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Thomas Small (4:01)

Welcome back to Conflicted to this semi emergency episode of Conflicted Eamon. Why is it a semi emergency episode? It's a sort of taco party episode, maybe. What do you think?

Eamon Dean (4:15)

Indeed, taco, exactly. It was supposed to be fafo as far as Iran was concerned. Now we are, you know, turning it into a taco episode as far as President Trump is concerned.

Thomas Small (4:29)

Dear listeners, you will understand what Eamon means by that as this episode unfolds. And I have to warn you in advance, this is a pretty underprepared episode. We had planned to record a completely different episode a couple of days ago, but you know, Eamon was totally caught up in the events unfolding in the Middle East. You know, going from one meeting to another meeting with one official with another official, hearing about all the slamming doors, opening doors, you know, cables flying back and forth as the region readied itself for what they thought was going to be a massive American attack on Iran and then realized that that wasn't going to happen. So we didn't record as we intended. And in the meantime, Amen said, look, Thomas, we have got to just lay it out for our listeners and tell them what the hell has been going on, what happened. And so I have conceded. Eamon.

Eamon Dean (5:22)

Indeed.

Thomas Small (5:22)

And we're going to do this special episode in which we kind of try our best to tell the whole story thus far of this Iranian imbroglio, right?

Eamon Dean (5:32)

Indeed. Let's get right into it.

Thomas Small (5:41)

So, Eamonn, the Middle east is harder than ever to understand. It's just bewitching, bewildering, bedeviling, all attempts to make sense of it. The Iran crisis escalated and escalated and escalated, all the while as a result of all sorts of geopolitics over the last eight months, as we will hear about. The region is more militarized than ever, less diplomatically aligned than ever, therefore more prone to miscalculation because allies, partners, don't fully trust each other. They all have different end goals. So it's an extremely complex time. Meanwhile, a quote unquote armada that Trump sent to the Middle east, huge military buildup intended to be used to attack Iran, we were told is still there. So it's all very fraught. And, you know, one reason that I was hesitant to do this episode is because I like conflicted episodes to go hard on the history and to be sort of future proof. And my fear is we record this now, this is late on Sunday night, the 1st of February, late Sunday night. And I'm thinking this is coming out in 36 hours and in the next 36 hours everything could change again. Can you promise me, Aemon, without giving the game away? Cause we wanna tell the whole story. But can you promise me that by the time this episode drops on Tuesday morning, everything won't have changed again?

Eamon Dean (7:10)

I'm 85% confident that nothing will change from now until the airing of this episode because of two factors. The first one, the airlines in both Iran and also in Europe and North America are resuming flights to the region and within Iran Iranian airspace as we speak. Which means basically they've been reassured that nothing surprising will happen out of the blue. The second thing is because tomorrow there will be a bloodbath in the financial markets across the world on a big way we haven't seen. If you think basically the $7 trillion wiped off the commodities market and the crypto over the past 72 hours was scary enough. Just wait until Monday in the markets. And so I don't think President Trump is going to attack Iran during a time when it could actually even result in more of the global market suffering. So that's why I would say 85% confidence that nothing will happen.

Thomas Small (8:09)

I see. So if you're listening to this as soon as it's released, dear listeners, that means yesterday there was a bloodbath in the global markets and flights are still to ing and froing as normal between the Middle east and the rest of the world. And everything is sort of on hold, at least for now. So, you know, the headline is, after all of this external expectation, all of this military buildup, there is not going to be a huge American strike against Iran. There will be no regime decapitation, there will be no regime change in Iran, at least for now. Right, Eamon?

Eamon Dean (8:45)

Yes, indeed. The magic word you used is for now.

Thomas Small (8:48)

Well, before we get to for now, we need to go back to last June, specifically the 13th of June, 2025, when Israel launched Operation Rising Lion. Now, immediately in the very name of that operation, Amen, we see some kind of link to the present, because by naming that Operation Rising Lion, Israel was telescoping its end game for Iran, which is regime change. The lion here is the old Iran, the pre revolutionary Iran, the Iran that had that lion in the middle of its flag. A Pahlavist Iran, possibly a monarchical Iran, or maybe a secular republican Iran, but a new Iran that was also an old Iran. So immediately analysts knew this was Israel's endgame.

Eamon Dean (9:40)

There is no doubt in my mind that the name the Rising lion is referring to the fact that the old Iranian flag in the Shah era had a lion on it. It was a symbol of Iran's proud imperial past. And that's why the Israelis, when they named their operation Rising lion, they were not joking around. They had something in mind. But as with everything, plans never survived the impact.

Thomas Small (10:07)

It is also possible, it must be admitted, that by Rising lion, the operation title was referring to the lion of Judah, the old symbol of the tribe of Judah from which the word Jew and Jewish derives, saying that, look, Israel is not going to be pushed around by Iran and its proxies anymore. This is the Israeli point of view. They're rising to throw them off. Either way, on the 13th of June, 2025, Israel strikes a number of Iranian military and nuclear targets. Iran, of course, retaliates. We remember those remarkable images of Iranian missiles falling on Israel. It was quite dramatic. Israel targeted 900 sites approximately. They destroyed ballistic missile launch sites, they destroyed air defense systems, they attacked air bases, they assassinated a number of important people. The chief of the irgc, the chief of the armed forces, the chief of Staff. So the many headed HYDRA regime lost some of its heads. And then on the 21st of June, or over the night of the 21st to the 22nd of June, Operation Midnight Hammer was launched by the United States.

Eamon Dean (11:12)

There was one particular facility that needed to be taken out, and that was Fordow. And Fordao was roughly about 180, 200ft beneath a hill which needed a significant bunker busting capability that the Israelis don't have and only the Americans have. That's why President Trump finally agreed to send the B2s in order to drop these bunker busting munitions on the site, burying roughly about 164 centrifuges containing highly enriched uranium beneath the mountain rubble, basically. And that operation was what sealed the fate of that conflict. Now we know that President Trump wanted to end that war one way or another, and so the only way to end it is by delivering a significant blow. Of course the Iranian leadership was in a shock and yet they decided to retaliate in a manner that was more or less rehearsed and staged by firing Scud missiles, you know, against the Al Udeid airbase in Qatar containing American forces.

Thomas Small (12:19)

Now, immediately after the war was ended, Trump and his team made it clear that their goal was to do with Iran's nuclear program. They hoped that that attack would be another kind of negotiation move in getting Iran to agree to completely destroy, cancel, abrogate and never again try to restart a military nuclear program. So that was always America's real strategic aim, ending the nuclear program. The summer passes, attention is on a Gaza ceasefire deal which is being negotiated between Israel and obviously Hamas mediated by Qatar and Egypt and Turkey to some extent, and the United States, not much progress was being made. And on 9 September, Israel launched an airstrike in Doha, the capital of Qatar, targeting Hamas leadership there. It came totally out of the blue. Even the United States was not informed in advance. It was the first ever direct strike on a GCC member state. So it was a very shocking event in the Middle East. It's safe to say that the strike in Doha was a major jolt to Gulf perceptions of security and Gulf perceptions of the degree to which the United States actually has leverage over Israel.

Eamon Dean (13:41)

No doubt about it. Do you remember in the episode after the Saudis and the Pakistanis signed the bilateral mutual somewhat nuclear defense treaty between them that was because of what happened in Doha. I mean, the Saudis were in a shock that a GCC country for the first time in the 78 years existence of Israel in the region was targeted by Israeli air force. It's just unheard of. And that was a red line. Especially the fact that what Qatar was doing, despite all of my reservation about Qatar and anyone who knows me know basically I'm no big fan of Qatar or the Qatar royal family. But despite all of that, at least they were, you know, the mediator. You know, I understand you want to kill Hamas people, I understand that. But you can't kill them when they are sitting in a negotiating table in good faith that you promised that you will show up to. And you kill not only the terrorist negotiator, but also you kill the mediator with him. That is not how things work. Otherwise people don't trust you. Yes, terrorists have no sanctity, but mediators do. And I think that was a step too far. Even I think Netanyahu himself will know by now that was not a wise move to have done.

Thomas Small (14:59)

Israel would have been thinking and would probably still say that Qatar is not a good faith mediator. Qatar was too incentivized to keep the ceasefire deal always on ice. Certainly the Doha strike reshaped the diplomatic field and gave a new sense of urgency to the ceasefire process. I mean, Washington immediately escalated its own peace push. And a month later, on 9 October, the Gaza ceasefire deal was announced. A multi phased process, the second phase of which just started last week. So whether that attack on Doha was wise, foolish, illegal, legal, whatever, moral, immoral, it did change things. It forced a deal to get through. A deal did get through. It also did, as you say, lead to the announcement of that Saudi Arabia, Pakistan strategic Mutual Defense Agreement. So that Doha attack had big reverberations geopolitically. And it's in the context of this that we need to remind everyone of the visit that the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman MBS, paid to Washington D.C. over the 18th and 19th of November.

Eamon Dean (16:12)

The visit by Mohammed bin Salman to D.C. was pivotal. It set the stage for a new understanding between Riyadh and D.C. when it comes to several issues. First of all, Saudi Arabia is not only just important when it comes to setting the scene for the energy market. You know, since the 1970s, whoever occupied the White House always understood that you want to have some semblance of control over the price of energy around the world. You need the Saudis on your side. That's the Reality. Now not only that, but Saudi Arabia of course have discovered like in a significant amount of rare earth minerals and elements which also set the scene for the US because they need that. And that's why it was a Pentagon friendly company, MP Materials, that signed the deal with Saudi Arabia and its company, Poor Minerals. Ma' Aden is the Aramco equivalent for the minerals because that's what happens. They wanted the dod, the Department of Defense, now Department of War to be in control of the American share of these minerals out of Saudi Arabia. In return, the Saudis wanted significant defense deals with the US including a mutual defense assistance treaty, not the defense treaty in the attack on one and attack on the other. But no, it's a kind of an assistance to help Saudi Arabia receive significant amount of defensive measures in the face of an attack by a third party. Should the attack by the third party against Saudi Arabia happen because of the alliance between Saudi Arabia and the U.S. in other words, just because I'm your friend, I could attract enemies. So if someone attack me because I'm your friend, I'm your ally, you have to come to my aid giving me defensive measures, not offensive.

Thomas Small (17:57)

On the back of that visit, Trump did designate Saudi Arabia a major non NATO ally. So he made it clear that Saudi was important. Now, in the lead up to MBS's visit and following it, Saudi Arabia released some carefully worded statements saying it would not be joining the Abraham Accords to normalize relations with Israel unless there were a credible pathway to Palestinian statehood or at least clear diplomatic movement towards peace. So Saudi appeared to be returning to its previous position based on the long standing Arab Peace initiative which always required Israel to accept a two state solution as a condition for any normalization of relations between the two countries. This irritated Israel and to some extent we now know for sure irritated the Emirates because the Abraham Accords was an Emirates initiative to create the conditions for Israel to be integrated into the region more normally. Now Eamon, I think we can say that MBS or Saudi Arabia there were three factors informing its decision to pull back a bit from joining the Abraham Accords. Domestic political constraints that always exist for Saudi because it's such a big country with a big Muslim population and in the context of the Gaza war, especially anti Israeli feeling was bubbling much closer to the surface, especially following Israel's attack on a fellow GCC state. So that was one problem. I think the Gaza war in general changed the game a bit. The perceived mercilessness of Israel's response, and I say perceived because I know the question of Israel's response is still very much debated and I don't want to go into it, but the perceived mercilessness of that response would have had an impact and there's a bit of good old fashioned Saudi game playing there as well. So by pulling back from the Abraham Accords, it gave Saudi a bit of leverage. It could place normalization on the negotiating table in Riyadh's negotiations with the U.S. the U.S. would love for this normalization to happen. So Saudi could get some more concessions from the White House by playing this game. Is that a fair analysis?

Eamon Dean (20:11)

Ayman it is a fair analysis, but also I mean my understanding from Riyadh, they are willing and happy to participate in the Abrahamic Accord but on their own terms. Their problem is the fact that Saudi Arabia as a representative of the Muslim Sunni world, which is now like in a basic just Sunni Islam is the largest sect in the world, surpassing Roman Catholics by half a billion people. There is 1.7 billion Sunnis and the next sect immediately after that will be the Catholics at lacking 1.2 billion. Imagine the Crown jewel of Sunni Islam will drag with it Pakistan will drag with it other nations in order to sign a new Abrahamic Accord 2o but they need one thing, though they said it many times, they said it in private, not in public. They need a new government in Israel that is no longer associated with what happened in Gaza and especially the fact that the current Israeli government is the most right wing government with figures such as Smotrich and Ben gvir, who the Saudi leadership say make the possibility of signing peace deal and normalization deal with them rather difficult given the public opinion not just only in Saudi Arabia but in the other countries that they want to bring with them. Because the Saudis don't want to come alone to the party. They want to bring with them others, including Pakistan and possibly the Indonesians by the way. That's why when they bring the only nuclear Muslim country Pakistan, when you bring with you Indonesia, the largest populous Muslim country, all of these need to happen with a government that is more acceptable to the wider Muslim world, that is not stained with so much as you described it, like basically perceived mercilessness of what happened in Gaza. That's one even to the point where they said the Saudis that heck we will even welcome another Netanyahu government but with more center right or center coalition rather than the current far right coalition that he is leading with these loonies. I was told by trusted Israeli friends that if it's up to Netanyahu, he Would love to take Smotrichem and GVIR and put them in a boiling, you know, pot of water and just see them screaming to death, you know, there is no love between them. But the problem here is there is not going to be any elections in Israel possibly until October 2026. So the Israeli response, especially Netanyahu, which is always the default setting in politics, which is bullshit. I don't trust mbs. MBS has other ulterior motives, I don't believe. Like, basically he is really concerned about the opinion of his own people. And it's like, no, wait a minute, he does actually, because he's trying to bring with him roughly 600 million Muslims in Saudi, in Pakistan and in Indonesia. So please pay attention. This is the problem, the breakdown of communication between the Saudis and the Israelis and the Americans. The Americans get it more than the Israelis. But even the Americans are like desperate for some breakthrough.

Thomas Small (23:20)

I'm glad that you mentioned that Netanyahu is in a way caught between two extremes here. In late October, the Israeli finance minister, Smotrich, who's like one of these notorious crazies, as you say, he was very insulting to Saudi Arabia when this question of normalization came up. He said that the Saudis should keep riding camels in the desert, he said, which caused a bit of an outcry. Now he was forced to apologize a few hours later, presumably by Netanyahu forcing him to do something about this. Netanyahu not wanting to exacerbate tensions between Israel and Saudi anymore. And this is linked to Iran because, you know, in the last few weeks, as something like a kind of consensus about how to deal with Iran was being worked out. I mean, as we know, that consensus was shot to high hell over the weekend. But nonetheless, diplomacy was going on to create this consensus. One of the problems was that following MBS's visit in November to the United States, Israeli officials and lobbying groups in Washington aligned with Israel began to work to condition or constrain parts at least of the deal that MBS and Trump agreed. The military deal, the economic deal, the

Eamon Dean (24:34)

nuclear deal, the nuclear energy deal. Actually it was a concerted effort by Netanyahu's government to undermine the whole thing. It's like, you can't do any of this unless if you sign peace with me now. And it's like the Saudis, no, fuck you. I mean, the whole thing started to collapse between the two countries because the Saudis felt, don't bully me into signing with you, especially you as a very right wing government. We said like you know, we want a better government. The Israelis saying, well, it's bs, you know, you're trying to extricate yourself from a commitment. But the Saudis said, we made a commitment with the state of Israel, not with your current government. So unfortunately, this undermining attempted by Netanyahu, pushed by his own coalition partners to do so, might have exacerbated the tensions between Saudi Arabia and Israel as well as Saudi Arabia and the uae. This is like basically where the region entered into the most fractured. I have seen it for a while.

Thomas Small (25:32)

Yeah, I mean, the tensions over the Abraham Accords between Israel and Saudi. As you say, the UAE was the biggest signatory to the Abraham Accords. It's really a UAE project to some extent. And for a long time, relations between Saudi Arabia and the UAE were breaking down across multiple files. Sudan, Libya, but especially Yemen. And on the 31st of December, as we've discussed on conflicted, this came wide open over Yemen and a media war began between Saudi and the uae, which quite quickly became a media war between Saudi and Israel. And as you say, the whole region and its traditional, let's say enemy of my enemy is my friend coalition. So Iran is the shared enemy. So we're all going to kind of try to get along at least it was totally fragmenting just as Iran was entering a period of destabilization greater than any it had really witnessed since the 1980s. And after this quick break, we will go back now fully into the Iran scenario, having laid out the backstory like that so that we can play out beat by beat, what the hell has been happening over the last four weeks or so. We'll be right back.

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Thomas Small (27:27)

We're back. Dear listeners, Eamon is absolutely champing at the bit to take over the reigns of this episode and I'm happy for it because my notes have just kind of more or less evaporated. Aemon, over to you, buddy. What has been going on?

Eamon Dean (27:42)

Okay, I will start with the chronological order of everything. Like everything can be traced back to the twelve Days War. There was an event, an important Event, in fact, a seminal event that happened on the 9th of June, 2025. Eamon Dean wrote a tweet. Yes, that's event, Eamon Dean. What?

Thomas Small (28:01)

Wait, you're really taking over, man? I'm just gonna sit back and listen.

Eamon Dean (28:06)

So I wrote a tweet, a long one. It's like more of a tweet article kind of thing. I called it Two Minutes to Midnight. And in that I explained why Israel is going to attack the Islamic Republic, Most likely by the 15th of June. So 6 days from that tweet come to 13th of June, 2 days before my date of attacking Iran. Lucky 9. The Israelis did attack Iran and started the whole 12 days war. The 12 days war did far more damage to the Islamic Republic than just destroying the ballistic missile sites, aircrafts on the tarmac, nuclear sites, assassinating regime leaders. It did far more than that, Thomas. What it did, it shattered. It destroyed the illusion of invincibility and competency that the Iranian people held, or some of them at least held off their regime. Just to give you an idea, from 2005 all the way until 2025. 20 years, two decades. During these two decades, Iran, the Islamic Republic, Zayatullah spent $300 billion on terrorist groups and terrorist regimes. So money. I have to talk about money. Money matters. Anyone who dealt with Iranians understand how much they are very entrepreneurial and thrifty. So $300 billion were spent on prepping up the Assad regime, Hezbollah, the Houthis, terrorist organizations, Hamas, all over the place, Iraq militias. In addition, from 2005 also all the way until 2025. Each year, each year the Iranian economy was losing up to $100 billion in economic activity from the sanctions. That's $2 trillion lost to the Iranian economy. You know, while their infrastructure is going down, while their currency is tank going down from 900 billion in 2005 all the way down to 300 billion right now. That's not a GDP lost at the collapse. In addition, the Iranian currency, at the eve of the 12 days war, which was only seven months ago, the Iranian currency was roughly about 400,000 riyals per dollar. You remember that the 12 days war ended this kind of myth, this illusion of invincibility and competency gone completely from the minds of the Iranian people that they're.

Thomas Small (30:35)

I think that's the point, Ayman, because for all those years, a lot of Iranians would have known that their country was spending all this money. But they thought to themselves, well, we're being told that we have these Enemies and that we have to spend this money to defend ourselves from attack. And yet after the 12 day wars, they were like, wait a second, we couldn't defend ourselves at all. They just totally wiped the floor with us. What have we been doing all these decades?

Eamon Dean (31:00)

Yes, exactly. The collapse of the Fordao Mountain was the collapse of this myth. It collapsed the whole myth. And people started to feel okay. Every month the Iranian currency started tanking. You know, 600,000 per dollar, 800,000 per dollar, 900,000 per dollar. Then in October, the Iranian currency on the 21st of October broke through the 1 million per dollar barrier. And you remember, Thomas, we were talking in the podcast, I said to you, if it reaches 1.3 million, this is going to be mass protest territory. These were my exact words, mass protest territory. When it's coupled with economic incompetency and strategic idiocy and absolute folly on how to run a government, it's the incompetence. And what is the sherry on the top of this rotten poo cake was between the end of the Twelve Days War and the collapse of the currency that happened at the very end of the year, near the last week of December, when it broke through the 1.3 million per dollar barrier I was telling you about, the Iranian leadership were holding in complete contempt their own people. They were not telling them, don't worry, we're going to negotiate a new deal with the Americans towards lifting the economic sanctions. We will bring the inflation under control, we will bring investments, and trade and banking and commerce will start to gradually return. Just bear with us, stay with us. We will lead you to the end of the tunnel. But what the Iranian leadership, did they switch off even that light of the end of the tunnel. And Khamenei, whenever Lakina, basically he was confronted with this, he will come out and say, remember people, this Islamic Republic is in the eyes of God and under the protection of the Mahdi, the 12th Imam, the absent Imam, so you don't have to worry. So whenever people are complaining about the lack of jobs, the lack of economic opportunities, the lack of everything, what is the Ayatollah's solution? Just go out and provide more of these religious painkillers to the population, saying, we are protected by God. So have faith, have faith, have faith. But people can't eat faith. People need jobs.

Thomas Small (33:27)

And as you say, by that point a lot of people, important people, had lost faith. The combination of the deteriorating economic situation and the disillusionment that had occurred as a result of the 12 day war meant the Iranian nation's bizaeries especially were fed up. So this is the middle class, shop owners and whatever, who had played such a big role in the 1978 and 79 revolutionary fervent there on 28 December 2025. So just over a month ago, they began to demonstrate to protest in Tehran. Quite quickly, these protests spread to hundreds of locations in all 31 provinces and then broadened to include not just economic demands, not just economic grievances, but political demands, attracting more and more people, especially young people, students. And on the 2nd of January, 2026, amen. The President of the United States, Donald Trump, started to effectively tweet. The first one was that America was locked and loaded and ready to go. And then 11 days later, the demonstrations having grown much more intense, probably on the back of that first tweet, and the regime already having launched a brutal crackdown, Trump posted that help was on its way and told the Iranians to keep protesting.

Eamon Dean (34:46)

I wish he didn't. I wish someone sane from within the administration has taken away his phone from his hand. These series of tweets were to have disastrous consequences. There are many reasons why I'm saying this. The first one is you do not associate the protest with you as the leader of the United States. You do not do that. You give the regime and their supporters the legitimacy for going after the protesters as the agents and instigators of a coup in the country. I mean, you label them as saboteurs and pro Americans and all of that. Don't jump on the bandwagon and say whatever you want to say. If you want to say something like, you know, you say, you know, well, we admire the bravery of the Iranian people and we support their decision, whatever that might be. We support the voice of freedom for people all over the world. That's it, you know, stop right there. Do not promise anything. Why? Because that led to more and more protesters coming to the street feeling that they are emboldened. This is their moment. And of course, what happened afterwards was a tragedy on a monumental scale. First he said, help on the way. Do not shoot the rioters, do not shoot the protesters. And then after that, of course, he went on to say, keep protesting. Go and take over your institutions. Gather the names of the people who are killing you. Justice will come to them, all of these things. This has limited considerably the strategic room for maneuver that the United States and their allies basically had in terms of dealing with the events on the ground there.

Thomas Small (36:17)

Trump's first tweet on 2 January was that the US is locked and loaded and ready to go. But the truth is that was just not the case. The United States did not have military assets in the region enough to launch any sort of attack against Iran. So they were not locked and loaded and ready to go. So that tweet, which I imagine Trump just sent on the spur of the moment, was not only dangerous, as you pointed out, it was also just totally false. And not only wrong footed the Iranian protesters, it wrong footed the whole world. You know, America's allies, Saudi and Israel for starters, knew that the US didn't have the military assets that it needed to do anything in Iran. So they were thinking, what the hell are you talking about? It started from the beginning by creating chaos.

Eamon Dean (37:04)

I mean, America had the thinnest, the thinnest level of military presence in the region since 9, 11, since 25 years ago. In other words, basically, Trump had the assets just only to launch maybe a wave of 60 Tomahawk missile cruise and that's it, Nothing else. So this is why history will judge these posts as not only strategic folly, but as a failure of communication at the highest possible level. Even on the 13th, when he posted for the second time, that basically help is coming, there was no help coming because it will take weeks to transfer. Even with the air bridge capacity that the US has, it will take weeks. There is no electronic warfare capability. There is no interceptors in the region. Also, at the same time, you have to build a coalition. You can't just go to war in the region. A war that could have ramifications for the energy export of seven countries that include Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, uae, for God's sake. I mean, you can't just start a war in this region without at least just, you know, consulting with them, talking to them. There are countries that will be hit immediately should Iran be hit. Right now, Israel is one of them, Jordan is one of them, because they have committed to helping the United States in this conflict. And of course there are the proxies and especially the Houthis who could basically attack the international shipping and especially harass Saudi Arabia.

Thomas Small (38:39)

And the great tragedy is from the 8th of January onward, when the Iranian regime imposed an Internet blackout across the country. The scale of repression against the protesters who had now come out in the probably hundreds of thousands, at least, was off the charts.

Eamon Dean (39:00)

There was. I can't tell how the recording was obtained and which GCC country obtained it. Nonetheless, it's a conversation on the phone in early January between two Iraqi Shia militia leaders who were Talking about sending hundreds of their own people across the border to help the Islamic Republic counterinsurgency, as they called it, capability, and to kill Iranians. Because the Iranian Islamic Republic leadership decided that they can't trust the job of killing Iranians to Iranians. They would rather import also some Iraqis and Lebanese Hezbollah experts to do it for themselves, just like what they did in Syria. And the recording was talking about how there was a conversation between Ayatollah Khamenei in Tehran with Ayatollah Muhammad Reza Sistani, the son of Ayatollah Ali Sistani. Of course, Ayatollah Ali Sistani is mentally incapable because of his old age, like he's in his late 90s. So Muhammad Reza Sistani is actually the power behind the throne in Iraq. He's the ultimate religious authority. And the conversation between the two was rather grim. Ayatollah Khamenei was saying, look, you know, I have this uprising on my hand, but what I've learned from the Syrian civil war is to not let it drag out. Assad was roughly killing about 1,000 people a month in the first eight months of the uprising. But that was dragging it on. He said, lakhani, when you slaughter the lamb, you need to do it quickly, swiftly, all done without delay, so the lamb doesn't suffer. So the Iranian nation shouldn't suffer. It should happen quickly. And that's why it's estimated that on the 8th and 9th January, roughly between 16,000 and 30,000 were killed, not killed and wounded and injured and arrested. No, no, no. Just killed. So over two days period per day, he was killing between 8,000 and 15,000 of his own people.

Thomas Small (41:07)

Now, can I just ask Aemon, because I want to now play devil's advocate, okay? Because lots of numbers have been FL of people think these higher numbers are totally made up in order to justify an American intervention. And frankly, the mind does boggle at the idea of even 8,000, but certainly like 15,000 people murdered in a day. It's so many people. How would you technically, feasibly be able to do that?

Eamon Dean (41:39)

First of all, if you look at even the Iranian community who are living in places like Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Masqat, Suhar, Kuwait, Bahrain, the number of families who had to open wake receptions for the people for their relatives who were killed there, if they were just representative of a small community from inside Iran, that in itself is shocking because there were hundreds of these wake receptions that were opened because many families lost relatives. That in itself is shocking. Also the red crescent of A certain GCC country that is friendly to Iran was also working on the ground in Iran before even the uprising. Basically, they were working there for years and providing charitable services for years. Their intelligence coming out of there is horrifying. They themselves were testified to the fact that they've seen with their own eyes protesters, you know, half wounded or wounded, and they were trying to get away. And then they were summarily executed, you know, wherever they were found. Hiding behind cars, behind trees, hiding behind, you know, rubbish bins. And also, basically, they were executed in their hospital beds. Now, they were given a fatwa. They were given. Just go out and put this down before it spreads. It has to be brutally done. What he said to Mohammad Riza Sistani in that phone call, I'm talking about the Ayatollah, he said, the slaughter of the lamb need to be done quick and decisive. Why? So to spare ourselves a civil war ahead. So when people say the numbers are too big because they have learned the lesson of the Syrian civil war, don't let the protests ferment and drag for months. Kill it immediately, put it down immediately, before it becomes a civil war.

Thomas Small (43:33)

And all the while, the regime was saying to its own people that these people who were dying were not even Iranians. They were all being accused of being Mossad agents, foreign agents, infiltrators. So the regime was working overtime to justify its violence by tarring all the protesters with that brush.

Eamon Dean (43:52)

In addition, the Islamic Republic's authorities, including the Health Ministry, including the Prosecutor General, they all said that the number of the protesters who were killed were 3,000, which tells you that if this is what they released when this is the official number. And by the way, the Prosecutor general said something that was shocking. He said the internal securities did all of this without the use of ammunition or weapons. And so I was thinking, really, the level to which the regime's officials go to insult the intelligence not only of their own people, but of the world. What are they all Shaolin Temple trainees, basically using kung fu methods to kill all of these protesters in one day? And with your own admission, 3,000. And this is why, when people say, oh, it's all propaganda to justify a war against the regime, I'm telling you, no one, no one now regrets not doing a deal with the Iranian regime like Trump before the protest started, because that's exactly what he always wanted, the deal. He is a deal maker.

Thomas Small (45:01)

Well, here we go. This is how we're gonna bring the two halves of this episode together, because we laid out in the first Half all of the geopolitical events of the last eight months. We've now just described what's happened within Iran over the last month, the tragedy there, the expectations that Donald Trump aroused, how those expectations were dashed, how it was singularly irresponsible of the President to do any of that. Now, what's going on? So on the 27th of January, so just four days ago, as of this recording, CENTCOM announced a multi day aerial readiness campaign in the Middle east, right? So everyone thought, okay, it's gonna happen, they're paving the way. There's gonna be a massive attack. Trump has to attack. He has said he's gonna come to these protesters rescue. There was shuttle diplomacy going on. Saudi and Israeli officials flew to Washington to talk about the situation, to come to some consensus what's gonna happen. You know, countries were saying publicly, countries like the Emirates, countries like Saudi Arabia, the Americans can't use our airspace. But privately they understood it's gonna happen. All of this is being interpreted as an absolute sign that Trump has decided to strike. We've gotta get online, right? Qatar flies to Tehran at the last minute. So what happened?

Eamon Dean (46:21)

What happened, my dear friend, is Taco. As I said to some friends just a night ago, I said it's gonna be either a FAFO for the regime or a taco for Trump.

Thomas Small (46:33)

I wanna tell the listeners what FAFO means in case they don't know. But I don't wanna actually say it out loud. It's basically screw around and find out. But the s there, it's not screw, it's f screw around and find and find out. Which is the more robust MAGA way. Like, hey man, we're going to show you what's what. And taco is Trump always chickens out. So that's the Democrat sort of spin on Trump. He pretends to be a big man, but actually he's a wimp.

Eamon Dean (47:00)

Well, in my opinion, he is to some extent because he got used to a lot of McDonald's fast food meals and he thinks basically wars also should be served fast food style. You know, go in, you know, one, two, three strikes, that's it, done, declare victory. But no, the reality is that if you want to take down the regime in Iran, you need to prepare for several weeks of intense campaign. And it's going to be hurtful, hurtful to not only the American forces and bases and assets in the region, is going to be hurtful to the global economy. It's going to be hurt, hurtful towards the allies in the region, including the GCC.6 as well as Israel and Jordan and possibly Syria. Even so, you cannot just wish for a quick buck to make in Iran. And by the way, one particular individual who I know is actually close to the administration, knows the administration mindset and knows the circle around Trump. And she said, just in case, Eamonna, when that delusion entered your mind, Trump does not give a damn about the Iranian people or the Iranian protesters who died, does not give a damn about them, not a single iota even. He doesn't care. He wants his deal. He wants to say that he is the one who stopped Iran's nuclear ambition. He buried it, he killed it, he's done with it, and he is better than Obama. I wish all of this is wrong for the sake of Iran, for the sake of the Iranian people. I wish all of this is wrong and that Trump is just playing for time and that he's trying basically to build more assets in the region and will do the right thing in the end, basically by putting an end to 47 years suffering of the Iranian people. But I don't think so. The behavior has been really awful.

Thomas Small (48:59)

You know, you say fast food warfare, Eamon, and that reminds me of an event that we haven't mentioned yet, which occurred the day after Trump tweeted that America was locked and loaded and ready to attack Iran is the amazing Venezuela operation. So the very next day, Nicolas Maduro, President of Venezuela, is kidnapped out of his bed, basically flown to New York and the United States military launches this amazing display of its prowess, et cetera. Trump, when he tweeted, we're locked and loaded and ready to go, knew that that operation was going to follow the next day. He might have even been thinking of that operation and tweeted it in order to deflect attention from Venezuela. Who knows now, but because of the Venezuela operation, maybe he thought, look, America can do anything, we can do anything. We can get rid of the Iranian regime if we wanted to. I don't know what he was thinking, but the Venezuela dimension is important to this story.

Eamon Dean (49:50)

You said you don't know what he was thinking. Maybe he wasn't thinking, you know, when he did what he did and wrote what he wrote. Because at the end of the day, he took his allies by surprise. And these allies in the region are reliable for Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and uae. And all of them were taken by surprise. It's like, hey, are you really going to war? Because we're going to be the most affected. The Jordanians committed to helping the United States and the reason why they all coalesced in Jordan. Like in a half of the American air power in the region almost is concentrated in Jordan. Why? Because of the lack of American air defense capability at the moment. They coalesced all of the forces there because they are defended by the Israeli air defense umbrella and Jordan can be part of that. Plus the Saudis are moving some of their air defense capability towards the Jordanian border to help them. All of this basically was beneath the table, but the rumors were swirling around that the Saudis were begging the Americans not to attack Iran because they were trying to save Iran. And the answer was no. There is no love lost between the Saudis and the Iranians. But the Saudis, just like the Israelis, the Israelis did the same too. By the way, they were cautioning against premature action against Iran, saying, for God's sake, you don't have enough electronic warfare capability or interceptors. If we are attacked, how do we defend ourselves and therefore build up some capability? Do whatever you want, but also consult with us. What is it that you want? Unfortunately, with Trump, he treat allies with the same contempt that he treats enemies. Look at the Europeans. Look at the Europeans.

Thomas Small (51:33)

Let's literally talk about the last 36 hours. Maybe as of this recording, 48 hours. Again, this is late on Sunday, the 1st of February. So the Saudi Defense Minister, Khalid bin Salman, the brother of mbs, flew to Washington two days ago and then flew back. My understanding is that as he was flying back he thought, okay, it's been decided there's going to be a massive attack against Iran. We and the gcc, including us Saudis, we just have to accept that fact, prepare for it, even to whatever extent we can help achieve it. Like it's going to happen. And it's almost like by the time he disembarked back in Riyadh, everything had changed. So it's clear that there is going to be no attack, at least not now. How is this being greeted in the region?

Eamon Dean (52:21)

It's greeted with considerable shock and rather people being dismayed about it. The Trump administration always had three objectives to achieve from the Islamic Republic. One is to give up their nuclear program entirely, including the transfer of the 411kg of, of highly enriched uranium to a third party country. You know, Russia, China, you know, basically whatever. The second thing is the ballistic missile program. They need to get rid of their MRBMs and anything above that and to keep only like in their SRBMs, short range, basically, and to finally sever their relationship with their proxies, terrorist proxies like Hezbollah, the Houthis, the Iraqi militias, et cetera, and Hamas, of course. However, now it is emerging that Iran and the Islamic Republic leaders decided that, let's pull all the charms out for Trump because we know how to manipulate him, just like we manipulated him for the first strike. We told him, oh, 833 executions were canceled, only for them to be executed at a 60 per day, you know, over the next two, three weeks. So the executions did happen regardless. And he made himself look like a fool in front of the American media and in front of the world by announcing, oh, stopped, stopped. We are having no more executions. That was really another folly. But then they pulled another charm here. They said, okay, we are ready for Russia, and Russia is willing to absorb, to take all the dangerous nuclear materials. We are willing now to undertake no more highly enriched uranium on Iranian soil. We are willing to give up the ambition they stopped at there, and that's it. So we will give you this win, this amazing win, that there will be no more nuclear Iran, not now, not in the future. That's it. We close this chapter once and for all. But no talk about the ballistic missiles and no talk about the proxies that unfortunately tempted President Trump into, okay, that's a start. That's a very good start. Let's now negotiate. And that's why the Qataris went to Tehran and the two sides decided, okay, we understand each other now, now we can have a deal. But then this is, I think, where President Trump has now, bypassing his allies in the region. He made the Saudis and the Saudi Defense Minister talk about it in the White House circles, in the congressional circles, that Saudi is on side with President Trump. Trump, that Saudi believe passionately that if the Iranian regime is not attacked, it will emerge more emboldened and stronger. So now, as soon as he lands back in Riyadh, he is left out to dry by the Trump administration because they decided to take the Ayatollah's word at their face value and to enter yet into another round of negotiations. And all the intelligence assessment in the region was, it's just, it's impossible for President Trump to have any form of deal, no matter how much concessions the Iranian regime give, to actually have any triumph about it, because it's not going to be a triumph. He can sign a deal tomorrow for the extraction of the uranium out of Iran and for the entire nuclear ambition to be closed forever. But will he sign a ceremony in the White House with President Pezeshkiyan? You know, it's a political suicide. It will be an Ugly spectacle after everything that happened?

Thomas Small (55:54)

You mean because of all of the slaughter that's gone on? It's just.

Eamon Dean (55:57)

Exactly.

Thomas Small (55:58)

Are you gonna shake hands with a guy whose hands are covered in that amount of blood?

Eamon Dean (56:03)

You see, this is the problem, is the fact that we are now post the point of no return as far as this regime's legitimacy. Don't do a deal with them, leave them alone. Just do a blockade. You know, say that anyone who buys oil from Iran will be sanctioned to death. But if you don't want war, I understand. I hate war. Goodness luck in a baseball. Yeah, I've seen five times.

Thomas Small (56:26)

I want him to say, eamonn, I don't want to do justice, or I don't want to be fair to Donald Trump, because I really think he massively screwed up here. But it's not just, I think that he chickened out. I mean, eventually I think he just realized what most of us, I think, really knew in our hearts. Unless we were like die hard Pahlavists amongst the Iranian diaspora or die hard Israeli gung ho people, whatever. I mean, you can't just change the Iranian regime. It was going to be.

Eamon Dean (56:55)

It's gonna be a civil war.

Thomas Small (56:56)

I mean, as I said last week in our Q and A, it was gonna be a disaster. And so frankly, okay, there's not gonna be a tremendous Iranian civil war with all of these terrible knock on effects. Fine, but why did you have to pretend there was gonna be one? Why did you have to encourage all of those Iranians out into the street? Why did you have to upset so many relationships with your allies in the region? Why? Why?

Eamon Dean (57:23)

Yes, why? We come back to the fact that no matter what, because of these tweets, his entire legacy will be judged against them, no matter what he do right now, ironically, if he do nothing, he's a chicken. And the Russians and the Chinese will not respect the world. At the end of the day, if you couldn't stand up against Iran, can you stand up against China when they invade Taiwan? No, of course not. No. No way. No way. If you couldn't risk a war against Iran and it is like basically 40 times weaker than China, why would you risk a war against China over Taiwan? By this strategic folly, Trump might have sealed the fate of Taiwan already. And therefore President Xi Jinping must be jumping from joy thinking that, wow, he can't even bring himself to wage a war against a nation that has been under sanctions for 20 years and it's already experiencing hyperinflation and many other things. The other thing is when people ask me, Ayman, what do you want? And the answer is, I don't know, because thank you, Donald Trump. Basically, you put us all in a situation where every outcome is worse than the other and that the best outcome, ironically, is not a peace deal, just blockade Iran and let them be the first aggressor. Better than just letting them go away with it. Because no matter what deal you sign with them, even if they give up everything, if they give up the nuclear ambition, if they give up the ballistic missiles, if they give up the proxies, if they give up their even turbines and robes and everything into you, and they're basically underwear, even if they give up all of that, it will still be a deal stained in blood. You cannot feel triumph about it. Your supporters even will not feel triumph about it. The Democrats will not feel triumph about it. No one. Your allies in the region, Europeans would not feel triumph about.

Thomas Small (59:24)

There is that sort of Tucker Carlson wing of MAGA who have already decided definitely not to believe that very many protesters in Iran were killed and who will be delighted that there isn't war between America and Iran because they're anti war. They say. Other people say they're in the pocket of Qatar. I don't know. It's all crazy what's going on at the moment. So Donald Trump will think, well, I've placated that wing of the MAGA coalition at least, as you said as well. He's always trying, I think, to position himself against Barack Obama's legacy. And ironically, I think he's achieving that in a way that he never intended. Because as we've talked about on conflicted before, when back in 2014, Obama had his famous red line in Syria, saying that if the Assad regime launched chemical attacks against its own people, then America would intervene. And then Obama didn't intervene after the regime did launch chemical attacks. So we know, we've talked about on the podcast, as a result of Obama's failure to live up to that red line, Russia was emboldened. Russia intervened in Syria, Russia flexed its muscles in Libya, the Wagner group expanded across Africa, and Russia took over the Crimea and eventually down the line invaded Ukraine. So these sorts of things have big consequences. And I think Donald Trump has just experienced his Obama red line. And it's much, much worse, it seems to me, much worse geopolitically because, you know, the situation is already so fragile and America's power is so, I mean, I don't want to exaggerate. America is not a weak country. It's an Extremely powerful country still, but its reputational damage downstream. And what do you think, Eamonn? What's the likely outcome of all of this, let's say over the next year

Eamon Dean (61:14)

or two, if in the end he opt for a deal and chicken out of doing the right thing? And the right thing, not necessarily a war, but definitely not endorsing this current regime and whitewashing it. If he does that, I think Taiwan is gone within five years. It's gone.

Thomas Small (61:33)

Basically, China will feel emboldened now in the way that Russia felt emboldened in 2014.

Eamon Dean (61:40)

Indeed, because if the threat of regional conflict against Saudi, Kuwait, uae, Israel, Jordan can scare the Trump administration into finding another arrangement with the ayatollahs of Iran, what to stop China to say, well, intervene against me in Taiwan and South Korea and Japan, two pillars of the global economy are gone and maybe even I will go after the Philippines too. That's why it is important to understand that American resolve right now should not be tested. American resolve more than ever should stand firm. Otherwise, we are risking absolutely the capitulation of Taiwan and the cowering of South Korea and Japan in the Pacific arena. And no ally of the United States will believe a word, you know, the United States will say in the future. Already that was shaken by Obama, by Biden, and now it is absolutely being shaken by Trump quest for a Nobel Peace Prize, which he will never get. We all know that. Basically the committee is very biased against him. So why is he obsessed with it? I have no idea.

Thomas Small (62:54)

I have an idea. It's because Barack Obama won one. I'm serious. I think that's really what motivates a lot of Trump's thinking. Sadly, the end result of all of this, and not just this, but lots of stuff. The Greenland thing, the thing with Canada. China seems to be winning.

Eamon Dean (63:12)

Indeed, winning without doing anything.

Thomas Small (63:14)

Yeah. No, China is benefiting from this erratic foreign policy and it's all very dispiriting. Listen, Eamon, we've got to bring this episode to a close. It's already gone on long enough. Dear listeners, we tried to, to put it all together. We went back to June. We told you everything that's kind of happened in the region. We've talked about all of these things on the podcast before in various places, some places only for our subscribers. So if you like this level of detail, do consider subscribing and joining the conflicted community. So having talked about these things here and there, we've never really put it all together. I hope you've found it useful. You know, we're all kind of in shock here, you know, Eamon, poor Eamon, the oracle of Arabia. You know, I'm afraid Donald Trump has trumped your ability to forecast Eamon, because nobody can foresee what this guy's gonna do.

Eamon Dean (64:04)

Unfortunately, I can only forecast what rational people do, whether good or evil people do as long as there is logic and rationality. But unfortunately, I can't forecast the actions of not narcissistic leaders like that.

Thomas Small (64:20)

It's hard. It's. Gosh, I feel I need a holiday, really, after the last four weeks.

Eamon Dean (64:25)

Me too.

Thomas Small (64:27)

Dear listeners, thanks so much for putting up with us.

Eamon Dean (64:29)

Just don't go to Taiwan. Just don't go to Taiwan, okay?

Thomas Small (64:31)

Don't go to Taiwan. For Taiwan. Okay, Take care everyone. We'll be back with you next Tuesday, I think with an episode about. Nope, I'm not even going to say. Because these days, who the hell knows?

Eamon Dean (64:42)

Take care, take care everyone. And don't go to Taiwan.

Thomas Small (64:54)

Conflicted is a message heard. Production Our executive producers are Jake Warren and Max Warren. This episode was produced and edited by Thomas Small.

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