School of War - Ep 205: Mark Dubowitz on Israel’s Unfolding Campaign in Iran

Episode Date: June 13, 2025

Mark Dubowitz, CEO of FDD, joins the show to breakdown last night’s spectacular Israeli strikes against the Iranian Regime and its nuclear program, and what comes next. ▪️ Times      •      02:00 Deception     •      06:00 Targets        •      09:00 The Scientists       •      11:00 Complacency     •      14:00 Israeli goals           •      19:00 Regime change     •      23:00 Strikes and talks           •      29:00 Drones     •      31:00 Counterpunch?          Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

It was a busy night in Iran. We've got Mark Dubowitz joining the show to explain what just happened and what might happen next. Let's get into it. It is a perspective for war. This Milwaukee invasion of the way. December 7, 1941, a date which will live in him. A bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a state. We continue to face the great situation in Iran.

We're a fight on the beaches. There's no sight on the landing ground. for more follow School of War on YouTube, Instagram, Substack, and Twitter. And feel free to follow me on Twitter at Aaron B. McLean. Hi, I'm Aaron McLean. Thanks for joining School of War. Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Mark, we were just talking yesterday afternoon. We spent an hour recording an episode on what might happen in the lead-up to talks on Sunday between the U.S. United States and Iran and tensions between Israel and Iran and prospects for an attack.

And, you know, the Israeli Air Force and Defense Force has achieved a lot over the night, but I have to say from School of Wars perspective, it's a little inconvenient because here we are, back again, to unpack what actually just went down. Let me start with this question. What do you think is the significance that the strikes, the Israelis just launched across Iran, targeting the nuclear program, other targets, and we can get into all that, that they didn't wait until talks on Sunday that the Americans were going to conduct with the Iranians. Well, I think the most remarkable thing to me was just that this was an incredible

deception operation, not just by the Israelis, but even more remarkably by President Trump himself. I mean, I think President Trump had been speaking all week about the need to begin another round of negotiations. There was talk about a sixth round in Oman. He was talking about the importance of getting non-essential personnel out of the region, just in case something were to transpire. But he's sort of talking down the military threat. He was sort of intimating that this was not the time for it. He was saying that we're very close to a deal with Iran when, of course, the U.S. negotiators were very far apart from the Iranian negotiators. But it's just an interesting deception operation. So I think for many people, the assumption was there were going to be no

Israeli strikes because the president had flashed the red light. Or if they were going to be strikes, they would take place next week after the sixth round of negotiations in Oman. So it seemed like President Trump was actually in on the joke, as they say, and really in on the deception operation. And I think they literally and figuratively caught the Iranians in their beds. And when the Israelis began to strike, they were able to go after hundreds of targets and including taking out very, very high value targets who were home in. bed asleep. I suppose that's one interpretation of the events of the last 24 hours or several days.

You know, what would you say to the interpretation that the reality may be more complex, that there were people in the United States who actually actively did not want this strike to happen, that it became obvious that it was kind of going to happen one way or the other, and now ex post facto, we are boarding the train. Like one contrary piece of evidence I would offer is the only, until the president actually made some statements, I guess, very early. early in the morning, which are now public in which we can get into. Like the only statement the U.S. government released last night came from the Department

of State. And I will just describe its tone with regard to the Israeli strikes as restrained, highly restrained. What's your interpretation of things like that? My understanding actually is that there was very tight coordination between the U.S. and Israeli militaries between Sancom and the IDF and that the statement from Secretary Rubio, which was one of caution or restraint, as you say, was an. attempt to, at least in the minds of the Iranians, try to separate the United States from Israel. I mean, there was a story that went out actually right before the strike by Barack Ravid from Axis,

who's, you know, very good sources, which was essentially saying that if there was any Israeli strike, the United States would play no offensive role in that strike. But the story made clear that the United States was obviously there to coordinate with Israel on the retaliation and to help the Israelis defeat. any retaliatory strikes by Iran using drones or missiles. And that's in fact, that's indeed exactly what happens. So my sense is that there was quite tight coordination. And the president Trump was, as I said, in on this deception campaign.

Now there may have been others in the administration who had no interest in the Israelis going and who may have been, you know, leaking on the Israelis or providing sort of trying to be very unhelpful as this operation unfolded. But I think the president was there. And I think he was really very much part of this very impressive deception operation, never mind the actual kinetic operation, which I'm sure we're going to talk about. Well, let's get into that. What actually got hit last night, Mark? Well, there were waves of attacks. There were hundreds of targets, nuclear defense, going after military personnel, scientists. They went after Iran's most significant enrichment facility called in a TANZ.

I think that was a very successful operation. they seemed to have destroyed Natanz. They went after senior leadership. They took out the senior IRGC commander. They took out the Army Chief of Staff. They took out the IRGC Aerospace Commander. And what was most interesting to me, actually, beyond taking out the top leadership

and really what was an impressive decapitation campaign, is they went after the nuclear weapon sciences. This was something that I've always been focused on as a really essential element of any kind of operation. Because where Iran has been is they've got enough enriched material for multiple bombs worth. They've got the missiles to deliver it. But they hadn't yet started to or they hadn't completed the warhead, that third essential element of that nuclear triad that I've described. And they've gone after the scientists.

It seems to me, based on reporting, that there were 13 nuclear scientists on their list. And they seem to have at least now confirmed the deaths of eight of them, including three of the top nuclear weapons scientists, the people that were actually in charge of this program. So that seems to have been a significant achievement. They also seem to have gone after the ballistic missile production capability and the inventories and some really interesting and massive whole operations that Mossad has been running on the ground. But by and large, I think it seems like this is only just beginning, that they're going to be multiple phases over multiple days, and we still have a lot to learn.

and the IAF, Israeli Air Force, and Mossade, still have a lot to do. So I want to get into what the wide range of target types seems to imply about the strategic goals of the operation. But before we get to that, let's stick with the targeting of the nuclear program itself and of the scientists. I was listening to the BBC for a moment this morning for my sins. And I heard a very concerned European commentator say, well, you know, this really is just going to increase the or accelerate.

the pace that the Iranians are going to go after the bomb and you can destroy all this equipment, but at the end of the day, you can't destroy the intellectual capacity to build the bomb. And I thought to myself, well, actually, I think some of that intellectual capacity just died. And I don't know how many people in Iran actually not only sort of understand basic weapons, science, and nuclear physics, but actually have the knowledge to the degree that they can help run programs to that effect. I imagine it's not an enormous number. Yeah, I mean, we had identified about 24 nuclear weapons scientists, of which 13 were really the most serious, the people that really have the technology expertise to run a nuclear warhead program. And obviously that there were three or four of the most experienced, the sort of Robert Oppenheimer's of the Iranian nuclear weapons program.

And I think the Israelis seem to pare that list down to 13 and taken out eight, and have taken out the top three. So so far, at least the battle damage assessment that I've seen has been quite impressive. And the sort of idea that you can't kill an idea, which seems to be the familiar refrain every time there's an successful Israeli operation, whether in Lebanon, in Gaza or inside Iran, I think you're right. In this case, you can certainly kill technical competence, particularly at that high level. Imagine if the Nazis had taken out Oppenheimer and these three top physicists during the Manhattan Project, That would have been a significant setback for our efforts during World War II.

Yeah, and indeed the first videos I saw last night as stuff started to roll in from Iran were images of burning residences and apartments that had been struck, which struck me as kind of a page out of the Lebanon or counter-Hesbullah playbook for Israel where individuals in the Hezbollah Chanic Command were targeted frequently where they lived or where they were meeting. Also, of course, you know, the Israelis went after what the head of Hamas. where he was at least staying in Iran. I guess the thing that struck me the most about that

beyond sort of the ruthlessness of it was that, you know, in the United States, we started telegraphing that this attack was coming on Wednesday afternoon. The fact that on Thursday night, a bunch of these guys apparently went to bed in their own beds struck me as kind of crazy. And speaks to, again, you know,

sort of the endless human capacity for complacency that you see these warning lights fly. flashing and yet make yourself vulnerable. And also the sort of constant underestimation of Israeli ruthlessness. Well, it is that. And so I think it also speaks to this deception campaign that I think the Israelis ran that was very, very effective. I mean, you know, I've got pretty good sources inside the Israeli government,

much better sources than the Iranians have. And I certainly didn't think that a military operation was in progress. I didn't think it was coming. And I thought if it was coming, would certainly wait until next week after this sixth round of negotiations in Oman. So I think that operation deceived everybody, including the Iranians, who decided to go to bed at night, thinking that at the very worst, they would have to contend with this next week, might as well get a few hours of Shadai, and then as you say, the Israelis hit

them in their bed. I think that also speaks to really the incredible intelligence dominance that Israel has over Iran. I mean, the ability to actually locate these people in their homes. You know, you can see these pictures. they went after, you know, condos, penthouses, where they just literally hit the apartment and left everything else standing. I also think it speaks to the fact that the Israelis benefit from having Iranian agents on the ground. Because millions of Iranians despise this regime,

there is a large pool of potential agents that Mossad can recruit from. And they seem to have done so very successfully, which is why they have penetrated the highest echelons of the, the nuclear defense and security establishment inside Iran. So, again, really speaks to what has been a constant theme of our work at FDD and the work of others, is that millions of Iranians despise this regime, all the more reason why to support these people, all the more reason now, after decapitating a key part of the leadership, if we support these Iranians, I think there's a real interesting opportunity that we may want to take advantage of, which is can Iranians bring down their own regime now at this moment

of regime weakness. So that's a natural transition to the next subject I wanted to cover, which is what does the range of targets suggest about Israeli goals? You've been telling me, I think, for at least a year now, that the Israelis had set as their objective the end of the current regime in Iran. And there is some tension, I think, between that and between American policy in the region. The target set last night certainly gives evidence that that's what they're after. Not to say that the name of the operation, which is Operation Rising Lion, right, which appears to have

some regime significance that's not particularly subtle, and maybe you can explain that. But, you know, this was not a strike solely targeted at the nuclear program. A number of very senior regime figures were killed. Others, it seems, were targeted, but not killed, but the head of the IRGC, the unfortunately named Mr. Salami, among others, are no longer with us. And if you were simply looking to take out the nuclear program, those targets are extraneous. So it seems they're after something else. I think they are.

I mean, I think that there is a clear indication that they not only want to go after the nuclear program, they want to go after the most senior military and security officials. Now, you could say for sure that, you know, that makes sense because what you want to do is eliminate the individuals who would then be in a command position to lead any kind of counteroffensive against you. and I certainly think that's true. But I do think that the Israelis in the past two years have really made weakening, undermining, and ultimately toppling the regime a fundamental pillar of their Iran strategy. So by going after the top leadership, you know, you're certainly doing that.

And we'll see in the ensuing waves of strikes, whether they continue to go after. I mean, I'm sure many of them are now in bunkers underground. And to what extent the Israelis and the subsequent rounds can take out other, high value leaders, we shall see. But I think what follows from this is a lot more emphasis, at least from the Israelis, I wish it was from the Americans, on severe weakening of the regime with a view to creating the conditions where either through decapitation or through supporting Iranians on the streets, you can bring down the Islamic Republic. Yeah, and I'm also struck by which targets haven't been struck, at least as of now. You know, no big economic targets, you know,

no energy targets, which would obviously, I think, piss Americans off, too, piss this administration off if they were going after things that were going to significantly affect, you know, the price energy resources. But also not things that, you know, necessarily would affect the Iranian people at large beyond, obviously, you know, the extent to which security services affect the Iranian people at large, you know, power plants, things like that. I haven't seen any reports of that, which typically in, you know, a campaign in which no holds are being barred, you might expect a run at economic or strategic economic targets like that. And I've not seen any reports to that effect.

Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, I think the Israelis are at least now careful about hitting anything that's going to rally the Iranians around the Islamic Republic flag. You did mention something interesting, which is the name of the Operation Rising Line. I actually think it was chosen deliberately by the Israelis. It's a line from the Bible. It has obviously very important biblical and historical, import for the Jewish people.

But I think ironically, in choosing the rising lion as the name of the operation, I think it actually is a nod to the pre-Islamic Republic flag, which is the flag showing the lion and the sun. And this was the flag before the Islamic Revolution under the Shah historic flag. It really has become the rallying flag for the Iranian opposition against the regime. And I think it's Prime Minister Netanyahu in his initial remarks announcing. the operation, didn't talk about the flag, but he really did talk to the Iranian people and made a really important point of saying, you know, you are not our enemy. Our war is not with you.

Our war is with the repressive regime that brutalizes you. And it sort of reiterates the theme that Netanyahu has been developing over the past couple of years as this coupling regime has become a pillar of their strategies is really talking to the Iranian people and saying that we will have a great relationship, we will have peace, we will have strong economic ties when this hated regime finally ends up in the ash heap of history. I certainly hope the Israelis continue that messaging. I think it's really important because what I see in Iranian social media are Iranians really enthusiastic, really, about what is taking place. They finally see an opportunity to bring down the regime. And I think I've always believed that this was going to be because of

Israeli activity, both military activity and the kind of activity that Mossad is engaged in. Yeah, and you were telling me yesterday, Iran's heading into a long, hot summer with its economy already not in a great place, and social unrest already pretty evident. So time will tell here as to the success of that is really objective. Though I will say, Mark, you make a lot of people nervous in Washington with that talk. A lot of people around the current administration for whom the words regime change are toxic. I was seen a lot of this on X over the course of the night. I saw, and these are, you know, from people who have the ear of different parts of the administration,

that this is now, you know, going to send another generation, quote unquote, generation of Americans to die in the Middle East for a war that isn't theirs, which I thought was, well, I'll just be the most generous I possibly can be and just say it's a bit premature. I can be much less generous and reject all the premises and point out how crazy that is. Yeah. I think the chances of Donald Trump sending large numbers or significant numbers of American troops to the Middle East to fight in any kind of war right now are somewhere between zero and nothing. But what's your take, Mark? Well, I think that's exactly right. I mean, I think the idea that they're going to be 500,000 mechanized U.S. troops invading Iran is ridiculous.

I don't think anyone is contemplating that. And I don't think this president would ever order that. So the phrase regime change, I think, is really a mischaracterization of what the, certainly what the Israeli strategy is and what the Iranian people are thinking about. They're not thinking about U.S. boots on the ground. They're thinking about what are the various things that can be done to weaken and undermine the regime. And ultimately, it's about Iranians themselves. Millions of Iranians have been on the streets since 2009 yelling death to the dictator.

President Biden, President Obama, President Trump, are you with us? Are you with the dictator? Unfortunately, three American presidents have written letters to the Ayatollah to talk about negotiations. But it actually is now taken an Israeli prime minister to finally provide the conditions. for a potential. And again, I'm not one of overstating this. I mean, there is a long way from where we are today to the end of the regime. But I think the fact that Iranians have been on the streets repeatedly since 2009, millions of Iranians, but have been brutally repressed by this very apparatus, the security apparatus that Israel has now gone after suggests that there may be a space where they

can take to the streets and not face the same kind of repressive regime with the same. same capabilities to bring them down. If that's the case, you know, you can weaken, you can undermine the regime. If history smiles on us the way it smiled on Ronald Reagan when he went after the Soviet Union with exactly this strategy, then the regime goes down. If it doesn't go down, but then at the very least, you're leveraging millions of Iranians to weaken, constrain the regime and make sure that Chaminé is spending 80% of his time trying to defend his regime against his own people and not 80% of his

time and resources, trying to figure out ways to attack U.S. troops, attack Israel, and rebuild this access of misery that has been so eviscerated by the Israelis in recent months. I want to come back to the military nature of these strikes in just a minute, but just to stick here at the political diplomatic level for another minute or so. I've got the president's statement that he made just a couple hours ago. It looks like it came at around six in the morning East Coast time here in the U.S. Let me just read it, and then you can help me parse it. I gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal. I told them in the strongest of words to, quote, just do it, end quote. But no matter how hard they tried, no matter how close they got,

they just couldn't get it done. I told them it would be much worse than anything they know, anticipated or were told that the United States makes the best and most lethal military equipment anywhere in the world by far, and that Israel has a lot of it with much more to come and they know how to use it. Certain Iranian hardliners spoke bravely, but they didn't know what was about to happen. They are all dead now, dead in all capitals. And it will only get worse. They're has already been great death and destruction, but there is still time to make this slaughter, with the next already planned attacks being even more brutal, come to an end. Iran must make a deal before there is nothing left, and save what was once known as the Iranian

Empire. No more death, no more destruction. All caps now, just do it before it's too late. God bless you all. I also saw a report that Steve Wickoff still plans to hold talks on Sunday with the Iranians. So this statement suggests what we might have otherwise inferred that Israeli strikes are going to continue. They were continuing into Iranian daylight. I saw, I saw strikes after the sun came up in Iran. Meanwhile, it looks like the Trump administration is going to simultaneously pursue a diplomatic

track. How do you see those things interacting, Mark? Yeah, I know. I found that statement just, just truly remarkable in the sort of history. They always are. They always are. They always are. And there's for presidential statements. That one really will go, we'll go down in the books. Look, I think it speaks to a few things. I mean, it's still a theory, Aaron, and, and, may prove to be completely wrong. But I think that, again, President Trump was sort of in on this, right? As much as the United States may try to create plausible deniability about the extent to which they supported these Israeli offensive strikes. And that may be true from a kinetic point of view in terms of the actual strategic design here. I think there was a strategy. And President Trump

laid it out a few months ago where he said, they're going to be direct talks. I'm putting a 60-day clock on those talks. By way, that expired a couple days ago. And he made it very clear that if those talks were not going to succeed, then there would be another option. And that option, he also made clear over the past few months that that option would result in military force. I think that he's now saying to the Khomeini, I told you, I warned you, I, by the way, I gave you a really good deal at the last round of negotiations. We can talk about what that deal looked like. You should have taken that deal, you rejected that deal. I made it very clear that we were going to dismantle your program peacefully and make sure that you had no enrichment, or we were going to dismantle the program

militarily. And so now I think he's taking the opportunity and he's right to do so to say, all right, I warned you. You thought I was bluffing. I don't bluff. Now why don't you come back to negotiations and let's talk about resolving this peacefully? Otherwise, the Israelis are going to just keep doing what they're doing and we're going to give them the full military backing. I will say one other thing, which I think it's important to talk about what the Israelis haven't hit yet. And I think that's where a U.S. role could be more important. I mean, the one facility that sounds like they haven't hit entirely or they haven't hit even at all is the Fordo nuclear facility. This is a enrichment facility, which is buried deep underground, which has advanced centrifuges,

and would be a facility that they could use to break out to nuclear weapons. it has always been the conventional wisdom that Israel may not have the ordinance to destroy Fordo without American military support. And it may be that if Haminae decides that once again not to come to the table and agree to a reasonable deal, that that's where there will be a U.S. military role is for the U.S. to take its B2 bombers, 30,000 pound massive ordinance penetrators and use those to destroy this Fordo facility. We'll see what has. happens and see what these kind of damage the Israelis can do. But again, that should always be part of the strategy. And I think Fordo is a very key part of the nuclear infrastructure that's still

yet to be fully taken out. Yeah, that's really interesting. And yes, it is obviously very significant that Fordo hasn't been hit yet. I mean, that's one possible Israeli strategic conception, right, is that American support could be forthcoming for that operation under certain circumstances. Another conception could be right that you really need the Iranians to be on the ropes in terms of their ability to respond. You need to have absolute air dominance because if you're going to have people on the ground, you're going to need to protect them. Then that means you're going to need to strike any ground maneuver units coming for them. So that also is another reason why it might not have been a night one affair. I guess there's probably target specific reasons too.

Maybe what's down in those tunnels just can't easily be moved out. So there's really no no threat of it, you know, running away, as it were. Just another possible option. Yeah, I mean, the threat really is in that what I worry about is I don't know if the Israelis were able to take out the enriched material, the hundreds of kilograms of enriched uranium that was stored in tunnels, potentially under Natanz, under Fordo, under Isfahan, the conversion facility. And there was always the risk that the Iranians take that enriched material, get it into an underground

enrichment facility like Fordo, and then can go to 90% enriched uranium. Now, I think they're going to go to 90% in rich uranium. The real question, of course, is once they have that, can they build a crude nuclear device and can they, more importantly or more dangerously build the actual warhead? And that's why it was so important that the top list of priorities was to go after those nuclear scientists who are the ones that are capable of fashioning a nuclear warhead. Because without a nuclear warhead, a crude nuclear device, you know, 90% enriched uranium is not that useful for Iran right now.

So we'll have to see how all this plays out, but I am worried about the Fordo facility, enriched material, some kind of clandestine enrichment facility and breakout taking place, and then the Iranians having some kind of crude nuclear device, and then they call themselves and declare themselves a nuclear power. And all of this has not been for naught, but we certainly have not stopped them from developing that nuclear weapons capability. So more to see, lots more days to come, and we'll see where the Israelis go next. And if the American military gets involved.

And there's another dimension of the strike. I want to make sure we hit before we sign off here, which is in addition to the airstrikes, there appears to have been action on the ground already. This seems we have from the Israelis. In a page taken from the Ukrainian playbook, it seems, or two playbooks developed in parallel to one another, drones were smuggled in to Iran and struck. So launched from Iran and struck targets in Iran. I saw that some of the targets were ballistic missile sites, Iranian ballistic missile sites.

Some of the targets were Iranian anti-air assets. Some of the targets were personalities. Tell us what we should know about this aspect of the operation. Yeah, not to take any credit away from the Ukrainians who have been really brilliant in using this kind of operation. But the Israelis have actually been doing this for years, using drones on Iranian soil to go after the regime targets. I think this operation sounds way more extensive and comprehensive than anything the Israelis have done in the past on Iranian soil. But again, it speaks, one, to the ability to get lethal equipment into Iran, to recruit Iranians, to be involved in these operations, both in terms of the intelligence and the actual kinetic exercises.

And three, to have had that exquisite intelligence about which capabilities to hit, go after ballistic missile sites, go after ballistic missile sites, go after air defense, really take down the mobile air defenses that would be dangerous for Israeli pilots if they're flying over Iranian airspace. So another really impressive Mossad operation speaking to the extent to which Mossad has deeply penetrated, the security establishment is able to seemingly operate at will on Iranian soil and get significant support from the Iranian people who are acting as agents providing key intelligence and key operational capabilities that most side agents may not have on their own. Yeah. The point I keep making here in School of War, we had Fred Kagan on to talk about the June 1

Ukrainian strikes last week, and I made the point, I'll make it again this morning, that if this can be done to the Iranians by the Israelis and they can be done to the Russians by the Ukrainians, it means it can be done to us, presumably by the Chinese, and that's something we all need to keep in mind. Final question, because I know you're a busy guy and you've got a lot on your plate this morning. Do you think the Iranians show up on Sunday to talk to Steve Wickoff? I would be shocked if they do. I've been shocked by many things over the past couple of hours. I think that would be so humiliating for a Khomeini and the regime that they're not likely to show up. But is there possibility they show up at another date? There is a possibility. I mean,

again, it really matters what President Trump says. It matters what the American military posture is. it matters what the Iranians perceived all this to be. Because if they believe that the United States is prepared to join the Israelis in going after Fordo, in taking out the remaining nuclear infrastructure, and in going after leadership assets, then Khomey will understand that his regime is significantly at risk. And if he believes that it's at risk, then the only play he has left is to join those negotiations and try and negotiate his way out of this. Now, we haven't talked about this, and I really don't want to end the episode because I think there is a certain degree of

admiration for what Israel's done, and I don't want to be too exuberant about it. The Iranians still retain lethal capability. And they fired 100 drones at Israel. Thankfully, the Israeli air defenses and Israeli pilots working with U.S. pilots and other coalition pilots were able to shoot them down. but there are still thousands of ballistic missiles in the Iranian arsenal. They can do significant damage to Israel. I don't know if Chaminet is going to be crazy enough to go after our assets in the region and go after using sleeper cells in the United States. That would be the end of his regime.

So he's more likely to focus his firepower on the Israelis. He's also more likely to use his sleeper cells to go after Israeli and Jewish targets around the world. but there's still a counterpunch to come. The Iranians are not going to take this sitting down. And I think there's still a lot of danger to Israel, to Jewish communities around the world. And the Israelis are taking this very seriously. They're not underestimating their enemy.

Certainly a dangerous moment. If there are other inflection points in the days to come, I hope you will come back and help us understand them. Mark Dubowitz, CEO of FD, thank you so much. Thank you, Aaron. This is a nebulous media production. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.