David Gura (1:42)

iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

Christina Raffini (1:52)

Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts radio news. Welcome to the Bloomberg this Weekend podcast with David Gura, Christina Raffini and Lisa Mateo.

Dan Williams (2:07)

We're covering a lot of breaking news this morning out of the Middle East. The US Taking extraordinary strikes on Iran. We have a statement from the President that he posted in the early morning hours. We're going to have news reports, analysis over the course of this morning as we will every weekend, Saturdays and Sundays from 7 o' clock to 10 o' clock on Bloomberg Television. Bloomberg Radio streaming on the Bloomberg Business app and@Bloomberg.com as well. And Christina, suffice to say we were both awoken early by all of this news.

Christina Raffini (2:31)

Quite, quite early. This was not quite the show we had planned today as we just mentioned. But look, this is why we're here, this is why our teams are in. And this is one of the great things about being at Bloomberg is people were awake all night. People were online immediately and reporting this out. We want to play you some more of the sound from that startling about eight minute statement the President dropped on social media this morning. Again, he didn't call the press pool, he didn't notify everyone. We talked to our reporter in Mar? A Lago and she said she found out when the rest of the world did. Posted online. Among some of the many remarkable things in that statement, including a declaration of war against Iran and a call for regime change, the President also said this campaign could cost American lives.

Alec Baldwin (3:11)

The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost and we may have casualties that often happens in war. But we're doing this not for now, we're doing this for the future. And it is a noble mission. We pray for every service member as they selflessly risk their lives to ensure that Americans and our children will never be threatened by a nuclear armed Iran. We ask God to protect all of our heroes in harm's way. And we trust that with his help, the men and women of the armed forces will prevail. We have the greatest in the world and they will prevail. To the members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the armed forces and all of the police, I say tonight that you must lay down your weapons and have complete immunity or in the alternative, face certain death. So lay down your arms. You will be treated fairly with total immunity or you will face certain death. Finally, to the great proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand. Stay sheltered. Don't leave your home. It's very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere. When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance. For generations, for many years, you have asked for America's help, but you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let's see how you respond. America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach. This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass. May God bless the brave men and women of America's armed forces. May God bless the United States of America. May. May God bless you all. Thank you.

Dan Williams (5:25)

The last two minutes of that extraordinary statement from the President of the United States released on Truth Social early this morning, well before dawn. Our coverage spans the globe, but I'm going to bring in Dan Williams, Jerusalem based correspondent for Bloomberg News, along with Jomana Vercecci, the anchor of Horizons on Bloomberg Television. Joe Matthew, the anchor of Balance of Power. Jeff Mason, White House correspondent, with us on set here in New York. Jomana, we were just talking about your current circumstance. The fact that you've been hearing these strikes where you're sitting, I want to go to that entreaty from the President of the United States there at the end, urging Iranians to lay down their weapons. I should point out here these are airstrikes and one wonders what the logical next steps would be were one to do that on the ground in Iran. And I'm curious how you're thinking about that. The President calling for Iranians effectively to rise up, calling on the Revolutionary Guard

Christina Raffini (6:10)

for those who do lay down their weapons.

Dan Williams (6:11)

But what mechanism is in place to do that? Talk about that challenge if you would jomana in these next few hours and days.

Jomana Vercecci (6:17)

Yeah, well it's a huge challenge and I think from what we can gather, just the retaliation that all of these Gulf states have seen and witnessed over the last few hours suggests that the Iranian regime isn't going to go down quietly. They've been readying themselves for the real possibility of military action. They have responded very quickly. Remember in the 12 day Iran Israel war, it took them a couple of days to calibrate their response. This time they were ready to go and they have targeted multiple countries. I will tell you, I'm sitting here in Dubai and 15 minutes ago I heard a couple blasts and it seems as though they're not sparing any Gulf states insofar as a, as the US has assets in those countries. So we're talking about the uae, we're talking about Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq. All of these countries are involved. So it has become a regional war. And what we know from authorities in all of these countries is that most of the missiles and drones have been intercepted. So there don't appear to be any civilian casualties from the strikes themselves. There has been one casualty in Abu Dhabi on back of shrapnel. But that is the bigger issue here because a short while ago it was reported that the Foreign Minister Abbasar actually did make a call to his counterparts in all those countries and warned them about them allowing the US to use their bases to launch further strikes on Iran. So this would suggest that Iran are intent on retaliating. Now when it comes to the demonstrators, you have to rewind back a month ago there was an uprising, but it was brutal, brutally put down and there are unofficial numbers that have come through. We don't know the exact death, death toll but the numbers put forward by human rights agencies suggest that 30,000 people, more than 30,000 people were killed in these demonstrations. So there is a wariness I think in Tehran amongst the population And a real question as to what exactly the US's assistance actually looks like and whether the focus here is to target, once again, military infrastructure, perhaps key individuals within the IR regime. But in terms of actual support on the ground, what does that look like? Because once again, the stakes are very high. And this is an Iranian regime we spoke about in the prior hour that is very intense on its own survival. It's an existential threat to them and they will not go down easily.

Christina Raffini (8:42)

And Iranian expats I've spoken to recently in the us, who despise this regime with every fiber of their being, still have family. In Tehran, I talked to a woman who said her family, she hadn't spoken to them in days during the last round of strikes because they had gone to the mountains to try to hide from these air assaults. So these are the people the Trump administration is trying to appeal to, but at the same time, these are the people who are being put in harm's way, as well as our colleagues and friends and other people throughout the region. Dan, I understand you are now outside and safe. I hope you've emerged from a shelter. I'm wondering if we're hearing any more from the Israeli government this morning. I reached out to the embassy here and they said they're not speaking yet. I'm wondering if you're hearing anything on your side of the world

David Gura (9:25)

as of now know there have been procedural updates, for example, from the transportation minister about conditions at Israel's airports. The Israeli airspace is closed, as are the airspaces of other relevant countries in the region that obviously will affect air traffic, travel and the like. They've also been called to shelters very regularly, usually divvied up by sector, by city, by community, by part of the country. The Israelis have been weathered two such missile attacks going back all the way to 1991, the Gulf War, and over those three and a half decades have been developing a very sophisticated system that really homes down to the areas likely to be affected by any specific launch. So basically, if you are in the line of fire where you happen to live, or potentially in the line of fire for debris that could emerge for an interception of a missile above where you are, a missile intended for another part of the country, you'll receive a timely warning to go down to shelters. That's happened already a half dozen times since this really blew up at just past 8:00am this morning, just past 10 in the Gulf. And we've been seeing that repeatedly. I think part of the reason the Iranians have succeeded apparently in scoring strikes in those Gulf targets, as Jumana alluded to, is it comes down as much to range as anything else. Israel is well over 1,000 kilometers away. Those gulf targets are in some cases just a few hundred kilomet kilometers away from the Iranian launch points. That means there's far less time to prepare for those incoming missiles, to intercept them, to mount an interception. Obviously, when you're across the region as Israel is, and Israel has a very sophisticated defense array system, then it's easier to track those missiles and see them coming, I expect after Prime Minister Netanyahu put out that recorded message very close to President Trump's message, in fact, the content tracking almost exactly with what Trump said. The Israelis also calling on the Iranian people, Iranian people of all communities and sectors to rise up and take hold of their destiny now that the Iranian government is apparently receiving a drubbing at the hands of the combined US And Israeli forces. We won't hear back from him until, I think, nightfall when the Jewish Sabbath ends here in Israel.

Christina Raffini (11:44)

That's a really good point, Dan. I mean, in June, during that 12 day back and forth, we did watch the Iron Dome very successfully intercept most of those munitions. There were a few that got through, but for the most part, what you were seeing watching those screens was actually the interceptors going out and taking on those. Iran clearly knew this was a possibility and recalculated what they would strike and when.

Dan Williams (12:03)

Joe Matthew, let me stick with this theme of surprise and I know that you were listening, as I was, to Courtney Subramanian, who's with the White House pool at Mar A Lago, noting that she was as surprised as all of us by the presentation of that statement early in the morning. She saw it pop up online as we all did. I'm curious about lawmakers and how surprised they were. I saw reporting earlier this morning from the New York Times that Jack Reed's communications director, Jack Reed, of course, the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, was given no advance notice of this. One wonders about the so called Gang of Eight. The leadership from the House and the Senate, the leading members of the Select Intelligence Committees as well. Any indication if they were given any heads up here at this point?

Chris Whipple (12:38)

We actually just have learned at Bloomberg News that the Gang of Eight did get a heads up on this, which did not happen, for instance, when the US Went into Venezuela to capture Nicolas Maduro. And there was a bit of outrage when Marco Rubio at the time the Secretary of State, suggested that they couldn't trust members of Congress to not leak that information. And the Gang of Eight is quite well known for not doing that. These are the two party leaders in each chamber, and leader and ranking member of both intel committees. That would include Mark Warner, who is out with a statement this morning demanding a war powers vote. And it gets back to this idea of a prolonged engagement, which the President is clearly telegraphing. The speaker of the House was also briefed, we understand, and I suspect that that came from the same place. Whether there's going to be a classified briefing for all members now will be the next question. And I suspect in the days ahead they'll be demanding that.

Christina Raffini (13:28)

And Jeff corrects my memory, but I think that's a departure From when the U.S. struck Iran's nuclear facilities earlier in last year, in the summer, because I remember hearing a lot of griping from Congress that members hadn't been notified. Maybe some Republicans had, but I don't think the full G8 was notified.

Jeff Mason (13:41)

No, I think your memory is right on that.

Dan Williams (13:43)

I just.

Jeff Mason (13:43)

Just to sort of take a broader look or stand back. Look at that. You heard the president use the language and use the word war. Well, Congress has the right to declare war. And that could be another major tension point politically in Washington, the fact that the president, though some lawmakers may have been given a heads up, he didn't go and ask permission. He didn't ask Congress to get behind this. He went ahead and did it. This is another example, I think, that some critics would say, of. Of the Congress, which of course is controlled by Republicans giving up powers, that the Constitution gives them to the executive. That's been true with tariffs as well. This, of course, on a major foreign policy level.

Christina Raffini (14:23)

And debate about the War Powers act is not exclusive to this president. This was an issue for Democratic presidents. This is an issue for Republican. This has been, as long as we've covered Washington, this has been something Congress has complained about. But to me, the fact that usually when you hear presidents announce strikes like this, they dance around this specifically so they don't come into direct contact. What does it tell you about the power dynamic between Congress and this White House that the president is outright saying this is a war, it could be protracted and there could be American casualties.

Jeff Mason (14:50)

I think it's just another example of the strengthening of the executive that has happened under President Trump's second term. I mean, he has claimed powers in many, many ways that are not his. He has used executive orders to govern more so than legislation, which, which is not to downplay the legislation. The legislative victories that he also had in terms of tax cuts. And that has been a tension point in Washington. It's been a tension point with certainly with Democrats. The question is whether Democrats, Republicans rather, as Joe was referencing earlier, are going to rise up against that as well. Certainly I can guarantee you if this were a Democratic president in office, they would not be standing for this. But that has been a hallmark of

Christina Raffini (15:30)

the Therein lies the issue that has

Jeff Mason (15:31)

been a hallmark of the Republican response, response to President Trump's second term is that they don't stand up. So will this be a line that they feel he's crossed?

Dan Williams (15:40)

TBD Jomana, you heard Dan talking about the alignment in those statements between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump. I want to ask you about how effectively Gulf leaders have been able to make their case to President Trump in the run up to all of this. We saw that inaugural meeting of the Board of peace in Washington, D.C. many Gulf leaders party to that and were present for that first meeting. I guess there is some inherent ineffectiveness here. But what is that level of communication, the quality of that communication like between Gulf leaders and the president right now?

Jomana Vercecci (16:09)

I mean, you got to be thinking. You've got to be thinking they're working on the channels. We just got a statement put out by the Saudi Arabian Foreign Ministry calling for an immediate de escalation, saying that they stand in unity with their Gulf allies in the region, the ones who had been targeted. And for Gulf states, look, this is of utmost priority. De escalation is of utmost priority. And I think, you know, when it comes to the relationship with Iran, I wouldn't say that there's a huge amount of love lost between many of these Gulf nations and the Iranian regime. But that being said for them, what is more important in the region in the context of their own economic visions, because many of these countries are undergoing economic transformation, is political stability. And that has been a consistent theme. If you speak to the leaders in these various Gulf states, they will tell you that they don't want this crisis to spiral out of control. And viewers may recall that a couple of years ago, 2023, there was actually a mediation that was brokered by China between Saudi Arabia and Iran to sort of restore diplomatic relationships or both sides pledged non interference in each other's affairs. And that was a big step. It was a big milestone in because you may also recall that in prior incidents, Saudi Aramco facilities in Afghan were also subject to retaliation from Iran. So this time around, they've been working very aggressively the last couple of years to ensure that those type of strikes don't happen again. And yet here we are on a day like today where every single US Based military base, or not every single, but every single country that is hosting a US Based has been been targeted with the Iranian retaliation. So they would be looking upon this with a lot of consternation, concern about what happens next, obviously pushing for a big de escalation here, working those diplomatic channels. But it's unlikely at this point that things can calm down or de escalate because the messaging that's come through, at least from the island Israeli side, is that this is an operation that's going to go on for days. And as long as that happens, you would think that also the Gulf states and their assets, the US Assets in the region will continue to be targets.

Christina Raffini (18:29)

I also wanted to update our audience. Courtney Subramanian, our White House correspondent in Mar? A Lago with the president, updates us and confirms that we are not expected to get further remarks from President Trump today. Dan, I want to go to you and ask about President Trump and the relationship, relationship between him and Benjamin Netanyahu. This has been two leaders who were very close and then had a bit of a tiff. The romance seemed to be over and then it has reignited in recent months. The prime minister was recently at the White House and sources were telling me Israeli officials were coming out of that meeting. The word they used was giddy. Flash forward a few weeks later and we have this joint strike on Iran. Talk to us about that relationship and how much influence you think Netanyahu has over President President Trump when it comes to taking action in Iran.

David Gura (19:16)

I think he has a great deal of influence. Indeed, there was something of a falling out in between the two Trump administrations. Famously, Trump then out of office in Mar a Lago, use the effort about Netanyahu unhappy about the Israeli prime minister, prime minister being so quick to recognize President Biden's election win. I think that's all well in the past. I don't think there's any discussion. I think President Trump would be the first to agree with this. This is a president who really enjoys success and admires success. And I think after the catastrophe of October 7th, the way the Israeli government and military were blindsided by that Hamas attack two and a half years ago, Netanyahu, our veteran prime minister, the longest serving prime minister, with his eye firmly on his historical legacy and also the needs of the country in the given moment, put his mind not just to turning around the situation in Gaza, but effectively revolutionizing revolution, bringing about revolutionary change to the Middle east at large. Israel went on the offensive on several fronts against other Iranian allies. Hamas has enjoyed Iranian patronage for a very long time, as has Hezbollah in Lebanon, Shiite groups in Iraq, certain groups in Syria, until very recently. Recently, and then again the Houthis in Yemen are also aligned with Iran and now Israel, with the help of the United States, taking on Iran directly. So I think what's clear here is that Trump has been persuaded, it may have been by other forces, may have been for his own reading of history. He'll be someone who will remember the Iran crisis of 1979, the Iranian Revolution, when the US embassy was taken over and many of the staff held hostage for a long time. He will be aware of that. There are also US Allegations that Iran has been behind assassination attempts, or at least one against this president, who survived two assassination attempts, active assassination attempts, in recent months, so it would appear, a combination of the counsel of the Israeli prime minister, a prime minister he trusts to get the job done and potentially to give him a solid accounting of the realities of the Middle east and his own ideas about his historical place or U.S. priorities in the Middle east and how U.S. interests might be served by seeing a change of regime in Iran. It seems that they've coalesced in this day that we've seen. And also as noted six months ago in June, they stress test this relationship with the United States joining the Israelis in what was then a surprise attack against Iran. The US Joined in and now they joined in at the outset with the US Pre positioning planes in Israel, which itself is without precedent. So, yes, there is a very tight relationship between these men that goes well beyond a rapport to what appears to be a common understanding of the Middle East.

Dan Williams (22:05)

Joe, at a moment like this, one tends to look back on what happened in the preceding days. You were on Capitol Hill for the State of the Union watching the president advisers come in.

Christina Raffini (22:14)

That's right. That seems like a thousand years.

Dan Williams (22:15)

That feels like a thousand years ago. General Kaine was there, of course, Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State as well. In fact, we were talking yesterday, Cristina and I. Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, still having a plan to go to Israel over the course of the trip.

Christina Raffini (22:26)

They haven't pulled down that trip. It was announced yesterday.

Dan Williams (22:30)

I wonder how you think about that, Joe, the run up to this again. I keep going back to this theme of surprise, but what you've observed, sort of the apparatus surrounding all of this. Yes, we've heard from the president, but the degree to which he's been engaging with and we've heard from his advisers on national security, defense and diplomacy.

Chris Whipple (22:46)

Yeah. And of course, at that point when we were in the Capitol for State of the Union, the storyline was one of optimism that there were. They were gearing up for talks on Thursday. President said 10 to 15 days. By the way, this is 10 days on the spot. I'm not sure if you guys noticed that, which is kind of interesting. But you know Marco Rubio about Iran, that's also very true. And really no new insight into justification. It certainly wasn't amounting to what we heard in this video overnight. Of course, they clearly knew this. And he had a briefing by the CENTCOM commander on Thursday. Little did we know that was probably a briefing about how the attack was ready to go. Look, this is going to play differently with different members of the Cabinet. You point out Marco Rubio reminding everyone of the tension between Marco Rubio and J.D. vance as the potential heir apparent of this president and of maga. This is going to be very difficult for JD Vance to telegraph publicly to. So he's going to have to support this, obviously, as a member of the administration. But to make this an America first, we need to do this now as a domestic issue for him. Knowing that he wants to run in 28 is going to be tough.

Christina Raffini (23:55)

Jeff, I want to play you a bit more sound from the President's remarks this morning. No, apologize. We've heard the President's remarks this morning. But I want to play you sound from the president speaking yesterday in corporate Texas, because listening to what he said during the State of the Union, listening to the messaging up into this speech, as we were all trying to read the tea leaves last night, when I heard this, I thought, oh, so let's play this and you can give us your.

Alec Baldwin (24:16)

They don't want to quite go far enough. And it's too bad. Look, we've been playing with them for 47 years and that's a long time. They've been blowing the legs off our people, blowing the face off our people, the arms. They've been knocking out ships one by one. But every month there's something else. So you can't put up with it too long. We're not happy with the negotiation. They just don't want to. They don't want to say the key words, we're not going to have a nuclear weapon.

Christina Raffini (24:46)

Was that the President tipping his hat there for people who were listening? And what are the ramifications for this as we look at the bigger geopolitical strategy? I'm talking about Potential conflicts like China, Taiwan ahead of the president's visit to China, and then, of course, Russia and Ukraine. Does this impact that?

Jomana Vercecci (25:02)

Sure.

Jeff Mason (25:02)

So, number one, I think he probably was telegraphing it. And I think it's interesting as well, because this is a president who has made clear almost from day one that he's interested in getting the Nobel Peace Prize. And yet he's also a president who is very, very interested in using the forces that are available to him in terms of military power. And he's certainly done that now in Iran. On the broader geopolitical ramifications. I thought it was very interesting to hear earlier what Russia, Russia's reaction to this. I'm sure some would call that very rich to have Russia saying that this is an unprovoked attack and not in line with international norms, considering the fact that Russia, of course, invaded Ukraine. But that again, that does have ramifications for this. How does, how does that change this administration, the Trump administration's ability to, to form a peace deal there, which of course President Trump has said he wants. You rightly said the president is going to China in about a month. There's always this sort of threat or concern of China potentially invading Taiwan. What kind of message does the United States strike on another country, in this case Iran, send to China in terms of whether that would be accepted or acceptable?

Dan Williams (26:11)

Our colleague Tony Halpin heads up our Russia coverage, making a very good point in light of the statement that you just mentioned there that what this showcases, in fact, is the reduced capacity of Russia and Vladimir Putin to defend its long standing allies in the Middle East. I wonder what you think about that. We have seen, certainly with Iran, the damage to a lot of its proxies in the region. And Russia for so long was a patron of a lot of these countries, Iran chief among them in supporting them against the prospect of this kind of aggression.

Christina Raffini (26:39)

And we saw this in Syria. You know, it was one of the big reasons that regime couldn't hold on. Is it just Russia didn't have the bandwidth to support that regime as much as they used to. I remember when I was there quite a few years ago, there were pictures of the ayatollah of the IRGC leaders all over that area and, you know, that's not there anymore.

Chris Whipple (26:57)

Well, it really just reminds us of the disruption in the, in world order that we've seen just in the President's first year, in this second term. There's a lot of overlap here, as you're pointing out. And to get back to what Jeff said, how this impacts a potential peace deal around Ukraine. The way that it may be informing the Chinese when it comes to Taiwan are huge questions right now. We haven't even brought up Greenland since we came on the air this morning.

Christina Raffini (27:21)

Thanks for joining us on today's Bloomberg this Weekend podcast. Don't forget to tune in live for the show every Saturday and Saturday, Sunday morning starting at 7am Eastern.

Dan Williams (27:29)

We're on Bloomberg Television Radio and the Bloomberg Business app, bringing you unique takes and in depth interviews on news, politics, lifestyle and culture.

Alec Baldwin (27:44)

Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the Thing, I talked to composer Mark Shaman. It's about the hang.

Chris Whipple (27:51)

It's the pleasure of hanging out with the people that you're with. You know, Rob and I was always

Alec Baldwin (27:56)

a great Hank and journalist Chris Whipple. Every White House staffer, they work in

David Gura (28:01)

a bubble called the West Wing.

Alec Baldwin (28:03)

And it's exponentially more so in the Trump White House. Listen to the new season of here's the thing on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.