Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Now, Fred Kaplan, Slate's War Stories columnist, with his take on the latest in the Israel-Iran war and the role of the United States. In addition to writing extensively about military conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, Fred has written several books about nuclear weapons, which, of course, are a central issue in this conflict. Books including The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War, which was published in 2020. Fred, always good to have you. Welcome back to WNYC.

Fred Kaplan: Thanks. Always good to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start on President Trump's latest statement about US involvement, that he'll decide whether to go in with Israel militarily on this within two weeks. I see you have a brand new article on Slate just posted with the headline Trump isn't engaging in strategic ambiguity on Iran. It's something-- what? Much more vague. Flesh it out for us.

Fred Kaplan: Some of his supporters have said, "Oh, this is raising strategic ambiguity to an art form," which is just nonsense. Strategic ambiguity means being somewhat ambiguous about what kind of threat that you're going to mount if something bad happens. The point of it is to keep your adversary cautious. For example, our policy toward Taiwan is like this. I think if you're either the Ayatollah of Iran, or if you're an ally, or if you're one of the Arab countries in the region. Trump's back and forths just leave you confused, just make you think there is no point paying attention to anything this guy says. You can't trust a word. If he's issuing a threat, maybe it's a bluff. If he seems to be bluffing, maybe it's a threat.

Brian Lehrer: Maybe that's the definition of strategic ambiguity.

Fred Kaplan: Hold on. Here's the thing. I made the mistake of writing a couple days ago that Trump seemed to be on the verge of an attack.

Brian Lehrer: Can I read this headline? This was your headline on Tuesday in Slate. It really looks like the US is headed for war with Iran. Something changed.

Fred Kaplan: Here's what he had done. He had sent more forces to the region. He said the residents of Tehran should evacuate immediately. This city of nine and a half million people, Brian. more people than in New York City. He said that he'd issued an ultimatum to Iran. He said that when they started negotiations on possibly getting rid of the nuclear program that they had 60 days. He goes, "Now this is day 61." He said that he was demanding unconditional surrender. Now, if you do all of that and then two days later you say, "Oh, I may attack, I may not attack. Nobody knows what [crosstalk]."

Brian Lehrer: I'll decide in two weeks.

Fred Kaplan: Basically, what you're telling people is that you, Donald Trump, are among those people who don't know what he's going to do. The two-week business. I've been reminded by several stories that this is a common trope of his. "Oh, I'm going to decide on sanctions against Russia in two weeks. I'm going to decide about tariffs in two weeks." Then he doesn't do anything. It doesn't provide any clarity. Now I read a story the other day that he changed his mind because he's worried that Iran might end up just complete chaos like Libya, or maybe that the Republican Guards would just take over, which would maybe even be more threatening than [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: To Israel and the Arab states.

Fred Kaplan: Here's the thing, Brian. These are genuine concerns, but they're the kind of concerns that you should consider in a National Security Council meeting where you have advisors who aren't afraid to give their objective, honest advice, and not after you've caused such a ruckus by issuing threats that now nobody takes seriously.

Brian Lehrer: The two-week thing, when he said it yesterday, you referred to this a minute ago. It reminded me of a recent Axios article called Trump's Timeline, Always Two Weeks. It also cites reporting by Bloomberg News. I'm going to read from this because it's interesting. It says, "Taxes on February 9th, we're going to be announcing something I would say over the next two or three weeks.

Wiretapping on March 4th, I think you're going to find some very interesting items coming to the forefront over the next two weeks. Infrastructure on April 5th, we're going to make an announcement in two weeks. Infrastructure on April 29th, we've got the plan largely completed, and we'll be filing over the next two or three weeks, maybe sooner. The Paris accord, April 29th. I'll be making a big decision on the Paris Accord over the next two weeks. Their last example, ISIS, May 21st, we're going to be having a news conference in about two weeks to let everyone know how well we're doing."

We can read that written with maybe a smirk by Axios, but this war, life and death. How do you actually hear his statement of deciding in two weeks in the context of this strategic ambiguity, even if it's bad strategic ambiguity? What could come next?

Fred Kaplan: Beats me. There is one difference between this situation and all the other ones that you cited. This one is going to stay on the front page of the newspapers and in your every half-hour news broadcast for at least another two weeks unless Iran collapses before then or something. Everybody's forgotten about a lot of those things.

Brian Lehrer: The point of that, by the way, I said it was a recent article, that was from his first term. That was from 2017 when he was giving all those two-week timelines. That's how long he's been doing this. I'm sorry, go ahead and finish that thought.

Fred Kaplan: He can't just wriggle out of the corner on this one. He's going to have to do one thing or the other. I will say this. I think it's genuinely the case that Trump does not want to get into wars. I think he also thinks so, that by standing up and acting tough and making big threats that people will cower. They've learned that they don't have to because he doesn't follow through.

The other thing that's worth pointing out, Brian, is that we're in this situation for two reasons. One, Donald Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal, which Barack Obama and five other leaders signed with Iraq a 150-page document that was as airtight on verification provisions as any arms control treaty that has ever been signed, and that Iran was obeying up to the moment that Trump pulled out of it. There would be no fledgling or advancing nuclear program of that accorded stayed in place.

Brian Lehrer: Let me jump in on that because others have said that the old Obama Iran arms deal temporarily delayed any plan they might have had to develop nuclear weapons. Yes, but it did nothing to discourage Iran from using the money it got from lifting the sanctions to wage conventional warfare in the region. More aggressively, its proxies like Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis to expand its power over not just Israel, but also the Arab Gulf states and Syria. Do you disagree with that at all? At very least, it's not all on Trump's withdrawal from that accord.

Fred Kaplan: Yes, I do disagree because most of those sanctions are still in place. To aid Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, that doesn't cost billions of dollars. This is pretty cheap stuff as far as these things go. Iran would have been able to do that one way or the other. It is true that in the early stages of the negotiations back in 2015, Obama and the other Westerners did try to include bans on ballistic missiles, bans on funding terrorist groups, a complete ban on enrichment, which we'll get into in a couple minutes if you'd like to.

They decided that in the end, whether or not Iran had ballistic missiles or was aiding terrorist groups, it was better to keep them without a nuclear bomb than to have all that and a nuclear bomb. They decided purposely, deliberately, and explicitly they weren't trying to hide anything to make this a narrowly focused agreement, because A, that was the only one they could really get, and B, it was better than having no agreement at all.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, any questions or comments about the Israel-Iran war and the US role for Fred Kaplan, columnist for Slate? His column is called War Stories. His latest article, Trump's vagueness on Iran is not strategic. 212-433-WNYC 212-433-9692. Call or text. What's your take on Israel's motive for starting this bombing campaign aimed at Iran's nuclear capability? Did Israel conclude that Iran was suddenly or recently moving more quickly than before toward a bomb?

Fred Kaplan: There's a very interesting article in the latest Economist. Now, it's based mainly on Israeli intelligence sources, but it says that they had detected a covert- [silence]

Brian Lehrer: Did we lose you?

Fred Kaplan: -to craft it into a weapon.

Brian Lehrer: You broke up there for a second.

Fred Kaplan: Oh, sorry.

Brian Lehrer: Just go back one sentence. [crosstalk]

Fred Kaplan: There's an article from the latest Economist. Can you hear me now? Sorry.

Brian Lehrer: Yes.

Fred Kaplan: An article in the latest Economist based on Israeli intelligence sources claiming that Iran had been covertly testing a program to weaponize some of the uranium and that they'd done some cold testing, in other words, not with real uranium but with something like it, and that they'd been successful. Now, I don't know if this is true. I remember talking with someone well informed about this a few months ago, who said that they tried something, but it was unclear whether it was successful.

Now, this is concerning because their uranium enrichment had reached the point within a few weeks, if they wanted to, they could have enough highly enriched uranium to have the ingredients for a bomb. I think some other things are in play here, too, because you can look at videotape going back 20 years of Netanyahu saying over and over that Iran was on the verge of building a bomb. I don't think that's really Netanyahu's main concern.

I think if Trump had come up with an accord and that Iran had agreed, "We won't have any uranium enrichment," I think Netanyahu would be opposed to it anyway, because what he fears isn't an Iranian bomb, which really the Iran nuclear deal put the kibosh on quite solidly. He is concerned that the sanctions will be lifted and that Iran will be welcomed into the international community, become a wealthy power, and that that would be the big threat.

I think this is actually a point about which people could have a reasonable and interesting debate, but he shrouded it in hysterical and highly misleading, often distorted talk about the nuclear threat. He's now boxed himself into a trap because let's say that Iran really is moving toward capability to weaponize uranium. A lot of people don't believe him because he's cried wolf so many times in the past.

Brian Lehrer: Also many people, including many Israelis, believe Prime Minister Netanyahu, who keeps ramping up the war in Gaza despite the hostages who are still there, who could theoretically come home in a ceasefire, and despite having largely at least defanged Hamas because more war keeps him in power and oh, by the way, out of prison. Is there any widespread belief that this is another case of more war is political self-preservation?

Fred Kaplan: Possibly. I think it is also the case. The preparation for this, and I don't necessarily say it was conscious preparation, but look at what's happened in the last six months. Israel has pretty much destroyed Hezbollah as a serious threat to Israel. A year ago, they were a much greater threat potentially, than Hamas. Has decimated the ranks of Hamas. Syria basically is no longer an enemy to Israel. I think a lot of Israelis give Netanyahu some credit for all of these things, and the consequences are not denied.

I think another reason why he's going after Iran now is that he can, without having to worry about Iran using one of its nearby proxy militias to send a lot of missiles to Israel, because they don't exist anymore. Also because, remember last year, in retaliation to an Iranian attack, Israel pretty much knocked out all of the air defense weapons situated around Iran's nuclear facilities and other military infrastructure.

They have not yet reconstructed those defenses, although they might be on the verge of doing so. This is a way that he could do this pretty easily without having to worry about planes getting shot down and so forth. Whatever is going on with Iran's nuclear program, from Netanyahu's point of view, as someone who just wants to get rid of the Iranian regime and has wanted to do so for a long time, this is a moment when he thinks he could actually have a chance of doing it.

Brian Lehrer: Foreign Affairs magazine today has an article skeptical of Israel and one skeptical of Iran in this conflict. The Iran one says they have overplayed their hand since the lifting of sanctions under Obama, with all these proxies who Israel has shown the ability to really weaken since October 7th. The article on Israel says they actually don't have the military capacity to destroy Iran's nuclear programme with airstrikes. I'm curious your reaction to either.

Fred Kaplan: I think both are true. As for Israel's capacity, they've done some serious damage to Natanz, which is one of the major uranium enrichment sites, which is partly underground. I think they haven't done anything to a much larger one called Fordo, which is literally buried inside a mountain. Some international inspectors who, when the Iran nuclear deal was still in effect, have actually inspected the place, say that it's half a mile down inside this mountain.

Israel has no weapons that can take that out or even do serious damage to it. The United States has an enormous bunker buster weapon called the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, which is a 30,000-pound bomb. The kinds of bombs that Israel has used to wipe out whole neighborhoods in Hamas, those are 2,000-pound bombs. This is a 30,000-pound bomb, and it's an earth penetrator. Tests have shown that it probably can not completely destroy, at least do really, really serious damage. It's such a heavy weapon. It can only be carried by an American B-2 bomber. If Israel really is going to destroy Iran's nuclear program or even come close to it, they do-

Brian Lehrer: Then they need Trump to take part.

Fred Kaplan: -need the States to take part.

Brian Lehrer: If you're just joining us, my guest is Slate's War Stories columnist Fred Kaplan, also author of books including several about nuclear weapons called The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War, the most recent in that category, which was published in 2020. Mike in Manhattan, you're on WNYC with Fred Kaplan. Hi, Mike.

Mike: Hi. I think Fred is exactly right to look at it first from Netanyahu's point of view, then Trump. From Netanyahu's point of view, if there was ever a time that you were going to try and regime change in Iran, right now is the time because, as Fred said, Hamas is decimated, Hezbollah is decimated, Syria is now in completely different hands. He doesn't have to worry about a war on multiple fronts.

If I was Israel, I'd also be thinking Iran has tested Israel's Iron Dome in a way that they've never really had before. A couple of their ballistic missiles actually got through and caused some significant damage. Israel might also be thinking, aside from the nukes, if Iran has a chance to stockpile thousands of ballistic missiles, they can overwhelm the Iron Dome at some point. The Iron Dome is non impenetrable. If you're Israel and you're going to do this, now is the time.

Then from Trump's point of view, on one hand, he wouldn't mind. Trump wants to win the Peace Prize. That's his big thing. He wants to win a Nobel Peace Prize. If he can be the president that brings peace to the Middle East, then he'd be the greatest guy in the world in his mind. That's all been thrown upside down because of October 7th and everything that's happened since then. Now Israel is saying, "We need your bunker bomb." If Trump gives it to them, then the Tucker Carlson wing is going to say, "You're getting us involved in a war." If he doesn't support Israel, obviously, he's going to have huge problems.

Trump is in a rock and a hard place. I heard a report on the BBC yesterday. I don't know if Fred knows if this is true, that some Israeli was claiming that Israel has other ways of getting to that deep bunker without a bunker bomb. In other words, they've got guys on the ground in Iran. Now, I don't know if there's any validity to that, but Trump is basically, I think, saying, "There's a no-win situation for me. I'm going to give Israel two weeks."

If Israel inflicts so much damage on Iran that the Iranians finally say, "Enough, we give," and they cry uncle, then Trump can step in and say, "Oh, see, it all worked out." Otherwise, he's in a no-win situation. All he cares about is being the Nobel Peace Prize winner. He's pissed off at Netanyahu that Netanyahu has thrown all this into disrepair for him. That's my [inaudible 00:20:23], thank you.

Brian Lehrer: All right, thank you very much. A lot of political analysis from that caller who told our screener he is currently walking in Central Park. Fred, a quick take on any of that?

Fred Kaplan: As for the story, I did see that story that Israel has other ways. I don't know what it's referring to. Maybe cyber attacks, although that only has a short-term effect. It can be fixed. I don't know. Commandos on the ground who blow up the mountain with dynamite. I don't know.

Let's face it. Israel can be awfully creative about this. If you had told me a year ago that Israel had a plan to build a factory which makes cell phones and they figured out a way to get all of these cell phones in the hands of thousands of Hezbollah agents and that they were planting a third of an ounce of dynamite in each of these phones which can be activated with a remote control device, I would have said, "This sounds like a very good movie but quite implausible," and yet they did that. I don't know. Maybe they do have something, but I think it'll be equally surprising if something like that does occur.

Brian Lehrer: Listener texts, "Netanyahu attacked Iran to change the subject of international attention from his massacres in Gaza." I don't know if you think that's literally true. You could tell us.

Fred Kaplan: I think there's plenty of attention to the massacres in Gaza. I don't think much can distract attention from that, especially since-- look, unavoidably, whenever you start dropping bombs, even if you're just aiming at military targets, a lot of them are in cities and you're going to end up killing people. Iran has missiles, and they fire back. Some Israelis have been killed too, and in fact [unintelligible 00:22:20]

Brian Lehrer: Civilians. Let me ask you something about the sensitive topic of civilian casualties because I'm hearing something from Iran that seems to echo something we've heard a lot this year from Israel. Iran is attacking Israeli civilian targets. I don't think that's in determination dispute, but they claimed when they hit a hospital yesterday, for example, that they were aiming for a military target nearby.

Now Israel makes similar claims about Hamas targets or self-defense all the time after the recent killings at food distribution sites in Gaza, for example. Everyone lies on all sides of these conflicts. I know. Do you have credible reporting that these claims are true or false from either Israel or Iran?

Fred Kaplan: I have not read anything that reports Israel denying that there was a military target near the hospital, so it's plausible. If that is true, just think about that. It means that if Iran really retaliates in great force, then it shows that their missiles aren't terribly accurate, and they could do a lot of that. Everybody who starts a war thinks it's going to be brief. I remember when the United States invaded Iraq, they pushed up the date to March so that the war would be over before [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: The heat of summer. Yes, I remember that.

Fred Kaplan: We ended up staying there for nine years. This isn't a war like that because, at least so far, there's no troops on the ground, but these things can go on for a while and people get killed. If the Ayatollah thinks he's really going down, who's to say that he might not decide to take a whole lot of other countries with him? I don't know. Anytime you start doing this, you're literally playing with fire, and there are a lot of risks.

Brian Lehrer: Here's a caller who remembers a history of US foisted regime change that goes back a lot further than Iraq in 2003 and is even more relevant. Bill in Lake Placid, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Bill: Hi. I can't believe that we're doing the same exact thing that we screwed up once before. In 1953, the CIA and MI6 deposed the government of Mohammad Mosaddegh and installed the Shah. The Shah, of course, led directly to the mullahs because he was so dictatorial. We've got the mullahs because we deposed Mohammad Mosaddegh. Now, how many times do we have to screw up the same thing again? Regime change in Iran doesn't work.

We did a regime change in Iraq, which turned out to be a huge disaster, and we had to have troops on the ground, which we're not going to have in a country with 85 million people. How is this ever going to possibly work? We did it once before, and it was a total disaster, so what could possibly go wrong?

Brian Lehrer: Bill, I'm going to leave it there for time. Fred, I'm going to move on to the next caller on the presumption that you agree with everything that he said, but if not, you can say anything you want.

Fred Kaplan: The ghost of Mosaddegh still roams in the minds of many Iranians, which means that although the current regime is very unpopular, whereas Mosaddegh was quite popular, most Iranians, even the western-leaning ones, don't like the idea of foreign intervention to topple their governments either.

Brian Lehrer: I'm a little jealous of Bill calling from Lake Placid, which is a very good place to be when it's going to be 100 degrees in a couple of days. Derek in Jersey City, you're on WNYC. Hi, Derek.

Derek: Hi, Brian. Hi, Fred. Fred and Brian, I'm both fans of your work. My question right now is, what are the Democrats [inaudible 00:26:40] We have this pathetic so-called resistance in Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer. The last I heard from them was Chuck Schumer a couple weeks ago, trying to go to Trump with this hilarious video where he says, "TACO Trump is backing down against Iran." Where is anti-war [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: TACO, for people who don't know the reference, is this thing that some critics are using as an acronym, TACO for Trump Always Chickens Out. Usually it's applied to his tariffs policy. You're saying Schumer used it even with respect to Iran, which really would be warmongering if he did that.

Derek: Yes. I actually had to look up what it meant because their communication is so poor, they won't even explain what their stupid acronyms mean. This is a failing resistance party that cannot come up with a clear message. This would be one of the most unpopular actions the Trump administration has taken. On every other issue, they'll jump down Trump's throat, throw big press conferences on this.

I'm hearing basically radio silence other than maybe Bernie or Ilhan Omar. It's because we have a Democratic Party that is owned and captured by the government of Israel and AIPAC. Until that changes, we're going to keep getting led into these disastrous apocalyptic wars that make America more and more in peril. I think Israel is the biggest threat to American national security in the world. Thanks, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Derek, thank you for your call. Fred, I don't know if you're reporting on domestic politics enough to know if his reference to Schumer using that TACO acronym with respect to military strikes against Iran is accurate. I hadn't seen it myself. In addition to that and whatever you want to say about that, it does seem like getting the most press for who's against Trump throwing in militarily against Iran is the MAGA leadership. Steve Bannon, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson.

Fred Kaplan: There are some Democrats who are at least filing motions to have this voted on by Congress under the War Powers Act, which is something that Congress was very enthusiastic about when they passed it 50 years ago, but they haven't invoked very much since, and there's a reason for this. It speaks somewhat to what the caller was saying, and that is that Congress really doesn't want to take a stand on this kind of stuff because it's risky. What if things go south?

Look, if the Iranian regime folded overnight, I think most people would be pleased by this here, in the Arab world, even in Iran. They don't want to speak out against this attack yet because what if it works? Then we'll want to be on the side of it. Some criticism has started now that it looks like this is going to take a lot longer, and it's causing more civilian damage and damage to Israel, even among European allies. For the first few days of the attack, they were eerily silent about the whole thing. Now they're saying, "Oh, we really have to push for de-escalation." They're meeting with Iranian delegates in Geneva. Everybody is a little bit opportunistic and even a little cynical about this.

Brian Lehrer: We just looked up what that Trump TACO reference came from, and I'm going to read from a New Republic article, and that's going to be the last word as we're out of time. It says, "Neither House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries nor Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has done much to tear Trump's flirtations with war down. In fact, Schumer made a video posted before Israel's attacks criticizing "TACO Trump" for engaging in negotiations with Iran. He also refused to sponsor a bill that Senator Bernie Sanders introduced this week, barring funding for military force against Iran."

Then next paragraph says, "With Trump seemingly on the cusp of bringing the US Military into the conflict, Schumer did just last night--" this may be a few days ago, sign on to a letter telling Trump that, "We will not rubber stamp military intervention that puts the United States at risk and stating that Congress needs, "a clear, detailed plan outlining the goals, risks, cost, and timeline for any proposed mission." That all leaves me confused about Schumer's position. In a way, he's playing both sides of it.

Fred Kaplan: Remember, Schumer was opposed to Obama's.

Brian Lehrer: To the Iran deal. That's right.

Fred Kaplan: Going along with Netanyahu. At the same time, it is true. If the United States gets involved in this war, I think America has a lot of military bases and a lot of citizens throughout the Middle East, and they will be in danger. They will be vulnerable to a retaliatory attack if that happens.

Brian Lehrer: Fred Kaplan writes the War Stories column for Slate and is author of books, including some about nuclear weapons like The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War, and others. Fred, thank you for coming on.

Fred Kaplan: Sure. Anytime.

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