BREAKING: IRAN TALKS ADVANCE, UAE’S SECRET AIRSTRIKES REVEALED – w/ Michael Rubin

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:04]Hi, Michael. How are you? I'm glad you can join us.

[00:00:07]>> Great. Great. You know, you spent years warning about these risks of negotiating with the the Islamic Republic of Iran and that uh in in other regimes similar to them that use using diplomacy as a pressure valve um rather than maybe a path toward genuine compromise has its own risk. You've lived in Iran. You've worked inside the Pentagon and studied the Islamic Republic for decades and you've been one of those more consistent uh skeptics of any engagement with Iran.

[00:00:36]Where we sit now, right, we have thisou framework. We came out of a war. We've been in, you know, 40 plus day ceasefire.

[00:00:44]We're getting very completely different descriptions of what appears to be perhaps the same deal or, you know, each side has their own deal. They're they they also seem to be speaking up. Trump says the framework is largely negotiated. Iran says it's not even close to finalized. You know, Trump says hormones must open without tolls. Iran then gets clever and talks about environmental fees and, you know, this cooperative agreement with Oman. So, we're kind of sitting here in this very strange time. Uh, I want to start broadly on some of this with you. Are we watching the beginning of this more real regional settlement or are we watching more competing narratives being built around a framework that may not actually exist?

[00:01:27]>> Honestly, Azie, I think it's the latter.

[00:01:30]This really is a bizarre negotiation situation because not only does Donald Trump not necessarily commit to what some of what may have been laid out, but we really don't know who is in charge in Iran who is committing. You know, just on May 28th, NORC News, which is close to the Supreme National Security Council, published a really interesting article complaining about how difficult and how much paralysis there was given that it can take days or weeks to get responses from uh the presumptive supreme leader Mushtapa Kamei because he remains in security isolation, they say.

[00:02:13]and how so many other basic decisions are being devolved to working groups which then don't have a name and a face and an account individual accountability assigned to them. And so we've get a situation where both sides are trying to talk about a memorandum of understanding, but at the same time both sides are reserving the right to simply demand more from each other and treat this memorandum of understanding as ephemeral even in the 60 days in which it's supposed to be in effect.

[00:02:51]You know, before we get into whether or not this is even good or bad, you know, I'm not sure like we, you know, we just you just laid it out as well. We know what we're really dealing with. Trump recently stated Iran must agree that they will never have a nuclear weapon or a bomb. Uh but then, you know, coming from Beijing, he said, "I don't really care about the nuclear material."

[00:03:12]Essentially saying it's just psychological or public relations. I've spoken to many about this. He also said that the hormone rate must be opened immediately. As I said when I opened um and he suggested that the enriched uranium would be ultimately resolved under this international supervision.

[00:03:28]But almost immediately we started hearing all these different versions of it. And this is where what you just said is really interesting. And I want to dive a little bit deeper into that. You know, you focused a lot on Iran.

[00:03:40]We're starting to see differences in how it's being presented within Iran's side media. Tasnim, Farce, Raja, I mean, you name it. Every single one of them seems to come out with a very different description of what is happening right now. Tashnim says the memorandum is not finished. Ali Hasham, you know, also he's with Al Jazzer, but he reports that Trump's announcement regarding the lifting the blockades was actually one of Thran's conditions before moving into more of these sensitive discussions. But then you had Fars News come out and call Trump's description of everything a mixed uh I think they said a mixed truth, a mix of truth and lies. And then we had Fars News already then come out and say there's no clause requiring Iran to open hormoons without compensation or administrative arrangements. So it just seems like even from the Iran side, their media outlets, you know, whether they're the state, you know, IB or or one of, you know, Tasim Force, et very very different things. And and even within the administration itself, you have Ismi who's saying one thing, you have Adeli saying another thing, Bali comes out. How do you see that uh playing into this? Do you think perhaps there's an intentionality behind the confusion? Maybe because of the domestic political environment inside of Iran. Uh maybe perhaps Trump knows that that exists. So they're all playing this, you know, chaos of words for the public.

[00:05:05]>> Well, you know, Azie, I really couldn't say it better than you just said it. And you've raised all my concerns. Look, let's put Donald Trump aside for a second. The problem with Donald Trump is when you talk about red lines, but the person who's talking about red lines is colorblind, then ultimately you have a problem. But with that quip aside, look, in the traditional dynamics which we've had in Iran with regard to the principalists or as often called in in Washington, the hardliners and the reformers, I've always been on the outside of analytical consensus because I haven't seen the reformers as sincere as others in Washington do. And instead, I saw us getting into a game of good cop, bad cop. um and the Iranians being very strategic and tactful in how they um try to exploit this dynamic. What's going on now, as you said, I think is something a little bit different.

[00:06:04]There's at least three or four different factions within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. I mean, you have Kalabaf, you have um Va Vahidi, you have um Jalali, uh and so forth. And then on top of that you have some of the civilian leadership um which um Iraqi and so forth um who are making statements here and there. What I worry about is a dynamic inside Iran where on one hand it can be empowering to talk to United States because then you get into a dynamic where you can uh flex your muscles, you can perhaps get concessions and so forth, but it becomes an incentive for all the competing factions inside Thran to then oppose the person who has been making these agreements.

[00:06:56]And we've seen some of this with regard to earlier rounds in in Pakistan where Vahidi uh remained back in Thran and then we saw people questioning whether Kalaboth was being treasonous by giving certain things away and it can be when you when you have a dynamic like that it can be truly truly messy. And this is where, look, I'm not against diplomacy uh all the time, but all I've always argued and it was the subject of of my book about 10 years ago is just like economic sanctions have a cost and military action has a cost. All I argue is that diplomacy isn't costfree and that sometimes you need to go into it being cognizant of the dynamics. You've got to go into it saying first do no harm. And you've got to understand whether or not timing uh how you're going to play the timing of these because if you rush diplomacy at a time when the faction uh factional debate hasn't settled down inside the Islamic Republic, you could actually make things a lot more difficult for yourself.

[00:08:08]>> Yeah. I I was just actually looking up a a a report. I wanted to read something to you real quick before I get to another question here. You know, there some some analyzing this. Look at this.

[00:08:20]I I'll read this to you. US has reached a deadlock in an attempt to avoid an endless war trap with Iran. And again, mind you, this came out also. You know, Trump just was in the situation room. He just came out of it just before we got on this live. Um it was a nearly 2hour uh situation room meeting and he came out saying he hasn't made a final decision. You know, he he still wants to think about it longer. So, you know, it looks like um we're no better off than we were before the war even started. Tan is of course refusing to yield on some of the issues. The terms of the new agreement remain vague with two sides far apart on key issues like Iran's nuclear program. You know, it appears Trump desperately needs short-term concessions to justify launching the war, um etc. And, you know, perhaps even an off-ramp. And then we have um of course Scott Besson came out earlier and said that he was sanctioning that um Persian Gulf Waterway Authority that came out and um they responded as well condemning this action considering being sanctioned by a country whose leader is proud of piracy as a sign of its positive performance. You will not achieve control over the state of Hormuz if you did not achieve it in the field or in diplomacy.

[00:09:34]when you hear this stuff, you know, Trump again coming out of the situation.

[00:09:38]I think this is the third time or second time this week he's been in the situation room and then on top of this, you have senior officials uh reportedly saying the White House believes the deal is close again, as we said earlier. They just said it again, but disagreements remain and it now they're adding another layer, the frozen assets. You know, you've been vocal about some of this in the past, including with the JCPOA. How do you feel about what's going on right now um specifically with this potential um unfreezing of these assets as as as part of thisou? Well, you know, my own plan for those assets, first of all, just to trace where the assets come from that they're talking about. During the Biden administration, when the Biden administration was taking a more um affusive approach to Iran, making the argument that unfreezing assets would um lead Iran to precipitate with better behavior. uh the Biden administration encouraged and agreed to the unfreezing of assets that were mostly held in South Korea. Those assets were transferred to a bank in Qatar where they've remained ever since. So the bulk of the assets which the Iranians are actually now talking about at least according to TSN which of course as you know is closer to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are is the money that's parked in cutter. Now, if I had my way, what I've always argued is that money should have been taken to help rebuild southern Lebanon as so-called um reparations. And in a way, you would dispense with having that money sitting there for the Iranians to bargain over.

[00:11:15]And other way, you would actually have Joseph Aun, the president of Lebanon, be able to contribute something to southern Lebanon outside the strangle hold of Hezbollah. But okay, that hasn't been done. Let me also give you one anecdote before going into the heart of your question with regard to the assets. A college classmate of mine worked for a major New York insurance firm and you know ransomware and so sometimes companies would come they would be infected with a virus and on one hand the ransom might be I'm arbitrarily saying $5 million but to rebuild their system would be $50 million. So they would want to pay out the $5 million and they'd go to this insurance company to do it. But the problem is if you don't know exactly where that money is going, if it could be criminals in North Korea for example, then you could find yourself a foul of US Treasury Department, Office of Foreign Asset Control, OFAC sanctions. And so sometimes she was in a hard place of having to explain to these companies that, you know, you have to pay out the $50 million um dollars to rebuild your um your systems because it could be very very dangerous to wire money to a recipient whom you don't know who that is. Now, we can talk about the Persian Gulf uh waterway authority or whatever it's called, but are these tolls being paid in cryptocurrency? How are they actually being paid? Do you know how they're um is there an accounting for how they're going to be paid? And if the answer to that is you don't know, then that can be very very dangerous. Suppose that the people in charge >> Well, actually, Michael, on that real quick, I'm glad you brought up the crypto. Just two seconds. I want to read something. This was during the the Reagan National uh you know, the Reagan Foundation has a a national economic forum. Scott Besson was actually at this forum and I I want to read this. He says, "We have seized about 1 billion of Iran's crypto. Just outright grabbed the wallets. Some of them may be typing in right now and might not realize their wallet has been grabbed. This is money that's stolen from the Iranian people."

[00:13:27]>> Okay. Actually, I'm glad you actually brought that up, Azie, because one of my other projects that um I I wish we could insert more into the debate. And this is something, look, I understand the Iraq war is controversial, but what really struck me about the Iraq war, both before when I was an advocate for it and then I went when I went to Iraq, was just how sharp the division was between on one day Iraq was our adversary. on the other day they were our ally and yet because of sanctions we had a difficulty rebuilding the Iraqi economy in a way where the Iraqis um even though the Iraqi economy today is booming it still has um major issues and there's an old Iraqi joke about how could you tell an honest Iraqi general the answer was he was the one driving the taxi cab because the implication was he didn't embezzle enough at any When it comes to Iran, why is it that we don't have a sovereign wealth fund for Iran? Donald Trump and others talk about stopping Iran's oil or seizing Iran's oil. And you just talked about Treasury Secretary Scott Bass taking a billion dollars. Well, wouldn't it be good to put that billion dollars into a sovereign wealth fund? Perhaps have a trusted outside source, the Japanese, the Germans. It doesn't have to be American. Manage it so when the day of regime change comes, the Iranians can actually have the funds in their pocket to rebuild. And again, one of my criticisms not just of the Trump administration, but of the Biden administration and the Obama administration as well is that we don't think enough about the day after. But going back to your I mean going back to your question, there's so much more to talk about with regard to the straight authority. Um, how do you want to break this down, Azie?

[00:15:23]>> No, no, no. Go ahead. Because it's going to go right into the next part. I wanted to ask you some questions on the hormones because you, you know, you you've made some compelling arguments about this. So, um, however way you want to take it, M.

[00:15:35]>> Okay. I mean, look, the biggest problem, you know, my gut reaction, Azie, is when it comes to the straight of Hormuz and this initial demand, it was just one of those bizarre demands. Excuse my language, throwing stuff at the wall.

[00:15:49]Actually, I'll self censor throwing stuff in the wall and see what sticks.

[00:15:53]And I think we probably surprised the Iranians that somehow this stuck and that this has become a subject for negotiations because the law with regard to international waters is pretty darn clear. And the precedent which this would set is so dangerous that the notion of scrapping I mean decades centuries of international maritime law common law is is just bizarre to me. Now some people can say hey the United States doesn't actually uh has never signed has never ratified the UN convention for law of the sea but we abide by it even though we haven't even though we haven't ratified it. So what you're actually saying is that the stra um Taiwan straight, China or Taiwan for that matter can can um charge tolls or that we can have tolls in the straight of Malaa or that we can have um tolls going around the that the Yemenes and the Jibushians can charge tolls at the Baba Manda. I mean, unfortunately, I'm not sure whether Donald Trump fully understands that what's happening in the straight of Hormuz has ramifications far outside the straight of Hormuz. And separately Azie and I go to the horn of Africa often so I don't think this gets enough attention but just with regard to these ramifications of what's going on as so much sea trade has been diverted away and so much has gone down south to be channeled around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. We need to be paying attention to the fact that after more than a decade, piracy is back off the coast of Somalia because there's so much temptation as so much shipping now channels off the coast of Somalia. I mean, and so the ramifications in the second order effects are huge. One last thing. I was in Ethiopia for a conference about three weeks ago and when I was talk they didn't talk about it so much at the conference but when I was talking um to friends of friends in Addis Ababa and so forth there's a real concern in Ethiopia which of course is a landlocked country that with diesel drying up that there could actually be a food crisis a famine in Addis Ababa because they don't have the fuel to bring food from the countryside and from the farms into the capital itself. So again, the ramifications of all these issues are something a it represents an intelligence failure on the part of the US or andor strategic um negligence on the part of Donald Trump.

[00:18:31]>> Yeah. Speaking of uh the strait and the blockade, I want to read something that came out just about 20 minutes ago or so. Again, I think it was at that same um forum. Secretary Bessant said um any easing of Iran blockade will happen very slowly you know so there seems to be some agreement to ease the blockade um but it's going to be slowly you and I want to go to something you said um you argued because the regime now seeks to utilize its leverage over shipping to force these concessions you know essentially Iran will also be able to pull out the hornless card for any future demands it has unless Trump really extracts a price that the regime cannot bear. What do you mean by that?

[00:19:14]>> Well, I mean ultimately Yeah. I mean basically what you said is what I believe and ultimately the issue is >> but what is that price that you're looking at right now? Yeah.

[00:19:24]>> No, no. I mean ultimately um what needs to happen is to shut down completely this notion that Iran can um can interfere with international shipping.

[00:19:36]When you have a hornets nest, you have two good options. One is to leave it alone. The other is to get rid of it.

[00:19:42]But the worst possible option is to come down in the middle, sitting under that hornets's nest, lightly tapping it with a stick. And too often it seems that that tends to be the policy approach which the Americans take. Now, ultimately in the situation like this, if Iran can force concessions, if they can interfere with shipping, if they can get the international community to panic, then whenever they need something, and they're going to need things, this again is something that they're going to drag out. Remember, Iran sets its fiscal year to begin on March 22nd, right after Nus. And to make their budget, they need to guess what the price of oil is going to be and how much oil they can sell over the next year. If the price of oil declines and their income declines, then they can't make payroll. If the price of oil is above what they expected and they've sold all their oil, then they have other money uh which they can spread around to proxy groups or whatever they want. Now, the problem with Iran right now is it hasn't been able to sell a lot of its oil and a lot of its oil wells are getting to the danger point where because there's not adequate storage capacity at sea or on land, they might need to shut down, which can kill an oil well, especially one where the average age is 90 years old. Because remember when was oil? Um the Darcy concession in Iran was 1901. Oil was struck I think at Masjidi Solomon back in 1908 and then you had the production of the Anglo Persian oil company today BP starting in 1909. So you have very old oil fields.

[00:21:35]Iran is going to be in a situation now where they're hemorrhaging cash because they can't sell oil and if this agreement comes to play the price of oil is going to decline.

[00:21:48]And so how are they going to make payroll? And I'm reminded historically of Serbia back in 1999. You remember Azie that Bill Clinton launched a bombing campaign to compel Sloban Mallovich not to commit war crimes in Kosovo.

[00:22:03]>> In the end, Kosovo became independent.

[00:22:07]But Slobon Mallovich remained in power after the bombing ended. It was the next year where when he was unable to pay salaries, when many of his supporters had been killed or dispersed that the people rose up and overthrew him and so Iran may worry about this situation unless they can get cash quick and what better way to do that than straight up from extortion.

[00:22:30]>> Well, let me ask you about this though.

[00:22:33]I've I've been in a lot of conversations around, you know, what we've done, we the US, what we've done in other scenarios. You know, you just brought up um one from Clinton's era.

[00:22:47]>> Some say, you know, even going into this, Trump was looking at the Venezuela model. We've heard Syria floated around.

[00:22:53]We've heard Iraq floated around. We've heard all these different scenarios floated around. And I hear your argument in terms of, you know, economically suffocating them so they can't even pay their IRGC forces or their, you know, NISM, uh, their their national military or, you know, whomever else. But it just seems like every step of the way when we try to use even a semblance of a strategy from other some other point in time in history, it doesn't seem to impact them the way that we're expecting it to impact. our logic mind thinks okay you know Secretary Besson came out remember during even I think it was even during the war he was talking about it at one of the um congressional hearings that even in December they had intentionally tried to suffocate them to get people to rise that they you know Bessant was saying that they're they're essentially one of the causes um for the the merchants the Bazaris to come out in December and start protesting and so when you think about this do you really see that it's working in a situation that we have right now with this regime in Iran.

[00:23:59]>> Well, Azie, I think that your analysis is right on, but I'm going to push back on one issue. I'm not saying that we should be taking the model of Serbia.

[00:24:08]I'm simply saying that's where we are right now. And >> Oh, right, right, right. I'm not saying you're taking Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:24:14]>> No, no. And and so I agree with you. And one of the problem look, this is why I'm a historian by training rather than a political scientist. As a historian, I get paid to predict the past. And I'm sure most of my critics say I only get that right about half the time. But I don't believe in a one-sizefits-all model. So, I agree with you. I also agree that one of the problems we have in Washington, actually two problems.

[00:24:37]One is we don't know how to deal with zombie regimes. And long after regimes, let's say North Korea, has lost its legitimacy, it still manages to plow along. When I was working on my one of my books about the history of um diplomacy with rogue regimes, I went and I interviewed a lot of Clinton administration people who were engaged in the 1994 agreed framework. I talked to people in the eighth army um stationed in South Korea who were in command positions back in 1994. And what they said is one of the reasons why the Clinton administration was so generous in the agreed framework is they didn't believe that North Korea would exist in 10 years. And yet they do. And the same danger now comes with Iran because the Iranians back in January have shown themselves willing to extract far more blood than many people believe their security forces would. Now the only other issue I disagree with you is with regard to Scott Bessant and this is an American thing. Too often the United States thinks the world revolves around us and in Washington we spend our time naval gazing. But the fact of the matter is when I look at what caused the Bizardi rebellion uh or I should say strike in um in December wasn't anything the United States did. It was the collapse of the state bank inside Iran which so many Iranian officials were using as a piggy bank and then expecting uh the Iranian public to bail out.

[00:26:06]That's what crashed the currency right before the protest began.

[00:26:12]>> Yeah. Uh, of I remember that. But I think it was just I guess my point was Bessent actually came out though and and was trying to take some kind of credit in terms of what they were manipulating with the markets even the global economy to crash that so that um it would kind of kick off from the strikes into broader movements. Yeah.

[00:26:32]>> We were overly optimistic Aussie.

[00:26:34]>> Yeah. Yeah. Um, I want to move a little bit and you know, even picking from your historian background, I'm actually really excited about this part of this, Michael.

[00:26:45]>> And we started out, we we kind of talked about it in the beginning, but I want to talk about who actually runs Iran right now. You know, that's a big question on a lot of people's minds, whether Moaba is alive or in a coma or not. Um and and I do have a a question about that too in a second but you know comes out he was present he was in Pakistan and then we didn't hear from him and allegedly there were all these rumors around that he was sidelined or he was forced to stay home or he was even you know under house arrest. I didn't see anything around that but but uh you know we we hear all of this and then we have Pzion on this side saying something. we have Adolf Chi on the other side. Um, you know, I personally think Vahidi is really the one behind the scenes calling the shots on everything. Yeah. Uh, you know, and so we we see all this and then the New York Times article that came out, you know, with um Ronin Burkeman and Faras Fasi and that, you know, a whole team of contributors talking about how, you know, Ahmed Nhad was was the guy that American Israel wanted to actually, you know, kind of install as a transition leader or somebody. um when we think about who's really in charge inside of Iran um in your in your knowledge of history of the way that the last 47 years have gone or even before that even but right now seeing what we're seeing kind of play out um I'm glad we both kind of are on the same page with with Vahidi but where do you where else do you see the the players um do you think Jali's camp the hardliners are involved in anything? Uh, do you think it's more the progressives?

[00:28:30]I know you mentioned the reformists earlier. What does it look like inside of Iran? Who's really running Iran?

[00:28:35]>> Okay. Well, first of all, Azie, when we talk about progressives, hardliners, reformers, moderates, um I just want to say that the way I've always looked at Iran, and this goes to the pre-war period, is instead of having that uh spectrum between reform and hardline in terms of Islamic Republic officials, I've always found it much more analytically clarifying to have two axes. one being the uh reformist to principalist axis and the other being the economic philosophy whether you're an economic liberal or pragmatist or whether you believe in the state centered command economy and then you have different quadrants and I think that for example when Robson Johnny was alive he was much more of an economic liberalizer corrupt as can be but liberalizer in theory uh which and Akmad Nad on the other hand was a command economy guy so let's put that analytical framework aside, I'm going to give you one anecdote and then I'm going to answer your question.

[00:29:36]I remember when Hafaz al-Assad died, I believe that Bashar al-Assad in Syria was constitutionally too young to take over power. And then when I would read the New York Times or the Washington Post, this is where I began. And for people who know me well, they they know about this. This is where I began my war on the passive voice because when you say the constitution was changed, well, who changed the constitution?

[00:30:07]Because that shows you who's really in power in Syria in order to allow Bashar al-Assad back in the year 2000 to come to power. So, back to Iran. Muchapa.

[00:30:20]On the day on February 28th, the day of Ali Kamei's death, the Iranian press was still referring to Muchapa as Hatal Islam. So he wasn't an Ayatollah let alone a grand Ayatollah qualified to rise to the level of supreme leader. So if we want to see who is in charge in Iran, I would follow that. I would pull that thread. Who was the one that pushed Muchaba Kamei through the assembly of experts? And likewise, >> exactly. And this is why we came to the same conclusion. And likewise, when it comes to this magic box, I call him Schroinger's Ayatollah. When it comes to this, >> say that again. What do you call them?

[00:31:09]>> Schroinger's Ayatollah. Like, we don't know whether he's alive or dead, but he's both. I always think of Weekend at Bernie, but I like that one, too.

[00:31:17]>> Oh, yeah. No, I I I had a piece entitled Weekend at Mapas, and I had a colleague do some great AI art to accompany it. At any rate, um, but I'm dating myself as a child of the 1970s and 80s on this. At any rate, um, but great movie by the way.

[00:31:34]>> At any rate, um, when it comes to who controls basically Muchapa's letterhead, when we have statements that are issued in his name, if we can trace that, whether or not Muchapa is alive, that's how we know who's in charge. But the interesting thing here, and my former colleague and student, Shay Katiri, pointed this out. It's safe to say that it's someone in the Revolutionary Guard that's in control. And we've talked about the different factions. But if we assume that the Revolutionary Guard was the one that pushed Muchapa through the assembly of experts to become supreme leader against their own desires and his religious credentials.

[00:32:17]And given that the military attack, what everyone thinks about it, has been killing revolutionary guardsmen. This means ever since February 28th, Machapa Kamei's chief supporters have become uh have increasingly been eliminated. And this raises the question, should there be any peace and stability inside Iran?

[00:32:44]While the revolutionary guard may want to continue to pro promote things in which Muchapa's name, could there actually be a clerical backlash and impeachment mechanism given much lack of clerical authority?

[00:33:00]>> So given that I want to ask you a question on this though um and I I don't know for his name escaped me. I was trying to look it up real quick. I can't believe I forgot his name. Um, but there was a chief of staff from Musha announced a few weeks ago.

[00:33:15]>> Oh, I know. I forget who that was.

[00:33:16]>> A couple weeks ago. Yeah. I I don't know why his name uh just escaped me. It'll pop up probably.

[00:33:22]>> He's more of one of those quietest. Uh he's got more connections with the economic uh echelons of the society, the the merchants. Um he's less of that hardcore historical ideological based. he seems more economic based. You know, I thought that was also really interesting that his chief of staff in a moment where nobody knows where Muchaba is, you know, um that that kind of person would be involved in this. Also considering that Ahmed B is, you know, I think we both agree on this as well, uh, that he's the one calling the shots, the IRGC seems to be more of that um, economic business control oligarchy type of mechanism structure instead of the ideological that we've traditionally seen on the other side.

[00:34:14]>> Do you see a shift? You know, I I always think of it as a pendulum. Do you see a shift happening within Iran even with all the I call it purging you know the US calls it decapitation. Um do you see this shift happen happening though inside of Iran or do you still see it the same ideological prior to February 28th? Well, I mean, first of all, Azie, I think it was actually Hillary Clinton that described the growing strength of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a slow creeping military coup deta. And to give credit where credit is due, Ali was the one who had written about this before Hillary Clinton had made these remarks. But um ultimately I and this is where I'm critical of American um administrations just on this one issue because whether it was under President Obama or under the Trump administrations or under Joe Biden, I don't think there's been a full appreciation inside the United States about the economic importance of the Revolutionary Guard.

[00:35:16]And on this, I don't see it as a pendulum. I see it as a um as basically a um how to put it the mechanism is out of alignment. And I mean, look, I'm going to indulge my inner historian and just for your audience, and this is the way I always try to explain it when I teach for US military audiences, is that the revolutionary guard really came to power ideologically back during the Iran Iraq war. And in 1988, when Humeni got up and he said, "It's like drinking from a chalice of poison, but I have no choice but to drink from this cup if I want the Islamic Republic to survive." Agreed to a ceasefire. But the revolutionary guard didn't want to give up their privilege.

[00:36:00]They didn't want to go back to the barracks. So they took their equivalent of the Army Corps of Engineers, started investing in the civilian economy. I say this as a proud Philadelphiaian. It was like 1930 Chicago or 1920 uh or 2026 Chicago in that um you had almost this mafia being created. But if you want to understand the revolutionary guard today, imagine taking Becttel, KBR, Hal Burton, merging it with Northrup, Brahman and Boeing, Exxon Mobile and Shell and Walmart. And ultimately, that's what the revolutionary guard is.

[00:36:35]They control 40% of the economy. And no matter who is in power, whether it's a revolutionary guardsman or whoever's in power as the supreme leader isn't they're not going to sacrifice their own business empire for someone else's um pleasure. Now the irony here of course is when um Ali Hamei became supreme leader on in June of 1989 he was a compromised candidate and people thought that he was powerless and that's why the Ross and Johnny's and so forth accepted him but ultimately he consolidated control um and so you've got a situation where on one hand like I said the revolutionary guard's not going to want to give this up but also you've got a situation Azie and I'm not sure we fully appreciate this where this is the first transition in 36 years and so people feel not only is this their one opportunity to win the hundred billion dollar lottery but if they lose I mean it's like the Hunger Games if they lose they could wind up dead because the purges the quiet purges are often um quite violent inside the Islamic Republic I mean Ali Khani opponents back in the 80s and early 90s didn't end up in a quiet retirement. They ended up in a quiet grave. And so this is something which we need to pay attention to. And the other issue with the revolutionary guard and I'll end up here because I don't want to um just spout off um constantly.

[00:38:12]>> Oh no, I mean I could talk for hours but I know if we have other things we can also get through but yes.

[00:38:17]>> Yeah. I mean, but very quickly, look, first of all, I've always looked a gasast at the fact that we will parse in the United States over every figure, every statistic in every election. And yet, we're so willing, whether it's China, Russia, Iran, to accept statistics from dictatorships. But let's say a few years, I mean a decade ago or so when the official budget of the revolutionary guard was $8 billion. In reality, it was much higher. But when you go to the smuggling income across the straight of Hormuz, that's another 11 billion to$1 13 billion. And I've spent time with smugglers in the straight of Hormuz. And they're good, honest of the earth, not a political bone in their body smugglers. And when I say this, they're not pro-Islamic Republic, but the they have to refuel on the Iranian side at the so-called invisible jetties. And because the revolutionary guard gets subsidized oil uh gasoline um they sell it at a 400% markup and that and the landing fees explain the 11 to$13 billion. Then when you look at for example dunyatta ectasad the Iranian equivalent of the financial times or the wall street journal and you look at the no bid single source contracts in some years that's 20 30 $40 billion for the revolutionary guard when you add it together what you find is the revolutionary guard's business empire means far more than its official budget.

[00:39:47]So if the Iranian parliament was had the power and was able to declare that the revolutionary guard were terrorists and take their official budget to zero, they'd still be able to act autonomously because of the business empire. And so tying this all up, that's why you have an economist, someone who's quiet, someone who knows where all the bank accounts are in charge.

[00:40:12]>> Yeah. You famously said, and I and I want to get this right, so I'm going to try to read off this, but you said if Trump wished to purchase the Manhattan skyscraper, he should negotiate with its owners rather than the pan handler out front. So, final thought on this one.

[00:40:27]You know, I think I I saw something come through some of the news cycles about a week or so or two ago, maybe 10 days ago, where Trump said he didn't want the signature of Moshab on any or any deal.

[00:40:40]He wanted somebody else. And you know, are you do you think that Trump learned the lesson of, you know, from his business deals purchasing those skyscrapers? He he wants the guy that actually makes the calls, not the leader.

[00:40:57]>> No, unfortunately, I don't think he learned that lesson. But what's actually interesting here, Azie, when you talk to Trump administration officials, um what they had said prior to um Operation Epic Fury, especially against the backdrop of the 12-day war in June of 2025 is Donald Trump specifically had said that he did not want to target Ali Kamei and he did not want the Israelis to target Ali Kamei because he still hoped to make a deal and he wanted Ali Kamei to sign Of course, somewhere somehow between June of 2025 and February of 2026, Trump's thinking changed. Putting that aside, the same question still exists.

[00:41:44]If you're going to make a deal, how are you going to make the deal? And again, one other historical analogy. Okay, without getting into the Arab-Israeli conflict, it's safe to say that in um I think it was July of 2000 when you had Camp David 2, Bill Clinton thought that he was going to have brokered peace between Yaser Arafat and I guess at the time it was audac. Um, and look, no president, Democrat or Republican, is going to go to a high-profile summit and put their prestige on the line unless they think that um, all they have to do is dot the eyes and cross the tees.

[00:42:22]According to Bill Clinton at the time, Yaser Arafat refused to abide by what his negotiators had said, which is why Bill Clinton, who is normally unflapable, was so angry at the subsequent press conference. Putting that aside, when Yah when Moar Gaddafi in 2003 showed signs of wanting to come in from the cold, it actually took the United States, Bill Burns was in charge of the secret diplomacy at the time, working through the British MI6 about 2 years to determine that the people who are reaching out to negotiate actually had the um buyin of Muamar Gaddafi. It seems because um at the time George W. Bush didn't want to be embarrassed at the way Bill Clinton had was politicians are politicians.

[00:43:13]What I worry about is that Donald Trump has forgotten that lesson. He wants someone to sign a deal and he's hoping that that person will actually be able to enforce it. Now, this is also something I've written about and I say this as an analyst rather than as an advocate. a more coherent strategy. If that were the case, let's say we wanted to support Kalabah.

[00:43:36]If that were the case, then any bombing campaign that we have against Iran should try to systematically eliminate the competition to Calib. But it doesn't seem that there's any coherence in that sort to our campaign.

[00:43:55]>> Yeah, I kind of wonder because Trump said at some point, you know, we're done. But then he said there's, you know, two weeks left. And he said at some point Trump said it and I think um Prime Minister Netanyahu said at some point too in terms of you know they already have their targets. And in my mind I kept thinking okay those are people not infrastructure necessarily.

[00:44:15]It could just be those individuals again the purging to get to the finish line.

[00:44:20]Michael let's assume for a moment some version of this framework survives. And I want to go beyond Iran a little bit and go, you know, deeper into the to the region. Um, we also have the front happening in Lebanon, Palestine. I'm sorry. Yes, Israel and Lebanon. I'm a peace guy. Don't worry about it.

[00:44:39]>> Well, I meant Israel and Lebanon, but there's also news coming out about Gaza as well. But let's just assume this framework survives. You know, one thing's become very um clear here is that the war itself may have looked very different than most people realized. I think we can all agree it's very unusual. Uh and for months the public conversation has really focused around Washington, Tehran, Jerusalem, you know, um and now we've got Beirut in the in the mix here. Um you know, we're learning that all these regional actors um at some point have played a much larger role behind the scenes. In fact, according to the Wall Street Journal reporting, the UAE carried out dozens of strikes against Iranian targets during the war and allegedly with the US and Israeli intelligence to support it. And part of that was also because according to the same reports, it was, you know, it was kind of like a push back because Saudi Arabia was sort of pushing back on it too, you know. Um, there were targets that included, Abu Musa, Bandar Abos, Lavan Island, you know, etc. these prochemical complexes, you know, and then we also see these reports coming out that suggest Saudi Arabia, as I said, with UAE, but was opposed to much of the campaign. However, the interesting thing is I heard there were some reports coming out that Saudi Arabia was pushing Trump harder to, you know, uh, to to go harder in this war, you know. So, when we're looking at all of this, to me, it kind of revealed something important. Not only was the anti-Iran coalition potentially broader than maybe many realize, but the Gulf itself may not have been entirely aligned, which I think is telling right now um and very very interesting. I wanted to get your thoughts on how significant is it, for example, that you know um the UAE and Saudi Arabia may have had vastly different approaches to confronting Iran and what does that even tell us about the future of Gulf politics? Well, Azie, I might push back a little bit on you because look, I I tend to um I I certainly agree.

[00:46:37]>> Go ahead. Yeah, sure. Go ahead. No, I I mean I certainly agree with the competition between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and of course I had spent part of last summer in southern Yemen with the southern forces which were subsequently um bombed and expelled and I was recently in Benghazi as well in Libya where of course there's some of the dynamic of the United Arab Emirates and um the the Saudis and or the cutteries in other spots but it seemed that the common threat which Iran posed had done more to unify the Gulf Cooperation Council than any any other event in in its history. Remember and your your listeners know that in 1981 that's when the Gulf Cooperation Council formed with the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts um in response to the Islamic Revolution. But um many I mean just because it was formed it was sort of like the Arab League or so many of these other organizations. It was dysfunctional.

[00:47:37]They would have equoperability.

[00:47:42]Um there's no political coordination or very rare political coordination. That started to change. That said, we still do see the Emirates and Saudi Arabia playing out their disputes in the future. And by the way, one thing that worries me is that let's say regime change does come to Iran. The worst thing that could happen for the Iranian people is the same thing that happened for the Sudanese people, which is the Saudis and the Emiratis play out their rivalry in a way that just treats the people on the ground as pawns and that that really would be a tragedy. And so I hope there's further pushing towards coordination. Um that said, one of our big intelligence failures was I don't think anyone expected the Iranians to strike at the Gulf Cooperation Council members the way which they did. It's one thing and I don't want to excuse it going after al- Ud air base or jabali port or uh king khaled air base or what have you where Americans might be but going after other sites in Qatar after all Qatar is done for Iran or going after Dulkum the port of Dulkum that Oman controls that really was a shock to a number of people and I really do believe it was a miscue on the part of the Iranians that said you're right these schisms do exist in the GCC. And the reason we're talking about them so much is because, and this is where I agree with you, um I would say even though the GCC isn't always on one page, it matters a lot more than it did just a year ago.

[00:49:14]>> Yeah, I see that too. I I think it was more maybe around the approach and also the concerns. I mean, you know, we also have ha hajj that just came and went, you know, we've got the holiday, you know, at and then all these other competing events happening and we've also got Turkey and on one side too being that uh there seems to be like a a power balance or a power struggle really between Saudi Arabia, Turkey, you know, Israel is trying to emerge as as another influencer in the region. You know, I think even Netanyahu said that they're trying to scale back from US support or reliance on US at some point by I think he said by the end of the year.

[00:49:56]Um, you know, one of the moving moving to how this kind of sits uh where we are right now with Iran, but looking at the Lebanon front, one of the recurring themes in the Iranian reporting, and we've seen this, uh, even during the ceasefire moments back in April, um, is that there are issues and fronts happening at the same time. You would think that they're isolated or separate, but they seem to constantly go back at the center to Iran trying to um puppeteer what happens. Lebanon isn't separate from Homus. You know, Gaza isn't separate from the sanctions. The nuclear file isn't separated from Hezbollah. Everything seems to appear connected while also being its own event in a way. you know, Iranian officials explicitly saying that their goal is to end the war on all fronts, including Lebanon. We saw this, you know, and then we see also Netanyahu moving in a completely different direction. As soon as theou framework was announced, you saw an expansion of uh the front uh of of the conflict in, you know, between Israel and Lebanon. You saw that. And so um and and just the other day he was talking about deepening the operations in Lebanon and fortifying these security zones. And now in Gaza also he says Israel now controls roughly 60% of the territory and intends to push towards 70%.

[00:51:20]Can there be meaningful US Iran agreement deal anything whatever we want to call it? Do you think that that's even possible with all of these other um competing uh competing um conflicts happening at the same time? um you know Hezbollah continues to remain armed and active as well in this. We have to take that into consideration and you know Iran's leverage over that or their history with Hezbollah. Where do you see this if if Lebanon is being embedded into this MOU process? Doesn't that undermine the argument that you know Trump can negotiate with Iran while treating the proxy network as a separate issue? Well, I look, I largely agree with the way you've you've laid this out, Azie, and I mean, it may not be a politically correct analogy, but it's the whole issue of the tentacles versus the head of the octopus. And certainly, I see uh the Iranians perhaps playing games. And part of this is our own strategic or bureaucratic geography where we have artificial boundaries. And in the United States in Washington, we like to treat these as um I mean different offices which are stovepipe and don't necessarily talk to each other. When I look at the issue broadly, the only Iranian what we in Washington would say the as an Iranian identify as an Iranian proxy, the only one that I think has internal legitimacy based on my own travels in the region would be the Houthis. Now, I'm no apologist apologist for the Houthies, but look, in the United States, our sense of history goes back four or eight years and then everything's forgotten. We're historic historical amnesiacs.

[00:52:58]But the fact of the matter is, if you talk to Yemenes, they look at the Houthis in terms of Imam Yaya and the imam going back to the 60s, the 40s, 19th century, and so forth. And so, even though the Iranians have tried to co-opt them, the Houthis are always going to be there. Lebanon, I think, is where, and look, anyone who's been to Lebanon, that's where their heart is. Let me say upfront, I think the Israeli strategy is a mistake. First of all, when you have the occupation south of the Latani River or even north of the Latani River, you've got a situation where I mean, there's analogies that pop into everyone's mind of the Israeli occupation between 1982 and 2000. But what's changed between 2000 and 2026 is this drones. And so the importance of holding the high ground or the ability to um push back short-range mortars and artillery has actually that that's no longer a reason to justify an occupation. What I see the Israelis doing right now is actually creating diplomatic chits to cash in so that um the Lebanese government um Joseph Aun has the ability to say I've disarmed this this weaponry from Hezbollah this heavy weaponry and therefore Israel since I met that condition you have to withdraw from this. So I I see Israel playing that game. The other thing and this goes back to historical amnesia that has always frustrated me Azie is you know Lebanon has had a disarmament of a militia before in 1992 Samir Zaza's Lebanese forces were disarmed and the heavy weaponry was actually sold at the time I believe it was to Croatia which was in the course of its war um in Yugoslavia. Well, why can't that serve as a model and save some diplomatic and sectarian face? I'm not saying give Hezbollah the money, but if Hezbollah were to sell some of this weaponry or the I should say the Lebanese government were to sell this weaponry to Ukraine, a lot of its Russian weaponry that the Ukrainians could use or sell it to Cypress and have Cypress sell weaponry to um to Ukraine and then you the Lebanese government would use the proceeds to help rebuild the damage in southern Lebanon. There are historical analogies here because look, I've been to Dia many times. I've been to Nabatia, spent a lot of time in southern Lebanon. And the fact of the matter is a lot of these people just want to move on. And this is where it's actually interesting now because you have the Israelis negotiating uh with the Lebanese government and behind the scenes they both will acknowledge that their major concern is Hezbollah, not each other.

[00:55:50]Yeah, you actually answered one of the questions I was going to ask you because you've argued Hezbollah remains one of those biggest obstacles to the Lebanese sovereignty and I was going to ask you, you know, what would actually disarmament require, but you just laid it out as well with what we can do going back to the '90s. So, I appreciate that.

[00:56:06]Um, I want to ask you one more question about this and and move on to a final thought.

[00:56:14]Does expanding Israeli control and Gaza complicate broader regional diplomacy in your opinion or are these tracks ultimately inseparable?

[00:56:24]>> Well, you know, ultimately I think Hamas needs to be disarmed. I mean, I tend to be against militias and that extends, by the way, to even pro-American militias like the Peshmerga in Iraqi Kurdistan.

[00:56:37]I'll be consistent on this. Um, I don't believe that Israel's current um, security zone in Gaza is sustainable.

[00:56:50]That said, I'm not sure what could come next. And quite honestly, and I don't mean to punt the question, Azie, is I don't do much when it comes to the Arab-Israeli Palestinian Israeli conflict because with a name like Reuben, when I started out doing my PhD, I kind of figured I'd be pigeonhold if I did that. And at the same time, um my my PhD adviser was a guy named Abbas Amanat. And for Iranians, they know the Ammanat family through the brother Merdad Amanat, who was the architect of the Bourji Shakyad, which became the Bourjazadi.

[00:57:27]At any rate, >> I actually know his son.

[00:57:30]>> Okay, there you go.

[00:57:33]>> Nice family. Very nice family.

[00:57:34]>> Exactly. Um at at any rate, when it comes to um I I just lost my train of thought, but when it comes >> I'm sorry, you were talking about your name and then working with the Yeah.

[00:57:47]>> Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um when it comes to um the Where did I get um No, I I just completely lost my train of thought. My >> I'm sorry. We were talking about >> brilliant and I'll remember it later.

[00:58:01]>> I'm sorry. It was about Gaza and whether it's the the same track. We were talking about whether they're inseparable or not and you were going back to your past, right?

[00:58:10]>> When I was starting my PhD on my graduate school work, Abbas Aman got up at the lecture and this was the year of operation desert storm. So the whole lecture hall, actually I was a freshman at the time. The whole lecture hall was filled and he was like, you know, people can talk about the Arab-Israeli conflicts and I'll address that, but it's really not important because Iran had a 2,000-year history. So let's talk about that. And I just got drawn in and fascinated. So in this case, that was the Ammonat connection. But the point is that I'm just not the best person to talk about Israel or Aza. All I would say is that um this may be controversial but this comes from my work in Somaland that I do believe that that there is a moral hazard to providing as much aid and assistance to Gaza or many other aspirant states or warturn states as we tend to want to do because if you realize if you're trying to build up government capac capacity and government responsibility and you realize that no matter what you do, your infrastructure will likely be rebuilt by the international community, then the decision to choose violence actually um the threshold declines. And so when I look at the success of Somaland, and I'm not saying it has to be one or the other, I see a country that has basically thrived by deciding not to engage in violence.

[00:59:47]And look, many in your audience may disagree with me because I genuinely think that the Israelis would accept a two-state solution. I actually think there's going to be a three-state solution because I'm not sure that the West Bank and Gaza have the political culture that will allow their unity. But then again, there's two Albania, one Albania, one called Kosovo. There's two Romania, one of which is called Moldova.

[01:00:11]And so if there's two Palestines, I don't see that as uh West Bank and Raza, I don't see that as a huge issue. And look, if you wanted my own two-state solution, the way I would do it in order to um without being condescending, rewarding government capacity and so forth is you take those sections that work like Jericho, Bethlehem, and Ramla and you grant them full independence.

[01:00:38]And as other cities and regions of Palestine come to the same conclusion and see light at the end of the tunnel, then you let them join that nugget until you grow full capacity in the West Bank and Gaza. That's how I would do it. But again, I'm just sitting here in my living room. I'm not in the Trump administration.

[01:00:58]>> Well, Michael Ruben, thank you so much.

[01:01:00]It was a pleasure to connect with you.

[01:01:02]Um, I could talk for hours about some of this stuff. you know so much about Iran, but thank you again and uh we'll just have to see what happens over the next few days. Yeah, >> thank you Azie.

[01:01:11]>> Yes, thank you. Bye-bye. Byebye.