard.

Politically, I get into a lot of arguments with people. And there are a few times where people that are usually opposed to me have thanked me because I didn’t go at them hard. I understood that they were making a good point, gave them a counterpoint, and didn’t call them ugly names. And I think that’s what the Gulf States feel like now. It’s like, “America understands, they listen to us.” Because like I said, every time Trump pulled back, I think it was at their behest.

And you’ve got to think about one other thing that Trump probably had on his mind. They kept saying the blockade was going to cause something to happen with the oil wells. I don’t understand the science behind it, but supposedly if you don’t keep pumping, they go dry or something of that nature. And then either you can’t bring them back online or it’s like starting from scratch. And if you think about it on a worldwide market, if we would have kept the embargo going so long, imagine losing Iranian oil. I mean, it is a contributor to the global economy of oil. And that’s something that I don’t think Trump wanted to lose either.

Speaker 1: I don’t understand the technology of it either, Mike, but I put it like this: if you’re siphoning from one area to another, you put the hose in where it has the liquid and you provide the suction that starts the flow going. Once you start the flow going, the moving liquid brings the other liquid up with it, and that’s a continuous draw. And I think that was kind of like the concept they were talking about with the oil wells.

And, you know, you brought up the European countries. Donald Trump has been less than happy with NATO for a number of years in his first presidential term. Remember, he said NATO countries are supposed to be spending 2% of their GDP, and none of them were. And he kept insisting that they do. And when one of the NATO countries said, “Well, does that mean if we don’t put up our 2%, you won’t protect us if we’re attacked?” He said, “Maybe. I don’t know, we’ll have to think about it on a case-by-case basis.” He left it open. And I think that scared the crap out of a lot of these NATO countries.

Here’s the other aspect, too. Most of these NATO countries in Europe have gone the route of unfettered immigration from a number of different places, from their former colonial destinations. And I think that if you look at the nation of England, where they have 70 Muslim mosques in the city of London—and as a matter of fact, the mayor of London is a Muslim and not… (audio cuts off)