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- [00:01]
Mike Pesca
Fourth of July savings are here at the Home Depot, so it's time to get your grilling on. Pick up the traeger Pro Series 22 Pellet Grill and Smoker now on special buy for $389. Was $549. Smoke a rack of ribs or bake an apple pie. This grill is versatile enough to do it all this summer. No matter how you like your steaks, your barbecues are guaranteed to be well done. Celebrate 4th of July with fast free delivery on select grills right now at the Home Depot. It's up to availability. You know that one friend who somehow knows everything about money? Yeah. Now imagine they live in your phone. Say hey to Experian, your big financial friend.
- [00:44]
Michael Allen
It's the app that helps you check.
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Mike Pesca
Your FICO score, find ways to save, and basically feel like a financial genius. And guess what? It's totally free. So go on, download the Experian app. Trust me, having a BFF like this is a total game changer.
- [01:00]
Michael Allen
Foreign.
- [01:04]
Mike Pesca
It's Monday, June 23, 2025, from Peach Fish Productions. It's the gist. I'm Mike Pesca. If Donald Trump is behind it, I'm against it. It's not the worst heuristic in the world, but it's also not the best. I believe that the attack on Iran without further escalation is possible. But when Donald J. Trump and his DNI Tulsi Gabbard and his SecDef Pete, he and his Vice President, JD Vance are the key figures making these decisions. I do not trust Donald Trump. Then again, those people I named are simultaneously poster children for Donald Trump's propensity to surround himself with the unqualified, but also the exact people who would rein in his instincts for escalation. Here was JD Vance on this week. This week.
- [01:58]
Michael Allen
And so I'd say to people who are worried about a protracted military conflict is number one. The president more than anybody is worried about protracted military conflicts.
- [02:07]
Mike Pesca
That is not what we're getting ourselves involved in. Great. That is key. Iran is tottering and there are many voices saying now is the time to decapitate them, to turn the Mullers into posthumous. Tempting though it is, and promising though a world without an Islamic revolutionary state would be, I do not think this can be our project, our guided project. I am glad that that the administration emphasized that. As you heard in the J.D. vance interview. Oh, wait. Then a few hours later, the top of the administration truthed it is not politically correct to use the term regime change, but if the current regime is unable to make Iran great again, why wouldn't there be regime change? Mega. Yes, President Trump, it is politically incorrect. You, by the way, are a politician, and you have just articulated an incorrect strategy. But then again, you are a politician named Donald Trump. So what does anyone expect? Just like on the night of the bombing when you said Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated and that too had to be walked back. And the issue isn't some number of Pinocchio issued by Polyfact. We're talking about the very fundamental basis of if the strikes work and if we have to do more, if the mops obliterated the facility in the program, then that argues against further intervention. We wouldn't need to. But if, and this is not an if, this was the description of the head of the Joint's chiefs of staff. If the facilities experience severe damage and destruction, that's another thing. Also, the head of the IAEA says the Iranians snuck out there are almost 900 pounds of 60% enriched uranium. These differences are crucial. And we understand that Donald Trump can't be expected not to engage in the greatest bluster possible. But when war, life, death, a fundamental betrayal of a main campaign pledge, when that is all on the line, it seems important. Then again, Trump's critics within the party don't seem to be exactly experts on what the threat is. Here was the Charlie Kirk show the night of the bombing of Fordeau.
- [04:16]
Michael Allen
The main one they were focused on is Fodro. That is our Fordo. Fordo.
- [04:21]
Mike Pesca
Here was Steve Bannon on the bombing of Fordeau.
- [04:26]
Michael Allen
The bunker busters. Right. For the Fedor facility, they use the Tomahawks. And I think There was what, 20 to 30 Tomahawks fired from US Navy submarines. Correct. Against the other two facilities, obviously. The. The fedora was. The Fordo was the. The most important.
- [04:46]
Mike Pesca
Of course, you don't have to have an intimate familiarity with the exact issues to generally have a sincere and decent one worry about Quagmire. It tends to maybe undercut your credibility on the subject a little bit. Not that Kirk was some staunch holdout. He very much opposed the bombing. Lots of shows opposing going in further, getting sucked in further. He's a restrictionist. Then as soon as the bombing happened, he tweeted out support of Donald Trump and his judgment, perhaps realizing, oh, those are the rules of being in a cult. Now, back to the issue of regime change for a second. If it happens, it happens. And it probably would be good. It would certainly inject A lot of chaos into the arena. It eventually happened in Syria and there was chaos along the way. But it's good that the Assad regime is done. Some hawkish decapitary forces might say, well, if it's going to happen, don't you want your hand in there guiding events yet? That's where I think those forces really haven't learned the difference between what the US thinks and hopes it can do and what really can happen. What 90 million people, by the way, Senator Cruz, that's population of Iran. What 90 million people who have largely been denied facts. What they're going to want happen. Those are massively different things. I don't know if the people want to overthrow the mullahs. I don't know if what they want is just fewer crackdowns from the Ministry of Vice. Certainly there will be a little bit of rally round the flag slash minaret phenomenon going on with Iran. And I really think it's important that the United States not go in there and slay ayatollahs on the way to making the world saf again. I see no reason why this strike must lead to further engagement. And yeah, I understand the argument. Well, we always say strikes shouldn't lead to further engagement, but they always do. Well, they don't always do strikes. Sands quagmires resulting. That often happens. I give you Operation Juniper Shield, which has been ongoing for like almost 20 years. I give you operation the old operation from 86 El Dorado Canyon. Do you not know of these operations? Doesn't strike the same bell as the Midnight Hammer does. Those were the bombings of Libya 86 and ongoing operations in Mali. We weren't drawn into further wars. There were a lot of airstrikes against Al Shabaab in Somalia. There weren't further wars. Loss of American lives in Somalia. Operations against the Houthis haven't caused American lives. They also have been successful. Unlike many of the other ones I've listed, Iran is a stronger enemy than any of the countries and forces that I just named. They're stronger, but as their skirmishes with Israel shows, it's quite plausible that they're not strong per say. Of course, it's also the case that the US Has a different tolerance for the loss of lives than the Israelis do. And in the US case, it's basically nil. So so much depends, as JD Vance was saying, on the Iranian reaction and the state of warfare throughout our interconnected world. And to that end, on the show today, I am joined by National Security Council veteran Michael Allen. He hosts the Natsack Matters podcast from Beacon Global Strategies and he is certainly steeped in these issues. Now, I do have to say the interview was conducted Friday, but unlike the Fordeau facility, it was meant to be somewhat bulletproof, anticipating a mission could occur at any time. Everything you're going to hear is still relevant, still informative. Michael Allen, up next. Hi guys. Is Ed getting you down? Do you not? If literally here, imagine the crude crescendo of the slide whistle. You know the one. Let's get other things like your confidence back up with Hims. HIMS provides you access to treatments that could help you last longer. So you can be ready whenever the mood strikes. If you're feeling stalled out in the bedroom, HIMS is the solution. It's changing men's health. By providing you access with affordable sexual health treatments from the comfort of your couch, HIMS provides an access to a range of doctor trusted ED treatments like here are some you may have heard of Viagra Cialis. So this isn't some weird off brand version of Cialis. This is the Cialis, the one with the tubs on tv. And you get it from hims. You fill out a form. A medical provider determines the right treatment for you. Your medication ships directly, shipping's free. No insurance is needed. That's really important. HIMS has been doing this for a long, long time. They're very trusted. This is very important area for men, from what I understand. And HIMS is the one who can help. Start your free online Visit today@hims.com the Gist that's H I M S.com the Gist for your personalized ED treatment options. Himss.com the Gist now here's the part I speak fast. Joining me now is Michael Allen. He served in the George W. Bush White House for seven years in a variety of national security policy and legislative roles. Many, many titles. He is now the direct Managing Director of Beacon Global Strategies. Welcome to the gist.
- [10:30]
Michael Allen
Thanks so much for having me.
- [10:31]
Mike Pesca
I should all say, as a fellow podcast host, I've been listening to Nat Sec Matters. I wish, I wish I had stolen that title. It sings.
- [10:40]
Michael Allen
It's a mouthful, but it's fun.
- [10:43]
Mike Pesca
It's fun to do, but man, does national security matter.
- [10:48]
Michael Allen
It's everywhere.
- [10:50]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, when we booked you, and I think we do forget about that often. Maybe you don't, but citizens do. When we booked you, I was hot to talk about Ukraine and their spiderweb operation. And then of course, this hot war between Israel and Iran breaks out. But everything is so interconnected, right. The Iranians supply the drones that are used by the Russians who attack the Ukrainians who use drones to attack the Russians. And the Russians are going to be resupplying the Iranians. Oh my gosh. So let's go to spider web. Do we know now more than we knew even two weeks ago about the scope of that operation? We were told something like a third, maybe, maybe a quarter to a third of Russia's long range bomber capacity was destroyed. Is that what we know now?
- [11:40]
Michael Allen
Yeah, I think that figure has held up. And if anything, over time we've come to an even deeper appreciation, if that's even possible, of just how daring this particular raid was. When you see and really digest just how deeply they got into Russia, all the sort of safe houses and clandestine warehouses they needed to set up, the logistics required to put these into trucks and pull them up near air bases that are heavily guarded, even if they're far away from the front. And then if we needed another reminder of how important drones are to modern warfare, Israel takes a page out of the Ukrainian book, or vice versa, and uses this more or less the same types of techniques and practices to go after a variety of targets inside of Iran. So there's a lot going on.
- [12:42]
Mike Pesca
Right. So I do want to go back specifically to a question I had about Ukraine, which was this was a very successful operation. As a psyops, it was a successful operation. It backheeled the Russians, the Ukrainians, who haven't had many military victories in the last year were absolutely thrilled, as well they should be. But are long range bombers the primary problem for the Ukrainian defense situation?
- [13:11]
Michael Allen
They aren't. They can launch some cruise missiles which have been annoying and deadly and something that the Russians have gone to repeatedly. But the old fashioned way is the way that the Russians or the Ukrainians would make progress. And that's really artillery, troops on the ground, the types of meat and potatoes type military issues. That's what's really the determining factors in the offensive defensive struggle that's going on in this positional war.
- [13:46]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. And that is incrementally, inch by inch, foot by foot. We can't say it's going well for the Ukrainians in the last few months, can we?
- [13:54]
Michael Allen
Well, it depends on how you look at it. I mean, it's never in a good position. You're never in a good position if you're losing territory. But the statistics about just how little the Russians are gaining are really shocking. People have done the math and more or less said it would take at this rate that the Russians are advancing, it would take 70 or 80 years to take all of Ukraine. Now that's fanciful and it doesn't necessarily tell the whole picture of what they're trying to do because they're not trying to take over the whole country anymore. It does sort of show that the Russians are only making incremental and non decisive process, non decisive progress. And particularly someone like me who believes that we need to continue to support the Ukrainians, I think it's important to note that the Russians have, through this positional, attritional warfare, just reached the 100,000 casualty mark. So of course that's not just deaths, that's injuries as well. But that's unbelievable.
- [15:00]
Mike Pesca
But injuries that take the fighters off the playing field, which is important.
- [15:04]
Michael Allen
Exactly. And so while Putin doesn't seem bothered by this and they do seem to be able to get more troops out on the field, it's still just shocking. It tells you that the Ukrainians, while maybe not winning, are not losing and there is no prospect of them losing.
- [15:21]
Mike Pesca
Anytime soon if they continue fighting. And if they, even though the, the trade in, in casualty is something like 3 to 1, maybe even 4 to 1, the raw materials we're talking about, just the population sizes are about that as well. So the Ukrainians can, you know, kill or disabled four enemy soldiers for every one of theirs. It doesn't mean that's a winning strategy for war.
- [15:50]
Michael Allen
Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, what the Ukrainians need is more weaponry, more intelligence from the west generally, but in particular the United States. I think it's probably a pretty closely held estimate here in Washington, but there is some date before the end of the year that the so called presidential drawdown authority, which is the way we talk about how much more money and how much more equipment is heading from the United States over to the Ukrainians. It's going to run out. And there's a big political dispute to Congress for approval.
- [16:24]
Mike Pesca
Right.
- [16:25]
Michael Allen
Well, the President typically would request something. The Congress could end up adding something on their own and that's probably what would happen. But there are alternative means of going forward. I think Zelensky was going to ask the president at the G7 if, hey, listen, just continue to sell us arms, the Europeans will pay for it. Maybe you borrow against the critical minerals agreement, maybe it's loans, whatever. But we need the United States to continue to supply something even if it's not quote unquote for free anymore. So that's what's really critical. I don't think Trump is wild about the helping keep the Ukrainians alive and going, but he certainly doesn't want to see him knocked off the battlefield. So he'll have a tough decision to some at some point before the end of the year on this, on this issue.
- [17:12]
Mike Pesca
Right. He's not. But we're seeing in Israel that he gets heartened by big military victories and he wants to be a part of it. So let's go to Israel. And my assessment, the assessment of some of the generals on your show, other people I listen to, is that if we were paying attention, there was, there were more and more data points, more and more pieces of evidence which added up to Iran is, if not a paper, Persian tiger much less potent than we thought they were. They didn't, they couldn't do anything to forestall the destruction of Hezbollah. The very clever beeper operations had a large part to play with that. The last time there was an exchange with Israel, almost none of those missiles got through. One fell on a poor Palestinian guy in the West Bank. So every time that the concept of what this regional power could do was actually put to the test and it was less and less impressive. But that doesn't mean that the conventional wisdom would be and therefore an Israeli strike would go as well as it did. Is that about right? And even with that, does do the people in Washington, the people in the national security establishment say, wow, that Israeli strike was even better, or where Israel is now in relation to Iran is even better for them than we thought it could be?
- [18:41]
Michael Allen
I think you're right. It is in the even better category. I could see the Israelis hitting having some success. I am surprised they haven't lost a pilot. I'm surprised they haven't lost anybody that has flown any types of missions over Iran. And I didn't foresee that it would be this easy to establish air superiority where they essentially have a permissive environment. And sometimes people are joking a little bit about this because the F35s do need to be refueled, but they're almost to the point where they're able to circle around in Iran. And once intelligence or a satellite sees a missile launcher pop up, hone in on that target and take it out. And this is just absolutely remarkable what the military has been able to do inside of Iran. Of course, intelligence has done amazing things. Again, they're obviously engaging in some pretty nifty cyber tricks as well. But yeah, I think this is shocking a lot of people. It just the military proficience that you've seen out of the Israelis.
- [19:48]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. By the way, interconnectivity. I didn't even know this would be a theme. But why do they have air superiority and refueling? One reason is they could refuel over Syria. Syria used to be a hostile airspace, now it's not. Why not? Syria's big backers or Assad's big backers got distracted in other wars like Russia, who was a major one that got distracted and bogged down in Ukraine. So now we have a new power center in Syria, which they don't seem to mind at all. In fact, I speculated. Sorry, go ahead.
- [20:17]
Michael Allen
Oh no, no, I was just agreeing. There's so many different factors that were in the Israelis favor. Well, also just after October 7th, you know, I'm not saying I'm an Israeli societal expert, but I could sense as I talked to Israelis and read about what they were feeling, I think, and I bought into the theme that this really shattered their sense of national security.
- [20:45]
Mike Pesca
Right.
- [20:45]
Michael Allen
They didn't feel like deterrence worked anymore.
- [20:49]
Mike Pesca
They realized they weren't going to mow the lawn.
- [20:52]
Michael Allen
Exactly.
- [20:53]
Mike Pesca
Over a thousand of them died. And they said whatever we were doing to trust that our enemies wouldn't try insane self destructive attacks didn't work and therefore we will now prove to them that they were wrong.
- [21:06]
Michael Allen
Yeah.
- [21:07]
Mike Pesca
In Lebanon, in. I know there's a gigantic humanitarian catastrophe, but just in terms of dismantling Hamas everywhere except Yemen. And we'll get to that. They've taken the fight to their enemies and done better than expected.
- [21:21]
Michael Allen
They've taken them on everywhere and I think it's been just absolutely incredible. And they have really gone through this societal transformation to where everyone in Israel pretty much knew that Netanyahu was going to take a shot at the Iranian nuclear program at some point. It was just a question of when. So I think they have steeled themselves for this moment. They were ready to go. You laid out sort of the geopolitical quote unquote convenience of it all, or at least a bunch of factors that said go for it. And. And they went for it.
- [21:59]
Mike Pesca
So what do you think Netanyahu's plan was in terms of the, what's called in logistics, the final mile, which is the full destruction of their mountain bunker of Fardo. This is can't do it alone.
- [22:15]
Michael Allen
Yeah.
- [22:16]
Mike Pesca
What do you think his conceptia, as the, as they would say in Hebrew was of getting Donald Trump and the Americans to help them with that?
- [22:25]
Michael Allen
So this is really bothered me because I thought to myself, does Israel have a plan to take out Fordow if the United States doesn't get into the fight. And for years I've been hearing whispers about a commando raid and it might have even been a suicide commando raid that ended up in the New York Times recently. It may be that's what took it off the board, because it was just out there in stark black and white. But in any event, once the campaign had begun, I don't think you were going to be able to sneak some commandos in there. So it led me to believe, wow, Netanyahu is either gambling or crafty or maybe both. And that is, well, first, I guess the President of the United States could have signaled, you know what, go on in, I may help you later. And that might have been enough for Netanyahu. But history may show that President Trump didn't greenlight him like that and that Netanyahu just went in and gambled. And people probably said to him, but we don't have a good plan to take out for now. And he probably said, did he say, I don't know? Well, let's. I think the Americans will get in once we demonstrate some success. So nothing succeeds like success. And so. But it's kind of bothered me because it's like, did the Israelis get a signal from us or are they jamming us and sort of saying, get us over the one yard line here? Either way, I think President Trump has looked at this situation. It's different than if we were going to start the war on our own and skip over what we wanted to do, which was diplomacy backed by sort of coercive sanctions. But we're in the fight now, and so the president needs to decide.
- [24:04]
Mike Pesca
Let's also point out that I know that there is disagreement within the MAGA constituency. And a lot of what Donald Trump supporters and also Donald Trump has signaled over the years is we don't want to get bogged down in foreign wars, America first. And yet 10 years ago, when he came down the escalator, there was an element in his speech about not allowing Iran to get a nuclear bomb that has been consistent. He's never veered away from that. So that's another data point. Another thing that I'd point out that, you know, is the Houthi portion of Donald Trump's current presidency where there was some firing at the Houthis and then there was a pullback after 30 days, America never did establish air superiority. So it was a different cost benefit analysis. And I think from the reporting, I read in the New York Times that maybe, you know, General Michael Corella, the head of centcom, he wanted to do it, but he always thought that it was a multi month plan. And Trump, when he was apprised of that, thought it was not worth it. Plus it was costing them. It cost the United States about $1 billion in the first month alone. So even though the Houthis are but a proxy of Iran, it seems to me that you take those obstacles off the table like air superiority. I don't know about the cost. Maybe you do. This is a very different situation. It seems even it seems crazy to say because again, Iran's the mothership and the Houthis are the satellite. But Iran seems an easier target than the Houthis.
- [25:35]
Michael Allen
And we've been talking about Iran for 25 years, since about 2003 when an Iranian resistance group notified the United States that there was a secret enrichment plant inside of Iran. And that tells us where the Iranians mindset has been. All of this time they later, when I was in the White House built it was at one point the most highly classified secret in the federal government that they were building an underground centrifuge facility in FORDO. This was 2007. It was declassified by President Obama in 2009. These issues have been going on forever. We have been talking about generally speaking as well how awful it is that more states get more nuclear weapons because it causes this cascade effect of others feeling like they need them too. This is in our core national security interest to have fewer nuclear weapons. States in this case it's especially acute because they're a state sponsor of terror. They are a revolutionary regime. And I think when we talk about sort of arresting certain regions of the world and getting them into a place where they can grow and thrive and move on to Asia. I think this, at the end of the day, when you weigh all the factors, I think is going to lead President Trump to say, you know what, I may not have gotten this here, but here we are and I'm going to go ahead and finish this job.
- [26:59]
Mike Pesca
Okay. Do you think Iran views its membership in the nuclear club fundamentally differently than all the existing members?
- [27:05]
Michael Allen
I think they view it more than anybody else as a guarantor of their regime going into the future. If anything, Russia's experience with Ukraine has led them to believe, wow, this is more of a bulletproof shield than I could have ever imagined. The Biden administration, I believe while they should get credit for standing by the Ukrainians, never they piecemealed assistance rather than giving them everything they needed to win in win and decisive in a decisive manner because they were worried about the Russians. They were worried about World War Three, and that's appropriate. We should worry about World War Three. But I think they were overcorrecting for the fact that they had nuclear weapons. They believed too much that Putin might use them. They were nervous about it. The Europeans were nervous about it. This led people to hold back support to Ukraine. And so I think the Iranians looked at this and just thought to themselves, I mean, we really need nuclear weapons. This has gives all of our adversaries a pause before they mess with us. And that's another reason why we don't want them to have it. We don't need to have a revolutionary terrorist regime dominating one of the key theaters on the earth, especially one that is so critical to energy, that's so critical to the nate, to the world's sea lanes, and now is critical to artificial intelligence, given the fact that we're going to build all these data centers there in an effort to try and beat the Chinese to the punch on artificial intelligence. So it's now such an important region. There's an. There's a really good lesson here of we probably shouldn't have let this thing go as far as it's gone. And now it's time to correct things.
- [28:49]
Mike Pesca
And we'll be back in a minute with more of Michael Allen. We're back with Michael Allen, a former veteran of the Bush National Security Council. He hosts the Natsack Matters podcast for Beacon. You're laying out compelling reasons for why a nuclearized Iran would be a much bigger headache. Mischief maker. I'm downplaying all the terror that they could spread, but I was actually thinking of when everyone else, every other state, gets a bomb, it's for defense and also to checkmate or stalemate their enemies. They can't be constrained as much. Do you think that Iran, with its revolutionary and Islamic fervor, and actually contemplates using the nuclear bomb proactively more than the other states that have it.
- [29:48]
Michael Allen
So not so much. I know the Israelis disagree.
- [29:53]
Mike Pesca
Yeah.
- [29:54]
Michael Allen
And they, they see, they see this as an existential threat. And so I don't rule it out. I do think that the fundamentals of deterrence might kick in at some point. And you could have a situation where the Israelis and the Iranians would deter each other as nuclear powers, but the Israelis never want to get there. I don't love the idea of them, the Iranians, being there either. I don't want to take a chance on them using it. But at some point, I don't believe. I think they're fundamentally deterrable in the end. But I don't know that I want to take the gamble on it if we're the doorstep of destroying it and setting them back.
- [30:35]
Mike Pesca
Well, speaking of existential threats, what are the chances that Khamenei looks at this moment as just that and bargains away the nuclear program, else it be destroyed by air and maybe he be destroyed is there. What are the chances of that is my question.
- [30:52]
Michael Allen
So I don't think they're good. But I have been thinking the last few days how interesting the Iranian National Security Council meetings, if you will, must be. And I look forward to the I hope I'm still alive when the history of this period comes out, because I think they're staring into the abyss and they're thinking to themselves, do I really want to risk the regime on fordow and maintaining a nuclear weapons program? We wanted it for regime security. Now our adversaries have taken it so seriously that having it risks the viability of the regime that we're trying to protect. So it's a really tough call. Obviously their rhetoric is suggesting they're going to not give in, not give up. And so it's, it's really difficult. I still think they're going to hold out for a little while and not give it all to President Trump over this next coming period, because I think they just can't imagine the surrender that they would have to go through. It's almost hard to figure out a way they could save face at this moment. So I think they're going to chance it, hope it doesn't work, divert some highly enriched uranium, come up with a new covert program in a couple of years and revisit this. It's going to be really hard to see, as Trump puts it in a quote, unconditional surrender.
- [32:23]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. Also complicating that is I don't know how much accurate information they have. I don't know how rational they are. I'm not even talking about the fact that they're fundamentalist ideologues who believe in martyrdom. But just look at their actions, discounting threats of Israel, which in their rhetoric is inherently weak and incapable of doing these things. But the more data points that are presented showing you that actually Israel is quite potent, they seem not to have adjusted their leaders, going to sleep in their own beds and then being targeted and killing. And here's the one that blew my mind and potent blew their minds. There was a spate of killings, of assassinations, essentially of nuclear scientists on day one of the attacks. And then on day two, these nuclear scientists where I'm not saying they were going around their business blase, but they got into their cars, their existing cars, and were blown up by car bombs. That to me does not show proper respect for Israeli capabilities. So you have to then say, will they really understand what, how imperiled their regime is if they don't give up nuclear weapons?
- [33:32]
Michael Allen
Yeah, I like that point. I mean, things are clearly unraveling. They, the Israelis have penetrated almost, apparently every level of the Iranian superstructure. They were able, remember way back in April, or maybe it was October, when they were able to kill the Hamas figure in the IRGC guest house inside of Tehran. They have stolen nuclear documents from the Iranians and flown them out on a cargo plane. This was a few years ago that landed clandestinely inside of Iran. They're launching, they're launching drones from all over the place. They have assassins on motorcycles. They've murdered the chief nuclear weapons scientist with the machine gun a few years ago. I mean, you would think that the machine gun.
- [34:20]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, remote control that they snuck into the country.
- [34:24]
Michael Allen
Yeah. And put on an abandoned car and shot him from 300 yards away. You would think that the Iranians would say to themselves, you know what, we might be a little outmatched or outgunned here. And so maybe we'll do a tactical retreat and figure all this out later because we have some real problems on our own. Regime security. And by that I mean the basics of regime security. But I don't know that they're capable of surrender or I hate calling it surrender. I don't know if they're capable of compromising right now. They certainly don't act like it in public. The experience we've had with them is not promising. The character of their regime isn't one that wants to defer to others or make compromise or make meaningful compromises. No wonder, no matter what you think of the old JCPOA under Obama, so it's hard to think of them compromising with a Trump diplomatic initiative. And by the way, I mean, what if Trump agrees to some sort of diplomatic solution where we're, quote, unquote, dismantling all the centrifuges, moving them out of the country. No more enrichment. I mean, you're committing to a multi year process that the Iranians will drag their feet for years and months. I mean, you were just entering some kind of crazy merry go round where they're trying to divert things and hide things. And you know, he may have to think to himself, it might be easier at this point just to take it, take it out and monitor it into the future rather than trying to figure out a bona fide way for them to export all of these goods out of the country. I mean, what a verification disaster it would be.
- [36:06]
Mike Pesca
Would the Pottery Barn rule apply to destroying the FARDO reactors? I mean, it wouldn't be regime change. Yeah, I guess the big question is can you do this as a one time or two bomb strike and then be done with it?
- [36:21]
Michael Allen
Great question. I think there are very few people in the US Air Force and now at the White House, you know the answer to this question is. You're well aware we all out here on the outside presume it's the case because we've been told that's the case. Of course there's reason for us to suggest this because it must make the Iranians fearful and maybe it makes them more willing to compromise. But a 30,000 pound bomb, I'm told just from people who work in the Pentagon, if you put two or three of those together, you're going to have some sort of success. And so I think that they know it would be a mission success. But you know, I mean, it's a lot to gamble on.
- [37:02]
Mike Pesca
So the big objection to this is the idea of a protracted war getting dragged into one of these never ending conflicts. And I know it happened and we were scarred by that. But is it easy to avoid a protracted war? I know you have to guard against it, but just from my perspective, sometimes the trauma of a past mistake convinces you that such a mistake was inevitable. So is how much of a risk is a action by the United States bombing this one huge facility and maybe a couple others? How huge a risk is the slippery slope?
- [37:45]
Michael Allen
So we're definitely would be buying ourselves some trouble. The Iranians do have a bunch of short range ballistic missiles which as I understand it, aren't necessarily as usable against the Israeli target, but would be more appropriate to aim at our bases. Now we do have missile defense, we do have F35s especially that have entered the region, Aegis missile destroyers, we've got all sorts of things that we've set the theater with in order to protect, to protect our allies and US bases in the region. So we can mitigate some of this blowback. I mean there are downside risks however to doing this. So you know, the Iranians may decide over going to have to hit us by way of a terrorist attack. I mean they are state sponsor of terrorism. There are other ways they could get back at us over time. It's really. Just. How does the President see the cost benefit analysis? Is this. There will. There are. There are some negatives. Can we accept those negatives and mitigate them? But, yeah, you know, I can see that it would be something that would weigh heavily on the President's mind.
- [38:56]
Mike Pesca
Okay, Couple more questions. You've been very generous with your time.
- [38:59]
Michael Allen
No, no, I got plenty.
- [39:00]
Mike Pesca
Okay. How hamstrung? Or maybe that's overstating it. How much of it is it just a negative that the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsa Gabbard, seems not to be trusted in a. At this moment, in a role where the Director of the. The DNI would normally be principal.
- [39:28]
Michael Allen
Yeah. You know, we created a Director of National Intelligence to look across all of the intelligence agencies and make sure that all differing voices were heard. Any dissents felt like they had the space to levy an objection to a group think type of conclusion. So it. You know, in a perfect world, in a perfect NSC system, the intelligence community not only has the CIA there because it's the preeminent intelligence agency for the United States, but you have a DNI there for a lot of reasons. And so if the DNI isn't participating, it's a net negative. If it. If there are specific drawbacks to Tulsi Gabbard being in that seat that have caused the DNI not to be involved, then that's a. That's a problem. Also, you know, I'm just looking, though, at this before we got on this new article talking about who's in and who's out. It seems like she's out, but Radcliffe is in. So I'm not losing sleep over it. The intelligence community's views are definitely represented. They are briefing up and down all to all the policymakers, including the President. So at the end of the day, I think it's fine, but it's not quite the way the Congress and the President thought this system would work after Iraq WMD and then the intel. The other intelligence failure of 9 11.
- [40:57]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, I was thinking more in terms of the practical. I know this is not in terms of process. This is not how you do it. It's not how it was set up. I just wonder if there are any specific powers that a Director of National Intelligence has vested in them that no one else does.
- [41:13]
Michael Allen
Oh, not really. Not.
- [41:15]
Mike Pesca
Not really. And if she wants to, or if that position wants to somehow get in the way of this, would they be able to?
- [41:23]
Michael Allen
Sure. I mean, the dni, if they're. If he or she is in the meetings, can Try and offer differing opinions that might ultimately benefit policymakers though if the President's hearing two or three different views. So. But no, I don't think it's going to materially impact operations or the decision making process or anything like that.
- [41:45]
Mike Pesca
Same question with Secretary of Defense.
- [41:48]
Michael Allen
Well, if it's true that hegcest is not very involved and the President isn't getting advice from the military side of the House, either from the CENTCOM commander or the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, then that is a much more serious issue because. Well, first of all, you don't have a full time National Security Advisor. You have that part. So we're already missing a couple of institutional players here. You mentioned the dni, but the SEC Def is one that is virtually indispensable. Maybe you can make up for it a little bit by having especially capable people in the department present in interagency discussions. But that's not. If it's true that Hegseth's been cut out of it. It's not a good practice to have where the SEC Def isn't playing a big role in a major military operation. After all, who does the President turn to and say, are you sure this mother of all bombs, this mop is going to work? I mean that's what the SEC Def should be saying. I have looked into this. I have asked everyone in the Air Force. Here is the report port. It is ready to go, sir.
- [42:56]
Mike Pesca
Well, presumably the Joint Chiefs, Dan Kane or Kurilla, who I mentioned, they'd have that information, right?
- [43:03]
Michael Allen
Yeah, but you still need. We're still civilian control of the military. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is not at the chain of command. It's supposed to have a two headed hydra, if you will, a civilian plus a military. So again, you know, maybe this is too textbooky or whatever, but at some point I don't like having too many institutions off the chessboard when we're having or trying to have a serious decision making process.
- [43:30]
Mike Pesca
Michael Allen is Managing Director of Beacon Global Strategies. He was at the National Security Council, served as special assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counter proliferation strategy from 27 to January 09. And with Beacon Global Strategies, he also hosts Nat Sec Matters, the podcast the. The Indispensable Podcast. Thank you so much.
- [43:56]
Michael Allen
Thank you for having me. This has been fun.
- [44:03]
Mike Pesca
And that's it for today's show. Cory War produces the gist. Astrid Green does our socials. Kathleen Sykes, she's the editor of the GIST List. Ashley Kahn is the production coordinator for the gist. Michelle Pesca does all that she sees. She sits over that and calls the shots and moves the chess pieces. Leo Baums are intern. He's very good with coming up with databases. Data's base improve. Thanks for listening. The gist is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, Monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.