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- [00:01]
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- [01:03]
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- [02:51]
Elisa Catalano
Military success is one measure and I think the administration has focused predominantly on that at the expense of strategic success. And so I think that's really where the challenge is, because there have been military successes. It's an overwhelming military success, and yet here we are.
- [03:11]
Ariant Bhattabai
It's the Lawfare podcast. I'm Ariant Bhattabai, public Service Fellow here at Lawfare with Elisa Catalano, yours senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and adjunct senior fellow at the center for New American Security.
- [03:24]
Elisa Catalano
I think what we're seeing now is a European willingness to say, you cannot hold at risk the global economy. It is signaling to Iran and to its Gulf partners. We see this and this is not okay. And we are going to take steps politically and otherwise to ensure that this does not continue.
- [03:46]
Ariant Bhattabai
Today we're talking about the implications of the U. S. Israeli war with Iran for the broader Gulf region. So, Elisa, I'm going to start with the basics here. In response to the US Israeli attacks on its territory, Iran has been taking a number of steps to try to disrupt freedom of navigation, the Strait of Hormuz that's occurring at sea. In terms of what we're seeing in the sky, there's been airstrikes, There have been missile strikes and drone strikes on our facilities and embassies throughout the region. There have been strikes on energy and tourism infrastructure. Since the beginning of the conflict, Iran has said that it would kind of stop some of these activities, but it really has not. Can you talk to us about what Iran has been doing? And there is this kind of, you know, we're hearing on a daily basis essentially from the administration that we've depleted their capabilities, and yet we're seeing these activities continue. So how are they doing all of this? What are they doing and how are they doing it?
- [04:50]
Elisa Catalano
So I think the picture we're seeing unfold is one that was entirely predictable.
- [04:56]
Ariant Bhattabai
Right.
- [04:56]
Elisa Catalano
On the one hand, Iran is no match for the conventional power of the US Military and certainly not the combined US Military and Israeli Defense Forces. And so this is not a conventional fight. Right? We, I think the US And Israel are proceeding with a conventional fight. It is a fight primarily from the air. Thousands and thousands of targets kind of systematically being eliminated. Military infrastructure capabilities in terms of production for ballistic missiles, clearly a decapitation campaign that continues kind of methodical phases of what you would expect from a intense conventional engagement. Iran has prepared, and the IRGC in particular has prepared for this over decades by building its asymmetric capabilities. And so E1, we always knew that they would put at risk the Strait of Hormuz. They've been telegraphing it for decades. They showed some willingness to do it four, five, six, seven years ago, and they've been building the capabilities to do it better and smarter. Two, their capabilities are dispersed, right? So it's all over the country. And despite the fact that the US And Israel have targeted thousands of military targets throughout the country, Iran is a very, very big place. I feel like it's a simple thing to say, but one that we need to be reminded of every day. And so these capabilities that are relatively cheap, relatively small, and hit it in ways that are hard for the US to get at, I think persist. And that's what we're seeing kind of on the tactical side, strategically. Iran is trying to expand the war in such a way that raises costs, and it's doing it with some success. The question has always been how long can they continue to hold at risk the global economy, the physical infrastructure of their neighbors in the Gulf, while the US And Israel continue the conventional fight? And kind of where's the tipping point right now? I would say is probably in favor of Iran just slightly because it's managed to do something that I don't think we've talked about in the past quite as extensively, and that is put the strait at risk without harming its own ability to continue to move the tankers it wants or the commercial vessels it wants through the strait. Like we've always imagined a scenario where they would hold the straight at risk, but at high cost to themselves. And what they've managed to do in this case is lower the cost for them and raise the cost for everyone else in the war.
- [07:46]
Ariant Bhattabai
So we've talked about the kind of read the Iran side of things. I want to now start to talk a little bit about what we're seeing on the US Side first, and then we're going to kind of shift to allies and partners as well. But so I've been struck by the President, the administration's essentially confession at times that they didn't really anticipate a lot of the things that we're seeing, and especially how things would play out in the straight with the disruption that we're seeing currently. You've dealt with planning for this precise scenario for a really long time. You've done it in government at the State Department, you've done it in Congress, you've done it at, you know, various research institutions. Can you kind of diagnose the problem of what seems to have gone wrong here? I mean, do you even agree that something has gone wrong here? But what has what has gone wrong here?
- [08:37]
Elisa Catalano
So gone wrong for whom? And on what I think is the is the question right? This was entirely predictable. Right. There isn't a single scenario or Red Team or planning exercise that I certainly either participated in or was or observed, as you did over years, that didn't talk through the types of escalation measures Iran could take in this context. And closing the straight, it was always if it wasn't number one, it was number two or it was number three. And it was kind of always combined with a package of asymmetric steps that it could take. Activating its proxies was always another. Right. And we can talk about why now is different than perhaps when we were running those kinds of scenarios and the change in some of the assumptions that we had back then that I don't think hold as much now, certainly after the last two years, but the capabilities to close the strait were always high on our list. And so modeling this was not the problem. If we're diagnosing a problem. I think part of the challenges of how this war has been prosecuted is the lack of taking seriously some of this very serious analysis that has been conducted over decades now. An understanding of the strategic calculus of the regime is one. The kinds of things that regime would do when under threat, I think is a correlation to that, the ability to weaken the regime quickly in a conventional fight, something that I think military success is one measure, and I think the administration has focused predominantly on that at the expense of strategic success. And so I think that's really where the challenge is, because there have been military successes. It's an overwhelming military success. And yet here we are.
- [10:39]
Ariant Bhattabai
So precisely here we are. This is where we are now. And, you know, we are on this kind of course for the foreseeable future. And I want to talk timelines in a minute, but if you were to go back to the National Security Security Council, for example, where you served previously, what would your recommendation be for a way forward? What should the US do now that we have put ourselves in this current situation?
- [11:04]
Elisa Catalano
Well, I think you have a lot of competing interests that are at play now, right. You have not only US Interests, but you have the interests of our partners in the Gulf. You have Israel's interests at play as well. And these are not necessarily all overlapping. And so when I think about what potential exit ramps there are, and there is the kind of caricature one which is the president will ultimately decide when he wants this war to end.
- [11:31]
Ariant Bhattabai
Right.
- [11:31]
Elisa Catalano
And what feeds into that calculus, so far, popular opinion has not weighed heavily on his decision, but presumably at some point that will the economic costs that we are now seeing, I mean, oil prices peaking at $119 yesterday, questions about what this means, the administration, I think, struggling with answers to those questions over the last 72 hours. And so at some point that too will probably be a factor. I think the political context in which a prolonged military engagement like this occurs also a factor. So none of those by themselves seem to be motivating the president, but I think we have to acknowledge the fact that he could wake up any day and decide it's done. And so the consequences are probably the bigger question. Did you in fact degrade the regime's ability to put US Interests at risk in the region and beyond? Have you done enough to set back their reconstitution plans for building back some of their lost capabilities? What does this mean internally for how the regime will behave inside of Iran against Iranians, but also just how it will make decisions moving forward given the very real hits that it has taken? And how will regional players feel about the potential for a regime that continues to exist but is now on the other end of having been attacked and demonstrating it's willing to cross some red lines, especially against its neighbors, that it wasn't willing to do in the past? None of those are an exit ramp, but these are the things that I'm thinking about feeding into the how long are we in this for? What is the exit ramp? I think at the end of the day, neither the Iranians nor the Americans have indicated that they're interested in a diplomatic off ramp yet. And so I think we're kind of still in this escalation cycle, at least for the foreseeable future. We've got, I think, one Marine expeditiary unit almost arriving to the Gulf, potentially another on its way, and dozens of vessels associated with that additional deployment. So it doesn't look like this is ending soon. These may all be leverage points, but it certainly seems like it's going to be a little bit longer.
- [13:56]
Ariant Bhattabai
Yeah. And Sue, I guess two things to kind of unpack from this. One is the you mentioned the oil prices and the implications for kind of domestic support for the conflict, which currently, at least based on what we're seeing in the polls, is not great for the administration to begin with. And obviously the longer this goes on, the less we expect to have support for it with the general public. So perhaps to respond to some of these concerns, the administration has now been talking about potentially unsanctioning Iranian oil. We saw this playbook with Russia just recently as well. So can you kind of talk about the pros and cons of this approach? Because on the one hand, I understand wanting to kind of tell the general public in the United States here that this is under control and not have them have sticker shock every time they go to fill up their gas tank. On the other hand, it seems a little counterproductive in terms of trying to pressure the regime if you're trying to get it to seek one of those off ramps that you've been talking about. So what are the pros and cons here? What is the rationale for this decision?
- [15:06]
Elisa Catalano
The irony of the maximum pressure campaign that is the hallmark of the first Trump administration. And you're talking about lifting sanctions. And I have a couple of things to say. I think about this one, lifting Russia sanctions in order to allow for some oil to be on the market and try and stabilize prices didn't seem to assure the markets at all. The assurance campaign that the administration has undertaken, the sanctions, temporary sanctions lifting being won, but also commitments to underwrite insurance commitments to escort vessels through the strait, all of these things have, have not contributed to prices coming down. In fact, quite the opposite. And so I'm not an energy expert, as you well know, but my guess is that it is unlikely to change the calculus all that much, given everything else that's happening in the an extra million barrels a day while releases of strategic reserves have already not had an effect, while Gulf is still trying to pump out as much as it can, at least out of Saudi Arabia, UAE and those who are outside of the strait or have capability outside of the strait. None of this seems to be working. Then you have the kind of psychological impact of what does it mean to temporarily lift sanctions on a regime that you're trying to degrade. The fact that you give kind of that little bit of a lifeline sounds counterproductive, certainly counterproductive to Israel's aims of doing as much to push the regime into a crisis as possible. And so that seems to be at odds with some of at least what we said the war was for early on. Those things have changed quite a bit. And then the third point I'd make is it's not just about oil prices, right? So the risks to the global economy here are much wider than that. There are all kinds of things that are trapped because of the blocking of the strait that just basically is not allowing any commercial activity to come out, whether it's helium, aluminum, whether it's free precursors for fertilizer and so those ripple effects will be felt in addition to the oil prices. And that may not hit American consumers tomorrow, but it will drive some adjustments in the market as people are looking at these costs rising. One, I guess I said that was the last one, but I have another. I don't think we've paid a whole lot of attention to the fact that there are, there's been some little reporting about this. Dozens and dozens of vessels trapped in the Persian Gulf. Right. And so these are commercial vessels, these are not military vessels. The potential for environmental catastrophe here is not zero. Right. Not only if you hit an oil tanker, but if you hit a vessel that has a fertilizer on it or, or these are crews that are not able to kind of get off their vessels and they can't actually get out of the waterway. And there's, there are other considerations here that I think will drive the level of discomfort not only in the markets, but potentially also in populations.
- [18:36]
Ariant Bhattabai
That piece about the environment is such a good point and I agree that it's not something that people have picked up on a lot. And that's in addition to the environmental costs that we're seeing more broadly in the conflict. Right. This whole hitting oil facilities, not fantastic for the environment.
- [18:52]
Elisa Catalano
Okay.
- [18:52]
Ariant Bhattabai
The last question I have for you on the kind of US side of things is you mentioned you started talking a little bit about the kind of timeframes, what we might expect. And you know, this conflict, as you noted, is probably going to go on for a while. That seems to be in contrast with what we had initially heard from the administration, which perhaps planned for something that was going to be a quicker, I guess, campaign than what is playing out. I want you to kind of talk a little bit through some of, you know, how long should we be planning for this to play out? What are the kind of costs here? I'm thinking particularly of like readiness in terms of military readiness and in terms of balancing trade offs with other theaters, other interests that we have around the globe. As this drags on, what should we be thinking about?
- [19:40]
Elisa Catalano
So you can already see that the costs associated with the conventional part of this war are increasing by the day. Right. So early on we talked about a billion dollars a day. I think that was in the first like seven or eight days. That number started flo. Then there was discussions about a potential supplemental emergency request for budget at 50 billion and now we're seeing that rise to about 200 billion. So just that alone over the course of what's been what, 20 days is I think a pretty interesting Marker for just how costly this war is just on being able to prosecute it. Right. And so that's one kind of timeline of cost that I think is only increasing by the day. The other is that these are not endless supplies that are available.
- [20:39]
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- [20:39]
Elisa Catalano
Every interceptor that is used, every precision strike capability that is used is one less in the arsenal for the next contingency. And so that timeline for replacing a million dollar interceptor or several tens of millions of dollars, other kind of asset, not to mention vessels and other kind of massive kind of platforms, we saw an F35 taken offline just in the last 24 hours. These are massive platforms, but even just the day to day necessary munitions, these are costly. They have long production timelines on the short end, six months, on the long end, over a year. And so that recedes our ability to be prepared for what is next. And then the third kind of cost timeline that I think about is the, the way in which we are detracting from other theaters. As you, as you've already indicated, people have talked about the Ukraine piece. Right. Every, every air defense or surface to air missile that, that is being used in the Persian Gulf is one less thing that Europeans can buy to give Ukraine in its fight against its illegal war, the illegal war from Russia. There's the Indo Pacific theater too. And here we've already drawn a number of resources out of that theater. We've taken THAAD away from South Korea, we've taken EMU out of Japan. But we're also demonstrating kind of exquisite precision capabilities, really advanced capabilities in the region. Right now we're showing all of that, which means that adversaries are learning from every day that we are prosecuting this war against Iran. Beijing understands that much better the kinds of capabilities that the United States has brought to bear. Some that haven't been displayed before. Right. There's the military success, which is overwhelming because our capabilities are so, so advanced and so terrific. But we're also showing that in this case now for three weeks and people will learn from that, adversaries will learn from that, and that feed into how we have to think about the next contingency, whether it's in the Indo Pacific or elsewhere.
- [23:01]
Ariant Bhattabai
Yeah. So let's start to zoom out a little bit and talk about allies and partners. I want to start with Israel, who is conducting these combined operations with us. And you know, you start kind of talking a little bit about some of the objectives, overlapping some not so much. And I want to kind of ask you to talk to us about what is Israel trying to accomplish here, how is it similar to or different from what the United States objectives are?
- [23:30]
Elisa Catalano
So I think it's critical to think about the calculus of the Israeli government in the context of kind of post October 7th. Right. Because I do think that that's such a critical element of how this is being approached, how it was approached in a 12 day war last June. But also this fight and the Lebanon front, that is also being or is escalating by the day. And that is an unwillingness to allow the Israeli people to live under threat, which is maybe a doctrinal shift, maybe it's an adjustment. But at the end of the day, I think there is a very real visceral commitment to ensuring that Israelis don't live under that cloud of threats and Iran being kind of the singular most important perpetrator of that threat. And that's why you see so much public support inside of Israel for this war, because it is to eliminate that cloud that has hung over the population for so long. I think the way in which Israel has targeted specifically a regime, political and military leadership, it shows a little bit about its calculations here. It is seeking to ensure that there is as much crisis chaos inside of Iranian systems as possible. So on the one hand, working with the Americans to eliminate capabilities, right. Ensure that ballistic missile and drone capabilities is eroded aggressively, making it so much harder for it to rebuild or that we can talk about for how long that can last and how long it might take a regime to build back, but it's really focused on taking those tools away from the regime. But the other is sowing chaos, making sure that the regime's ability to make decisions is so hampered that it creates fissures and fractures within the system. And I think there Israel is less, feels less risk from an Iran in that kind of crisis, a breakdown in in the state, potentially civil war, right, like that. That is of less concern because that means it's focused on Iran and not focused on Israel. And I think there is where it certainly has daylight with Gulf partners and I think to some extent with the administration because the administration's not interested in a prolonged crisis in the Middle east that draws it further in. Right. Like it's interested in a regime in Iran that will it what it wants, whether that's energy security, whether that's capitulation on a nuclear deal. And so there's a difference there, I think, in how much comfort and tolerance there is for pushing Iran into a crisis point that teeters over into chaos.
- [26:41]
Ariant Bhattabai
You made the point about the kind of differences between of opinion between Israel and the Gulf partners. And one of the things that started under the first Trump administration with the Abraham Accords, continued into the Biden administration with kind of the various constructs that were folded under the Abraham Accords was precisely to try to bring those two sides together. And there was actually the first Trump administration's credit, and to the credit of the Biden administration, a lot of work was done very successfully to try to kind of normalize relations and integrate the region a little better. In light of what you just said, how do you think the conflict is going to play out? How is it going to affect that kind of progress that had been made in terms of getting Israel to normalize relations or get, get the, get the Gulfies to normalize relations with Israel.
- [27:34]
Elisa Catalano
So I think this is complicated and it's a important point to remind everyone of that the Gulf is not monolithic. Right. And so you've got six states that have different interests and are going to operate a bit differently. But let's take a couple of them and break this down a little bit. On the one hand, you have senior Emirati officials who have come out on the record as saying there will not be, I'm paraphrasing here, but there won't be change in the relationship between the UAE and Israel and that Iran is the aggressor here against Gulf states. And that, that is clear. And in fact, I think that's clear amongst the six members of the GCC in particular, to the surprise of some of them, that in fact, Iran turned on all of them equally so aggressively, so quickly, probably less surprise in a place like Abu Dhabi or Riyadh, but a surprise in Muscat and in Doha. Right. So in some ways, Iran has kind of unified positions to some extent amongst the GCC in a way that has never happened before. I don't know how long that lasts. And in fact, we already see a little bit of the cracks there. I think the important thing to keep in mind when we talk about kind of what the future is between Israel and its neighbors, even after this war ends, you know, someone I really respect wrote a piece that came out today in Israel about how when you remove kind of the Iranian threat, which has combined Israel and the Gulf and on the same side against the Iranian regime, that's going to open the space for the kinds of natural cooperation and then normalizing of relations between Israel and the Gulf that everyone has always said expected. I think what that ignores is the Gaza war, right. And the fact that that put these Arab leaderships in very difficult positions. This is less about, I think the arguments that are being made is Israel as a destabilizer in the region rather than a stabilizer. Like, I think it's separate and apart from that, this is an existential issue for the Arab and Muslim world. How to resolve the Palestinian question and the war in Gaza really underscores how important this still is to resolve. And so even after a successful campaign against the Iranian regime, let's say that's what happens and we're on the other side of this. I still think there's work to be done and that would require a government in Israel who wants to address that problem set, which we do not have at this moment. And so I think it's still a long ways off. And I think there are some very critical factors that are going to play into whether it's on the horizon or not at all.
- [30:24]
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- [34:34]
Ariant Bhattabai
So, running a little bit again here. We've seen a lot of tensions this week and the past couple of weeks between the United States and NATO allies. Not all of it is related to Iran, of course But. But all of these things may be distinct, but they're all feeding into one another. The President has been trying to, I guess, relaunch an iteration of an international maritime construct. There was an umbrella term for it in the first Trump administration. The last time we had this sort of escalation in the Gulf, in 2019, 2020, it was called the International Maritime Security Construct, or IMSC. The Biden administration tried a version of this as well, and now it seems like we're trying to go for 3.0. So how does this effort compare to what we've seen in the past, and what do you expect from it?
- [35:27]
Elisa Catalano
Well, you'll remember this because we wrote about it around the time that that maritime coalition effort happened in 2019 and 2020, that even then, because of the discomfort between the Europeans and the Trump administration over the withdrawal from the jcpoa, there was a parallel structure created, the European Maritime something in the Strait of Hormuz, the European Maritime Awareness Strait of Hormuz Mission, if I remember correctly, the best title.
- [36:00]
Ariant Bhattabai
Yeah, it was.
- [36:01]
Elisa Catalano
It's not an easy acronym. Normally I would just use the acronym, even though I try to remember not to. But in this case, the acronym wasn't easy either, but a parallel process.
- [36:13]
Ariant Bhattabai
Right.
- [36:13]
Elisa Catalano
In which the Europeans invest tested rather than the US Led one, which I think is really interesting because it reflects on a much lower scale what's happening today. Right. This idea that the Europeans potentially want to be a part of something that is not all about escalation, but has kind of a different mission set, and that it's shaped by real tensions in the transatlantic relationship. Then it was the jcpoa, now it's, it's Ukraine, it's Greenland. I mean, it's much more significant than it was in the first Trump administration. And so I think the implications are much more significant. The, the tension inside of Europe, I think, is on multi levels here. Right. No love lost with the Iranian regime. And in fact, I think you, in some ways, European partners have been more acutely aware of the threat from Iran in the last, last even five or six years than even some in Washington have been. And so that is rubbing up against the real challenges of dealing with the prosecution of a war that isn't founded in international law, at least by their definition, and doing so so soon after President Trump threatened to seize European territory. These are hard things to find, navigate your way through easily. And so I think what we're seeing now is a European willingness to say, you cannot hold at risk the global economy. It is signaling to Iran and to its Gulf partners, we see this and this is not okay. And we are going to take steps politically and otherwise to ensure that this does not continue. I think their contribution to Gulf defenses over the last two weeks has been significant. And so they've played a role there. They're focused on the eastern Mediterranean. We saw that just this morning with French vessels that are still in the eastern Med. But I don't think it's going to look like what President Trump has asked for, and it's going to be on European terms. And that's just one of many examples, I think, of that tension between Washington and European capitals and how it continues to unfold in this crisis and in
- [38:38]
Ariant Bhattabai
other, you know, we're currently in the phase of the conflict where there's a lot of largely conventional things happening, right. When we start to move inevitably toward the more kind of hybrid format that Iran just has been preparing for, as you said, for decades, and we start seeing potentially terrorists activities on European soil, assassination attempts like targeting of Jewish community centers, et cetera, et cetera. Do you think that changes things? Does that kind of depend on what else is going on in the bilateral relationships and the multilateral kind of NATO construct or how do you see that playing out?
- [39:18]
Elisa Catalano
So I think European capitals have been acutely aware of the kind of asymmetric threat, specifically on terrorism and of IRGC cells active in Europe for quite some time. Right. We've seen a steady increase in the vigilance in European capitals over, I would say, the last handful of years, some significant attempts to thwart plotting. Also talking about it publicly, which was not the case earlier on. Right. A lot of targeted sanctions, et cetera, et cetera. And so I think there's a level of vigilance there that continues, I suspect, although I don't know for sure, that there's at least some attempt to cooperation with the United States in kind of that counterterrorism and intelligence space. At least I would hope that there is. I think that's an important place for Europe to continue to be close to Washington because this is a threat that we we've known for decades and that has only gotten more acute. And so collaborating on those things, I think is is vital both for Europe's sake and for the United States, who is not immune to those kinds of threats in the Western Hemisphere. In fact, we know the IRGC has focused on the Western Hemisphere for the last two decades for a reason. Right. And we've seen indications of that over the years. So I think that's a place where we could see closer coordination, closer cooperation, potentially. I think it's compartmentalized, though, right? Like it's separate and apart from European vessels escorting commercial tankers in the Strait of Hormuz during an active conventional engagement, which is what we're in now. I do think that the other terrorism risks, including terrorism that targets Jewish communities throughout Europe and here at home, is only part of a larger rise in antisemitic violence. And that has not been a place necessarily where the United States and Europe have coordinated at least over the last year and a half, but one that I think fits under the umbrella of work on counterterrorism, and so would hope to see that as well. I do think that there's a role for the Europeans to play in the day after of this war. It's not a place where they have necessarily been very vocal to date, again, because there's so many, I think, conflicting feelings and policies on what this war means for Europe. But I think Europeans have a different nuanced understanding of the Iranian regime and of Iranian in general. And I think that that will be important when we look to mitigate for the bigger risks coming out of the war once the bombs stop falling.
- [42:03]
Ariant Bhattabai
I want to close this part of the conversation by talking a little bit about Asian allies, just because we obviously had the visit by the Japanese prime minister that was positive in some ways, but also very awkward in other ways when President Trump, for example, talked about being surprised in international relations and mentioned Pearl Harbor. So, you know, how do you see Asian allies playing into this? Some of them, Japan especially, very reliant on the stray of Hormuz for their own energy needs. They definitely have, you know, interests here. And the relationship hasn't been as tense between the US And Japan, for example, over the past year and a half as it's been with NATO, but it's also not thriving in some ways. Right. So can you kind of talk a little bit about the Asian allies role here and their interests?
- [43:00]
Elisa Catalano
I think it's fair to say that none of our traditional alliance relationships are thriving over the last year and change. So no different for our Asian allies as for Europeans. In that case, you put your finger on it, right? Like, the first consequences economically of this war were felt in, in Japan, in South Korea, in European cities who are heavily reliant specifically on gas exports in addition to crude oil from the Middle East. And so that has had a very real impacts that the ripple effects will be felt, I think, economically, if for some time. I mean, there's a lot of focus on contraction of GDP in the Gulf, not yet conversations about what, what the downstream impact of this war mean for growth in Asia and growth in Europe. But I suspect that that kind of economic analysis is coming right, the longer we're in it. And so three weeks in, we can already think about supply chain disruptions that are going to have impacts on manufacturing, et cetera. I think our European allies have been more comfortable with the fact that the United States has kind of withdrawn support for the Ukrainians from day one, withdrawn kind of from the NATO construct. Our Asian partners haven't had to experience that in quite the same way. But I think they are, as we speak, right. Removing air defenses from South Korea, removing US Troops that have been dedicated to Japan to fight another war, all indications of less focus on the threats in their neighborhood that they are most concerned with. And so I think they're balancing that as much as they are the near term economic costs of this war to them and how to ensure that that comes back and how to continue to have the kind of relationship with Washington that ensures that those resources and that deterrence is rebuilt at whatever point that this war ends. And so I suspect meetings like that, like the one we just witnessed in the Oval Office, is very much an indication of trying to invest in that longer term strategic need to keep the relationship in a good place. Not necessarily focused on floating Japanese vessels into the Strait of Hormuz, but providing what I would say is some political support to what the president is doing. And, and so that alone, I think, is part of the calculus, whether it's in Tokyo or our Seoul or, or in Canberra.
- [45:40]
Ariant Bhattabai
I just realized we've been talking for 40 minutes and we haven't, I realize we haven't actually talked about how China is kind of approaching all of this. Right. President Trump, in his kind of overture to various global actors, you know, has also been trying to get the Chinese to lend a hand in terms of ensuring freedom of navigation. China obviously has a lot of different kind of interests here, some of which are perhaps conflicting. It's probably quite happy that we are once again busy in the Middle East. There is a nice precedent that is being said from its perspective for a Taiwan kind of contingency. But it also has energy needs and interests and it has these kind of relationships across the region, both with Iran and the Gulf Arabs. So can you talk a little bit about how China might be seeing all of this, what we might expect from it in terms of responding to the, to more cooperation with President Trump? Also, there's going to Be a visit, I think next month, in just a few weeks. Right.
- [46:41]
Elisa Catalano
It's been postponed.
- [46:42]
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- [46:42]
Elisa Catalano
Or at least temporarily pushed off a little bit. You know, I was saying during the first week of the war that the President was going to make a decision about how long this was going to last when he started focusing on his trip to Beijing and what he wanted to have accomplished by the time that he got there. So clearly that at some point did factor into discussions and the trip has been been put off at least for a number of weeks. I think there are a couple of things that I would say. One is the scenario that we've seen unfold, which is not exactly the scenario that I think, at least when you and I were talking about this five or six years ago, not exactly the way we envisioned it. Right. And so the fact that China has still gotten quite a bit of its tankers through safely, even as Iran has threatened and de facto closed the strait for everyone else, it has made this less painful perhaps than we would have imagined and not drawn China into that kind of economic second and third order effect bubble that that others are experiencing in quite the same way. And China also had an enormous amount of storage that it was tapping into and so could probably withstand even not getting tankers through in the short term. But this certainly eases some of that economic pressure. You've seen what you would expect out of Beijing, which is calls for de escalation on both sides, not what seems to me a whole lot of willingness to kind of wade into trying to get the sides to, to negotiate or otherwise seek a diplomatic off ramp. It is not playing that role, at least not yet. I think we'll have to wait and see what the President may ask when he's in Beijing for that kind of role perhaps to be attractive, maybe not so that it's not wading into what is predominantly kind of a US potential quagmire where it's probably happy to see the United States really kind of focused here in the Middle east and not elsewhere. I will say one other thing though, that again, as this war has progressed over the last couple of weeks, we've lost sight of and that is the very real likelihood that China was responsible for providing the kinds of things to the Iranian regime that it was using to reconstitute some of its capabilities since the 12 Day War last year. Right. The precursors that are necessary for ballistic missile development. Clearly some of the very cheap dual use items that is really hard to stop that go into drone manufacturing. And so China kind of implicated I think in why the regime was able to rebuild as quickly, at least in the ballistic missile space and why at least Israel and the US Are so focused on that capability now and making sure that it is degraded, if not completely eliminated. And so a lot of different ways in which China has both tried to distance itself from this war, but is kind of tied into it in a number of ways that it probably can't extract itself completely. So I think we'll have to wait and see, probably with that Beijing meeting in mind as kind of an indicator of how much more Beijing is going to need to engage if this war continues three or four more weeks from now.
- [50:08]
Ariant Bhattabai
Okay. This wasn't really the topic of this conversation, but I have you here, so I have to ask, am I allowed to say no way to hear the question. So you served as a senior professional staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee until relatively recently, until last year. So I want to talk briefly about Congress and what you know, you mentioned the supplemental. What is Congress doing? What are we seeing? What is it not doing? I guess the latter category is a lot of it's going to be very busy. So.
- [50:46]
Elisa Catalano
Yeah, I mean, I have my personal views that are just bemoaning the fact that Article 1 is not as actively involved in everything that's happening right now as it was intended. And then my realist view that we probably shouldn't have expected very much because there's really nothing that is not politicized in the current environment. And at the end of the day, both houses of the legislature are are led by Republicans and Republicans who support the president's agenda or at least are not willing to argue against his agenda, including on this war. Although I do think that there's some discomfort among Republicans of how this war was started, certainly the lack of consultation. And the longer the war progresses, I wonder if we'll hear more of that and how it might manifest. But to date, you've seen two war powers resolution votes that went exactly as you would have expected them to, really along partisan lines. That, though, is the beginning of the debate, right? It's not the end of the debate. There are more war powers resolutions that are already in the process of votes being scheduled. And so it continues to to emphasize the need for debate. It puts it at the front of the agenda publicly. It is present in the minds of constituents. Right. Because they're the people they elected are casting votes. And so the longer this war continues, the longer the potential, the greater the potential for economic impacts here at home, the harder it is to take those votes. Right. Because at the end of the day, these are all political votes.
- [52:38]
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Votes.
- [52:38]
Elisa Catalano
And so it'll be interesting to see if and when votes change, even on the margins as these war powers resolutions continue. But you raised it because I raised it earlier. And I think the real rubber hits the road when this emergency supplemental budget request moves forward. It is significant. And here you, depending on procedure like this is going to require some Democratic support in order to pass. And so you're going to have debates on both sides on is this what we should be spending US Taxpayer dollar on? Right. There are going to be parts in the Democratic Party who are going to have strong feelings on that. There will be also in the Republican Party on spending in this context. And so that will come out the questions about whether this war is what we should be doing. Right. The kind of fundamental justification for the war also will be part of that debate. And so I think that is going to be one of the interesting moments in which Congress can really use that as leverage to either extract consultation almost by force from the administration or at least make the public debate much more serious than perhaps it has been now. And it will coincide potentially if the war is still going, with real economic costs starting to manifest globally and potentially here at home as well. So all those things come together I think, in the next coming weeks as this gets tackled. And it's an opportunity for Congress to demonstrate that it's still part of the game. I'm not sure that it will perform as intended, but it's at least an opportunity for it to reassert its role in this kind of decision making, which makes sense because it's the power of the purse. And ultimately that's where Congress has its strongest authorities. There'll probably be some other things on the margins like authorization for use of force. So if you look at war powers as the talking about mostly focused on the part of, of you can no longer be engaged in hostilities, authorization of use of force is proactively saying you can engage in hostilities. Right. Kind of as a dumbed down version of the distinction between those two tools. The last time we had AUMFs were 2001 and 2003 for Afghanistan and Iraq. Right. So that carries a very heavy burden in aumf, unlikely to kind of generate any more impact than the war powers resolutions have had. But again, in an effort to keep the debate alive and at the top of people's minds, I think this is a way that Congress can use these tools to that effect.
- [55:33]
Ariant Bhattabai
And by the way, everything you're describing is happening just what, now, eight months before the midterms. Right. And the conventional sort of phase of the war might be over, but as we've said, the other pieces of it may still be ongoing. The economic impact may still be there. So there's all of these things that are going to be kind of looming in the background as well.
- [55:53]
Elisa Catalano
Yeah. The midterms was always going to be about affordability. Right. And you think about that in terms of what people are paying for the basic necessities in everyday life, whether that's gas to fuel their car, whether it's groceries and where they're grown, and whether there's fertilizer able to grow them directly connected to this war. And then there's a bigger question of what should the government be spending its resources on, resources that it generates from the US taxpayer? Should it be $200 billion for this war? Should it be $200 billion on something else? Right. So both of those things coming to a head in a conversation that's really not about foreign policy as much as it is about what the United States citizen expects the United States government to be focused on. And you're right, November will be here before we know it.
- [56:46]
Ariant Bhattabai
All right. Well, that's a great place to leave it. Elisa, thank you for joining me today.
- [56:52]
Elisa Catalano
Thank you so much for having me. This is really fun.
- [56:57]
Ariant Bhattabai
The Lawfare podcast is produced by the lawfair Institute. If you want to support the show and listen ad free, you can become a Lawfare material supporter@lawfaremedia.org supporters also get admitted access to special events and other bonus content we don't share anywhere else. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review us wherever you get your podcasts. Look out for our other podcasts including Rational Security, Allies, the Aftermath and Escalation. Our Law Fair Presents podcast series about the war in Ukraine. Check out our written work@lawfaremedia.org the podcast is edited by Jen Patya and our audio engineer for this episode episode was Hazel Hoffman of Go Rodeo. Our theme song is from Alibi Music. As always, thank you for listening.
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