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- [00:00]
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- [01:01]
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- [01:30]
Thomas Small
Hello, dear listeners. Welcome back to Conflicted. I'm Thomas Small. With me is Eamon Dean. Eamonn. Usually I try to make these introductions full of optimism and make them sort of upbeat, but I don't feel upbeat. I do not feel upbeat. I think the memorandum of misunderstanding has rather taken the wind out of my sails. Certainly it has made me wonder if I ever understood anything about the dynamics of this conflict or if I've just been blind the whole time. I don't know. You must be feeling all sorts of feelings.
- [02:06]
Eamon Dean
I think in my opinion, this conflict is the result of hesitation and improvisation. So this is what characterized the whole conflict. Hesitation and improvisation and just make it as you go. I mean, but then with a huge cost, you know, to the global economy, to world security, and of course to America's reputation.
- [02:28]
Thomas Small
Well, in this episode, dear listeners, we're going to try to make sense of this memorandum of understanding, this mou. I mean, it hasn't actually been published properly yet. And it's not a deal, it's just essentially an agreement that we're going to have a deal down the line. So, you know, it's still up in the air. Everything is a bit unclear.
- [02:47]
Canva Narrator
It's.
- [02:48]
Thomas Small
And yet, Eamon, things are coming out, things that haven't come into the public yet. They're just sort of, you know, dripping out across the Internet. And so we're learning a little bit more about what's been going on over the last three months. Some of it's a little bit surprising, but, you know, eventually I guess we'll put all the pieces together, but in this episode, we'll try to do that for you. Dear listeners, let's get right into it, Okay, Eamon. Obviously, the White House wants us to think that this MOU that was digitally signed on Sunday evening, Washington time, this is the evening of the dear leaders President Donald Trump's 80th birthday. You know, in that quite remarkable, very Roman imperial scene of a. Of a cage fight taking place in front of the White House while a kind of ceasefire was being negotiated with the Persian enemy, really felt like, what century am I in? It was pretty, pretty surreal. But the White House would like us to believe that this represents a dramatic peace breakthrough. But from all that I can tell it in actual terms, the MOU appears highly favorable to Iran. It seems to me that if what we understand about it were to just be implemented tomorrow, we would kind of just go back to, let's say, last November.
- [04:22]
Eamon Dean
No, it's worse. Much worse than the status quo that existed, you know, in February.
- [04:29]
Thomas Small
Well, I was going to say status quo plus more money, plus having conceded some very important geopolitical points to Iran, most spectacularly its control or sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz. But it's sort of like we're going back plus making it worse, much worse, unfortunately.
- [04:49]
Eamon Dean
Thomas, let me put it this way. Truly, Donald Trump and J.D. vance managed really remarkably to snatch, without any need for it, you know, defeat from the jaws of victory. You know, it's like I can never even think of another fight that was so conceded to the enemy, when the enemy was actually down on their knees. And it was really an existential threat to them. And then a lifeline was given. And it shows basically, that the American administration, especially the president and his vice president, do not understand a thing about the Iranian regime, about the irgc, about their objectives, about their methodology, about their patience, especially strategic patience, strategic endurance. They don't understand that while Trump is used to fast food, he Press a button and a Coke Zero comes to him with a Big Mac. No, it doesn't work like that for the Iranian regime. They like to make you pay their bills 20, 30 years down the line.
- [06:12]
Thomas Small
Yes, it certainly seems that despite the best efforts of some, I think, of Donald Trump's advisors, certainly a lot of his international partners, and the efforts of people like you, Eamon, and others who have been trying to drum it into the heads of Western policymakers for years about precisely what kind of opponent, enemy, rival they face in the Islamic Republic. It seems like that is not getting through into the brain. You know, who knows? Who knows? The formal signing of this MOU is scheduled for this coming Friday 19th June. It will take place in Geneva. Quite interesting, given what you said last time, Eamonn, that you think all along it should have been Switzerland who was negotiating all of these deals. In the end, having played no part in negotiating the deal, Switzerland will play host to the signing of the deal. Such a far cry, Eamon, from what you hoped for and expected. Remember that tent that was gonna be set up on Kharg island where the ayatollahs were gonna be on their knees in front of a triumphant Trump signing a surrender deal? It's the exact opposite America.
- [07:19]
Eamon Dean
America is signing. Yeah.
- [07:20]
Thomas Small
Is signing not a surrender deal. Because it's not a deal. We don't wanna exaggerate what it's. What's going on.
- [07:26]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [07:27]
Thomas Small
It's kicking the can down the road and God knows anything can happen. But it is so different from what you expected.
- [07:33]
Eamon Dean
Exactly. I think we need to break it down now to the listener as to what we know for certain. Not like, you know, what we speculate, but for certain what we know based on intelligence sources and people that we talk to.
- [07:47]
Thomas Small
And this information is very new because, you know, we're recording this on the morning of Tuesday 16 June and yesterday, lots of descriptions of the MoU were circulating. Very maximalist descriptions, which it seems obvious from this morning were really the Iranian point of view on the MOU. And they were very, very. They made the MOU seem especially damaging to U.S. interest.
- [08:11]
Eamon Dean
Of course it was exaggerated. There's no question, you know, that the Iranians exaggerated the strategic gains and wins they got out of this, which is not even a final deal or anything. It's just an MOU with a 60 days expiration date. I mean, so really, it is not what Trump said. I succeeded where other presidents fail. Oh, come on, just shut up. You know, I mean, seriously. And on the other hand, you have. The Iranians are hailing it as a victory over the enemy. Guys, just calm down. You know, it's a 60 days MOU. That's it. However, the problem with this MOU, in my opinion, is that it sets now the foundations for the talks. That is my worry now, that it sets the tone. You see, when you have the terms for a ceasefire, generally it sets the tone for the final treaty, what the final treaty will look like. If the ceasefire was set in a way that is more disadvantageous, obviously disadvantageous to one party, then that one party cannot expect that the final treaty will be any different. Now, unfortunately, Thomas, Thomas, Thomas, my dear friend, unfortunately we have an MOU that sets the tone. That is more or less in favor or more in favor of the IRGC and the Iranian regime. That's why I am absolutely gobsmacked as to how could the President of the United States and his advisors, well, not all of them, by the way they are divided, could have agreed to this.
- [09:56]
Thomas Small
So walk the listener, Eamon, through. Walk the listener through what you feel confident you do know about the mou, the points that have been agreed by both sides and how they then set up the negotiations that will now begin over a final deal or treaty, how they set, set it up for Iran to prevail.
- [10:16]
Eamon Dean
First of all, the Iranian regime managed to legitimize their proxies because among the first clauses that we know of the MoU is that fighting will cease permanently. That's what it says. Fighting will cease permanently across all fronts, I.e. lebanon, Yemen and Iraq, in addition to Iran. Now, that is conceding to the Iranians that their proxies, which are all of them non state actors designated as terrorist organizations, all of them are now legitimate. I mean, himself, when he was sitting with Macron yesterday, President Trump says, what's wrong with talking to Hezbollah? You know, we have to talk to Hezbollah. Hezbollah is talking. Okay. Can you imagine someone saying, what's wrong with ISIS or Al Qaeda or a Shabab or Boko Haram? We should talk to them. I mean, it's a terrorist organization that has the blood of 330 American and French soldiers in Lebanon.
- [11:27]
Thomas Small
True, you say that, although that has been the French position all along.
- [11:30]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [11:31]
Thomas Small
Emmanuel Macron would have met Trump's words as music to his ears, because that's what the French have been saying all along. We have to treat Hezbollah as a legitimate political player.
- [11:39]
Eamon Dean
Exactly. But the problem is Hezbol responsible for multiple terrorist attacks all across the globe. You know, from kidnappings, executions, Assassinations, hostage taking, bombing of centers all across the world.
- [11:52]
Thomas Small
I understand, and I wish that Hezbollah didn't exist, but I'm just trying to play devil's advocate here. What about the IRA? Didn't the Good Friday Agreement almost 30 years ago, didn't it prove that, in fact, when it comes down to it, sometimes states just have to negotiate with terrorists who killed their own people in order to achieve some kind of political settlement to an intractable struggle?
- [12:13]
Eamon Dean
Well, because, you see, this is one of the reasons why I always say that you cannot just generalize, because the IRA is different. First of all, they were not a organization hell bent on maximizing casualties. It was all about spreading terror with political message and strategic aims. They were bloody. There was no question about it. But throughout the entirety, you know, of the existence of the IRA, they were responsible for 4,000 casualties. That's the entirety, you know, for Hezbollah, for Qaeda, for the IRGC, 4,000. That's a day count. Not a four decades, you know, struggle. That's just a day count as far as they're concerned. And we cannot say that Hezbollah is the ira. The IRA were a nationalist movement that was trying to get gains for the Catholic constituency in Northern Ireland. Hezbollah is about the eschatological, fanatical, imperial vision of the Ayatollahs of Iran. They are an extension of a foreign power. They are not there because they want what is best for Lebanon or even, even, even, even what is the best for the Shia of Lebanon. They are there to fulfill the strategic evil aims of the regime in Tehran. That's not the same.
- [13:39]
Thomas Small
No, it's not the same. It's not the same. Eschatological ideas were certainly present in the struggle between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland, but it's not the same. We don't want to debate that. So you say the MoU has conceded the point that Iran's proxy network is to be treated as legitimate in some respect. So that's obviously from our, from conflicted's point of view, a real setback.
- [14:04]
Eamon Dean
Extremely, extremely awful setback. And I cannot stress this because at least the listeners will know that I am consistent on this. You cannot negotiate with terrorists. At the end of the day, so many people are telling me, you know, well, you know, always terrorist organization, like in a need to be spoken to and negotiated with. Not all of them, every case is different. Just, you know, and they should be always crushed. Al Qaeda, you know, it's almost dead. ISIS is almost dead. And actually they are 90% crushed, all of them, because they need to be under pressure all the time. The Tamil Tigers, they were defeated to the last man. We cannot always say, oh, just because someone deployed violence outside of the state control for whatever grievances, some legitimate, some not, that we should treat them nicely, especially if they are state sponsored, you know, by an evil regime. No, we cannot, you know, do that. We cannot like, I mean, because otherwise you will cause the proliferation. One of the reasons why I always used to say, if you stop paying ransom, kidnappings will go down. So if we stop negotiating with terrorists, you know, then the number of terrorist organization and terrorist recruit like, and it will go down accordingly.
- [15:25]
Thomas Small
And we've seen this before because the JCPOA also didn't address the proxy networks of Iran. It tried to decouple America's nuclear anxieties vis a vis Iran from Iran's proxy network. And in the years following the jcpoa, Iran's proxy network grew in strength. The Shia Crescent, so called, grew in strength, causing tensions between America and its Arab allies, tensions between America and its ally Israel. You know, we've seen this play out already, so we can foresee that it will play out the same way again, that Iran will use whatever monies will be coming to it as a result of this deal. And from all reports, the monies will be much bigger than the JCPOA absolutely gave the IRGC gave Iran. So perhaps you'd like to address that. But Iran will use these monies we know to build up its military capability and reinforce its proxy network. What about the money that is being promised the regime?
- [16:25]
Eamon Dean
Okay, so first of all, there is roughly between 24 and 25 billion dollars that will be made available. Half of it, at least, made available. Already now. Now already made available. $12 billion. The Iranian president, Masoud Bezzishkian, said it is to pay salaries. I saw. You see, I always follow the movement of the Iranian currency. And when people said that the Emiratis paid money, I looked at the movement of the currency and I found nothing. I found nothing at all. There was no movement. But when the rumors that are now confirmed that the Qataris on behalf of the Americans, released the 12 billions the Iranian currency moved from 1.8 million riyals per dollar to 1.5.
- [17:11]
Thomas Small
Let me just make sure the listener understands what you're referring to, Eamon. So a few days ago, it was alleged online that the Emiratis had secretly been bailing out the Iranian regime in exchange for protection, for concessions, etc. You took to X amon and tried your best. Absolutely. To demolish this allegation, which it seems almost certainly emerged from Iran state propaganda channels in order to discredit the Emiratis or whatever. So that's one thing. But then what has emerged, really, in the last 24 hours is that something like that has happened, did happen, but involving Qatar. So what actually happened?
- [17:52]
Eamon Dean
Well, The Qataris made $12 billion available to the Iranian regime, basically in cash and gold and other denominations, and all with the blessings of the Trump administration. All of this could lead to a big scandal in the near future once people have time to scrutinize everything from the payments to. Because at the end of the day, someone somewhere in the American administration panicked and decided that the only way out of this war is to buy the Iranians out. So they are doing it. The problem is that out of the 25 billion of frozen funds, 12 billion now has been allocated for release, for immediate release. And the Qataris did that. So that's the first thing. The second thing is that there will be another 12 to 13 billion dollars that will be made available within the next 60 days. But the biggest problem is the fact that when I learned from my friends in the intelligence community here in the GCC that the Kushner Witkoff Qatari proposal, championed by Pakistan, of a $300 billion fund for Iran was announced as a rumor, first I was asking, is that true? And when they told me it's true, and it is complete bonkers, and it relies on Saudi, Qatar, Kuwait, UAE contributing to this $300 billion fund to reconstruct Iran. And it's like, I don't understand. Like, I mean, okay, Trump went for this war in order to topple the regime and said he's gonna squeeze them to the last dollar, and now you're throwing billions on them. I mean, this is where I think American credibility, American strategic credibility, is now nothing but a corpse that has been dragged by Mujtaba Khamenei and the IRGC over the entirety of the Zagros mountains.
- [19:52]
Thomas Small
So the JCPOA, if I've understood correctly, made $100 billion available to Iran. Something like 50 billion of that actually went to Iran, as it were, in its current account, because the other 50 billion was used to pay down various debts. So something like, in the end, let's say $50 billion was made available to Iran as a result of the JCPOA. So this MoU involves something less than that upfront, but also this sort of idea that $300 billion will emerge within, as you say, paid for by those states that have actually been damaged the most by Iranian aggression in this war. It really doesn't make sense. But. But I. I can't help but think, Eamon, that huge amounts of corruption are involved in this, and that this is another way for allies of the Trump administration, not only in the United States, to feather their nests. I mean, surely that's part of this whole story, that the venality and unscrupulosity that animates the Trump movement has been informing the course of this war and now the course of these negotiations the whole time, and that when push comes to shove, Trump, the man himself, inclines in the direction of helping people feather their nests. Isn't that part of this story?
- [21:20]
Eamon Dean
Yes, unfortunately, that's the truth. I mean, at the end of the day, this deal was negotiated not by seasoned statesmen, but it was negotiated by two real estate development people, Witkoff and Kushner, and Witkoff, who's a business partner with Asam Munir, the Field Marshal of Pakistan. And the two of them basically have a crypto mining operation in Pakistan itself. Hooray. So, and of course, like, you know, financed by the Qataris. How. What could go wrong? Seriously, what could go wrong when you have so many people with so much, you know, self interest, you know, in making sure that peace should happen at any cost, because that cost will go into their pocket. It's a profit into their pockets. Now, is this only corruption here, but the fact that the Treasury Secretary Besant, the Defense or War Secretary Hexev, and of course the Secretary of State, Rubio, these three are against it. And now we know that the head of the CIA, Radcliffe, is also against it. They are all against it. So, you see, suddenly we have a cabal of these unelected envoys, Kushner and Barak and Witkoff, and all of these people are actually siding with the Vice President, who's spineless and who is unqualified to be honest when he comes out and says that World War II and many other wars, almost every conflict, ended up with negotiations. Forgetting that Hitler blew his mind brain off while the Soviet soldiers were meters from his bunkers and Japan needed two nuclear nudges in order to surrender unconditionally, not to mention. Come on, Mr. Vice President, what about the American Civil War in your own backyard? Did it end with people sitting down together and negotiating an mou? Or it was Sherman and Grant, I mean, laying waste, you know, to the Confederacy. I mean, come on, give me a break. Like, I mean, how uneducated that man could be. And he is going out and saying, oh, there will be 300 billion. I heard him. He's saying there will be 300 billion. Oh my God. You are rewarding terrorism here.
- [23:49]
Thomas Small
So the MoU as, as far as we understand, it grants or it calls for an immediate cessation of war on all fronts, including Lebanon, thereby, as you say, legitimizing at least to some extent Iran's proxy network. It calls for the release of $24 billion in blocked Iranian funds, quote, unquote, over the course of a 60 day negotiation period with half released before the talks even begin, if I've understood correctly. And then mooting this possible $300 billion reconstruction plan which will invariably be mired in corruption. Okay, so we're just going to take a quick commercial break and when we get back, we'll talk about the rest of the points on the mou. We'll be right back.
- [24:34]
Eamon Dean
What a shit show, man. What a shit show.
- [24:43]
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- [26:12]
Thomas Small
We're back. Eamon. Okay, let's talk about. Well, what do we want to talk about next? The reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, possibly. So exactly what role? It's so confusing because Eamonn so many contradictory things are being said about the Strait of Hormuz, about the American Blockade of the Strait. Was it ever properly implemented at all? I mean, what is the truth about the Strait of Hormuz and the role that it plays in this MoU?
- [26:41]
Eamon Dean
Look, the only reason why the American blockade was, you know, more or less effective is because of two people and two people only, really. Hexith and Besant. You know, so the Treasury Secretary and the War Secretary, these two. I mean, I know especially with Hexith, many people don't like him, but let's give him some credit here. He did a fantastic job because he created Hexith, along with the Treasury Secretary, Besant, a joint task force to identify all the shadow fleet tankers of Iran and to hunt them down and to blockade them and to disable them and everything. That wasn't Trump. That actually was primarily the work of Hexez Ampecent. But if they were left to their own devices, without constant micromanagement and interference, you know, from Trump, they would have done the blockade even far more effectively. However, Trump was always interfering. Why? Because the, you know, the failed marshal of Pakistan, you know, Asan Munir. Failed marshal. Seriously, in my ass, like, he's a failed marshal. So basically, like, in a.
- [27:51]
Thomas Small
And you call him failed, but I'm afraid he has succeeded. I think Asa Munir has proved himself to be wilier and more competent at what he was trying to achieve. And we've given him credit for, you know, he's won.
- [28:07]
Eamon Dean
Yeah. You know, but through corruption and manipulation. So he was calling Trump all the time, oh, let this tanker out. You know, oh, we have a group of tankers. These are headed towards Pakistan when in fact, they were heading towards China. And they were like, you know, going to Gwadar Port. And from there they changed the destination, and they continue to ports in China. I mean, it was absolute corruption beyond imagination. So the Strait of Hormuz was actually making so much money, even during the blockade, thanks to the Pakistanis, to the most dishonest mediators the world has ever seen. And we are not done yet. Because why the MoU stipulate? Because that's what Asan Munir, the failed marshal of Pakistan, is proposing, or he proposed before that. Is that. Okay, okay, okay. Let's break the deadlock on the question of the charging of service fees that will generate 11 $12 billion a year to the Iranian regime on the ships that are passing the Hormuz Strait. How about we suspend the service fees and we open the strait for free navigation for free. No tolls, no service fees, no environmental protection fees, and all of this Bullshit. Let's allow free navigation for 60 days. After that, you are allowed to start the service fee charging based on mutual agreements between you and the rest of the Gulf states. The Iranians accepted that in principle. The Americans accepted that in principle. So as soon as the Americans accepted that in principle to be included in the MoU, this is when the Iranians then pounced back and said, thank you for accepting in principle that we can charge, whether now or in 10 years from now, whatever we want, we will do it. As soon as the 60 days is over, we will start charging fees. The calculation is that between 11, 12, $13 billion it could generate for the Iranian regime every year. That is way more than like four or five billion dollars more what Egypt is actually making out of the Suez Canal. My God. Thomas. Thomas, this is a complete capitulation and abandonment of international law and allowing a terrorist organization, the irgc, which just only months ago massacred tens of thousands of their own people on the streets. And guess what? We are rewarding them now by giving them directly, it will be paid directly to the IRGC Navy, directly between 11 and 13 billion dollars a year. Tell me, Thomas, in which dictionary this is a victory?
- [30:59]
Thomas Small
So I see also that the US is committing not to interfere in Iran's internal affairs. I see that the US has agreed to suspend sanctions on Iranian oil, petrochemicals and things.
- [31:17]
Eamon Dean
$130 billion a year. $130 billion.
- [31:20]
Thomas Small
That gives them a huge point of leverage that the us, you know, has had over Iran. I see. Well, the nuclear file. So what's going on there? It seems that we're going in reverse when it comes to Iran's nuclear program. But I can't really make sense of, you know, all the different allegations about what this MoU contains as regards the nuclear file. What can you tell us about?
- [31:46]
Eamon Dean
Well, the intelligence community, people I talk to here in the GCC and beyond in the European Union, they're almost all in agreement that there are very little details in reality inside this MoU regarding the nuclear file, because it actually kicks the can down the road. Well, at least the short alley, I would say, to discuss the mechanisms of a new nuclear deal within the 60 days. But. But these 60 days are not set in stone because they could become 60 weeks. I'm not kidding. Seriously, they could easily become 60 weeks because the negotiations over the nuclear file will be extremely painful and it will take forever. I mean, look, I want to tell the listeners that this is ridiculous. President Trump put as a objective of the conflict to the removal of the 460 kg of highly enriched uranium at 60%, the removal of 900, up to 1,000 kg of enriched uranium up to 20%, and also the removal of the 9,000 kg. 9,000 kg, 9 metric tons of enriched uranium up to 3.67%. That was what was supposed to happen. And that no centrifuges should remain, no capacity for enrichment. That set is over. The nuclear chapter should be closed. Now, many people are telling me that, yeah, but, you know, this is hard to implement or whatever. All that I say to everyone, just please give me a break. We have four, not one or two or three, but four precedent examples of how this should be done, how to denuclearize a country. You know, if there is just one teeny tiny detail that need to be inserted there, which is the political will by the leadership of that said country to get rid of its nuclear program. And these countries are Ukraine, Kazakhstan, South Africa and Libya. All of them without machinations and without chicanery and without all of the deception involved and the delay tactics and all of that. All of them got rid of either nuclear warheads, whether they are inherited. In the case of Kazakhstan and Ukraine, they got rid of them straight away. In the case of Libya, it was a program in its initial stages with centrifuges there and capacity and some enriched uranium. It was given entirely, declared, inspected, and given in its entirety, given up to the International Atomic Energy agency and the U.S. and in the case of South Africa, they had six fully constructed nuclear weapons and they worked with the international partners and global powers to dismantle them and get rid entirely of their ability to produce ever again a nuclear weapon. Before, of course, like, you know, basically the age of the apartheid, you know, was over. So. Wow. So we have four glaring examples, but
- [35:09]
Thomas Small
you say that's the case if there's the political will, but there is no political will in Tehran to denuclearize. And also looking back at most of those examples, the Iranian regime would never denuclearize. What happened to Gaddafi once he gave up his nuclear program, what happened to Ukraine? Imagine if Ukraine had kept its nuclear weapons. Things would be different there. I don't see any reason why Tehran should be convinced to get rid of its nuclear weapons if the Iranian regime does not possess the political will to denuclearize, okay, that. You've got to force them somehow. That's the whole point of the war.
- [35:45]
Eamon Dean
Exactly, exactly. So now, you know, you went to a war, you were winning it. It's not like, you know, basically that the US was Losing hundreds of men. You know, there was, you know, that kind of zeal, you know, within the GCC at least, like, you know, within the Emiratis and the Kuwaitis and even the Saudis were, in the last five days of the war, were really beginning to have that backbone to think, okay, maybe we can enter the war. But then Trump, forget Taco, he chickened out. He tacoed and burritoed and nachoed and everything you could imagine. And then he just lost the will to continue. Why? Because surrounded by corrupt, inexperienced people who know nothing about wars or national security or military strategy, nothing whatsoever. And he is paying the price for it.
- [36:41]
Thomas Small
Now at the end of this, I'm gonna just do my best to explain what I think happened and then you can tell me, no, you're wrong. But for now, before we get there, before I embarrass myself again, let's talk about the Emirates. I know that the allegations began to fly that the Emirates paid money to Iran. And you say that's certainly not true. It seems to be not true. And yet in addition to those allegations, there's this kind of percolating idea often being expressed by analysts that you have respected, you know that you do respect that. Seeing the writing on the wall, the Emirates are now reaching out to Iran and trying to salvage the situation by re establishing some kind of good relations with Tehran. What is the Emirati position now? Because the Emirates joined the Abraham Accords and since then have been aggressively pursuing a policy strategically designed with a kind of new Middle east in mind, this has led them to break quite spectacularly with Saudi Arabia, an important partner and neighbor. And you know, it's not working out at the moment. In a way they, they made a bet on the future of the region and it's not paying off because of what's happened. The larger land based states, which are seen from that Emirati, Israeli perspective to be more reactionary, backwards, not forward thinking, not oriented towards the future. I mean, Saudi, Egypt, Pakistan and Turkey, especially with Qatar as well, have shown that they actually carry huge geopolitical weight. I suppose because of their size, their population, they actually can move events more than that kind of Venetian, maritime regional order could in the end. So what are the Emirates now thinking now? A lot of their own strategic thinking is being proved to be incorrect, isn't that right?
- [38:39]
Eamon Dean
Well, you are right up to an extent. Look, the Abraham Accord was supposed to create a new Middle east where state sponsors of terrorism like Iran and their proxies will be isolated and that there will be a New era where the UAE and the rest of the gcc, especially Saudi Arabia, would alongside countries like India and Turkey and Egypt and Israel, of course, and Greece and Italy. All of these countries will come together to do the imec, the India, Middle East, European corridor, to counter the weight of China in terms of maritime trade and land trade and business and commerce. But we allowed, unfortunately, we allowed because of our short sightedness and because of the fact that people don't read events correctly through the lens of history and strategy and ideology and theology and anthropology and everything basically we could do here on this podcast. They did not read that October 7th was the IED that derailed this trade. October 7th was Iran's IED to completely derail this process and to make sure that, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's not a new age of international Middle Eastern, Asian, European corridor. This is not going to happen. Because the age of theocratic state, sponsor of terrorism and non state actors that I have across the region will not only become the legitimate force of the region, but will become the most dominant force in the region. And nation states that actually called for the protection of this model, like the UAE and Israel were sidelined completely. So nations like Pakistan, who did not like the IMEC in the first place because it will empower India, their traditional rival, and it was harming the commercial interests of their iron brother and ally, China. So Pakistan along with China, decided that the IMEC is not in their interest. So actually what Iran did was in favor of both Pakistan and China against India and Israel and the European Union, and of course the Saudis there in the middle thinking, well, you know what, let's see how fiercely the US will defend the Abrahamic Accord strategically and will push back against whoever's trying to sabotage it. Biden did not push back enough. And then when finally it seemed that Trump was about to push back enough, he chickened out in a spectacular way. And then this is when the Saudis, the Pakistanis, the Turks, the Egyptians, all of them came together and said, you know what, we are neither for the Abrahamic Accords, but we have to get together because we don't want to allow Iran to be the only dominant part. Yes, we will have to deal with it as it is. So now the Emiratis are doing a lot of thinking. This is now where I will come and answer your point. I've been sitting with people, I've been joining meetings, I've been like, I mean, looking at some of the workshops that are happening here in the UAE and beyond. In terms of what is the future like? And the future is bleak. I must say, the future is bleak for the region because there is a lot of disappointment here in the UAE that they have spent a lot of treasure and efforts and diplomacy trying to promote the nation state against non state actors like Hezbollah, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, you know, the Houthis. I mean, they spent a lot of treasure trying to undermine, you know, the enemies of the nation state, including Iran itself. They decoupled from Iran on the, you know, over the past four years, as I said to you, since 2021, they started decoupling from Iran commercially. And we talked about it in details here at the behest of the American administration, the Biden administration at the time, because the idea is that we are moving towards a Middle east that is free of non state actors and state sponsors of terrorism. It seems that unfortunately the UAE learned something recently which is that terrorism pays. Unfortunately, terrorism do pay, and pay it handsomely if you hold the straight up hormones hostage. And instead of the, the shocking was the European Union. I mean, they stood by and like, it's an international waterway, it's supposed to be protected by the global community, especially those with maritime power. And none of them even showed a single willingness even to defend it. You know, they say, oh, it's a result of a fight between Israel and America on one hand and Iran on the other. Yes, but the Strait of Hormuz was not part of that fight and shouldn't be. It shouldn't be. It's the equivalent of the Iranians starting to go and shooting down airplanes from the sky in order to close airways. No, no, you can't do that. So slowly and gradually it's becoming very clear that the global order that UNI championed and also the UAE championed has now been more or less choked almost to death by the inexperience and ignorance and incompetence of the Trump administration. And the UAE now is looking at how to balance its own interests between really thugs in the region. So how to balance their interest between India and Pakistan, between Saudi and Iran, between Israel and the US, between, you know, the non state actors in the region and how they are empowered and emboldened right now by all of these recent events. They are now trying to more or less manage the crisis. That's what they are doing right now. It's crisis management mode.
- [45:01]
Thomas Small
Yeah, I understand that analysis. I think the only thing that in my mind complicates it a bit is that if I go back five months to when Saudi and the Emirates had their split, their public split. Back then it seemed that it, it was in fact the Saudis who were very robustly supporting the principle of the nation state and that they were in fact revealing or accusing that in some respects, despite what the Emirates said, they were happy in some places to undermine the nation state in pursuit of their own strategic interests. And in Yemen, in Sudan and some other places. And at the time we did that episode about the two different perspectives, the Saudi and Emirates, how they have different strategies and perspectives. And we sort of said that in some respects the Emirates have that more maritime, piratical kind of view in which principles are a bit negotiable. And the Saudis were the ones very strictly enforcing the older idea of established nation states being intact. Now I'm not saying that that means that the Emirates are bad guys, the Saudis are good guys. I just think it's slightly more complicated. What the Emirates definitely believed was the Iranian attempt to create a regional imperium based on its own Shia theocracy was non negotiably bad and its Sunni concomitant in the Muslim Brotherhood was non negotiably bad. And in this respect they disagreed with Saudi who were happier to in some places interpret Muslim Brotherhood political parties as expressive of the national politics of that place. So it's, if you start digging down it's, it becomes really complicated because on the one hand, just like every country, the Emirates can play a principled game, but on the other hand pursue their own strategic interests which require the negotiation with those principles. And you know, the Emirati calculus really just depended on the United States being something that it has proved not to be. That is really the point.
- [47:20]
Eamon Dean
Exactly. Look, for me, you know, I believe that both stance of the Saudis and the Emiratis are right. They are right in their own way. Like, I mean it is perfectly fine for the Saudis to advocate for the unity and territorial integrity of nation states. I am with them there 100%. But in some exceptions I am also with the UAE when it comes to some cases, such as South Yemen and Somaliland, where the nation state itself failed miserably and some parts of it succeeded in creating their own temporary political entities that are actually successful economically and socially. So the question is, while the UAE is definitely for the unity and integrity of nation states, the question is what about those breakaway provinces that found themselves in a breakaway status not because they wanted, but because the central nation state failed completely and the capital is in turmoil and these people now are left to fend for themselves. What about them? Do we punish them by keeping them tethered to a sinking ship? Yeah, it's more pragmatic than we really give the Emiratis credit for.
- [48:34]
Thomas Small
Yeah, so that makes sense. There's a kind of gentleman's disagreement between two versions of supporting the nation state, if you like.
- [48:40]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [48:41]
Thomas Small
Which is obviously different from what used to unite both sides of that disagreement, which is opposing Iran's theocratic vision. And of course, they still do in principle oppose that vision. But sadly, because the United States has let them down so badly, everyone is simply going to have to go back to working with Iran. I mean, it's. This is the thing, Eamonn, I know you say that Donald Trump and his advisors have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, but can we. It seems clear now that at some point in January, maybe early February, but at some point early this year, Benjamin Netanyahu made the case to Donald Trump that moving up, and this is what I think is also very clear moving forward, a plan to aggressively attack Iran militarily with the goal of regime change there, that moving it up, going now, taking advantage of the protests that had broken out would quickly result in regime change. Now, whether Benjamin Netanyahu ever believed that, and it strikes me as hard to believe that he did, given how anyone with brains knows that regime change in Iran would be difficult. But it seems clear that what Israel did was sell Trump on the idea that something like what happened in Venezuela could happen in Iran, which is why he pressed go. So maybe there was some salesmanship going on there. And at one point, Trump realized that he had been tricked. He had been lured into a big Middle Eastern war, which is what overthrowing the Iranian regime would be. It's a big Middle Eastern war that requires troops on the ground, that requires dead Americans. Now, okay, fine, that might be all in service of the greater good, but that is possibly not what Donald Trump was sold. And so when he realized that, he just chickened out.
- [50:55]
Eamon Dean
He chickened out.
- [50:56]
Thomas Small
Well, but if he had been, if he had been tricked, if he had been sold a false bill of goods, doesn't that make sense that he might have said, hey, wait a second, wait a second, there's a hawkish team here that have tricked me. They're prepared for America to be in a three years long war in Iran. But I never was. I was tricked. Is that possibly also something that happened here?
- [51:21]
Eamon Dean
I don't think so. I don't think so. It's far more complicated than that. Way more complicated than that. However, let me tell you what my position is here. My position is I wish the war never happened. And in fact, in my opinion, I wish that Trump never wrote any of these tweets, because these were not written by Netanyahu. Help is in the way. We are locked and loaded. All of this. These happened before even Netanyahu set any foot in the White House. These happened at the spur of the moment. The protest happening and he's writing and the protest happening and he's posting. No, we have to come back to the fact that if at that moment, he decided to actually, instead of pursuing a military conflict immediately, instead of delaying it, at least in several months, possibly a year, but at the same time deciding this is the right moment to impose a blockade and to actually go and go after every economic lever of the regime. If he did that, and then the regime started by closing the Strait of Hormuz, that is when the Europeans and other allies would have sided with him. Why? Because he would have done the blockade for the right reasons, for the largest massacres of civilian protesters in modern history. So he would have, in the eyes of everyone around the world, done exactly the right thing. He decided that we cannot allow this regime to have money anymore to oppress their people. That's it. Like, we're going to blockade them. So I'm going to enforce the sanctions. The sanctions are there. I don't need anything except enforcement of the sanctions. So if he instructed his navy to go after the shadow fleet and take them one by one, and then the Iranians decided to be aggressive at that moment and blockade the Strait of Hormuz, that would have built the coalition among the GCC and the European Union that he needed in order actually to create, over time, a significant pressure on the regime to the point where there could be a massive military intervention that could topple this. But unfortunately, everything he does is impulsive.
- [53:49]
Thomas Small
I get that. But it does seem that his decision to go to war in the way that he did, without, as you said, carefully employing a strategy that foregrounded economic pressure, which, based on things that Scott Besant has said since the beginning of the war, was the strategy, it was in place, it seems that Israel played a role in that decision that they advocated.
- [54:24]
Eamon Dean
Of course they did.
- [54:25]
Thomas Small
Going to war.
- [54:26]
Eamon Dean
Of course they did.
- [54:27]
Thomas Small
So it's not just. So I've been trying to put the pieces together. This is my best attempt, Eamon, and this is largely based on things you've told me on conflicted. Right. So this is what I think happened. Let's see what you think. Four days after the 7th of October, a meeting occurs in which very powerful people from across the Atlantic World Order decide that the time has come to replace the Iranian regime. And together they begin brainstorming a long term strategy to achieve that end. And that strategy, to some extent during the Biden administration, but certainly once the second Donald Trump administration came to power was put in place. One part of that strategy, which we saw very quickly at the beginning of Trump's second term, was pressure on the Houthis, because they had in the previous two years, disrupted shipping in the Red Sea, which was obviously destabilizing to Europe's economic stability, but also to Egypt's sovereignty and stability. So this was a bad thing. So pressure was put on the Houthis at the beginning of Trump's second term. At the same time, the United States Treasury Department, led by Bessant, working together with the State Department, led by Rubio, and the War Department, led by Hegseth, constructed a strategy to put economic pressure on the regime. Part of that strategy was to neutralize the role that Venezuela was playing in financing the irgc, and this was resulting in the collapse of the Iranian currency, leading to greater internal unrest in the country, all in alignment with this strategy. Now, in the beginning of December of last year, you said that in the first quarter of 2026, we would see a resumption of the war against the Houthis. So I think that that was clearly part of the strategy, because before, in this long term way, we can dislodge the Iranian regime, we have to deal with its proxies, and we're going to first deal with the proxy that is most powerful and most able to put pressure on the world economy, the Houthis. So the first prong of the strategy was to neutralize the threat of the Houthis and liberate the Red Sea. But then protests broke out in Iran earlier than expected. They were both bigger than expected, and the crackdown against them by the regime was worse than anyone could have imagined. All of this is happening as a long, gestating plan to remove the President of Venezuela from power in a remarkable display of military expertise by the United States was about to happen. Do you remember we were recording an episode and it happened as we were recording. So Trump, a few hours before the Venezuela campaign, tweets, notoriously that he's locked and loaded and coming to the rescue of the Iranians. Now, I think now in retrospect, that what he had in mind was the Venezuela plan that was being launched a few hours after that, because Trump had Been told that the Venezuela plan was part of this larger strategy to overthrow the Iranian regime. So he thought, we're coming to your rescue by overthrowing Nicolas Maduro. But then, in a kind of heated, crazed moment, overwhelmed by the tremendous success of the Venezuela campaign and kind of goaded on by his propensity to send these tweets to protect the Iranian protesters and everything, a kind of false consciousness began to emerge in Donald Trump and in the White House that they could move up the plans to attack the regime militarily. It just kind of got out of control. Benjamin Netanyahu, for political reasons of his own, decided, we can go along with this. Last week, Elizabeth Zherkoff revealed on this show that Mossad documents that are being leaked in the Israeli press have revealed that the original plan was for Israel alone in June of this year, that is this month to resume its attacks on Iran to, as it were, in a grass cutting exercise, degrade some of its military capabilities. But again, I can see that makes sense. It's all part of a long term strategy. But Trump's tweets and the success of Venezuela and some Israeli political calculation meant that it was all moved up. This involved lying to Trump to make him feel that actually see what happened in Venezuela, we can make it happen in Iran too. Don't worry, it will be short, it'll be quick, will decapitate the regime and they'll concede immediately. And of course, the venality, the corruption, and of course the geopolitical dimension of Pakistan being against it, all of that working together to create this total shit show. That's my best attempt now, Eamon, to make sense of what happened. How do I score? Do I get an A? Do I get a B? Do I flunk? What do you think?
- [59:57]
Eamon Dean
I'll give you either A minus or B, to be honest. Oh, my God.
- [60:02]
Thomas Small
That's pretty good. Yeah.
- [60:03]
Eamon Dean
I have to be a very strict professor here. Look, everything you said, it's a precise timeline. And I agree with you because at the end of the day, we are dealing with a president who is, has a short attention span, you know, and therefore he always agree with the last person he talks to. This is a problem with Trump, like, and he always agree with the last person that he talks to, whether it is, you know, Rubio or the failed marshal of Pakistan one way or another, like, and he will always agree with the last person that he talks to, Netanyahu. Let me just basically be generous to Netanyahu here, although I don't like the man at all, but Let me be generous here. The decision making process in Israel is far more collective and complex than people think. It's not that the Prime Minister will decide to hit Iran and everyone will go along with it. No, the Prime Minister will rely on a multi layered body of decision making to decide the strategy of where to go, what to do and who to hit and what you know, and it's all based on the intelligence, the defense establishment and of course the political leaders and the wise leaders, like in the basically of Israel. That's one thing. It doesn't mean basically he has no agency of his own or interests of his own and machinations of his own, like in where he is trying to push that decision making process one way or another.
- [61:30]
Thomas Small
But also, if I may say, Eamonn, also it doesn't mean that that decision making process is rational, of course, for coherent or a well oiled machine. Elizabeth Zherkoff also said that, look, people think that Israel is this kind of like tightly run machine of genius strategic thinking. And she said that is not the case. It is just as chaotic as any late democracy at the moment. It's kind of not rational.
- [61:55]
Eamon Dean
Exactly. It used to be, but not anymore. And especially like just look what Netanyahu did with the new head of Mossad, who is from outside the agency. He overruled the agency completely on who he should appoint. And as soon as that guy comes in who doesn't speak English, by the way, he only speak Russian and Hebrew. So as soon as he comes in, he starts firing heads of departments all over the place. And you know, the Mossad is in chaos.
- [62:18]
Thomas Small
Just like Trump's new appointment of the head of National Intelligence.
- [62:21]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [62:22]
Thomas Small
It's the same. It is shambolic.
- [62:24]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [62:25]
Thomas Small
It is politically shallow. It is personally kind of corrupt. It is the same.
- [62:30]
Eamon Dean
And it's the same thing in Iran, by the way, Iran is now evolving into this nine headed dragon because now I've been sitting with someone who is extremely close to the Iranian leadership, let's put it this way, the past and the present. You know, we were having, you know, a meeting just yesterday and I'm gonna have a dinner with him also today. I mean, so it's like this person who speaks with great authority and it's a well known political entity. It's not like basically someone who's unknown. So he said that there are nine people right now who are running the country. Among them of course is General Wahidi of the irgc, Mohsin Rezai of the irgc, and among them of course, Ghaliba who was IRGC and now the speaker of the parliament, among them the head of the judiciary, and among them the president, because he represent, of course, a certain trend within the Iranian system. He need to be represented. So there are nine. And these nine do not make what they call it collective decision making because they don't meet ever in the same place or talk in the same meeting online room, like a zoom or whatever. No, no, they never. For security reasons. So these nine, let's call them the Nazgul, you know, okay, so the nine, you know, and of course, they serve one master, you know, you know, the disfigured Sauron, you know, Khamenei.
- [64:05]
Thomas Small
If they're the nine Nazgul, I want to know who are the seven dwarf lords in the current geopolitical political arrangement? Who are the three elf lords with the rings that Sauron never touched? Anyway, one day we can do a whole episode on the Lord of the Rings, but exactly. Okay, so these nine. I mean, I want to get back to the Israel thing, but okay, these nine.
- [64:22]
Eamon Dean
Yeah, yeah, but. But these nine, you know, because the listener will find it interesting, are doing what they call, you know, network decision making, not collective decision making. They talk to each other separately. So imagine nine, you know, circles, and there are lots of, you know, interconnected, overlapping lines between them. That's how decisions are being made in Iran right now. And he told me something interesting. He said, now the plan is that Mushtabah, now with the help of these nine, will rise and finally appear in public, most likely in Mashhad, at the burial of his father, either in Mashhad or Qum. And because the burial of Ayatollah Khamenei, the father, the procession will start on the 4th of July in Tehran.
- [65:14]
Thomas Small
That's how they're sticking it to the Americans right there on the 250th anniversary of the founding of the American republic.
- [65:20]
Eamon Dean
Exactly.
- [65:21]
Thomas Small
They know what they're doing.
- [65:22]
Ryan Reynolds
Exactly.
- [65:22]
Thomas Small
Gracious.
- [65:23]
Eamon Dean
And then they will move him to. On the 6th of July to Qom, and then Fankum, the holy city of Qom. They will move him to the holy city of Mashhad, where, of course, he was born and learned Islam and all of that. Like, basically, it will be buried there. And that's, I think, either in or in Mashhad, most likely in Mashhad, you know, for eschatological and religious and theological reasons, Ayatollah Mushta Bahaminay, the new leader, will appear in public for the first time in order to either bury his father because he need to be there and also to finally assert his authority over, of course, the nine that are loyal to him. So what's happening is we see in Iran an evolving decision making process. In Israel, we see a declining, chaotic decision making process. And in the White House, there is no decision making process whatsoever. So, I mean, you see here, and of course there is so much confusion within Saudi Arabia, even in Saudi Arabia and the UAE and Kuwait, there are now with internally disagreements over how to move forward, and these disagreements about whether to be hawkish with Iran, whether to be conciliatory with Iran, a lot of debates even within the internal government political decision making process within the uae, Saudi and Kuwait and Bahrain and Egypt and Turkey. Everyone is confused right now. So it shows that when there is a steady hand in the White House, the world at least can see things clearly. When there is no steady hand in the White House, there is no hand even to begin with. I think this is where we see the world going through the fog and the smoke and the ash of war, and we can't see our way through it.
- [67:25]
Thomas Small
Well, Eamon, you know, there are still people out there who robustly defend the idea that Donald Trump is a strategic genius, that he is a great leader. A lot of people still believe that. It's kind of amazing to me that they do.
- [67:43]
Eamon Dean
I, I think they do that. You know why? Because he's been lucky. He's been lucky. He just have a streak of luck. And people think it's genius.
- [67:49]
Thomas Small
Well, it seems to me that it was a tremendous mistake to reelect Donald Trump as President of the United States. I don't mean that to say that it was a good versus evil contest and that Kamala Harris or the Democrats were good. This is the whole problem of the last 15 years and certainly the last 10 years, the period of time that you and I, Eamonn, have tried to make sense of the world from a Middle Eastern point of view. For many, many dear listeners, it isn't a straightforward black and white situation. The liberal internationalist order had grown complacent, decadent, ideologically authoritarian. That had happened. It had resulted in very unhelpful strategic decisions by the globalist partisans of that of that order. As a result of which, in the midst of that decadence, in the midst of those bad decisions, a countervailing trend arose across the world, which Donald Trump became the great avatar of. We call it populism. A lot of people put a certain amount of support behind that movement because it opposed the decadent, liberal internationalist order. That they saw, I think rightfully, exactly, had made huge mistakes, had become decadent, had become ideologically committed and all those things. And yet a lot of people, and I hold my hand up and say at times I have been one of those people, forgot that though in some sense the enemy of my enemy is my friend, he still is my enemy. And Donald Trump and that whole movement which we saw manifest in Britain with Brexit, which we see manifest across the European continent with various right wing populist parties continuing to destabilize that decadent order, isn't actually different from that decadent order, but simply the rot that that order is undergoing. It's actually like almost vampirically or parasitically dependent upon that decadent order. It's not actually a reasonable response to the problems of that internationalist order and in fact has dispensed with very important components of the world order without which there is no world order. So we need to talk about this more unconflicted, I think, on and off. Because sometimes we unconflicted have got it wrong.
- [70:36]
Eamon Dean
Yes.
- [70:36]
Thomas Small
Because we saw the mistakes that the internationalist order were making, the American led order was making. We saw those mistakes as somehow coterminous with the Democratic Party. And we were lulled into, I think, a false binary which we should never have allowed ourselves to be.
- [70:55]
Eamon Dean
Yeah, I agree.
- [70:56]
Thomas Small
And we are eating a bit of humble pie.
- [70:58]
Eamon Dean
Yeah.
- [70:59]
Thomas Small
And we have to be a little bit savvier moving forward. That's my feeling. Eamon.
- [71:03]
Canva Narrator
Yeah.
- [71:04]
Eamon Dean
Although I like my humble bite to have a cayenne pepper. I like it spicy, to be honest.
- [71:10]
Thomas Small
You know, my friend, I love you. We're doing our best here. You know, a lot of people have been blindsided by the last six months. We have been.
- [71:18]
Eamon Dean
Yes, absolutely. I raise my hand and I say,
- [71:20]
Thomas Small
yeah, we've got to do better in future.
- [71:22]
Eamon Dean
Exactly, exactly. We learn from our mistakes, that's for sure.
- [71:25]
Thomas Small
Absolutely. Okay, well. Well, we're soldiering on into the future clear eyed. Maybe we can put Iran to bed.
- [71:31]
Eamon Dean
Ayman, what do you think? You know, I would love to put the Iranian regime to a permanent bed or casket. And I want to put the Iranian people on the throne of Persia. That's my dream.
- [71:43]
Thomas Small
Dear listeners, thanks for listening. You'll hear from us again next week.
- [71:47]
Eamon Dean
Stay well, keep safe, everyone.
- [71:49]
Thomas Small
Conflicted is a message heard. Production Our executive executive producers are Jake Warren and Max Warren. This episode was produced and edited by Thomas Small.
- [72:06]
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