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Understanding 9/11tv Debate on U.S. Policy Toward Iran Middle East CSPAN April 7, 2024 5:25am-6:50am EDT
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george washington university. >> hello, everyone. welcome. my name is alexander wilson, on the president of the john quincy adams society here at gw when i am so honored to be starting off our event, facing the next step for u.s. foreign policy in iran. it is a great honor to host this event which has been nine months in the making. thank you all for coming. [indiscernible]
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>> thank you all for coming out. it is a pleasure to see you all excited about this event being offered today. a special thanks to sam who did a lot of the great work in presenting and creating this event.
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>> thank you for the kind invitation. it is great to be here. i will start with introducing our speakers. [indiscernible] as we move on the questions will be more difficult. especially the last one. michael singh is a managing director at the washington institute and a former senior director of the national security council. [indiscernible] with a focus on iran and the middle east. michael is on the board of the
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u.s. institute of peace where i interned. [indiscernible] when i was writing my dissertation he patiently and graciously answered all the questions i sent to him. so thank you. steven simon is a visiting professor at the school of international studies with a distinguished career spanning roles in the clinton administration. he is a recognized author on counterterrorism [indiscernible] with a notable publication such as his latest work.
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steven is senior fellow at the quincy institute for responsible statecraft. thank you both of you for coming. i will start with an easy question. proxy forces are one of the pillars of iran's so-called forward defense strategy along with missile and nuclear programs they rely on a variety of proxy groups which they call our own nato alliance. michael, if you could briefly discuss them and then i will move on. michael: it is a pleasure to be here and appear with you both. i have known -- up here for you both. i have known both of you for a long time.
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this is an important topic. we have been clashing with iran and the middle east for a long time and iran presents a particularly troublesome case in the u.s. in part because of the strategy they deployed in the region, a strategy not based upon in many ways the traditional tools of statecraft. they are not signing treaties and making friends with neighbors. they lack a conventional military capability in many ways, they do not have a navy or air force. they face not only sanctions but also on historical factors, the nature of the regime and the origins in 1979 revolution. instead they employ this
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strategy of asymmetric power, training and arming groups around the middle east which then attend to wage war on and create problems for states which might otherwise be adversary to them. saudi arabia, a traditional rival of them, has to worry a lot about what is happening in the southern flank in yemen and maybe that means from iran's perspective they have less resources to focus on iran itself so we see ron working with youth groups across the region. hezbollah in lebanon. islamic jihad and hamas in the palestine territory. ruthie relished -- houthi rebels in yemen. syria, iraq, afghanistan. not all the relationships of the same. hezbollah is the largest most
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capable of the groups and probably has the closest relationship with iran. it is not accident that after the strike yesterday that quickly we saw a statement from hezbollah condemning it. why would hezbollah condemning a strike that israel conducted in syria against iran? because they are close with iran. hamas has had an up-and-down relationship with iran. hamas and iran at first were not on the same side. not to say hamas was on the side of democracy in any way but it was on the side of jihadist groups waging war against u.s. ally groups and the regime that is a client of iran. houthis in yemen, that
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relationship until recently was a looser relationship they had with partners on proxies around the region but has become closer in recent years as the houthis engage in wars with the u.s. and allies. other proxies are creations of iran. militias in syria or iraq would not exist if iran had not funded and created and staffed them. so there are a variety of relationships but they are all essentially for the same purpose, to project influence, to project power, to keep adversaries busy away from iran's borders. >> sort of taking the fight away
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from iran's borders, if you do not fight the adversaries abroad we will have to fight them on our own streets sort of. stephen, the proxy forces michael pointed out. what is the nature of the relationship? puppetmaster? alliance? a partnership? can iranians pick up the phone and tell houthis or hamas or hezbollah to attack such and such place or do they have their own agency? >> i think it is important to know that they would use whatsapp. nobody uses phone calls anymore. [laughter] it's a very good question. it is important to bear in mind a connection with your question
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that the relationship between these groups and iran for the most part are those of convenience. the iranians are opportunists. the u.s. and allies create many opportunities for iran to grab. these other groups are opportunistic in seeking or accepting iranian assistance because it serves their purposes. i think it is a system that works very well for iran as well as these other groups. it is mutually beneficial. you can see how well it is working or has been working for the who these -- houthis. houthis have been using fairly sophisticated missiles and drones in the red sea.
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they have been using these weapons and largely halting commercial shipping through the red sea into the suez canal, gravely damaging egypt and egypt's economy and adding substantial cost international shipping, largely inflated because of covid and adjustments the global shipping industry made in response to that crisis. thus far, international commerce has not been all that heavily affected by what the houthis have done but houthis would not have been able to do it if it were not for the very large number of weapons that iran has supplied over the years so that works quite nicely for them. these relationships work to the advantage of iraqi initial --
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iraqi initial's aligned with iran, they receive services from iran that help them press their agenda within iraq. these are examples of symbiotic relationships between iran and these other groups and the united states does this. it is a classic strategy. the united states uses the kurds as proxy, i am not equating it but in functional terms the kurds serve as proxy warfare for the united states and the united states has not perfected the proxy warfare, using yugoslav
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communists in world war ii, others in vietnam, cubans, it is an age-old strategy that works for any state when they can get it but as michael pointed out, the iranians are uniquely reliant on these proxy relationships because it cannot establish relationships with state actors so it has to settle for associate actors. michael: i want to emphasize one thing steve mentioned, the ambiguity of plausible deniability is part of the iran strategy. we often find ourselves in the wake of something that happened in the middle east having a debate come up what role did they know about it. the fact that there is uncertainty around this is part of their strategy. so even something where we do not have a lot of uncertainty, we are pretty sure what they are doing, they will deny it.
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sending arms to the houthis. where did the arms come from we ask iran. we don't know. it is clear what partners u.s. supports. iran is not like that. we did not give hamas the weapons, we did not give the houthis weapons, we don't know where they came from. plausible deniability. that's part of their strategy. it is important to recognize that regardless of the nature of the relationship between iran and hamas, what we can say clearly is hamas cannot do something like october 7 without the help of ron. houthis could not shut down shipping in the red sea without help from iran.
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steven: just a couple steven: steven: of observations on that point that i think is the important one. i disagree that iran support for hamas being essential for the attack they carried out october 7. i did not see a relationship at all. the ambiguity and plausible died -- deniability is crucially important for iran's adversaries, seeing it in their interest as attacking ron at home. nobody wants to do that. united states has never attacked iran mainland even after they have drawn considerable quantities of american blood. a full-scale war with iran seems income as a writ with whatever
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benefit the u.s. could extract from the conflict so they are happy about the plausible deniability because it relieves them the need to justify not attacking iran at home, on the mainland, something that countries simply do not wish to do. certainly the united states. >> a follow-up question on the houthis. some scholars [indiscernible] iran said this is the perfect opportunity and let's make yemen saudi arabia's vietnam, and make them spend a lot of money.
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yes or no? do you agree or not? steven: poor yemen has been everyone's vietnam since the 1950's. the iran houthis and houthis -- the iranian and who the interests aligned in this case. -- houthi interests align in this case. houthis are riding high on the international recognition they have gotten from striking shipping in the gulf. houthis must be deriving some
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satisfaction from imposing sanctions on the u.s. and their allies. for decades the u.s. has used economic sanctions to bring their enemies to their knees, or at least try to. the u.s. has a unique asset for doing that, the federal reserve and the fact that the dollar is the reserve currency. so the u.s. can impose very heavy economic penalties on adversaries. the houthis have something that is equivalent that they can use to keep ships from transiting the red sea safely. so they are imposing economic sanctions on their enemies.
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it is a clever move for them. the question is, do they stop when they achieve their expressed goal, which is to end hostilities and the withdrawal of israeli forces from gaza. i do not see them happening and if there were to happen, are the houthis now deriving so much satisfaction and intangible goods from these attacks that they will just continue them or resume them when they decide another [indiscernible] have been denied by the united states in some way? >> michael, next question. after the october 7 attacks,
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some israel officials and members of congress suggest this is iran's fault and said we have to hit the head of the snake, which is iran. in that context, how has the u.s. response then and how would you grade the bidens -- the biden administration's strategy? michael: it is true to some extent that iran needs to be held accountable for the actions of the proxy, which is not to say they are the same. hamas has the goals that do not necessarily align completely with those of iran, although they are often complementary. my own view is that hamas cannot
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do what it has done without iran's help and therefore there needs to be a cost imposed on iran for these actions, for supporting proxies like hamas. if you look at the situation with the movies, it was reported that -- if you look at the situation with the houthis, iran has sometimes played a direct role in their activities. in my view there has to be a cost to that. at the same time you have to bear in mind the bigger strategic picture. why did october 7 happen? in part because hamas exists not to help ordinary palestinians, but to inflict violence upon
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israel. it is their reason for being. you also have to look at some other things happening in the region. the move towards israeli normalization with arab states, especially with saudi arabia. for iran and the proxies, this is a very negative development. they are adversaries of iran banding in ways that strengthen the united states and the u.s. team in the region getting stronger. whether it was the proxy objective or not, i think october 7, one of the things you would hope would happen would be derailed that project so one of the things we have to do in washington is trying to get that back on the rails. whatever comes out of this
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conflict, we have to get back to the more positive agenda for the region. very difficult to do but jake sullivan is in saudi arabia this week it seems with the expressed desire to do that. has the biden administration done everything i would want, no. i think we need to be more willing to impose costs on iran for sure. my pleased to see jake is in riyadh, trying to get movement on this agenda in the wake of the gaza conflict that won't happen until the fighting is mostly over, yes. but i will resist your request to grade them and leave it at that. i will especially resist that question. >> let me ask you a follow-up. [inaudible]
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excuse me. if the proxy objective was to make sure the alliance is not being formed, the normalization between saudi arabia and iran, how successful was iran do you think and making sure this does not happen? some argue that because of the sheer death toll in gaza it would be extremely difficult politically for anyone to move towards normalization with israel. so if you may grade iran in their fallen -- foreign policy, what would you say? michael: my guess is the iranian regime is pleased with how things are gone. i am sardis say. look around the region. -- i am sorry to say.
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look around the region. u.s. and israel in some way isolated in the world. look at what has been happening with the u.n.. hamas back at the top of the agenda in a way it was not before and in the region the palestinian issue has hamas in a way they didn't before. you look at the access houthis have had in shutting down shipping in the red sea despite u.s. efforts to resist. you achieve all of this with, until yesterday, a relatively minimal toll of iranian casualties or any real cost for iran. until yesterday i think they would've said we achieved a lot without a good deal of cost. that is just the beginning of the story. that is just the first phase.
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you have tremendous suffering in gaza. i do not think iranian leaders and regime lose any sleep over that. the only thing they fit -- they don't worry when it happens to their own population, it is hard to imagine they worry about anybody else. but we can turn it around. if we can get the strategic agenda back on track, which i do think it is possible, if we can ensure iran pays the cost for its actions in the region and reopen shipping in the red sea despite houthis efforts to stop it, i think iran will turn around and say there has been a setback strategically but we have not yet gotten to that point. steven: quick note on what michael said. there is an iranian spy ship set
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to be sailing in that area providing intelligence to the houthis and some say the u.s. should start attacking iranian interest by targeting the ship. so what michael said i will repeat the same question for you, how would you grade this administration and would -- and is attacking the head of the snake a wise policy? steven: i think i largely savor the administration's approach to the crisis thus far. i teach for a living so the idea of grading is just -- [laughter] let's give it a pass/fail kind of thing. this is kind of a special study kind of thing.
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when the crisis erupted i think the administration did all the right things. i think it was important to lay out strong support for israel. on the outset, israel had just endured a horrible attack, we all know the details about it, it was heinous. and it is also an unwritten rule in u.s. diplomacy that if one is trying to manage israel and a crisis that could get out of hand, you want to embrace it very closely at the outset and assure them of your support because that will afford you capital you can draw down on further down the road in the conflict to manage israel's response.
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so, good right out of the gate. i think the response was strategic in that u.s. quickly deployed two carrier battle groups to the eastern mediterranean. that is not a joke. there are 90 combat aircraft on each aircraft carrier, that is 180 combat aircraft. that is a tremendous amount of offensive power on those airplanes and the administration did so very deliberately, in biden's words, to ensure that if iran or other parties were thinking of exploiting the crisis in israel, they shouldn't think about that.
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the statement was just don't. backing that up with the carrier battle groups was pretty deft. so i think that was the right response. the united states continued to support israel in a very robust way, and i think it is important to recognize the very complex domestic politics that the biden administration faces in dealing with this crisis. there are demonstrations on campuses, disruptive activity events at which biden has appeared that criticize the administration very heavily for its support of israel and you
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get the impression that the biden administration is doing something politically suicidal in supporting israel in this way and some interpreted the primary results in michigan as confirming of serious risk for the administration. sort of presumably wiser experts in political opinion and pulling experts think that actually although the protests have been quite vociferous, that most americans, and even a majority of democrats, favor american support for israel's response to the crisis thus far. that is not reported on very heavily so we tend to lose sight of it but the administration is
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not losing sight of it. nevertheless, they have to balance their game and you can see the way in which they have in part by abstaining from a particular u.n. security resolution. return of hostages to a cease-fire and the sanctioning of four settler activists on the west bank for their egregious acts. so the administration is finding new things and in the president's remarks the other day i think were primarily intended to affect a domestic audience. when leaders talk they are addressing different audiences, usually simultaneously. this one was largely addressed -- i would say until now he has done pretty well, including dealing with the houthi threat
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because while it is true there is no deterring them at this point because they are doing well with their current strategy, the fact is the houthis have succeeded in attacking very few ships, despite the presumed help of this iranian ship that is being channeled by electrical warfare assets that the u.s. has deployed to the red sea so i think the u.s. has done pretty well, because the aim is to decree -- degrade over time houthis capabilities to carry out attacks of this kind in the future. michael: it is remarkable how supportive president biden has
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been of israel, in the face of some oppositions and i think he deserves credit for that but i would not want that to get lost in all of this. he has made some tough choices, in some cases unpopular choices, to support an ally and i think you have to do that. he deserves credit for that. >> if you were the president, what would you do differently? michael: then what he is doing now? i think now we need to continue supporting our allies, and that is very difficult to do as these things drag on. but i think if you look at the position the houthis have in yemen, i think it is owed in some part to the fact that we shied away from supporting the saudi's in their conflict there. it left the houthis in place.
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we are all paying attention to the shutting down of shipping in the red sea because it is an international news story. but the houthis care about yemen. what have they achieved? shutting down international shipping does not help yemen or houthis. it may be in it increases biggest their prestige -- increases their prestige but does not help them suffer under sanctions. when these things become more difficult and drag on that is when you have to be really steadfast in your support. it does not mean you have to agree with every decision or not try to use your influence or criticize it or save the question of humanitarian aid act and so forth but to start stepping away and saying now that it is more costly we do not want to support our allies i think is not the right way to conduct policy. i do not think the biden
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administration is there, but i was not a fan on abstaining on this resolution for them. i do not like abstaining. you are either for something or against it but we need to hold our nerves as this goes forward and still be there to influence what happens next. >> stephen, if you were the president, what would you have done differently? steven: i am going to be kind of boring here. what else is new, i know. i don't mean to sort of hiatus from the question but i am not sure that doing anything very different, i think the administration is in a very difficult position right now but i do not see a lot of room for maneuvering. i think the administration is
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thinking in terms of serious departures from existing policy because of the emerging goals -- gulf between netanyahu and biden. netanyahu is essentially running against joe biden now in an israeli electoral contest and that is contributing to serious tensions. netanyahu is really sort of provocative of the president's requests and suggestions and so
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forth and that is pushing the two leaders into a very difficult situation. i know that some people are considering, i once supported this position myself, but the notion that the united states president, who has demonstrated his profound support for israel in a crisis against opposition within his own country and his own party would be in a position to reach over the head of the israeli prime minister to the israeli people and say, listen, netanyahu, whatever he is about
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is not leading israel in a good direction. we have some better ideas, and here they are. and say listen, netanyahu, whatever he is about, it is not leading israel in a good direction. here they are. in the hope of spurring move toward elections. theoretically, netanyahu has another three years to run before their need to be elections. my own view was that he could probably write about, at least in the near term, but the u.s. i think at this point is coming to see it as in its interest, our interest that netanyahu's reign
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come to an end. we are doing this in part because it is an election year in the united states. we are getting too close to the campaign season. the president would not want to avoid any open ruptures with netanyahu. that has been an example of something that could be done differently that i do not think it would be advisable necessarily. michael: i will say if you wanted to strengthen netanyahu, this is probably the way to do it. it seems to me he would make a virtue out of president biden opposing him, criticizing him and so forth because he would say look, i am standing up for israel's interest and i am doing it even in the face of opposition from our closest ally, the united states. you need someone strong enough to do that. i would say the risk of meddling from afar in another country's
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politics, including another democracy's politics is not just that it may be wrong period if it is an ally to democracy, but it may backfire and produce the opposite of the result you want. stephen: i agree with you. >> more difficult question -- last night, the israelis attacked the iranian embassy in damascus, which resulted in the death of a number of iranian commanders. imagine that you are into ron -- in tehran and they call you in the middle of the night and say mr. singh, we summon you to the iranian security council, and please tell us, what should iranians do in response to the attack? i have seen some iranian commentators suggesting enough is enough, we have been attacked
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too many times, and there has to be a response. if you were to advise the iranians, what would you advise them? michael: we started off talking about iran's strategy in the region, based on strategic power, not confrontation. iran is not very strong. when faced with this kind of direct, sharp pushback, my guess is you will not see iran eager for a direct confrontation. perhaps they will feel they have to make some show of response. but my guess is it will be a show of response and that the real retaliation will come, as it often does from iran, in an attempt do so through proxy, asymmetric means, and so forth. this is generally the pattern with iran. when iran has been faced within this kind of sharp pushback, and you could point out the same thing in its clash recently with pakistan, which did not get as
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much attention in washington because it seemed a little out of the ordinary him about it was something very similar when iran -- ordinary, but it was something very similar when iran struck and pakistan struck back and iran's response was to say let's calm down. it is not going to sue for peace with israel. it is not going to send an envoy to israel to negotiate. i would be surprised if iran was negotiating with israel. it is based on the proxies being the ones to take the casualties, not themselves. i am not of the view that is going to change simply because of what happened yesterday. i am not going to suggest that what i would say to the supreme leader in iran, and thankfully i have never found myself in that position, but my guess is that is how they will operate. >> same question to you. stephen: i largely agree with -- steven: i largely agree with
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michael. the striking thing thus far has been iranian restraint. and hezbollah restraint. these actors are rational actors, fundamentally. they may, as michael said, pursue a strategy owing to the respective strengths of iran and of its enemies, but they are rational and are deterred by the threat of punishment. this is one of the reasons that they were so upset with hamas for having done this thing on october 7, because it exposed iran to tremendous risk, and it did so because it would inevitably put iran under tremendous pressure to take some
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sort of action in defense of the palestinian cause or what have you. this would produce real risks for an iranian regime that already has a lot of other fish to fry. all is not well when iran. -- in iran. the notion of tackling a major power like israel, let alone the united states, is not something they would want to do. i would just add one thing to this. the iranians obviously have got some kind of, i don't know, psychological thing about israel . they just have a hard time wrapping their minds around the
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fact of a jewish state in the middle east. it has been a problem for them. but over time, that sort of psychological fixation has been overlain by a more strategic view of israel and the threat that it poses to iran. which does not make things any simpler, but it implies a recognition of israeli power and israel's ability to hurt iran. they are beginning to take that more seriously. it accounts largely for iran's solar deployed policy, its outer defense perimeter, which is essentially what we had been discussing in terms of the mobilization of the excess of resistance. in a wider circle around iran. so, i think there has been an important development here, and
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we need to analyze it. pay attention to it and assess it. >> thank you very much. i am going to open it to questions. heat, raise your hand, introduce yourself, and just as a reminder, that a question usually ends with a question mark. thank you. go ahead, sir. >> i am a freshman here. i have a quick question. iran has been trying to increase its foreign policies from a national relations stance, most notably [indiscernible] the president most recently said iran's position in the block's opposition to american unilateralism. what impact will this have on american foreign policy in the region? michael: well, look, bricks, for
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this of you who don't know, is now a long-standing sort of loose grouping, and its transfer brazil russia india -- brazil, russia, india, china, south africa. but now many other countries have joined boring the process of joining this grouping. it has been characterized in lots of different ways. it is sort of an alternate u.n. or nato. when you look at this group, it does not have a charter or really actions it takes. it is sort of mostly a discussion forum, quite loosely. i think for most of the countries that are partnering now with it, which included a lot of u.s. close partners, and call them allies -- and you might even call them allies, affiliating themselves with bricks is a way of aligning them
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with great power and competition. i call it omni alignment. it is basically a way of hedging and also making sure you are extracting the maximum possible benefit in this world where you have u.s.-china rivalry playing out. that is why you can have countries like saudi arabia and india, which are quite closely aligned with the united states. india views china as a rival. yet they come together in this bricks format because each has a reason to do so. all that said, i don't there is actually not strategically that binds these groups together. this is not nato, where there is a common threat they all face, and we have agreed to a mutual defense pact. this is not really even the u.n. , where there are secretariats and mechanisms for getting businesses done. it is much looser than that. what impact will iran's bricks affiliation have on u.s. foreign policy in the middle east?
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none is the answer. >> hi, i am a sophomore poly sigh major. what do you think the applications -- the implications would be if iran did get nuclear weapons? would they be able to use them the way russia does, which is to invade another country and then deterred the conventional response by using nukes? would you support an american or american israeli -- >> hold that microphone closer to your mouth. >> would you support. -- support an american or israeli attack where they bond fee reactors before they can get nukes for real? steven: anything worth doing is worth doing. >> you are joking with me right now. [laughter] steven: yeah, that's a good
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question. the real answer is i guess we will find out. as far, they -- thus far, they have not decided to turn that last screw and deliver an actual, deliverable warhead. they have desisted from doing so presumably for policy reasons. so, i think they see it as a development that would not serve their interests. it would just create too many pressures on them and expose them to the kinds of vulnerabilities that you -- the second part of your question highlighted it, enabling attacks from the outside by foreign
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powers, whether israel or the united states. it is problematic. the targets are anywhere between 1200 to 1500 kilometers from which these planes would be lost. there was no indication under the abraham accords that the israelis are going to be allowed to operate from an airbase in the uae, which is the only way they could really maintain the kind of operational tempo that would be required really to make the rubble bounce. and, back with satisfactory bone damage assessments. -- and come back with satisfied jury -- with satisfactory bone damage assessments. if they cannot attack within the region, they are really constrained, because carrying out the kinds of intensive attacks that would be required from israel would necessitate a lot of midair refueling, very
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long flights, huge operational risks, the kind of operational risks that military establishments generally -- it is hard to say that. the alliances could do it, but not without breathing hard. the way we do these things, it would be a sustained, coordinated bombing campaign that would last for weeks, and it would be pretty serious. but in either case, it is not clear that it would end iran's program, because iran has been dispersing its facilities. there may be facilities that the united states and israel do not know about. these developments in iran's programs i think will continue to advance to the extent that they are happening.
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the military solution to this may be in the west at this point. outside of the context of the general war. because once it is a general war , then anything could happen, and the parties to the conflict of belligerence will go all out. but the iranians should be able to reconstruct whatever kind of program they have pretty quickly. the united states made a devastating mistake by withdrawing from the jcpoa, the iran peace deal. the iran nuclear deal. that was a mistake, but it is not a mistake that can be undone
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. i don't think there is a chance of the united states and iran going back to that sort of a deal. anyway, if the iranians do get a weapon, then what would worry political scientists is a phenomenon that they call socialization, which is something -- it is a phenomenon that they detect in sort of the period after a country goes nuclear. it becomes a nuclear weapon state. by socialization, the process of understanding what the uses of such a weapon are, what they can be used for and what they really cannot be used for. the answer to what they can be used for his deterrence, to deter other people from using
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them, but they are not good for war fighting. but generally, the thinking goes that after a huge effort, costly effort to develop these weapons, you think now i really have the special sauce, aha. nobody can mess with me. then you begin to take risks that ultimately expose you to greater danger and force you to a position where you might have to use those nuclear weapons. that period is called socialization. we will see how the iranians make their way through that phase, if indeed they get a weapon. sorry i went on for so long. i am a teacher. michael: let me add one thing to this. my view is the middle east and the world is a terrible place if iran gets nuclear weapons.
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yes, we should be willing to use military force to stop them, but let's hope we don't have to. but the world, i worry, is on a cusp of a new nuclear way above -- a new wave of nuclear for -- we talk about things like taking troops out of korea and withdrawing our guarantees and so forth. we need to worry about nuclear proliferation the aunt just the bad actors like iran and north korea. we have to worry about nuclear proliferation more broadly. and steve was alluding to this a bit at the end, the idea of nuclear weapons being on the table for more of a battlefield type of use, novel forms of nuclear weapons and so forth. i worry a lot, and the question is beyond the scope of this conversation, that we are on the
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cusp of a another wave of nuclear proliferation. we should be focusing on, how do we stop that in all of its aspects? >> just a quick note and then we will go to questions. the israeli attack on iran and syria nuclear programs were successful because they were pretty nascent. they had just started a nuclear program. but the iranian case, have any times are they going to bomb them when they know how to -- how many times are they going to bond them when they know how to remake the same thing? when they do, it could give them more reason to bash with a bomb. that is one thing, and whether iran wants to bond, i think that they think that time is on their side. and there is no need to go for the bomb if, i mean, as long as they can threaten going for the bomb. they already know how to do it,
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they just have, as steven and michael pointed out, they don't have the need. they don't perceive the need for a bomb, but this could change. >> next question. >> my name is danny. you mentioned earlier that you do not believe that hamas. out the october 7 attacks without support from iran, and mr. simon, you said you disagreed with that, so i wonder if you can give it back and forth as to why you believe those things. sina: when michael pointed out that hamas could not have pulled off that attack without iran's support, steven disagreed, so the question is whether you can elaborate on that. michael: i am happy to elaborate. my own view is it is not clear the extent to which iran court and it -- hamas cordoning that the attack -- coordinated
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the attack with iran. it was a plan that was cut and pasted from the hezbollah plan, which likely was developed in collaboration between hezbollah and the iranian revolutionary guard corps that hamas then put into action. the analogy i will use, if you can forgive the casual nature of it, this is sort of a leroy jenkins attack by hamas. they did something without clear coordination with their patrons. i ran without nuclear coordination with hezbollah, was -- iran without clear coronation with hezbollah. as legal as it may be, they are maybe not super coordinated with one another. nevertheless, could the attack have happened without iranian support for hamas? my own view is no. this was not the firing of one are two rockets, not the type of attack we have seen in the past from hamas. if you see a map of the gaza
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strip and all the different points of attack by hamas, this was an incredibly sophisticated and overwhelming attack by hamas that required lots of training, lots of equipment, lots of know how, essentially. all of which, in one way or another, was provided by iran. iran provided hamas with money, not throughout its entire existence, but in the last 10 or 12 years, i aligned to 40 million or more dollars per year. iran played a role in the smuggling of arms to the gaza strip. this was not all just done with homemade rockets. that was the case with some other attacks from gaza, but certainly not this one. the training of hamas officials reportedly took place not just in the gaza strip, but some of it inside iran, but some of it was also provided by other proxies of iran.
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you see a very heavy iranian hand. everything that hamas has been doing over the last decade or so. the same is true for hezbollah, of the houthis. this does not imply that iran's high-end -- iran's hand is always on the button, but that is part of the strategy. that deniability is part of iran's strategy. it is not always wanted hand on the lever. instead it wants to hand these proxies the means to carry out attacks and then be able to say, gosh, i was not involved. we need to see through that game to a great extent. sina: steven, do you have a response? steven: the attack we are talking about, i assume, is the october 7 attack. that was planned by hamas within full view of israelis for two years preceding the attack. the israelis sought these
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preparations but misinterpreted them because of a certain kind of cognitive bias. they had this idea, this conception that hamas had made a strategic decision to focus on governance of the gaza strip and not wage some kind of annihilation is to attack against the israeli state. and replace it with an islamic state. so, israeli analysts were very convinced by the rightness of this conception, and it blinded them to what was happening right before their eyes. there is precedent for this in cases of surprise attacks involving many other countries and israel's own experience in
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the 1973 war was a surprise attack precisely for the same reason there was a conception on the part of the israelis that they would not attack unless they had a way to neutralize air superiority. that turned out to be the wrong judgment and terrible things and terrible things ensued. the attack involved bulldozers, supersecret high-tech that only the iranians know about.
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it relied on bulldozers. it relied on hand grenades. each, again, nobody knows about, especially iranian hand grenades . most of the hand grenades were stolen from israel. these things called rifles. that was kind of how it all happened. the rest was a function of the unbelievable sadism of the attackers, of those people who came through the holes in the fence. that was it. now, you show me what about this attack, the plan, the nature of it, the execution of it, required the assistance of the
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unbeatable islamic revolutionary guard corps. it sure escapes me. but you hear this all the time. you hear the, well, al qaeda, they were not responsible for 9/11. it had to have been a state, because only a state could do this. and it is the narrative that these dumb the arabs can't do anything right, but it takes wily persons to make this happen. i think this kind of narrative, i'm not impressed by it, and evidence does not support it. to my mind, hamas was strongly
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motivated to do this. they had a leader who was completely committed to the plan , and who really wanted to make it happen. it was rehearsed continuously. they had extensive intelligence, and the intelligence did not come from iran. the intelligence came from arab workers who crossed the border every day to do the work at these settlements, they are not settlements, small towns is what they are. they went to work, mowed the lawn, made little maps while they were mowing the lawn, and there was not super competent iranian intelligence agency that provided this element.
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from my perspective, it is really hard to implicate amram in a meaningful -- implicate iran in this in a meaningful way, and certainly u.s. and israeli intelligence agencies have converged on the view, very shortly after the attack, that the iranians had been unaware of it and they had not been involved in the attack. so, maybe michael is right and there is something i am missing here. i just don't see it. michael: i have to say on this, i strongly disagree with the -- and i don't really agree with the way that you phrased it, steve, that somehow it had to do with your evaluation of arabs and persians. i don't think that is right. we have plenty of evidence going back years of iranian material support for hamas, financial
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support. this is a matter of open testimony by u.s. officials. you can find this by googling. we have intercepted arms shipments from iran into gaza. just because weapons are unsophisticated does not mean that they were not provided by iran. iran, during the u.s. presence in iraq, provided very unsophisticated weaponry to iraqi militias to kill u.s. soldiers. the fact that they were not precision guided missiles or something hi end did not make them any less deadly or any less iranian in their province. arming thousands of men with rifles, over 3000 men involved in this on october 7, is not a small undertaking. this is not a casual terrorist attack. this is a military attack. i think we have plenty of evidence, both current and
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former, both in the cast and in the current period, of material iranian support for hamas. i reject that it is somehow a conspiracy theory or a made up narrative to pin blame on iran. iran does this. this is not a fantasy. this is a well-established -- and multiple administrations, democratic and republican, have laid same charges on iran's doorstep. -- laid these same charges on iran's doorstep. steven: i just think that is a red herring. it is true, but that does not mean it is relevant. that is my response. sina: go ahead. >> this question is for the two of you. there are some precedents i have to establish first. you can also disagree with the precedents. the first premise is state like
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entities are rational actors pursuing their own self-interest. the second one is that there are overlapping objectives that benefit two entities in the region that are trying to counter american powers, regardless of if they are proxies of iran or just have some intersectional objectives or benefits, they are both trying to counter iran. houthis, hezbollah, whatever they may be. the third is that america has had a destabilizing effect on the region, particularly in iraq, and afghanistan, in other parts of the middle east, even. now the question would be, could it be argued that a middle east with a reduced american presence would be more stable, with entities like iran not feeling encroached upon in what is geopolitically what they perceive as naturally their
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space? sina: so the question is, a potential u.s. withdrawal, would it have a stabilizing or destabilizing effect on the regional order, that is the question, right? steven? steven: i got scared off by your mention of intersectionality. [laughter] >> i've only retained the first premise, i'm sorry, it's late at night. steven: there is a thing called bounded rationality. these things do take a rational approach to the issues at the rationality would be bounded for a lot of different reasons. to us, it may look like they are not maximizing their utility functions, but as far as they're concerned, ok, they are, but on the question of whether the
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region would be better off with or without the united states, i would say first it depends. i do not see the region -- and i probably should, i can see this point, but it is hard for me to do it -- i see the region as a congaree's have different states and regions within states. therefore, i find it hard to make general assessments or judgments like, if the united states were gone, everything would be better. i think if there were 2500 troops in iraq right now, i think it is probably better that they stay there. and i can tell you a long story about why i think that, but that is the bottom line. there are 900 soldiers now in syria. it is probably better that they
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stay there, at least for a while, not forever. otherwise, the united states does not have a huge presence in the region. on any given day, there were probably 30,000 american military personnel in the region and a lot of those were aircraft carriers. there are 5000 people on an aircraft carrier, it adds up. we have a string of bases in the persian gulf, the states in which those bases are located. i think we are sort of at the tail end of an age of extreme intervention where the u.s. presence was quite destabilizing. there was a great joke during the bush administration where bush and his national security advisor condoleezza rice would say the problem with the middle
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east is that it's politics are frozen, and for 60 years, stability has been enforced, so now we have the answer to that problem. instability. so let's invade -- there is probably some truth to that joke. i think there was a period when the u.s. presence was extremely destabilizing. you overthrow governments, you disrupt societies. it is going to create certain circumstances. but now i am not sure that it's a really big consideration. i will just add one brief thing to that. if you look at the administrations military posture
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now -- the administration's military posture now, a lot of that has been drawn down. because there is not a strong appetite in washington for making large-scale military commitments at this point. china is on the other said of the door -- side of the door. strategic priorities have shifted and our interest has changed over time. so i think and hope that the issue you are raising is one that is now in the rearview mirror more than it is through
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the windshield. sina: michael? michael: just a quick note that william will is written -- has written on how stable unipolar worlds could be. >> [inaudible] sina: do you think the u.s. policy should be as active as it has been in the past? >> especially considering doha right now. >> what are you referring to talking about doha? the hostage negotiations the qatari's are considering between israel and hamas. it is a hard question to answer with a broad brush, because u.s.
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engagement in the region goes beyond the immediate conflict. no, i think the u.s. is an indispensable actor, where it is part of the hostage negotiations where bill burns has been a part of those discussions, or in the context of any other number of issues in the region, the u.s. plays a strong role. we have lots of partnerships in the region, nato allies in the region, and i think generally speaking that is a good thing. our involvement is a good thing, especially our diplomatic involvement is a good thing. sina: next question, serenely back -- sir in the back. >> i have heard iran described as a proxy of russia, and i also have heard it the other way, we are now russia is buying drones from iran. i would ask how you would characterize the russia-iran relationship, and what should
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the u.s. do about it? sina: what is the nature of u.s.-iranian relations? how would you characterize it? michael: this is historically a front relationship, a relationship which has not been at all a part of what the iranians and russians fought many wars, five wars, between the 1700s and 1800s. those wars ended in the mid-1800s with two treaties in particular, the treaties which are still bywords in iran for national humiliation because of the tremendously unequal nature of them. russia was part of the so-called great game with the u.k., with the british empire's splitting up iran into colonial or imperial influence. in the early 20th century, russian forces shelved the module and seeing iran during the constitutional revolution.
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-- in iran during the constitutional revolution. security council two was about stalin's efforts to essentially take over parts of iran, sort of self-declared breakaway republic s inside of iran, not unlike those currently sponsored by russians. my assumption, without being terribly close to either regime in question, is this is not the sort of affectionate relationship based in history, but rather one that is sort of essential. they feel as though they would like to see a world with less u.s. influence, for one reason or another, russia because of its decision to invade ukraine and the western and the western in u.s. led sanctions that resulted, i ran for a host of other reasons which may not be detailed here. and they find common cause in trying to oppose the united
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states, trying to counter the united states. i think what is really interesting and alarming is that the extent to which that relationship has reversed a bit in recent years. in the last couple of years in particular, with the provision of drones by iran and potentially missiles going forward by iran to russia, which has bound itself in dire need -- found itself in dire need because of the immense amount or number of resources that it has burned through in its illegal and fruitless war in ukraine. that is an interesting change in that relationship. my own view is that iran is to some extent a strategic asset and a junior partner in a kind of broader, i dunno what the right word is, it is not alliance, it is sort of a grouping of iran, china, and russia, which also brings in other countries like venezuela,
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north korea, cuba to some extent. but really russia and china see each other as the main actors in this partnership, and they see all the others as junior partners. i am sure iran does not see it that way, and i am sure iran feels as though its provision of drones to russia is a welcome turn of the tables. by the way, it is worth noting because of our previous conversation that the ukrainians attacked recently, from what i understand, an iranian drone factory inside russia. here we are talking about the risks, and should there be attacks inside iran and so forth, yet no one has raised the ukrainians attacking the drone factory inside russia, a nuclear armed power, and the win in washington seems to have -- and no one in washington seems to have blinked an eyelash. sina: i would like to take more questions, but i am told we have to wrap it up. thank you for coming.
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