welcome to amanpour on pbs. tonight, tough talk on iran. the u.s. secretary of state vows to crush the country unless it changes its behavior. can the u.s. do that alone? or is the region headed for another military confrontation? i'm joined by the former head of the national security agency, former head of the cia, michael hadden whose book takes a sobering view of the trump presidency. plus, he is the african-american preacher who stole the show at the royal wedding. bishop michael curry on that historic sermon and what the reaction says about britain, its royal family and the church.

good evening and welcome to the program. i'mchristian ahmae amanpour. that would be in return for a list of tough new demands. in his first major speech, the u.s. secretary of state mike pompeo today piled on the pressure, what he called tehran's maligned behaviobehavi. two weeks after pulling out of the iran nuclear deal, pompeo said iran could only get sanctions relief again if it agrees to 12 more demands. including pulling its forces out of syria, ending support for rebels in yemen, halting development of ballistic missiles and zero iranian

enrichment. the iranian president said no one would accept the united states deciding on behalf of the whole world. the u.s. wants the backing of its european allies. pompeo acknowledges that will be tough. >> we understand that our reimposition of sanctions and the pressure campaign on the iranian regime will pose financial and economic difficulties for a number of our friends. i know they may decide to try and keep their old nuclear deal going with tehran. that is certainly their decision to make. they know where we stand. >> the eu is working to try to protect european firms doing business in iran under the terms of that deal. this was european council president donald tusk last week. >> we are witnessing today a new phenomenon. the capricious assertiveness of the american administration. looking at the latest decisions of president trump, someone

could even think with friends like that, who needs enemies. >> tough words. here now to help us through all of this, the former director of the cia and nsa, michael hadden. his new book is the assault on intelligence and he joins me now from washington. general, welcome to our program. >> thank you. >> you heard secretary pompeo. iran has been compliying with te deal. do you see a strategy in the u.s. position right now? an actual strategy? >> i'm beginning to see the outline of plan b. wheth when we started plan a, the iran nuclear deal, i had my complaints. after it was put in place and my view and frankly of american intelligence was that iran was further away from a weapon with the agreement. we knew more about the program with the agreement. as you said, iran wasn't cheating. we ripped up plan a.

now i have been waiting for plan b. we have begun to get the outlines of plan b with clearly what was a set of maximalist demands, including just about everything we think the iranians are doing in with the nuclear portfolio as well. so i just don't know whether we could achieve those with iran still being iran. perhaps a hidden mean -- that's the hidden meaning of the secretary's speech. >> if i can read through your line, this is an attempt to break iran one way or the other, thinking they can do that or potentially sort of a military plan b? >> well, i hope it doesn't come to a military plan b and the secretary didn't suggest that except if the iranians try to move in the direction of a weapon. what he wants to do is impose crushing economic sanctions on

iran and therein lies the problem. we've got the goals for plan b. now the means. the means would be sanctions. but they would have to be more or less universal sanctions. we had that to get the original deal. i think it's going to be very difficult for us to get that with regard to this deal. not only because of the economic interests of our particularly european friends, but i don't know that they buy into our ultimate maximalist objective. >> just to be clear, you recall the original when obama and before him started to ramp up the pressure on iran. those were the maximalist global sanctions, including china, russia, europe. everybody was involved. how much more maximalist can you get? >> again, i think he wants to return to those kinds of crushing sanctions, which did get the iranians to the table. i just think it's going to -- the obama administration got to

that by narrowing its front and putting all international energy in a commonly agreed objective, which was the iranian nuclear program. now we are widening our front with regard to our objectives and now we're expecting to get as much allied and ternationa support. again, i'm beginningo s t outlines of the plan. th ia really heavy lift. what we may have done is further destabilized the situation in the persian gulf setting in motion events that might be hard to predict, let alone control. >> general, setting in motion also what looks to be a confrontation with its closest allies, the europeans, this threat of secondary sanctions on european businesses who may continue to try to do business. europe trying to go around the sort of existing methods and loopholes they can use to refuse to comply with u.s. sanctions. it just looks like president

trump is picking a fight with his closest allies when he needs them the most if he is to put the sanctions regime back again. >> i think that's absolutely correct. plan a, we got political agreement on the sanctions from our european allies. i think it was very clear what secretary pompeo said this morning in washington is that we are going to coerce our european allies simply by denying companies access to the american economy. that may be transactionally successful in the short-term. but relationally, i think it will be very, very harmful for the transatlantic relationships. >> can i ask you before i go on to the new relationship, what would a military confrontation with iran look like for the united states, the region, the world? >> boy, that's a very open-ended question. look, i am very much in support about -- against the iranians

pushing back against the iranians for what they're doing in iraq, in syria, with regard to hezbollah, in yemen. so i can see using american power and influence and resources there to push what really is iranian ascendents backward. i get that. when it came in the bush administration, which is dated now, but in the bush administration, there were no easy answers with regard to a military confrontation with regard to iran, even on the narrowly focused nuclear question. bob gates, former secretary of defense, used to say, pre-emptive strike against iranian nuclear program will guarantee that which we're trying to prevent. an iran that will stop at nothing to get a nuclear weapon. >> can i move on to your new book and the whole idea of reinforcing american intelligence, american democracy? i just want to -- your book

focused on the disdain for the truth and for doing -- what it's doing to intelligence. i wonder whether you noticed what the former secretary of state said about this very issue during a commencement speech last week. let's listen. >> if our leaders seek to conceal the truth or we as people become accepting of alternative realities that are no longer grounded in facts, then we as american citizens are on a pathway to releng wiinquis our freedom. when we a people, a free people, go wobbly on the truth, even on what may seem the most trivial of matters, we go wobbly on america. >> so secretary tillerson is just one of a number of prominent people using this theme right now. it is the theme of your book as well. i will read a quote in a moment. what do you think of what he said? >> you know, when i heard it, i

had the thought that that's a better summary of the book than i have been giving in my book tour. it's exactly the heart of the book. to be fair, the big we -- i think british and american society have been in a post-truth era, post-truth defined as decisions based less on evidence and data and more on preference, emotion, feeling, tribe and grievance. that creates great stress, which you must be feeling as well, for fact-based institutions like intelligence, law enforcement and journalism. where do they go in the national discussion if we aren't using facts as the basis for our decision? >> yes. we certainly all do feel it. it's a big battle to keep that ship of facts on the straight and narrow. i want to read from what you wrote recently in "the new york times" about this. we in the intelligence world

have dealt with argumentative presidents throughout the years. we have never served a president for whom truth doesn't matter. these are truly uncharted waters for the country. we have in the past argued over the values to be applied to objective reality or occasionally over what constituted objective reality. but never the existence or relevance of objectively -- of objective reality itself. what has this done to the intelligence community? >> it has given it an additional burden. look, all presidents are different. we in intelligence have to accommodate to the president or the prime minister. we have to learn how he learns, present things in his way, follow his priorities. but we always were talking with someone who seemed to be departing from a view of objective reality. and i don't think that's a common case often in this

administration. a very quick example. i relate in the book where an american newsman is pressing the president on why he believes barack obama wiretapped trump tower. the president responded, a lot of people agree with me, people were saying, a lot of people were saying. in other words, if i can make it popular or trending, it's real. i can use it as a basis for my action. that's the tension that i try to describe. >> certainly, it must worry you -- it worries me as a journalist and it has to worry just about everybody. some of that spirit was around during the george w. bush presidency where they -- you know, they had their own facts about intelligence and the rest. there was a war that happened because of that. the iraq war. we're reaping the backlash and

blow back from that. >> i was in the bush administration. with regard to weapons of mass destruction, let me throw myself on the mercy of the court. i was part of the team that strongly believed and advised the president that iraq had that. that was, turns out, based on information that was simply not true. if you are basing decisions, as i fear we often do today, without even a reference to that which might be objectively true, you simply increase your odds of actually heading in the wrong direction almost astronomically. >> thank you so much. your book comes at a timely moment. thanks for joining us this evening. >> thank you. now from the world of tough politics to the power of love. here the uk is still swooning over the royal wedding. the incredible infusion of black culture and american flare into a very traditional service. there was the gospel kingdom

choir raising the rafters with "stand by me." ♪ so darling, darling, stand by me ♪ >> it was bishop michael curry's address that shook things up for royals and celebrities who filled st. george's chapel at windsor. >> love is not selfish and self-centered. love can be sacrificial. and in so doing, becomes redempti redemptive. that way of unselfish sacrificial redemptive love changes lives and it can change this world. >> some of the royal family perhaps look a little bemused. many here and tweeters all over the world are still raving about curry's electrifying and oh, so different address.

he was born in chicago, raised in new york. the 65-year-old bishop is head of the american episcopal church. i'm delighted to say he joins me live from the chapel of christ our lord in the church center in new york. welcome to the program, bishop. >> thank you very much. good to be with you. >> i just don't know. did you think that your address would spark so much amazement and appreciation all over the world? >> you know, in all honesty, i had no idea. i really didn't. when i finished the sermon, i sat down and i remember thinking to myself, i hope it was okay. >> oh. at one point i remember you may be thinking that you may have diverged a bit maybe ad libbed a bit. something like we have to get you married. >> that was sort of a las transition point. i was aware that it was about time to wrap it up. so i was asking permission, give

me another minute. >> you know, we're going to talk about this. the theme was the enduring power of love. the transformative power of love. i want to know how it came to be that you were giving the address. were you specifically asked by the couple? did they talk to you about what they wanted to hear? did you talk to them? >> no. they made the decision. but they arrived at their decision in consultation with the archbishop of canterbury. i'm sure they consulted with others. when they had completed their consultation and thought and once they had made their decision, then i received a phone call from the archbishop. >> have you met them, meghan and harry? have you met them for a period of time? >> at the wedding. at the wedding, yes.

they did their premarital counseling and work and planning of the service with the archbishop and planning of the service with the dean of the chapel there. >> you know, so many -- >> what they gave me -- i will tell you what they gave me. >> go ahead. >> i was going to tell you, what they really gave me was the selection of the bible passage that we used, the song of solomon, that was their choice. it was a significant choice. they had a wide variety of scriptures they could have selected. in selecting that one, whether they were aware of it or not, that led me to the sermon that actually got preached. it's a fabulous text. it's a part of the bible that people may or may not have read. it's part of wisdom literature. it actually is love poetry between a man and a woman in the bible. they etch prexpress their love h other throughout the book.

and then in the eighth clhapter near the end, the woman actually senses that their love between the two of them is part of a greater love that has another source. that's where the text and the whole flow of that sermon came from the selection of the bible passage by the royal couple themselves. >> it was really amazing. honestly, we have never seen a royal wedding like this. we have never seen this amount of diversity, this amount of sort of raising the rafters. sort of a simplicity or so, a familiarity very modern. meghan markle didn't play down, she played up her african-american roots. you referred to martin luther king and many others in american culture in history. i just want to play a little snippet of what you said about the transformative power of love.

>> imagine this world when love is the way, when love is the way unselfish, sacrificial, when love is the way. then no child will go to bed hungry in this world ever again. when love is the way, we will let justice roll down like a mighty stream and righteousness like an ever flowing brook. when love is the way, poverty will become history. >> that's very powerful. that's very powerful imagery, bishop curry, to bring up there in front of the elite, in front of the whitest of white families. what were you thinking as you said all that? >> you know, i was honesty th l thinking that if we could just harness the real power of love, we could actually change and transform this world.

that was what was driving me. you know, i'm convinced that that's the case. that really is what jesus of nazareth was talking about, what he was really getting at and what he was willing to die for. to sacrifice himself, because this love is not a kind of se sentimental thing. there's nothing wrong with that. at its root, it's a sacrificial way that seeks the good and well-being of others sometimes even above and beyond one's own self interest. that's the kind of love that gandhi was talking about in creating a non-violent way that freed a country. the kind of love that a desmond tutu, a nelson mandela, a steven beco, helping to create a south africa with the possibility of being a land for all. obviously, if dr. martin luther king -- francis of asisi, i

would say the holy father himself. that's the kind -- the way of love that is a transformational way that -- gosh, that h made a difference in human life and civization whenever a change for good has happened. it's been people motivated and passionate about a way of love that was bigger than self. >> you mentioned the holy father, pope francis. will mention him. your church, the episcopal is a big campaigner for civil rights, human rights, as you are. it has had a female presiding bishop before you. it's one of only two angrily li churches that permit gay in their churches. a lot of the world is reacting to something a victim of sexual abuse in chile said that he had a conversation with pope francis. this person said, this guy,

the -- pope frances said to him, god made you like this, god loves you like this. i wonder what you think of that given that the catholic church believes that it goes against god's teaching and it's a disoriented, abnormal state of being. >> well, you know, what i can say is what my belief and the belief of our church and the episcopal church. this is biblical. every human being is created, as the book of genesis says, in the image and likeness of god. that image of god is one of the bible's way of saying that there's something about us that resembles god, that is of infinite value and worth because of that. that every human being, it doesn't matter who they are, it doesn't matter their politics, their religion, it doesn't

matter who they are, every human being is created in the image of god and of infinite value. if that is true, then we are who god has called and created us to be. part of our cast is to live deeply into that and to discover in evenew ways how god would us our lives that reflect god's dream and not a nightmare. >> bishop, there were a lot of african-americans who came for the wedding. a lot of british -- black british people there for the we wedding. people were energized. they thought, this is the first time the royal family has made itself look a lot like our society, more diverse. i wonder what you have heard from people and whether you think this could be a game changing moment. >> you know, the wonderful thing about it is, the royal family

all made this possible. they made all of this possible. i suspect that in some wonderful and small way, i got a feeling god was trying to send a message not just to them but maybe to the whole human family that the truth is no matter who we are, no matter our station in life, we actually come from the same god. last time i checked, even in the world of biology, if you have the same parent, you are related to that person. and the truth is, we got the same parent. >> yes. >> we are all related. whether we are royal or not. whether we are black, or white, red, yellow, brown, gay, straight, rich, poor, no matter the nationality, no matter the religion, we all come from the same god. if that's true, then we are brothers and sisters. we're meant to be our sisters' keeper and our brothers' keeper. we would have a very different

world if we all lived like that. >> i mean, it's powerful words. you can be sure that st. george's chapel has never rung with the passion of an address such as yours. i wonder whether you looked across -- did you see the queen, the duke, the royals sitting right in your line of sight? how did it affect you? that's a heady audience there. >> yes. that's true. you know, i have to admit, i've been ordained not quite 40 years. i've realized when i married couples that no matter how large or small the congregation that's gathered, speak to them. if i speak to their souls, the souls and the hearts of that couple, you will probably find that you are speaking to the souls of all those who are gathered around. so after a while, i just became a regular parish priest and was

talking to a young couple who was getting married. because their love for each other is related to the same love that god wants for the whole world. >> well, bishop curry, thank you. you rocked the royal wedding. thank you for joining us. >> thank you very much. >> bishop michael curry with the message for these times. that's it for our program tonight. thank you for watching amanpour on pbs. join us again tomorrow night.

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