00:20:23.660I think I think you might have been hearing okay mic is fine all right
00:20:36.320Okay. So, yeah, we're going to go over Pete Hexeth's press conference earlier this morning. But I just got news that Carolyn Leavitt is going to be doing a White House briefing.
00:20:53.320Also, King Rizal Pahlavi, His Royal Highness, the leader of the Lion and Son Revolution,
00:21:02.360he is doing an announcement at 1.30pm Eastern. However, I mean, initially I was going to go
00:21:17.240straight to that. But, um, you know, we'll have to finish the press briefing first and then we'll
00:21:23.100go to that right after. Oh, you think the acoustics are different? Cause okay. There's no flag. Sorry
00:21:28.320guys. Sorry guys. There we go. There we go. There's, there's a flag. Um, but there, there guys,
00:21:40.520there's a lot going on there is a lot going on and i have been monitoring um president
00:22:10.520some of the things that he's saying, like, it doesn't add up, you know what I mean?
00:22:18.700Like, it does not add up. And I think there's more going on behind the scenes than we realize.
00:22:28.460And ultimately, you know, President Trump made it very clear that he's not going to give away
00:22:36.540his plans. He's not going to give away what he's doing. And now there's like all this confusion
00:22:44.220with like, all these various plans. Oh, what do I think about the ceasefire? I think the ceasefire
00:22:54.380is basically just, it's another play by President Trump. You know, based on what the Prime Minister
00:23:05.080or president, whatever he is, of Pakistan, he's already confirmed that the Islamic regime
00:23:11.400has breached the terms of the ceasefire. So he's already, like, the Islamic regime has already
00:23:18.420violated the ceasefire. Now, I'm, like, there's a lot of news, there's a lot of rumors going around,
00:23:24.720so I'm really interested in this press briefing, because apparently there is a little bit of back
00:23:30.820and forth between the Islamic regime and the United States, of course. And the Islamic regime
00:23:36.860is saying that they're not going to agree to a ceasefire unless Israel stops attacking Hezbollah.
00:23:44.340And Israel has made it very clear that they're not going to stop attacking Hezbollah. In fact,
00:23:49.600what I've heard is that Israel's attack against Hezbollah yesterday was like the biggest
00:23:55.960in history. And Hezbollah is pretty much eradicated. But of course, we are waiting for that.
00:24:10.920The Prince's video appealing to the Aertes, that was yesterday. We already played that yesterday.
00:24:15.880There's a new announcement that he's making today at 1.30. But guys, there's so many rumors going
00:24:22.900around, it's hard to keep track. So I think like Carolyn Leavitt has confirmed that the conflict
00:24:32.880between Israel and Hezbollah is unrelated to the terms of the ceasefire. The Islamic regime is
00:24:41.680saying that they're not going to agree to a ceasefire unless that attack stops, which obviously
00:24:47.800it won't, because what's happening between Israel and Hezbollah, nothing to do with the
00:24:54.020ceasefire. Of course, the Islamic regime is concerned because Hezbollah is a proxy of the
00:24:58.280Islamic regime. But Israel decimating Hezbollah, that's really good for the Iranian people. It
00:25:03.420means less terrorist proxy groups coming into Iran to go after the Iranian people when they
00:25:09.340rise up. So that's one thing. Um, the other, the other thing as well is, um, uh, I don't know if
00:25:20.380this is true or not. So I'm hoping that we can get some, some clarification, some confirmation here,
00:25:25.580but, uh, apparently the, uh, the regime has refused to open the Strait of Hormuz. Apparently
00:25:33.080they've turned back at least five ships or something um if that's the case then then there's
00:25:39.400no seat then there is no ceasefire because president trump made it very clear that um the
00:25:45.320ceasefire is conditional upon the unconditional opening the ceasefire is is uh only guaranteed
00:25:57.720on the unconditional opening of the strait hi armin how are you hello hello
00:26:06.200thank you for for joining um i was planning on starting the usual time but then saw the news
00:26:11.320about about carolyn levitt holding a press conference um and i was just giving some
00:26:17.800thoughts on the ceasefire anyway so armin is here guys welcome to day 102 of iran revolution live
00:26:25.480with your wonderful and amazing host armin the bobby and your wonderful and amazing host goldie
00:26:31.640kamari armin how are you doing today i'm feeling a lot more confident i think i have a good
00:26:38.680understanding now of what president trump is doing so i'm actually very happy now based on my new
00:26:45.720understanding of what's going on so i'm actually really happy and what do oh so for guys for people
00:26:52.440in the audience yes we're going to go to king as well um that was what we were initially going to
00:26:59.080go to um so we'll see how this press conference goes and then we are going to go to king as well
00:27:07.880uh armin so what's your understanding then while we're waiting for for this to start i'd love to
00:27:13.560hear your thoughts oh okay um well i okay so i think this was all from the beginning president
00:27:19.880Trump was playing the chicken game with the Islamic Republic. The whole, we're going to end
00:27:25.820this civilization and everything, that was all basically a game to see when the Islamic Republic
00:27:34.720will blink. President Trump wants to disarm the Islamic Republic on the negotiating table
00:27:41.920more than in the battlefield. And this two weeks ceasefire, whether it will work or not,
00:27:48.540I mean, it could work, it could get extended, or it could just, within the next hours, it could, you know, fall apart.
00:27:57.000But we do know that even if it lasts a little bit, President Trump will be able to release a lot of oils from the Persian Gulf, increasing the oil reserves and reduce the prices.
00:28:09.820And as soon as you get that all out, if we go back to military operations, the Islamic Republic will lose its main leverage.
00:28:18.180This is also good timing for the airstrike carriers to get into the region.
00:28:22.040This is also really good for, because the frequent use of missile interceptors has reduced the interceptor stockpiles of America, United States.
00:28:33.800This is really good time to recover from that.
00:28:59.300They're really right now angry with the regime, so many of them.
00:29:02.860So the internal division is increasing.
00:29:05.900But President Trump is using the madman strategy to confuse the enemy and make them, you know.
00:29:14.840So the Islamic Republic said that they would never do ceasefire. They will only do a complete end to the war agreement, but no ceasefire. And President Trump coming out and saying, we are going to destroy everything to the Stone Ages, we're going to end this civilization.
00:29:32.100the Islamic Republic did fear that because as much as they don't care about the Iranian people
00:29:37.380and the nation, that is, all of that infrastructure is required for them to be able to continue their
00:29:42.820military operations. So they did cave in, they did capitulate, and they're basically going back
00:29:49.460to the negotiating table to either get a full surrender from them or more likely just give
00:29:54.900time to them to do mostly two things get the americans military recovery period but also
00:30:02.260releasing the tension on the oil prices because once all of that oil goes through the straight
00:30:07.860of hormones and gets to the world um it's basically over like you have that now circulating around the
00:30:13.780world and i think that the international markets is going to use this period not just to get the
00:30:18.740the flow of oil back to where it was normally, but to increase their reserves dramatically
00:30:25.740in case we go back to the military operations for them to have a lot of reserves to rely
00:30:30.740on so that they could do what is needed.
00:30:34.860So I think that this is actually, now that I think about it, this is a genius strategy.
00:30:39.100And I think now that I understand the whole destroying civilization was not referring
00:30:43.100to iran or the islamic islamic civilization it was just a bluff to get the islamic republic back
00:30:49.980to the negotiating table which is genius yeah i mean obviously we knew it was a bluff but um
00:30:58.780you know i don't think he was speaking about the iranian people speaking about the the islamic
00:31:02.860regime that's why they went back to the negotiating table because president trump
00:31:07.100was basically telling them that like you know we're just gonna destroy you we're gonna eradicate
00:31:11.180you and they're like oh my gosh so that's why they went back but um there's um i mean i don't know
00:31:18.620if it was a bluff per se it was a very strong threat yeah like he was just he's basically
00:31:25.740speaking their language but your analysis is so good and i i agree with that a hundred percent
00:31:32.300like this is this is president trump doing stuff behind the scenes and he has been
00:31:37.340been posting so much. And what's really interesting, wait, let me just keep an eye on
00:31:46.400the White House page here. Okay, I'm just keeping an eye on the White House page as well.
00:31:56.460Or you know what, let me just let me just go to this. I'll just go to this.
00:32:00.780So that this way, whenever it starts, we know. And you know, what's what's really interesting,
00:32:06.920armin about president trump's uh posts on truth social is that he's making some some claims and
00:32:15.560some statements that i don't think the irgc would ever agree to right and you know we'll go over all
00:32:25.080of this but one of them for example uh he said that you know something along the lines of the
00:32:31.000united states will work with iran and then the united states is going to go into iran and they're
00:32:36.840going to pick up like all of the the nuclear dust whatever and and you know take the nuclear dust
00:32:43.000out of the country armin i cannot envision any reality where the irgc uh will agree or allow
00:32:55.000um americans to go in and retrieve the uranium
00:32:59.480yeah i mean you're right because if that happens the irgc is no more like because this is a change
00:33:09.560of the very dna of the islamic republic and irgc so if anything from the islamic republic agrees
00:33:16.680to that we're not talking to the islamic republic anymore we're talking to the corpse of the islamic
00:33:21.560republic and they would at that point they would lose the support of their own followers and they
00:33:28.840We will have a double uprising, both from the Iranian people, the secular Iranian people,
00:33:34.080the majority secular-minded Iranian people, but also from the minority pro-regime people.
00:33:39.320They will also join the uprising, but we'll have 100% uprising against the regime, and that is not sustainable.
00:33:46.680And what's interesting about President Trump's post, Armin, is that he's saying that they've already agreed to this.
00:33:52.700so president trump is putting out on truth social that that iran and u.s have already agreed that
00:33:59.020the united states will go in and take the the nuclear dust yeah so he's definitely rolling
00:34:04.620he's this is just a roller coaster strategy we just will go i'm now considering this as as
00:34:10.300everything trump says we go from one extreme to completely destroying the entire an entire
00:34:15.420civilization to these are the best of people and they have agreed to everything this is just the
00:34:20.700roller coaster strategy and we've got guys just strap in we just have to go on the ride
00:34:28.060like you know as as tusi always says you know don't take president trump literally but take
00:34:33.660him seriously so there's obviously things going on and then the other thing armin i saw a video
00:34:39.900um yeah that's that's pretty much it um the other thing as well is i saw a video of um
00:34:48.300like Islamic regime supporters that were angry because there's a ceasefire and they're trying
00:34:58.340to find out whoever agreed to the ceasefire and calling them traitors and want to like behead
00:35:05.720them. And I have that clip as well that, you know, we need to share later. So like this is like
00:35:12.020President Trump is attacking them from various different angles here. And the fact that you now
00:35:18.440have the IRGC going after one another even more, right, like that, that internal collapse.
00:35:26.020And President Trump is very smart, because he still hasn't mentioned who he is speaking with.
00:35:36.040So when President Trump puts out that post about, you know, oh, Iran and the United States, we've we've agreed that the United States is going to go in.
00:35:47.840He doesn't say who he's made that agreement with. And so the IRGC people and their supporters are freaking out, pointing the finger at one another, trying to figure out what's going on.
00:35:58.100And then, you know, in the middle of all this, the IRGC is still attacking Israel.
00:36:03.380This morning, they attacked Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
00:36:08.120Saudi Arabia's east-west pipeline as well.
00:36:11.520Yes, yes. Saudi Arabia's east-west pipeline was attacked.
00:36:15.800But at the same time, there's also been some boom-booms and explosions on two islands in the Persian Gulf.
00:36:24.300uh uh la la was what's it yeah city and lavon right so i don't know what kind of ceasefire
00:36:34.220this is but this is like the very fragile one well it's it's the least ceasefire ceasefire
00:36:42.780i've ever seen because it seems like the the fires the boom booms haven't exactly ceased so
00:36:50.700yeah so yeah so goldie like do i have time to show you some of the reactions people are making
00:36:58.800look really quickly like just some reactions from from pro-regime people so here for example
00:37:05.020the irgc like channels are posting that about the ceasefire look at the comments by the pro-regime
00:37:11.020people and they're saying this is nothing but treason so this person is disappointed these
00:40:36.140the very beginning of Operation Epic Fury. President Trump stated this would be a four
00:40:41.420to six week military operation to dismantle the military threat posed by the radical Islamic
00:40:47.780Iranian regime. Thanks to the unbelievable capabilities of America's war fighters,
00:40:54.060the United States has achieved and exceeded those core military objectives in just 38 days.
00:41:00.620The U.S. military destroyed Iran's defense industrial base, crushing the regime's ability to manufacture weapons that they and their proxies use to maim and kill Americans and terrorize the world.
00:41:14.280Iran's ability to build and stockpile ballistic missiles and long-range drones has also been set back by years compared to where it was six weeks ago prior to the launch of Operation Epic Fury.
00:41:25.780We destroyed the vast majority of Iran's ballistic missiles, launcher vehicles, and long-range attack drones through more than 450 strikes on ballistic missiles and approximately 800 strikes on Iran's drone-launching units and storage facilities.
00:41:42.520In total, more than 13,000 targets across Iran were struck.
00:41:47.720Again, this is in the matter of just 38 days.
00:41:51.160Meanwhile, the Iranian naval navy was completely annihilated.
00:41:56.380The United States destroyed more than 150 naval vessels in total, including 16 entire classes of Iranian warships.
00:42:05.600Despite once being the largest undersea force in the Middle East, Iran now has zero submarine vessels.
00:42:13.52097% of Iran's once massive inventory of more than 5,000 naval mines has also been targeted
00:42:22.100Iran's air forces are functionally and operationally irrelevant at this point, after the United
00:42:27.200States maintained total air dominance over their country for weeks on end.
00:42:31.840To underscore the significance of this, before Operation Epic Fury, the Iranian Air Force
00:42:38.240would fly between 30 to 100 flights per day.
00:42:41.360Today, that number is zero. Iran's ability to fund and support its terrorist proxies has been
00:42:47.960greatly reduced. At this point, Iran can no longer distribute weapons to its proxies
00:42:53.300in the region. And most importantly, Iran will not be able to acquire nuclear weapons.
00:42:59.760Prior to the start of this successful operation, Iran was aggressively expanding its short-range
00:43:05.260ballistic missile arsenal. Through these weapons and its navy, Iran was attempting to build a
00:43:10.880military buildup around their country that would pose an imminent and existential threat to the
00:43:15.800United States military assets in the Middle East, our allies in the region, and ultimately the free
00:43:21.360world. Iran was pursuing this dangerous and aggressive strategy for one reason, to hold the
00:43:27.320entire world hostage to its terrorist ambitions. The Iranians aimed to use their expanded military
00:43:33.460capabilities as a shield around their country to continue achieving their ultimate goal
00:43:38.320internally building nuclear bombs. But their murderous and evil plans have been blown up
00:43:43.960quite literally and figuratively, along with their military, their nuclear program,
00:43:49.020and most of their senior leadership, including the former Supreme Leader Ayatollah al-Khamani.
00:43:55.160Their command and control structures were also massively disrupted after being struck more than
00:44:00.3002,000 times. Many of their remaining leaders are paralyzed in fear and no longer enjoy the freedom
00:44:06.200to move around their country freely and meet openly.
00:44:10.120Thanks to the unmatched excellence of our warriors at the direction of the commander-in-chief,
00:44:14.600the world has just witnessed a historically swift and successful military triumph.
00:44:20.720President Trump started Operation Epicuree with strategic military objectives,
00:44:25.020and the United States has clearly achieved them.
00:44:27.860As we mark this progress, we also remember and honor the 13 American heroes
00:44:32.840who laid down their lives in this noble effort.
00:44:35.340I know President Trump and our grateful nation honors their ultimate sacrifice, and we will never forget them. May God bless their families.
00:44:44.300The valiant efforts of all of our incredible service members created maximum leverage for the President of the United States,
00:44:51.660allowing he and his leadership team to engage in tough negotiations over the past couple of weeks that have now created an opening for a diplomatic solution in long-term peace in the Middle East.
00:45:02.960The president's maximum pressure and the leverage created by the success of Operation Epic Fury led to the Iranian regime asking for and ultimately agreeing to a ceasefire proposal with the United States.
00:45:16.320Iran could no longer tolerate being bombed or taking the gamble of what was to come following President Trump's 8 p.m. deadline last night.
00:45:25.000Iran has agreed to open the Strait of Hormuz.
00:45:27.500And as the president said, we have received a proposal from the Iranians that has been
00:45:31.740determined to be a workable basis on which to negotiate.
00:45:35.480I've seen a lot of inaccurate coverage today from the media about these negotiations and
00:51:54.560you know aligned again we're so lucky because every time he does that you know every time
00:52:01.120something big happens we start going into different directions and he comes make his
00:52:05.140statements and we get back aligned on the right path we're so lucky to have that
00:52:09.680i i agree i agree this is uh this was this was an excellent speech um exactly what needed to be said
00:52:19.940at the right time um we did get some requests some people are driving while they're listening
00:52:26.220so um i'm just gonna go through and i'm gonna read this very very briefly um and then and then
00:52:34.600we'll go back to the white house press briefing as well but this was this was so important and
00:52:40.240it answers all like it basically addresses everything right um so let's just go through
00:52:45.620this really quick so my dear compatriots great nation of iran you know what i'll just mute it
00:52:54.620and i'll just i'll just read the captions so that way i don't pause too much
00:52:58.860okay great nation of iran i salute each and every one of you who over the course of these last 100
00:53:08.960days have stood firm for freedom and the reclamation of iran who with extraordinary
00:53:14.720sacrifice have stood boldly against bullets and who for the past 40 days have braved the danger
00:53:23.500of bombardment. I know that news of the two-week ceasefire between the Islamic Republic, America
00:53:32.960and Israel has disheartened many of you. But today is not a time for despair. It is a time for even
00:53:43.040greater belief in victory what has transpired over these last 40 days falls in line with the
00:53:49.840very demands of the iranian nation made of the international community demands that after laying
00:53:58.960down their lives in the streets of iran our people further echoed on february 14th global day of
00:54:06.240action the blows dealt to the islamic republic in a mere 40 days have been unprecedented
00:54:15.920and for this regime irreparable the elimination of ali khamenei the man responsible for the murder
00:54:23.600of tens of thousands of courageous iranians is in itself a historic achievement for our nation
00:54:30.460Beyond him, dozens of senior commanders and principal agents within the IRGC, the Basij, and the regime's intelligence apparatus have also been removed.
00:54:43.600Thousands of the regime's oppressive forces have been destroyed.
00:54:47.680The command and control structure of the regime's repressive machinery has been paralyzed and has collapsed.
00:54:53.260the military infrastructure built not for the defense of iran but for the export of terrorism
00:55:00.900and instability has been annihilated the regime's financial resources used for oppression at home
00:55:09.460and terrorism abroad have been drastically diminished the islamic republic stands today
00:55:17.460more isolated and more reviled in the region and around the world than at any point in its history
00:55:23.220what remains for this regime is reliance on foreign mercenaries and a blood-stained
00:55:29.680few whose interests are bound to its survival the regime has suffered a devastating defeat
00:55:37.280in reality yet by severing internet access for 90 million Iranians and through its machinery
00:55:44.720of lies still pretends victory and issues hollow threats
00:55:49.240Those who claimed they would never accept a ceasefire have now lost their leader and their commanders, lost the war, accepted the ceasefire, and been dragged to the negotiating table for their complete capitulation.
00:56:09.240That's important. So guys, so, so, uh, Prince Reza Pahlavi or King Reza Pahlavi is pretty much
00:56:16.840saying what you and I have been saying, Armin, right? They're being dragged to the negotiation
00:56:23.180table for complete capitulation, which is another way of saying unconditional surrender,
00:56:29.580right? So even he is, um, reassuring the Iranian nation that these negotiations,
00:56:37.660you know, potential negotiations or whatever, if they happen, it's not about survival of the
00:56:45.980regime. It's about complete capitulation, aka unconditional surrender, if it even gets to that
00:56:52.100point, because, you know, there's already rumors that ceasefire has been breached, but we don't
00:56:55.580know. We know from the outset, however, that the Islamic Republic would not fall
00:57:03.280solely through the elimination of its command structure and the degradation of its repressive
00:57:08.960apparatus by aerial strikes. That is precisely why in every message I have addressed to you,
00:57:18.560I have emphasized that it is we, the Iranian nation, who must deliver the final blow to this
00:57:24.720weakened regime and bring about its ultimate end. I want you to know that I am moderating
00:57:32.640conditions inside Iran closely. I understand that while the Islamic Republic has been profoundly
00:57:40.560weakened, its capacity for repression has not been entirely eliminated. My singular objective
00:57:48.660is to ensure that the final action to topple the Islamic Republic comes at the lowest possible
00:57:55.280cost to human life. The life of each and every one of you is precious to me. I therefore ask
00:58:02.240that you remain patient, protect yourselves, and, with faith in victory and with full readiness,
00:58:12.080await the decisive moment. In the meantime, I and all our compatriots abroad will raise your
00:58:22.540demand for an end to the Islamic Republic with every ounce of our strength. Have faith that no
00:58:31.160force on earth can withstand the power of a united iran
00:58:39.880the islamic republic has no path of escape and no chance of survival this time and it shall fall
00:58:47.480at the mighty hands of you the great nation of iran long live iran there you go long live iran
00:58:56.600and jovic will add jovic shot to that oh there's me on news nation um yeah that was that was
00:59:08.280incredibly powerful and he i mean he basically um answered every single question that iranians have
00:59:19.960we're getting more reports now that the islamic republic is closing the strait of hormones
00:59:29.000but we have to wait until see how big of a deal this is yeah all right let's go back to
00:59:35.720to the white house press briefing that was fundamentally unserious the iran negotiations
00:59:41.480to negotiate i've seen a lot of inaccurate coverage today from the media about these
00:59:45.880negotiations and these plans already. So let me be clear and correct the record. The Iranians
00:59:51.720originally put forward a 10-point plan that was fundamentally unserious, unacceptable,
00:59:57.000and completely discarded. It was literally thrown in the garbage by President Trump and his
01:00:02.280negotiating team. Many outlets in this room have falsely reported on that plan as being acceptable
01:00:08.200to the United States, and that is false. With the president's deadline fast approaching and
01:00:13.160and the United States military decimating Iran with each passing hour, the regime acknowledged
01:00:18.600reality to the negotiating team. They put forward a more reasonable and entirely different and
01:00:24.200condensed plan to the president and his team. President Trump and the team determined the new
01:00:29.520modified plan was a workable basis on which to negotiate and to align it with our own 15-point
01:00:36.180proposal. The president's red lines, namely the end of Iranian enrichment in Iran, have not
01:00:43.120changed. And the idea that President Trump would ever accept an Iranian wish list as a deal
01:00:48.880is completely absurd. The president will only make a deal that serves in the best interests
01:00:54.120of the United States of America. And he as a negotiating team will focus on this effort over
01:00:58.960the next two weeks, so long as the straight up her moves remains open with no limitations or
01:01:04.500delays. These extraordinarily sensitive and complex negotiations will take place behind
01:01:09.960closed doors over the course of the next two weeks. I would strongly advise the media against
01:01:14.820running with narratives that have no basis in fact. What Iran says publicly or feeds to all of
01:01:20.320you in the press is much different than what they communicate to the United States, the president,
01:01:24.840and his team privately. Never underestimate President Trump's ability to successfully
01:01:29.620advance America's interests and broker peace. President Trump has a proven track record of
01:01:35.200achieving good deals on behalf of the United States and the American people, and he will only
01:01:40.180accept one that puts America first. With that, I will take your questions today. I'm sure you have
01:01:45.360a lot of them. In our new media seat, we have Shane Harris with the AMAC Newsline. Shane, thank you
01:01:50.000for being here. Why don't you kick us off? Yeah, thanks for having me, Caroline. Two questions for
01:01:53.600you. First, following the President's announcement of the ceasefire, if this is indeed the end of
01:01:58.000hostilities in Iran, what is the President's message to the American people about what was
01:02:02.400achieved for our country through Operation Epicurement.
01:02:05.280Sure. I think I just laid out a significant portion of that in my opening remarks.
01:02:09.520Six weeks ago, the President looked the American people in the eye directly,
01:02:13.040and he told them that he launched this operation to take out
01:02:16.080the imminent threat that was posed by Iran. And that threat has now been greatly destroyed.
01:02:21.280Their Navy, their missiles, their defense industrial base, and their desire and their
01:02:26.320plan to build a nuclear bomb inside their country is no longer going to be allowed,
01:02:30.560can no longer happen thanks to the remarkable success of Operation Epicuree over the course
01:02:35.460of the last 38 days. That has been absolutely achieved, and now we're moving into the next phase
01:02:40.440of this, which is a negotiating period, to put some fine points on this and to hopefully broker
01:02:45.640an agreement that can achieve long-term peace in the Middle East. Yeah, and then second, what is the
01:02:50.000President's message to American seniors who have a much higher voter participation rate and they're
01:02:54.680likely to be a key swing vote in the midterm elections? Well, the President loves our seniors
01:02:58.920across the country. And as you know, the president signed the one big beautiful bill,
01:03:03.520the working families tax cut last year, which greatly reduced taxes on social security for
01:03:09.360our seniors. In fact, thanks to the working families tax cut, nearly 90% of seniors will
01:03:13.980no longer pay tax on their social security. That's a huge win for our seniors and also
01:03:18.960for our middle class and working families across the country with the no tax on tips provision and
01:03:23.600the no tax on overtime. Next week is tax week. You'll hear a lot from the president about how
01:03:28.680his policies have benefited the American people, and I'm proud to report that the president will
01:03:32.740be traveling next week to the great states of Nevada and Arizona to tout this historic
01:03:37.340accomplishment over the course of the next week. Thank you for being here, Shane. Gabe.
01:03:41.700Thank you, Caroline. Iranian state media is saying that Iran has now closed off the
01:03:46.320straightforward moves today in response to the Israeli attacks on Lebanon. What's the
01:03:50.160White House response to that? And you just listed many military successes. I understand that,
01:03:55.400but strategically, how is the administration arguing that Iran does not have more economic leverage
01:04:02.080than now than it is before the SAR report?
01:04:05.880Sure. Well, with respect to the first reporting out of Iranian state media,
01:04:09.740the president was made aware of those reports before I came to the podium.
01:08:04.940So regarding the President's rhetoric, when the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, George W. Bush said in a message to the Iraqi people that the military campaign was directed, quote,
01:08:18.260against the lawless men who rule your country and not against you.
01:08:21.620Yesterday, the president threatened to destroy Iran's civilization, the entire civilization.
01:08:29.400Not the Iranian government, but the Iranian civilization, the Iranian people.
01:08:35.500The U.S. has been a moral leader for most of its history by fighting...
01:08:40.240These questions are so stupid. Why are they talking about the regime threatening to murder people?
01:08:44.780civilizations. How can the president claim that America can ever have the moral high ground
01:08:50.300if he's threatening to destroy civilizations and not casting wars as fights against other
01:08:57.260governments? Andrew, I think you should take a look at the actions of this president over the
01:09:01.640course of the past six weeks and the actions of our brave men and women in our United States
01:09:05.920military who have taken out the military, essentially taken out the military of a rogue
01:09:11.660Islamic regime that has chanted death to America for 47 years, that has killed and maimed thousands
01:09:18.520of American soldiers over the course of the last five decades. The president absolutely has the
01:09:23.760moral high ground over the Iranian terrorist regime, and for you to even suggest otherwise
01:09:28.160is frankly insulting. Go ahead. With all due respect, there is- Just given what we've seen
01:09:36.900in Lebanon today and the increased attacks of Israel.
01:09:40.020I mean, is there any concern that Netanyahu is trying to kill the ceasefire?
01:53:37.680In last night's wave of more than 800 strikes, we finished completely destroying Iran's defense
01:53:45.800industrial base, a core pillar of our mission objective. What little they have left buried
01:53:52.660in bunkers is all they will have. They can still shoot, we know that. Their command and control is
01:53:59.800so decimated they can't really talk and coordinate, so they still may shoot here and there, but that
01:54:04.500would be very, very unwise. But they can no longer build missiles, build rockets, build launchers,
01:54:12.880or build UAVs. Their factories have been razed to the ground, set back in historic fashion.
01:54:21.980You see, had Iran refused our terms, the next targets would have been their power plants,
01:54:27.920their bridges, and oil and energy infrastructure. Targets they could not defend
01:54:33.220and could not realistically rebuild it would have taken them decades and we were locked and loaded
01:54:39.900so guys now that they are given that they communicated so many times that they're not
01:54:45.660going to meet to talk about a ceasefire the only thing they're willing to talk about is absolute
01:54:51.960guarantees for the united states to never do war with the islamic republic ever again this is a
01:54:58.600huge embarrassment for the islamic republic because they're now going to islamabad to talk
01:55:02.980about ceasefire against the very like this is the opposite of the exact thing that they said
01:55:09.100on on state tv that they're going to do like they said they will never do this and now they're doing
01:55:13.860it and the fact that they're now doing this they have exposed their weakness so it showed that
01:55:20.680president trump threatening that they're going to i don't know destroy them take them to the stone
01:55:25.660ages take out the bridge and power plants the islamic republic caved in they capitulated they're
01:55:31.400like okay let's meet and they have now shown now we all know this is new information to all of us
01:55:38.120how far like when when they would tap out what it takes for the islamic republic to be like
01:55:44.640okay okay let's talk because we didn't know like how much pressure that we need to put on them
01:55:49.380until they basically cry uncle or say basically say like give in and now we know we know how like
01:55:55.740And now that we know that, we also know for the future, if we need to get them to this point again, how easy it is, because none of this is defendable.
01:59:51.460So we didn't play this part of the Q&A because we went to other things, but just listen to this.
01:59:56.860Is the United States still considering withdrawing from NATO? Is that still a possibility?
02:00:01.620It's something the president has discussed, and I think it's something the president will be discussing in a couple of hours with Secretary General Ruta.
02:00:07.840And perhaps you'll hear directly from the president following that meeting later this afternoon. Thank you.
02:00:13.740I mean, that would require Congress vote for that to withdraw from NATO. So that's interesting.
02:00:20.540If they want to do it, they have to do it before the midterms. I don't even know if they could do it then.
02:00:26.860Wow. I just want to share that really quickly.
02:00:30.420Okay. That's insane. That's like historic.
02:00:36.120Material, excuse me, they should not have, will be removed.
02:00:39.580Right now, their dust is deeply buried and watched 24-7 overhead.
02:00:44.160The president has been clear from the beginning there will be no Iranian nuclear weapons.
02:00:49.880Period. Full stop. Other presidents said it. President Trump did it.
02:00:56.860Operation Epic Fury, less than six weeks, clear mission, decisive action, overwhelming firepower, America first, a historic battlefield victory.
02:01:09.320For decades, Iran killed Americans with roadside bombs in Iraq, using cowardly proxies to do their dirty work while they hid safely in Tehran.
02:01:19.860They struck our embassies with car bombs and attacked from the shadows, never daring to face us toe to toe.
02:01:26.860They thought they could bleed America with impunity.
02:01:30.540Well, they just learned the hard way, what happens when you try to fight us directly.
02:01:36.660And even when they got lucky, one time in 40 days, and down two of our pilots, they couldn't hold them.
02:01:44.520In a daring 14-hour rescue operation, seven hours in daylight and seven hours of night, both pilots were recovered safely.
02:01:56.860A daylight thunder run right up the middle of their country. Boots on the ground. A midnight raid right up the middle of their country. Boots on the ground. Zero American casualties.
02:02:16.200That is really embarrassing for the Islamic Republic. How could you go against the United
02:02:21.140States Army when you have everything to your advantage and you can't even capture one soldier
02:02:27.320on the territory that you're controlling? That is really embarrassing.
02:02:32.060The Iranians humiliated and demoralized. We control their fate, not the other way around.
02:04:59.760spoke for all of us. God is good. The chairman will now provide an even deeper military detail
02:05:09.220on the historic success of Operation Epic Fury, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Secretary, and good
02:05:14.340morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for being here. I want to start this morning by honoring
02:05:19.140the 13 members of our American Joint Force who were killed in action thus far during this operation.
02:05:25.100Their sacrifice and that of their families is deeply important to us, and we are grateful for each of them and will continue to mourn their loss.
02:05:35.260Their names and their bravery will never be forgotten.
02:05:38.840On February 28th, the President of the United States ordered the Joint Force to execute Operation Epic Fury with the direction to accomplish three distinct military objectives.
02:05:50.060destroy Iran's ballistic missile and drone capabilities, destroy the Iranian Navy,
02:05:56.720and destroy their defense industrial base to ensure that Iran cannot reconstitute the ability
02:06:02.380to project power outside their borders. Over the course of 38 days of major combat operation,
02:06:08.440the Joint Force achieved the military objectives as defined by the president.
02:06:12.740We welcome the ongoing ceasefire, and as the Secretary said, we hope that Iran
02:06:18.100chooses a lasting peace. But as Secretary Hegseth said, let us be clear, a ceasefire is a pause
02:06:24.420and the Joint Force remains ready if ordered or called upon to resume combat operations
02:06:30.800with the same speed and precision as we've demonstrated over the last 38 days, and we
02:06:37.080hope that that is not the case. I want to congratulate and thank the leadership today
02:06:42.260at U.S. Central Command, including the Commander Admiral Brad Cooper, the Deputy Commander
02:06:47.480Lieutenant General Kevin Leahy, the Senior Enlisted Leader, Fleet Master Chief Compton,
02:06:53.560and every one of the component commanders, Senior Enlisted Leaders, and especially the staff down
02:07:00.300at U.S. Central Command, who does not get called out for any of the credit, but grinds 24-7 to help
02:07:06.520offer the options that we bring to the Secretary and the President. I also want to highlight the
02:07:11.260forces in the United States European Command under the command of Alexis Grinkowicz, who protected
02:07:16.740the western flank in support of CENTCOM. And I want to thank our partners across the intelligence
02:07:23.300community. Our ability to see and understand what an adversary is doing help us to be as decisive
02:07:30.760as we must be on the battlefield. And that includes DIA, NSA, NGA, the CIA, and the National
02:07:39.480Reconnaissance Office, and others. I want to thank the other combatant commands who have thus far
02:07:44.840contributed along the way to U.S. Central Command. This includes Transcom, Stratcom, Spacecom,
02:07:53.300SOCOM, and Cybercom, all of whom poured all in in support of CENTCOM's efforts.
02:08:00.120And I want to thank, as the Secretary did, our Gulf partners who fought alongside each and every one
02:08:06.340of us every day. From the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, and Jordan, all
02:08:13.420who joined us together to defend and protect our people and our assets and who if required
02:08:20.540stand ready to do so again and i want to thank my team at the joint staff who work literally around
02:08:28.220the clock in order to help me offer the options that i must with the associated risks to the
02:08:34.460secretary and to the president they are the hardest working people that i know and i am deeply grateful
02:08:40.940for their service. Most importantly today, I want to thank America's members of the Joint Force
02:08:48.060who've poured everything that they can into Operation Epic Fury and their families who've
02:08:54.660worked 24 hours a day for 38 days. The Secretary and I could not be more proud of each and every
02:09:01.620one of you. And we deeply appreciate the support of the American people who we know always have us
02:09:09.180in our thoughts and prayers, and we can feel this literally every single day.
02:09:15.260As the Secretary said, the United States has devastated the regime's ability to harm Americans
02:09:20.460and our interests for years to come. Since the beginning of major combat operations,
02:09:25.880the United States Joint Forces struck more than 13,000 targets, including in that 13,000,
02:09:32.100more than 4,000 dynamic targets that popped up on the battlefield and were immediately addressed,
02:09:38.040thanks to the exceptional command and control system
02:09:41.060and intelligence, acumen, and agility of our joint force.
02:10:58.800guys armin's gone what should we do oh armin's gone what should we do now
02:11:04.240Guys, we can do whatever we want. Armin's gone. I'm joking. All right, we'll continue with us.
02:11:08.720The United States has devastated the regime's ability to harm Americans and our interests for years to come.
02:11:15.480Since the beginning of major combat operations, the United States Joint Force has struck more than 13,000 targets,
02:11:22.140including in that 13,000, more than 4,000 dynamic targets that popped up on the battlefield and were immediately addressed,
02:11:30.080thanks to the exceptional command and control system and intelligence, acumen, and agility of
02:11:35.840our joint force. CENTCOM forces destroyed approximately 80 percent of Iran's air defense
02:11:41.460systems, striking more than 1,500 air defense targets, more than 450 ballistic missile storage
02:11:48.260facilities, 800 one-way attack drones storage facilities. All of these systems are gone.
02:11:54.660We've devastated Iran's command and control and logistical networks, destroying more than 2,000 command and control nodes and degrading their ability to target U.S. and friendly forces.
02:12:07.600It is, and we know this, incredibly frustrating right now to be a lower level Iranian commander trying to fight your fight.
02:12:16.380As the Secretary said, the Iranian Navy now lies mostly at the bottom of the Arabian Gulf,
02:12:21.600and we assess that we've sunk more than 90 percent of their regular fleet,
02:12:25.960including all of the major surface combatants, as the Secretary said.
02:12:29.920150 ships are at the bottom of the ocean, and half of the IRGC Navy's small attack boats.
02:12:37.200Joint fires protected from the land, sea, and air executed more than 700 strikes against
02:12:44.180naval mine targets and we had assessed that we destroyed more than 95 percent of their naval
02:12:49.280mines and perhaps most importantly we've destroyed Iran's defense industrial base
02:12:56.260their ability to reconstitute those capabilities for years to come. We attacked along with our
02:13:03.120partners approximately 90 percent of their weapons factories. Every factory that produced
02:13:09.200Shahid one-way attack drones was struck. Every factory that produces the guidance systems that
02:13:15.340go into those drones was struck. Their missile defense industrial base is shattered with more
02:13:20.760than 80 percent of their missile facilities gone, as well as their solid rocket motor
02:13:25.900production capability. It will take years for Iran to rebuild any major surface combatants
02:13:32.640as more than 20 naval production and fabrication facilities have been damaged or destroyed.
02:13:39.200and nearly 80 percent of Iran's nuclear industrial base was hit, further degrading
02:13:44.720their attempts to attain a nuclear weapon. Throughout Operation Epic Fury, our joint
02:13:51.680force struck at the heart of Iran's ability to project power and threaten the United States
02:13:57.920and the region. And in order to do this, it required the service and sacrifice of more
02:14:04.000than 50,000 American war fighters deployed across CENTCOM, EUCOM, and stateside. The joint force
02:14:12.400flew more than 10,000 missions, including 62 bomber missions, 18 of which flew round trip
02:14:20.240from the United States to deliver bombs on military targets. Each of these missions was
02:14:27.360more than 30 hours in duration. And we did that 18 times. No other military in the world can do
02:14:35.320that. And it's a testament to the logistical force that quietly serves behind them. I cannot thank
02:14:42.720TRANSCOM and the Air Force Tanker and Mobility Force more. Combined with Army and Navy joint
02:14:49.780fires, we stuck more than 13,000 targets. And along with our Gulf partners, we've thus far
02:14:55.820intercepted 1,700 ballistic missiles and one-way attack drones, defending our forces and our
02:15:01.960partners in the civilian population, and we remain ready to do so should the need arise.
02:15:09.660Along the way, we consume more than 6 million meals, and by my estimate, more than 950,000
02:15:18.060gallons of coffee, 2 million energy drinks, and a lot of nicotine, but I am not saying that we
02:15:24.180have a problem. I've laid out the statistics, but it does not truly capture the nature of
02:15:32.260combat. This is gritty and unforgiving business. It's chaotic, it's hot, it's dark, it's
02:15:39.480unpredictable, and there's always unknowns. And our people proudly walked into those
02:15:46.120unknowns and continue forward. And through it all, the joint force has demonstrated the
02:15:51.140unwavering resolve that the nation demands of us. We are a mission-focused force, and our
02:15:57.540objectives always is to create the conditions for peace, and today we have, while be ready
02:16:04.280should that peace break, which we hope it is not, and we remain ready. Before I turn it back to the
02:16:11.400Secretary, I also want to quickly revisit the rescue of the Air Force fighter crew over the
02:16:16.840weekend. To give you an update, we've had, the Secretary and I have had the profound honor of
02:16:22.080speaking directly with many of the warfighters on that mission, from the downed crew that were
02:16:29.340picked up to those forces that went and got them. Hearing these stories firsthand has only deepened
02:16:37.060our appreciation for their tenacity, creativity, courage, and grit of the American Joint Force.
02:16:45.320This is a story that gets to the very heart and soul of who we are as a joint force, who we are as Americans, selfless sacrifice in service of others.
02:20:29.080As the chairman laid out, our troops are prepared to defend, prepared to go on offense, prepared to restart at a moment's notice with whatever target package would be needed in order to ensure that Iran complies.
02:20:40.840As far as the strait, you saw the initial agreement that was struck, which is Iran's letting ships go through.
02:20:51.280And ultimately, as the president, we've done an incredible job militarily inside the Strait of Hormuz.
02:20:58.380I failed to mention Admiral Cooper's name. He's done a phenomenal job along with everybody at AFSENT and AFSENT and ARSENT and all the components down there, laying the groundwork for Iran.
02:21:10.320Iran doesn't have the same ability to defend it the way they did before. And so, as the president has pointed out to the rest of the world, we barely get any of our energy out of the street, just a tiny fraction.
02:21:19.880It's time for the rest of the world to step up and ensure that that stays open after President
02:21:24.780Trump and the War Department brought Iran to the place where they are voluntarily opening it right
02:21:29.820now, as was announced last night. Yes, Jerry. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. And thank you both.
02:21:37.460I also just want to point out, I was listening, I was listening to the part
02:21:41.340where, you know, he's saying that we're not planning on leaving. Guys, that's really
02:21:48.060important right that also um hints at the fact that the ceasefire um probably not going anywhere
02:21:54.780right probably not going anywhere so um yeah that's why the military isn't leaving and that's
02:22:03.820really important to to recognize and acknowledge as well the update uh president trump posted on
02:22:09.780true social this morning that uh the there has been a very productive regime change in iran
02:22:16.040and that there will be no enrichment of uranium, and the U.S. will work with Iran to dig up and
02:22:22.340remove the deeply buried nuclear dust. So I just have two questions here. So both you,
02:22:30.080Mr. Secretary, and the President have referred to a new regime in Iran. So is this not the regime
02:22:36.760that was at war with us for 47 years? And what do we think of when we're saying that this is a new
02:22:44.280regime. What are we thinking and what are we saying there? And then my second question is,
02:22:48.400with any future deal with Iran, is their handing over of all of their enriched uranium,
02:22:56.380and their promising not to enrich any future uranium, be non-negotiable for the U.S.?
02:23:01.360It's always been non-negotiable that they won't have nuclear capabilities. And so right now it's
02:23:06.360buried and we're watching it. We know exactly what they have, and they know that. And they
02:23:11.240will either give it to us, which the president has laid out. He'll give it to us voluntarily.
02:23:15.720We'll get it. We'll take it. We'll take it out. Or if we have to do something else ourselves,
02:23:19.520like we did in Midnight Hammer or something like that, we reserve that opportunity. But
02:23:23.520what's clear, what the new Iranian regime knows is they'll never have a nuclear weapon or the
02:23:30.060capability to get a path to one. As far as the new regime, you heard the list that I read. It's a new
02:23:36.260group of people who've seen the full capability of the United States military and has a new
02:23:41.420calculus about what it means to negotiate with us, hence why they came to the table wanting a
02:23:47.640ceasefire and the shooting to stop. So this new regime, which the regime has been changed,
02:23:52.860has a different interaction with the U.S. So I want to I want to talk about this a little bit,
02:23:58.780okay because i was looking at i was looking at president trump's truth social post from yesterday
02:24:08.940i said yesterday was it was the day before maybe
02:26:15.960Sorry, guys. Give me one moment. Give me one moment. Is it this one?
02:26:18.200No. No. No. No. Sorry, guys. Give me one moment. Here we go. Here we go. No, wait.
02:26:38.180That's not it. Okay. Here we go. Here we go. I found it. Okay. Okay. Sorry, guys. So,
02:26:48.200this is this is where I think he is being deceptive okay oh how do I spell
02:27:01.220so compromisers in Persian it's saw this gap saw this gap
02:27:08.980there you go so this guy compromisers okay
02:27:19.200but guys so here here's where it's interesting because he's he's saying however now that we
02:27:30.180have complete and total regime change we're different smarter and less radicalized minds
02:27:37.240prevail. So he's not saying that the people there are not radicals. He's acknowledging
02:27:44.500that the people there are radicals. They're just maybe less radicalized, right? This is where it
02:27:54.620gets interesting. He says, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen. Who knows?
02:28:01.440right? So when I read this, this to me makes it seem as if there is a difference between
02:28:12.360regime change versus revolution. So because President Trump has said in past Q&As,
02:28:21.640in past statements that, you know, when he's speaking about regime change, he's like, well,
02:28:27.460you know, there's been a change in the regime because we're dealing with new people.
02:28:31.440Right. So I think I think this is part of President Trump's troll because, like, I've never heard the sentence, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen.
02:28:45.160OK, so so I think what President Trump is essentially saying is he's he's him and his administration are going to be laying the groundwork.
02:28:57.120With this, you know, new regime, quote unquote, and again, remember, the only thing that President Trump is interested in is unconditional surrender.
02:29:09.240So President Trump is hopeful that this, you know, new regime is going to be more reasonable and that this new regime is going to agree to terms of surrender.
02:29:24.800and to people who are saying i'm reading too much into his words um i don't think so because i
02:29:32.860pretty much haven't been wrong so far with what president trump is talking about and the fact
02:29:37.900that he's saying maybe something revolutionary revolutionarily wonderful can happen
02:29:43.820like what what what else could this mean like why is president trump saying that you know if like
02:29:54.800you know now that we have like a total complete regime change with more moderate people
02:30:00.320now something revolutionarily wonderful can happen i mean if you guys don't see that i
02:30:07.440don't know what to tell you because um i it just it just doesn't make sense can can someone um
02:30:17.440explain to me any other context or scenario where you have heard the phrase
02:30:27.440revolutionarily wonderful because i have never ever heard the phrase revolutionarily wonderful
02:30:36.400in my life. So I just, I'm just like that, that stuck out to me, right? That stuck out to me.
02:30:58.640And I think you have to read between the lines here. He's saying now that there's been total
02:31:02.440regime change who knows maybe some like maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen
02:31:08.120who knows so i think what's happening this is my theory i can't give you like a timeline
02:31:16.260right because i don't know the timeline but my theory is that president trump and israel are
02:31:23.580pretty much paving the way they're weakening the the regime to the point where um the iranian
02:31:32.060people can rise up and the Iranian people can do something revolutionarily wonderful.
02:31:41.180Okay. Yeah, this is exactly it. I agree with you. Right. Because President Trump has always said
02:31:52.640President Trump has always said that it's not up to America for regime change. And Israel has said
02:32:00.560it's not up to Israel for regime change. And you heard Keynes of Pahlavi's message today.
02:32:06.560It's up to the people of Iran to instigate regime change, right? And the only people who can do that
02:32:20.340are the Iranian people. When they tried to do that two months ago, they were brutally massacred
02:32:27.920because they were unarmed now now what's happening is president trump and uh prime minister netanyahu
02:32:39.520are creating the conditions right and i think even pete hegseth said we are creating the conditions
02:32:47.680for peace right he's being very vague about that they're they're creating the conditions
02:32:54.240okay and then see at the end he says 47 years of extortion corruption and death will finally
02:33:03.840end god bless the great people of iran so that's how i see this that's how i see this
02:33:22.440oh yeah the whole the civilization thing that refers to to the islamic regime i don't know why
02:33:34.000like like everyone's looking for an excuse to attack president trump i mean
02:33:38.280sure he could have used better wording but i mean this is this is his message to the irgc right like
02:33:46.200president trump is sending a strong message to the islamic regime right and he makes that very
02:33:52.380clear because at the end he says 47 years of extortion corruption and death will finally end
02:33:56.960god bless the great people of iran so it's it's it's really it's really obvious that he's speaking
02:34:01.700to the islamic regime when he's talking about civilization the only the only criticism i have
02:34:06.660is that i think he gives the islamic regime too much credit by calling them a civilization right
02:34:11.780because they're just like a savage death cult of jihad but you know that's fine um so there you go
02:34:18.780So there's my sort of thoughts on the reason why they're saying regime change, right?
02:34:27.840Like when they say regime change, I don't think, like they're not referring to revolution.
02:34:34.000They're basically just saying we killed all their leaders and now there's new leaders in there.
02:34:38.640And the fact that President Trump included the word, the phrase revolutionarily wonderful, to me, that's like he's hinting at, you know, he's hinting that there's there's a difference.
02:34:55.260There's a difference. And that, you know, he's basically creating the conditions for revolution to people saying King is a power that he spoke this morning.
02:35:05.520yes we played his video um we'll play it again we we aired his video live when when it went live
02:35:12.960um but i'll do it again after this um this this press briefing right here mr secretary thank you
02:35:21.440oh of course i was going in front right here thank you mr secretary and general kane mary
02:35:25.840margaret with the daily wire two questions uh iran has said that safe passage to the straight
02:35:59.380open. Our military is watching. Sure, their military is watching, but commerce will flow.
02:36:04.320And that's what you saw the markets react to is that reality. As far as shooting that,
02:36:09.440we were monitoring it last night in real time. Of course we are. Iran would be wise to find a way
02:36:16.100to get the carrier pigeon to their troops out in remote locations to know not to shoot, not to
02:36:22.880shoot any longer, one-way attacks or missiles, because this takes time sometimes for ceasefires
02:36:28.160to take hold. We're watching it. We're prepared if necessary, but we hope and believe that it'll
02:36:34.660hold. Yes. Thank you, Secretary Hankseth. Sorry. Thank you. Excuse me. Why are you so rude? Just
02:36:39.880wait. I'm calling on people. Thank you, Secretary Hankseth. Yesterday in the President's Truth
02:36:45.060Social, he threatened to wipe out a civilization. That statement elicited a huge response in
02:36:51.640America. If Iran did not come to the table and make a deal yesterday by the deadline,
02:36:56.660was the president really prepared to wipe out Iran entirely? Like I said, we had a target set
02:37:03.080locked and loaded of infrastructure, bridges, power plants. Remember, this is a terror regime.
02:37:09.380The military regime used all of these things for dual use to fund their military, to fund their
02:37:13.800terror camps. We had a lot of legitimate targets. They knew exactly the scope of what we were
02:37:18.000capable of. We hit some military targets on CARG, which is a bit of a signal. They can't defend it.
02:37:23.660And so the Iran ultimately understood their ability, their future to produce, to generate power, to fuel their terrorist regime was in our hands, was in President Trump's hands.
02:37:36.960That's why they came to the table. He ultimately said, we can take it all from you.
02:37:42.060Your ability to export energy will be taken away. And the United States military has the ability to strike those things with impunity.
02:37:48.340That type of threat is what brought them to the place where they effectively say, OK, we want to cut this deal.
02:37:56.600Yes, right here. Morning, Mr. Secretary, Mr. Chairman, David Zier, Real America's Voice.
02:38:01.660During the ceasefire, what do we do when we see Iran rearming, regrouping, repositioning weapon systems and air defenses?
02:38:11.500And also, have we confirmed the specific model type of air defense or man pads that took down our F-15?
02:38:19.340And is it still a threat for our patrols?
02:38:23.300We're still working through the specific details around that particular shoot down.
02:38:30.880And the crews, when they normally return, go through a debriefing process along with the other members of that flight that were out there.
02:38:38.560And they'll go back, as they always do, and forensically look at what are the tactical lessons learned? Did we sense or see something? Could we have done something different? We do that, as I mentioned, in a prior press conference every single time we take any loss like that so that we become a quick learning organization.
02:38:58.840On the other part of your question around the movement of Iranian military forces, U.S. CENTCOM will continue to monitor that situation.
02:39:08.700They will continue to have a series of response options.
02:39:12.960And if need be, we'll come to the secretary and the president for guidance and be prepared to to do the things that they're ordered to do so against valid military targets in accordance with the normal procedures that we have.
02:39:26.680I would just note, it's a good question.
02:39:29.720The more Iran moves, the more Iran moves forces,
02:39:51.200Mr. Secretary, Lou Martinez with ABC News.
02:39:53.560First, a question to General Cain, sir.
02:39:55.820In your personal opinion, were the risks of the Strait of Hormuz being closed because of the conflict,
02:40:02.160were they mitigated early enough in part of the decision-making process to lead up to the decision to take action against Iran?
02:40:10.920And in your opinion, is Iran in control of the Strait of Hormuz?
02:40:14.200We just heard the Secretary say that Iran is letting them ships through, which would imply that potentially it's not just –
02:40:23.040the Secretary also said that the US, that the strait is open. He did say that, sir.
02:40:28.880But in your opinion, sir, how can U.S. ensure safe passage? Mr. Secretary,
02:40:37.120can you say today that the United States achieved, the administration achieved the military goals
02:40:42.640that you constantly delineated? But strategically, is that a victory because of that? And also,
02:40:52.160So you said earlier that the president chose mercy, but you yourself had said three weeks ago that we will give an apporter to Iranian troops.
02:41:02.300How do you correlate those two? And do you think that your comments may have put American troops at risk?
02:41:09.640No. I try to be nice up here, but you did listen to what I said, right?
02:41:16.340I laid out the objectives. We believe we've accomplished them, and it's a historic military victory.
02:41:21.460And President Trump has the option as the commander in chief to compel an adversary to the table, which is precisely what he did.
02:41:28.700And at the end, he chose to say, you know what, I'd rather talk to you at the table than obliterate your capability to export oil and fund your terror regime.
02:41:36.620So he did make that choice. That was his choice.
02:41:38.840He was a president of peace and he's been willing to make those really tough calls that the American people elected him to do.
02:41:45.360Nothing we've done, not a single thing we've done.
02:41:48.140This is a typical, of course, it's ABC. Not a single thing we've done has put an American troop
02:41:53.640in more of a harm's way. We've only set our troops up to harm Iranian military capabilities,
02:42:00.180which they've done to devastating fashion and to great success. Mr. Chairman, you had a question.
02:42:05.220There's a lot in that question. I'd love to take that offline and answer it, but I'm struggling
02:42:12.480to find exactly what your question was, and that's probably me, not you. Okay, all right.
02:42:17.340Mr. Chairman, it's sorry. It was an indictment framed as a question, so you're forgiven for
02:42:21.740that understanding. Go ahead, please. No, you've had your chance. Go ahead, sir.
02:42:27.260Thank you very much. I believe so, based on the diplomatic
02:42:29.740negotiations. I believe so. I believe so. Sorry. Mr. Kord or Rahim Rashidi from Kurdistan.
02:42:36.940I'm Representative Kurdistan TVN, Kurdistan 24 Today. I have two questions. Mr. Secretary,
02:42:47.100will your forces stay in the region and continue to defend and protect your allies and take the
02:42:55.980responsibility for their security? Second question is, as you mentioned,
02:43:03.900many times that you have full control of Iran airspace. Do you still have this control or not?
02:43:11.900Well, thank you for the question, the chairman of the UAE and Bahrain and Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, who have fought shoulder to shoulder with us, especially in defense of our facilities, of our people, of their facilities, and we appreciate that.
02:43:28.340So that coordination, of course, will continue.
02:43:30.540And then when it comes to the skies over Iran, I would just, again, I would point to exhibit A and exhibit B, seven hours in the day, seven hours at night. If any foreign adversary attempted to do the same over our soil, they would have no ability to do so.
02:43:45.260uh do will they have a system here or there maybe do they have a network a system that's capable of
02:43:53.140defending their skies no they don't it's as the chairman laid out that's that's been dismantled
02:43:58.040degraded and destroyed so uh it's it's a it's a slight distinction but an important one yes right
02:44:03.260here go ahead general george in the middle of a war excuse me you got a question go ahead yes
02:44:08.640yes uh two questions actually great so during this time um is the president still are you
02:44:14.740still encouraging civilians to rise up against the regime, or are they satisfied with this
02:44:21.500new regime change, or is this two-week period to kind of see where that leads? Also, talk about
02:44:28.040the enriched uranium going in there. Would that require special forces or other military,
02:44:34.460our service members? Who would be basically going in there, entrusted to going in there
02:44:39.000to get that uranium out. Again, on the uranium, we're watching it. We know what they have and
02:44:45.980they will give it up and we'll get it and we'll take it. If we have to, we can do it in any means
02:44:51.700necessary. So that's something the president is going to solve for. We already have a midnight
02:44:56.360hammer with the place we put them in and the reason it's in the situation where it is.
02:45:02.500The second one was about the people. Listen, I would love to see the Iranian people take
02:45:06.500advantage of this opportunity um they have been oppressed by the previous regime
02:45:11.200boom i would love to see the iranian people take advantage of this opportunity right so basically
02:45:19.400laying the groundwork laying the groundwork taking advantage of this opportunity
02:45:25.560and uh they'll have a new opportunity with this regime oppressed listen i would love to see the
02:45:32.240right so look guys he basically just said it he basically just said it he said um i would love to
02:45:40.120see them have an opportunity like i would love to see the iranian people take advantage of this
02:45:44.600opportunity right so he says they had an opportunity with the old regime unfortunately
02:45:50.040iranians weren't successful because we were mass slaughtered and then he says now they will have
02:45:56.180another opportunity with this new regime, right? Listen.
02:46:00.940People take advantage of this opportunity. That's something the president is going to solve for.
02:46:04.920We already have a midnight hammer with the place we put them in and the reason it's in the
02:46:10.720situation where it is. The second one was about the people. Listen, I would love to see the
02:46:15.960Iranian people take advantage of this opportunity. They have been oppressed by the previous regime
02:46:21.320and they'll have a new opportunity, but this regime, that remains to be seen. That was not
02:46:26.820our objective in this effort. So he's saying they're going to have a new opportunity. They're
02:46:32.780going to have another opportunity with this new regime, right? What opportunity is he speaking
02:46:37.940about? The opportunity that he's speaking about is revolution. So they had an opportunity with
02:46:45.380the old regime. Now they're going to have an opportunity with the new regime. And
02:46:50.740yeah, he said it's not a U.S. goal. Obviously, obviously, revolution is not a goal of the U.S.
02:46:59.940because it's not up to the United States to do revolution. It's up to the Iranian people.
02:47:05.360It's up to the Iranian people to do the revolution. Like, of course, of course,
02:47:11.640it's not up to the United States. Guys, like, I mean, the armchair experts, like you really need
02:47:19.280to educate yourselves a little bit more. Like we've been speaking about this for the last two
02:47:23.300months. It's not the responsibility of the United States to instigate revolution. It's the
02:47:30.040responsibility of the Iranian people. But they're brave people. Horrible things have been done to
02:47:37.040them by the previous regime. Tens of thousands targeted and killed and assassinated in a way
02:47:41.600the government never should. And we wish them the best. Absolutely. Thank you all very much.
02:47:45.740Appreciate it. There you go. So Pete Hexeth basically just confirmed that the Iranian
02:47:51.420people are going to have an opportunity for revolution under this new regime. Remember,
02:47:57.380like I told you, they're making a distinction between regime and revolution.
02:48:04.980And they will give it up and we'll get it and we'll take it. If we have to,
02:58:22.260On your mind, Starmer with Britain and Britain has been given to us who have been asking for Aff advices of Russia during hurricane family to give to each other.
02:58:35.840The genre of Britain became in Turkey at the time we've put community intent on Iran and Trump realized that Trump has been timing that pasti
03:12:21.760The point is that the two weeks of the United States will allow the United States to enter the region and the U.S.S. Boxer to enter the region.
03:14:59.020The point of this point is that the war has never been fixed.
03:15:29.020of uh paris and for the next couple of days it happens to be my wife's birthday week apparently
03:15:34.780we do birthday weeks these days birth weeks is that a thing uh so we're gonna continue our live
03:15:39.640coverage of course uh from uh the situation in iran the ceasefire is getting extremely heated
03:15:46.920pun intended and we're gonna give you guys uh the latest updates uh first we're gonna talk about
03:15:51.900what happened so they the islamic revolutionary guard corps have now broken their ceasefire
03:15:56.400less than 24 hours and this isn't about what they did last night we of course gave you guys the live
03:16:02.980coverage from the moment the ceasefire started and for the next for the first 10 minutes half
03:16:08.760an hour we did have some missiles and drones but today more and more but it doesn't stop here
03:16:16.040the hardliners of the IRGC are now attacking the rest of the regime leadership for actually even
03:16:22.880agreeing to the ceasefire in the first place. They are now refusing to even begin the negotiations
03:16:29.240which should technically start on Friday the 10th of April. For now the IRGC says we are not going
03:16:37.100to talk because the Israelis are hitting our IRGC Hezbollah wing in Lebanon. And of course based on
03:16:47.580that the Israeli defense forces have retaliated and continue to hit the Hezbollah positions in
03:16:52.560the south of Lebanon. All right, so all this is going to be a part of our live report, and we're
03:16:59.060going to get your reaction. First things first, let's go to the attacks from the IRGC towards not
03:17:05.140just Israel, but also the Arab states. We had this from Kuwait. Over the last 10 hours, the Kuwaiti
03:17:13.540armed forces have been dealing with a huge number of attacks involving over 40 suicide drones from
03:17:23.640Iran. The drones, part of their Shahid drone program, have been targeting the Kuwaiti civilians
03:17:30.220and the infrastructure. According to the AFP, that includes oil facilities in Kuwait, power plants,
03:17:36.800water treatment infrastructure and residential areas and as we speak i literally also just
03:17:44.600spoke to my father who is in tehran and the strikes have once again started in the capital
03:17:52.820of iran let's go to the first video which is obviously very dark so it's mostly sound of
03:17:59.380explosions. Here we go. Meanwhile, we also have an update from the Emiratis. The United Arab Emirates,
03:18:25.660The Ministry of Defense has now obviously issued, has been issuing a number of alerts throughout the day, confirming that their air defense systems are responding to missile threats coming from Iran, saying that our systems are currently responding to a missile threat.
03:18:43.060Please remain in a safe location and follow official channels for warnings and updates.
03:18:50.580Do not approach, touch or photograph any fragments or objects that have fallen as a result of successful air interceptions
03:18:58.680and allow the relevant authorities to assess the situation.
03:33:30.120his reaction to the proposal to the ceasefire the whole saga since last night he reacted furiously
03:33:39.140to the IRGC's 10-point proposal he called it a disaster a catastrophe and he followed it by
03:33:47.820describing it as a chaotic day Pakistan apparently messed up here who would have thought by the way
03:33:55.960Literally, everybody thought that Pakistan are very, very competent, very smart people, very truthful people.
03:34:03.960So essentially what happened was Pakistanis were trying to mediate between the Americans and the Islamic Republic.
03:34:12.960What they decided to do was to keep running between the two sides, providing briefs and drafts of proposals from each to the other one.
03:34:21.960Now, the IRGC, because they had like two or three different groups trying to negotiate separately without communicating with each other, the Pakistanis apparently gave the wrong proposal.
03:34:33.520And then they gave the wrong draft from the Americans to the Islamic Republic.
03:34:39.340And now they're saying, oh, actually, we might have messed up here.
03:34:41.640So the IRGC have now come up with a whole new list of a draft that was never actually agreed on by the Americans.
03:34:47.960And that's why Witkoff, initially when he saw the crazy 10-point plan, again, if you've missed it, we're going to go through the lists of both the Americans and the IRGC.
03:35:00.080Steve Witkoff said, well, this is crazy. Nobody's going to agree to this. Nobody.
03:35:04.080But the IRGC announced that this is the list that they agreed on.
03:35:08.520They had to also get Egypt and Turkey.
03:35:11.600As you can see, all the very competent and truthful countries have been involved.
03:35:15.040Pakistan, Turkey, and Egypt. Very morally high, superior countries getting involved. And China
03:35:23.560also were trying to put pressure on the Islamic Republic to reopen the Strait of Hormuz,
03:35:28.440which is now apparently closed again. Before we go to the list of the drafts that were very,
03:35:34.860very different to each other, let's go to the Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, who's sent out an
03:35:40.140urgent message to the people inside Iran saying that obviously right now it correctly said it's
03:35:46.620not the right time to take to the streets just be patient it's still chaotic the only time that you
03:35:53.300can actually see a situation where the people in Iran can take action is after the military action
03:35:58.860after the war not now we're still in the middle of it you're supposed to have technically a two
03:36:03.460week pause which so far is not going too well let's wait till Friday because that's when they
03:36:08.780supposed to be starting negotiations not really sure how that's gonna go but the war hasn't ended
03:36:14.460yet so don't take to the streets just be patient you will know when you have to go out let's go to
04:01:22.980Mark my words. Iranians cannot be hidden from history. They are making history. Iranians will reclaim their liberty and their nation. As I have told my compatriots, I hear you. I am with you.
04:01:39.200The world may be distracted today by the back and forth of diplomatic compromises, but your courage, your sacrifice, and your cries for liberty continue to be seen and heard.
04:01:54.440You will not be forced to accept the remnants of this regime clinging to power.
04:01:59.820This battle will only end with your liberation.
04:02:02.660You, like the other heroes of our history, will be recorded as great men and women who defied an illegitimate, tyrannical regime and reclaimed Iran for future generations.
04:02:16.120I am with you until our ultimate victory, until we reclaim Iran and we rebuild our beloved nation hand in hand.
04:02:24.700The struggle continues. We will see it through.
04:02:27.480there you go so that is the most recent message from his royal highness
04:02:36.980and this is the most important line right at the beginning the revolution in iran started with the
04:02:43.980people and it will end with the people and their ultimate victory over the islamic republic well
04:02:52.540said. Well said. Okay. I'm going to see if I can find the full J.D. Vance video.
04:05:08.500So, in the past couple of days, I've seen a lot of reporting from the American media about the 10-point proposal that the Iranians have made.
04:05:17.380now. As I know, because I've been involved in this, there are three different 10-point proposals
04:05:21.960at least that I've seen floating around. The first 10-point proposal was something that was
04:05:26.240submitted, and we think, frankly, was probably written by ChatGPT that was submitted to Steve
04:05:30.580Whitcoff and Jared Kushner. That immediately went in the garbage and was rejected. There was a second
04:05:36.06010-point proposal that was much more reasonable that was based on some back and forth between us,
04:05:41.160between the Pakistanis and Palestinians. That is the 10-point proposal that the president was
04:05:45.760referencing in his truth yesterday. And then, frankly, I've seen a third 10-point proposal
04:05:50.380that's even more maximalist than the first 10-point proposal that's been floating around
04:05:54.560various social media channels. Now, here's what's interesting about all this, is that I've seen
04:05:59.860various organs, the New York Times, CNN, others, pick up and run the original 10-point proposal
04:06:06.740based on little more than a random Yahoo in Iran submitting it to public access television in the
04:06:13.740country of Iran, and then them saying that somehow represents the negotiating position
04:06:18.280of the government. It's the equivalent of somebody in, let's say, a democratic councilman
04:06:23.860in Boise, Idaho, saying something crazy, the local public access TV picking up that crazy.
04:06:32.000Okay, so there's another post. Oh, okay, you know what, maybe I can find
04:06:42.200maybe I can find, um, the full thing on, what is it? Live now.
04:06:54.960Maybe I can go there and find it. Let's see. Let's see if you can find JD Vance.
04:10:24.220And, you know, yeah, I've been on the phone a lot the past couple of days, but we're glad to be where we are.
04:10:29.660Mr. Vice President, how is the United States accomplishing its stated objective of ensuring Iran doesn't have a nuclear weapon ever if they still have highly enriched uranium?
04:10:40.540Well, look, I mean, this is one of the things, it's going to be one of the main subjects of
04:10:45.380negotiation is that we want Iran to not be able to make a nuclear weapon. We want the nuclear fuel,
04:10:51.860which is something the president has made very clear. And again, the way to think about this is
04:10:56.860the United States has certain demands and certain things that we want. The Iranians have things they
04:11:02.040can get out of the negotiation. The more that they're willing to give us, I think the more
04:11:05.740they're going to get things out of this negotiation. The president's talked about sanctions relief.
04:11:09.700The president's talked about economic partnerships and things like that.
04:11:13.580That's not going to happen unless the Iranians make a firm commitment to stop anything close to the development of a nuclear weapon.
04:11:22.880And frankly, the president has all the cards here.
04:11:25.500We've got a lot of leverage. We've got a lot of things that we can do.
04:11:28.200But right now, I think we're in a good spot.
04:11:29.880To wipe Iranian civilization off the map, still on the table, is it fair to keep 90 million Iranians under that threat for the actions of their leaders?
04:11:39.700Well, look, the leadership is really to blame for the condition of the country in Iran.
04:11:43.300The president of the United States has made very clear that the United States has a lot of leverage here.
04:11:48.940We have economic leverage. We've got military leverage.
04:11:51.740What he's trying to do is make sure the American people are safe and strike a deal that's good for the American people.
04:11:57.220I just look, I encourage the Iranians to come to the table seriously.
04:12:01.400We've seen some signs that they're going to do that.
04:12:03.720We've seen some signs of bravado. Fundamentally, we're in a good spot.
04:12:07.440They're reopening the Straits. We have a ceasefire.
04:12:09.420And frankly, if they break their end of the bargain, then they're going to see some serious consequences.
04:12:14.080Wiping them off the map is different than an economic leverage or military leverage.
04:12:18.280Why is that kind of language useful in this kind of scenario?
04:12:22.540Well, again, the president of the United States is saying that unless the Iranians do the right thing,
04:12:27.380he is going to have some serious consequences for the regime.
04:12:29.820We obviously don't want the people of Iran to suffer, but we have a lot of leverage the president of the United States could use.
04:12:36.180And it's why I think it's so important for the Iranians to be negotiators in good faith.
04:12:53.260Cardinal Christophe Pierre into the Pentagon.
04:12:56.140I haven't seen the story, unfortunately.
04:12:58.040Essentially, the reporting by the free press is that they told him that the American military has a lot of might
04:13:02.980and they can do whatever they want and the church should get on its side.
04:13:06.880Does that message sound correct to you? Is that something you would sign off on?
04:13:10.500So, one, with no disrespect to the Cardinal, I don't know who Cardinal Christophe Pierre is.
04:13:15.640He's the ambassador to the Holy See and the U.S.
04:13:18.020Oh, okay, okay. I've met him before. Sorry, I just didn't remember the name.
04:13:22.440I've never seen this reporting. I'd like to actually talk to Cardinal Christophe Pierre and, frankly, to our people to figure out what actually happened.
04:13:29.800I think it's always a bad idea to offer an opinion on stories that are unconfirmed and uncorroborated, so I'm not going to do that.
04:13:36.800On the question of Iran's enriched uranium, do you see a scenario in which the administration may be willing to agree to allow Iran to continue enriching uranium for civilian nuclear purposes?
04:13:49.180Well, look, what the president has said is that we don't want Iran to have the capacity to build a nuclear weapon.
04:13:55.160The president's also said that we don't want Iran enriching towards a nuclear weapon, and we want Iran to give up the nuclear fuel.
04:14:01.260Those are going to be our demands during the negotiation.
04:14:03.420And again, we're going to see what the Iranians are willing to give up.
04:14:07.160If they make a good faith effort to actually give us the things that we need to have a successful negotiation for the security of the American people, I think there's a lot on the other end.
04:14:16.620If they don't give us what we need, then I think it's going to be bad.
04:14:19.580But I'm optimistic that the Iranians are going to be smart, that they're going to negotiate in good faith.
04:14:25.160And you're negotiating with Iran. I know Kevin sort of asked about this already, but he essentially is saying that they're distrustful of the U.S. for, you know, he tweeted out that three of the 10 points in the ceasefire framework have already said they're distrustful of the U.S.
04:14:42.380What do you make of him tweeting that out before negotiations?
04:14:45.120So I thought it was interesting, actually, because I did see that tweet from Ghaliboff actually just a couple of minutes ago.
04:14:53.640And let me say a few things. First of all, he said that there are a few points of disagreement before the negotiation.
04:14:59.940Well, that must mean that there's a lot of points of agreement because there's a 15 point plan floating around.
04:15:05.160There's a 10 point plan floating around. If he's frustrated about three issues, that actually means that there's a lot of agreement.
04:15:11.600That's point number one. Point number two, to respond to each of those issues, and I read it
04:15:16.080very closely, let me just say this. I actually wonder how good he is at understanding English
04:15:23.020because there are things that he said that frankly didn't make sense in the context of the
04:15:27.360negotiations that we've had. But to address the three points, first of all, he talked about an
04:15:31.540attack that allegedly happened on Iran and how that was a violation of the ceasefire.
04:15:36.080Ceasefires are always messy. An hour after the president announced the ceasefire,
04:15:40.420the Iranians launch a bunch of missiles. Then the Israelis responded. Then some of the Gulf
04:15:45.080Arab states responded. This is the nature of a ceasefire. No ceasefire ever goes without a little
04:15:50.680bit of choppiness. What we have been very clear about is that we want to stop the bombing. We
04:15:56.720want our allies to stop the bombing. And we want the Iranians to do the same thing. We're seeing
04:16:01.920evidence that things are going in the right direction, but it's going to take a little time.
04:16:05.960The second thing Gottliebopf said, which, again, I found fascinating, is he said, we refuse to give up the right to enrichment.
04:16:14.080And I thought to myself, you know what?
04:16:16.000My wife has the right to skydive, but she doesn't jump out of an airplane because she and I have an agreement that she's not going to do that because I don't want my wife jumping out of an airplane.
04:16:26.600We don't really concern ourselves with what they claim they have the right to do.
04:16:31.540We concern ourselves with what they actually do.
04:16:33.900And I think the president's been very clear on the enrichment question.
04:32:32.740Because the Iranian people are like, hey, keep bombing.
04:32:35.300Iranian civilization off the map is still on the table.
04:32:38.400Is it fair to keep 90 million Iranians?
04:32:40.340Guys, the Iranian civilization, like whatever you say, the level of destruction that the Qajar dynasty inflicted upon the Iranian people is not even like what the Americans are doing to the infrastructure, what the Americans and Israelis are doing and would be doing to the infrastructure in Iran.
04:32:59.480doesn't even come close to what the Qajar dynasty did to Iran
04:33:04.520and the disaster that they left behind for the Pahlavi dynasty.
04:33:10.820And the Iranians under the Pahlavi leadership managed to build
04:33:15.300one of the most prospering, advanced societies, countries in the world,
04:33:19.700one of the fastest growing, one of the most industrious countries in the world.
04:33:23.840Within a very short amount of time, they brought Iran from the edge of collapse
04:34:51.660Guys, this is why you need to pay more attention to what President Trump does and less to what he says, because what he says is basically a roller coaster.
04:35:01.800It's the madman strategy to scare you.
04:39:07.600And then it also buys time to rebuild the air defense because we know that a pause,
04:39:13.360this pause will give the United States time to restock its missile interceptors.
04:39:20.200And also another benefit is going to be the, oh yes, you guys are confirming.
04:39:24.960benefit is going to be that you know you're demonstrating again internationally that we give
04:39:29.420them a shot to do diplomacy and these people suck that you can't do diplomacy with them but the the
04:39:35.260most important benefit is the division right now guys i think even you guys are underestimating how
04:39:41.140important the division is within the islamic republic guys the whole this is how the regime
04:39:46.940will come down it's not going to be with missiles it's not going to be with like drones it's not
04:39:53.020going to be with any like all of the people uprising drones missiles hitting their uh you
04:40:00.240know base military bases all of this will eventually make the islamic republic fall
04:40:05.460when they turn against each other it will all come down to division among them and them turning
04:40:12.400against each other i mean i already explained this to you once before so i'm not going to do it now
04:40:16.580But that is the key thing. Unity among the opposition, division among regime supporters. We need that. That's what we need to end the regime. The Islamic Republic will not be able to survive if their own followers turn against them.
04:40:32.880And this, what President Trump did, is like he just threw a grenade in the middle of the Islamic Republic.
05:19:30.340murdered 45,000 innocent protesters in just two days on January 8 and January 9 of this year.
05:19:41.680A regime that is executing young protesters as we speak.
05:19:49.060A regime that has lost every shot of legitimacy it ever claimed to hold.
05:19:54.360No ceasefire, no agreement, no formula with the remnants of this regime changes that reality.
05:20:03.020The military operations of recent weeks have weakened the regime's repressive machinery and fractured its command structure.
05:20:11.700The playing field is more level than it has been in decades.
05:20:17.600The people of Iran welcome this. It is what they called for on the streets of Iran and in the streets of cities around the world in their millions.
05:20:28.740They want to see the regime's capacity for repression degraded further.
05:20:36.040The Iranian people are determined to bring this regime down. They have had enough.
05:20:40.840They have always known that ultimately, while they will come and appreciate international help, they will need to finish their job themselves because they will never accept this rump regime.
05:20:57.800The very same regime and same thugs that slaughtered them in the streets just two months ago.
05:21:05.880Ali Khamenei is dead, but the regime has not changed because its nature and its DNA are unchangeable.
05:21:17.960We see it clearly at this very moment.
05:21:22.560This criminal cabal is still firing rockets and violating the sovereignty of our neighbors.
05:21:31.500It is still threatening the United States and Europe.
05:21:34.660It is still inviting terrorist groups like Hezbollah, Ashtar al-Shaabi, and others onto our soil to terrorize the Iranians and prevent popular protests.
05:21:47.000It is still holding the people of Iran hostage with an internet blackout that has lasted for more than one whole month because it is still afraid of the people of Iran.
05:21:59.100It is still afraid of their righteous rage, their demand for dignity, and their fight for freedom.
05:22:07.080They are afraid because they know the people's fight will not cease, nor should the world's resolve.
05:22:15.960The regime, weakened as it is, is not a reliable partner for any lasting arrangement.
05:22:22.660A wounded animal lashes out. It becomes more dangerous.
05:22:29.100It is not sitting at the negotiation table out of goodwill.
05:22:35.020It is there yet again to buy time to seek concessions and to strengthen its hand
05:22:40.500to inflict more terror on Iranians and on the world.
05:22:46.300It won't be tamed at the negotiation table.
05:22:50.740It can only be empowered and emboldened.
05:22:53.640The right course is to see this through to its conclusion, to continue to set the conditions for the people of Iran to wage the final battle for liberation.
05:23:06.120To ensure that when Iranians again come to the streets, the regime is not able to crack down.
05:23:12.880But even if further help does not come, Iranians will fight on.
05:23:18.580The regime will fall. This is a certainty.
05:23:22.260The only question is when and how much more terror, blackmail, and suffering the world is prepared to tolerate in the meantime.
05:23:33.120A free democratic Iran restored to its civilizational roots is the only path to stability across the entire region.
05:23:43.240A country the international community can work with and end to decades of proxy wars, gas-priced terrorism, nuclear brinksmanship, and hostage blackmail.
05:23:59.040Iranians will not quit. They will not surrender.
05:24:03.200Mark my words, Iranians cannot be hidden from history.
05:24:09.180Iranians will reclaim their liberty and their nation.
05:24:12.320As I have told my compatriots, I hear you. I am with you. The world may be distracted today by the back and forth of diplomatic compromises, but your courage, your sacrifice, and your cries for liberty continue to be seen and heard, and they will not go unrewarded.
05:24:33.340You will not be forced to accept the remnants of this regime clinging to power.
05:24:39.900This battle will only end with your liberation.
05:24:43.440You, like the other heroes of our history, will be recorded as great men and women
05:24:50.480who defied an illegitimate tyrannical regime and reclaimed Iran for future generations.
05:24:57.760I am with you until our ultimate victory, until we reclaim Iran and we rebuild our beloved nation, hand in hand.
05:25:10.280The struggle continues. We will see it through.
05:33:16.740And then when the people did it, Khomeini declared it to be the second revolution.
05:33:22.880So guys, look at this. You know what they're saying? Based on the history of the Islamic Republic, we don't have to wait for the order of our supreme leader. The people could do things themselves and it would be okay.
05:33:37.600You see how they're trying to shift the power from the supreme leadership to the people themselves by using the story?
05:33:47.440So guys, in 1979, Imam Khomeini, the first supreme leader, he didn't tell the people to go capture the embassy, the American embassy.
05:33:59.400It was the people, there was the pro-regime people who did it themselves.
05:34:03.920And after it already happened, then Khomeini endorsed it.
05:34:09.180Like, guys, there's reports that he wasn't sure if this is a good idea or not.
05:34:13.140But once it happened, he just went with it.
05:34:15.360And he endorsed it by calling it a second revolution,
05:34:18.720meaning that the first revolution was bringing down the Pan-Levi dynasty.
05:34:22.560And then the second revolution was bringing down the U.S. embassy in Tehran.
05:34:29.400So he endorsed it. So he's saying that given that that that's the precedent that we have, that we don't have to wait for like we the people could decide things ourselves.
05:34:39.400And he's saying that because they're trying to use much as a way to say, like, guys, just just wait for the command of your supreme leader.
05:34:48.400leader this guy is saying like no we don't have to just like before we invaded we basically captured
05:34:54.960the embassy in 1979 without waiting for the order of the supreme leader here we the people could
05:35:02.640also we also have the power we the we deported like the durka durka people not all the people
05:35:07.760this is so interesting this is so interesting guys you were learning this is a very edgy learning
05:35:14.080like learning moment for you guys to see how these people's minds operate and this is also
05:35:19.520yeah oh sorry please continue this is i i interrupted this is also what this is also a
05:35:25.440shift from the of power from the supreme leadership towards the durka durka people
05:35:31.120like it's not like it's not the supreme leader commanding the people the the the pro regime
05:35:35.520people now the pro regime people have realized that with ali khamini dead they could decide
05:35:41.760things themselves but yeah go on goldie so uh i think some people were probably maybe tuning out
05:35:48.720a little bit um well no no but let me just explain because uh as soon as you started on your rant
05:35:57.040uh everyone all of a sudden woke up and they're like oh my god it's armin power hour armin rant
05:36:01.920time so everyone's really excited and now we're getting a few requests from people uh because
05:36:07.680they're like we didn't catch all of the contacts so they're asking if you can go back to the
05:36:12.080beginning of the video and start translating from the beginning because now that you started like
05:36:18.880you know going on the rant everyone woke up because when i was speaking apparently when i
05:36:22.960speak everyone tunes out and falls asleep no of course you guys all exposed yourselves yeah
05:36:29.840everyone you guys exposed yourselves now i know when i speak you don't pay attention but when
05:36:35.120ominous you guys pay attention good to know no not true not sure at all good to know
05:36:47.360okay somebody's asking where is this this is inside iran this is at okay let me give you the
05:36:53.040context this is a video from inside iran early in the morning when it was announced that uh
05:37:30.240If you had the pro-regime, let's say the regime supporters are 5%, Ali Khamenei for many years, for multiple decades, has used the regime supporters to want the maximum.
05:37:44.340But every time he trained them as these wild dogs that only he had the leash to, as these aggressive wild dogs that want everything, the destruction of America, Israel, the complete enforcement of Islamic laws.
05:38:00.240And every time they failed, he would blame it on the reformers, and the reformers knew that they were the useful scapegoat of Ali Khamenei, so they went with it.
05:38:12.260And every time Ali Khamenei wanted to capitulate or retreat, he would pull the leash on the regime supporters by telling them why this is necessary or by telling them how this is the fault of some other people like Rouhani or Zarif or Khatami.
05:38:29.800But now with Ali Khamenei dead, Mujtaba Khamenei is supposed to fill that role, but he might be dead as well, or in a coma, he's not showing up.
05:38:39.600But even if he was, because he doesn't speak as well as his father, and he doesn't have the charisma, and he doesn't have the level of loyalty among the pro-regime people, he wouldn't be as effective as his father.
05:38:52.060So this is why here, look at here, state media and the maddas, the religious vocalist, who used to be the tool of Ali Khamenei to spread his message to his followers and basically tell them what the correct narrative is.
05:39:07.520Now that Ali Khamenei is dead and Mustafa Khamenei is not effective, the new supreme leader is the state media and also the maddas, the religious vocalists, because they used to be the tool, they used to be the leash that Ali Khamenei would use to pull to make these people calm down whenever they don't reach the objectives that was communicated to them that they were supposed to reach.
05:39:30.300But now that the leash has become the new supreme leader.
05:39:33.340So Mujtab al-Khamenei is not the new supreme leader.
05:39:35.580The state media that is the voice of the regime supporters,
05:39:38.820the regime supporters without Ali Khamenei basically telling them to chill the F out,
05:39:44.420the regime supporters are now in charge and the state media is their voice.
05:39:50.060So now when the state, so now when if you want to,
05:39:55.120by the way, the state media is still using Mujtab al-Khamenei as a dead puppet
05:39:59.820in a way that every time they need to make these people chill the F out,
05:40:03.500they're going to say Mushtaba Khamenei said so. And they just put words in Mushtaba Khamenei's mouth.
05:40:08.380That's why we saw, here, that's why we saw, if you go over here, if I could find this.
05:40:18.300Yeah, that's why we saw the state TV saying that it was Mushtaba Khamenei's order to do the ceasefire.
05:40:25.020okay but a lot of people are some people are not buying it or some people are saying much some
05:40:31.660people are buying it some people are saying much never said so and some people don't think they
05:40:37.020don't think much table is as significant as his father but you can see that president trump's
05:40:42.140grenade in causing division amongst the islamic republic supporter has been working so as soon as
05:40:47.340the ceasefire started people started chanting magma which means death to the compromisers
05:40:54.140meaning whoever within the islamic republic is responsible for the ceasefire taking place
05:40:58.620is the compromiser because the reason is that ali khamine fed like made these people addicted
05:41:03.660to victory narratives and gave them the impression that the islamic republic is very strong and that
05:41:08.780they can defeat america and israel and that they are so much more powerful than them and these
05:41:15.340people think that this is why these people were continue in continuation of the strategy to keep
05:41:23.020I think these people supporting the Islamic Republic throughout this war, the Islamic
05:41:30.160Republic followers have been told that everything is going in the favor of the Islamic Republic
05:41:35.580and the Americans and Israelis are losing and the Islamic Republic is winning.
05:41:39.360This is not because the Islamic Republic is retarded.
05:41:42.080This is because the followers of the Islamic Republic have been made to be retarded because
05:41:46.040they are useful idiots of the Islamic Republic.
05:41:48.500But the Islamic Republic knows that in order to survive, it needed to give these people
05:41:53.260victory narratives or else they will stop supporting the Islamic Republic because that's
05:41:58.100the image of the Islamic Republic that they have fell in love with, the strong Islamic
05:48:29.100And he's doing that by giving us the story of the capture of the United States embassy in Tehran in 1979.
05:48:40.700So shortly after the success of the Islamic revolution in 1979, the jihadi-minded people, they went and captured the embassy.
05:48:53.020So the important thing that you need to remember from that is that Khomeini didn't order that.
05:48:59.440The first Supreme Leader, Khomeini, he didn't order that.
05:49:03.280The young pro-Islamic regime revolutionaries, they just went and did that themselves.
05:49:11.220And after they captured the embassy and took the American staff hostage, Khomeini came out and endorsed it by calling it the second revolution.
05:49:23.320So the first revolution was basically toppling the Pahlavi dynasty.
05:49:27.200The second revolution was the capturing of the U.S. embassy in Tehran and taking the embassy staff hostage.
05:49:35.900so this person is reminding people here of that story by saying
05:49:42.140like was it imam khomeini that gave the order to capture the embassy
05:49:49.860so somebody's saying no and then he's saying like well good job
05:49:54.700it was the people the people went and took it and then this and then khomeini said this is the
05:50:01.340second revolution so some of the things we need to do it ourselves and then the imam will approve
05:50:14.460it later so so this is very interesting so he's suggesting that in the same way that khomeini
05:50:22.780didn't give the order we don't have to wait for the order of mush table we could do things
05:50:28.220ourselves and once we're successful then he would put the stamp of approval on it just like what
05:50:33.580happened in 1979 so this other person wants to counter and armin i just wanted to say like like
05:50:39.100that's a very good point because like um in the past before the revolution started um i shared a
05:50:43.980bunch of documentaries about the 1979 you know hostage taking um and that's exactly what happened
05:50:50.060so it was it basically started with some mullahs in the universities and the mullahs convinced about
05:50:57.180i don't know 400 university students to go and take the american embassy hostage
05:51:01.820so it was the mullahs corrupting the the young university students they went and they took the
05:51:07.180university hostage and then khomeini basically um like confirmed it and was like yes this is
05:51:13.900like the second revolution now yeah yeah and there's some reports that at first he wasn't
05:51:19.740sure if this is a good idea but once it happened they were like okay let's just say it was a good
05:51:23.820idea and and the students that did it they were a combination of islamists and communists and
05:51:29.340there were a lot of a lot of like mek of university students involved as well in the american hostage
05:51:35.580taking so it was a combination of the jihadis and the communists yeah and goldie the reason i mean
05:51:42.540you already know this but i'm saying it's the reason why khomeini was hesitant to capture the
05:51:47.740embassy but then when it happened he approved it was because he considered the americans to be
05:51:55.180carter to be on his side like he understood that his success of his revolution was done because he
05:52:02.220had carter's blessing so he didn't want to upset the americans because he because they're like well
05:52:09.020we wouldn't we wouldn't have been successful it would add their blessing right so that's why
05:52:13.420Khomeini was hesitant, but then when it happened, he just went on full anti-American effort.
05:52:21.260Anyway, guys, if anyone doesn't believe this, you can look it up. Jimmy Carter actually met
05:52:29.820secretly with Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic regime, several times before the 1979 Islamic coup
05:52:39.740d'etat happened. So Jimmy Carter and his team were secretly meeting with this evil demon man,
05:52:47.360this pedophile. And for some insane messed up reason, Jimmy Carter and the Democrats thought
05:52:54.280that this man would be more reasonable than the Shah of Iran. Remember, the Shah of Iran was a
05:52:59.640huge ally of the United States. But Jimmy Carter was secretly meeting with the Ayatollah. And
05:53:06.740And Jimmy Carter thought that, you know, the Ayatollah is going to be better for American
05:53:11.920interests and therefore backed the Ayatollah and told the Shah that he needs to stand down.
05:53:19.180So thank you, Jimmy Carter and the Democrats.