The Ben Mulroney Show - Could the conflict of Iran be the Ayatollah's last fight?

Episode Date: June 17, 2025

Guests and Topics: - Goldie Ghamari, former PC MPP with family in Iran -General Rick Hillier - Toronto Star reporter Allan Woods If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Thank you so much for joining us on Tuesday. And the war in the Middle East has taken on a new shape. It has morphed into something different. And I think to the betterment of the world, despite the violence that is going on, despite the carnage, despite the death, the net result is of benefit in a number of ways. One, it is laying bare the hypocrisy of those who attack Israel. It is showing that it does not matter what Israel does.

They are always in the wrong. It does not matter what Israel does. They are always in the wrong. It does not matter the behavior of a Jew. It is wrong. And we are seeing that play out in real time. So it's a definitely a weakening of every paper tiger that the pro HamHamas people have been putting forth for months. And also, it's a net result of making sure that Iran does not ever come into possession of a nuclear weapon, at least not the Iran that we know today. Because make no mistake, the people of Iran had been held hostage for about 46 years by the religious zealots that took over

during the Iranian Revolution of 1979. And since then, what was once a secular nation is has been under the heel of the Ayatollahs. And so there is the possibility that one day that There is the possibility that one day that country could return and return to be a positive force in the world. But until that day, we are at war with them. And I say we, I say we who support Israel's right to exist and we who do not believe that people who chant death to America, death to Jews, death to Israel, death to the West, should have a weapon of mass destruction.

Call me crazy, I know it's a hot take, but I don't think that they should be responsible to, you know, for a carpool, let alone a nuclear weapon. So that's my take. Here's what Donald Trump had to say about why he doesn't think there should be nuclear weapons in Iran. Do you want to see regime change in Iran?

I want to see no nuclear weapon in Iran and we're well on our way to making sure that happens. Now I want to give you some context because by and large the, the campaign by Israel to attack the military industrial complex of Iran, the greatest sponsor of terrorism in the world, the campaign to decapitate their ability to prosecute any form of terrorism or war has been going very well. Let's listen to some of the audio

of some of the bombs going off. And they're going for military targets. I mean there are some civilians who are caught in the crossfire, but it is very clear from the images that we are seeing that they are not targeting civilians, unlike what Iran is doing, targeting people in downtown Tel Aviv. They are they're making up these ludicrous claims that they are hiding fighter jets underneath these apartment complexes, which is why they are being bombed with impunity. It's nonsense. It's lies. And if you believe it, you're an idiot. You're a friggin idiot. And I have no time for you. Donald Trump, Donald Trump did not want Israel to do what they're doing

right now. He warned against it. But when they did it, he decided to get on the right side of history. Not that he was, he didn't want Israel to defend itself, but he's now taking a leadership role here. And he is sort of rewriting history in real time. Iran should have signed the deal I told them to sign. What a shame and waste of human life. Simply stated, Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. I said it over and over again.

Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran. So he's implying that that this is happening because he made it so. That is not the case. Although he did give them 60 days to to get back to the table to sign a nuclear deal, and they didn't. And this started on day 61. And I want to play a little bit of Donald Trump, not Donald Trump, I'll give you another example of the chaos that is being sown in Iran right now. There's video and I want to give you context because it is not in English, but there is a woman, and I want to give you context because it is not in English, but there is a woman newscaster on the state run Iranian news channel who is stating that nothing is going to happen to the people of Tehran. Pay no attention to what the disinformation coming your way with the and I believe her last line is something to the effect of, with the protection of Allah, no missile shall hurt us.

And she says that, and about two or three seconds later, the studio is promptly bombed by Israel, and you can see her fleeing the set. Let's listen to this. Yeah, Allah might have been trying to tell you something there. Just yeah, there you go. I'm sure that fatwa is coming my way anytime now. All right. Here's Naftali Bennett, the former Israeli prime minister, who by the way, has been an

incredible de facto spokesperson for the Israeli position explaining as if it I mean, it's a sad state of affairs that it requires explaining It requires justification, but here's Naftali Bennett explaining why this conflict is necessary The Israeli people are strong We understand that this is just something we have to go through in order to remove this existential threat Look, we have no issue with Iran. If Iran would stop wanting to destroy Israel, you know, its leader says we're going to destroy Israel, they develop nuclear arms, they develop ballistic missiles, they stop all of this, we can have peace, we can have quiet.

But unless they do that, we have to act and this was more than the last moment. It's beyond the last moment. I mean, at this time, it's becoming fairly difficult to take out the entire nuclear program because they've already spread it across multiple locations. Look, when you have a neighbor who consistently says that there will be no peace if there is a single Jew living in the Middle East. And they have as their stated goal to eradicate the state of Israel from the map.

And they have taken active steps to fund organizations like Hezbollah, like the Houthis, like Hamas, who also have the stated goal of killing as many Jews as they can. And then you find out that they are on the precipice of obtaining a nuclear weapon. If that were Canada, we have the privilege of not living there. But if that were happening on our doorstep, first of all, we don't have the money or the military to take care of it,

but we would hope to God the Americans would do it for us. And sure as Shinola, they would. They would take care of it right quick. And they would be just and they would be right for doing it. But for some reason, the antisemitism runs so deep in certain types of people they They find a way to turn Israel into the bad guy here And and and more and more people I believe are seeing the hypocrisy and the racism and the anti-Semitism

For what it is But you know there are personal stories that are coming out of this as well. Remember what I said off of the top that the Iranian people have been held hostage. Well here is Goldie Gamari, he's a former a PC member of provincial Parliament in Ontario, telling one of my colleagues at 640 Toronto about a message that he got from someone in Iran. I have been receiving countless messages from people inside the country. I want to share one with you if you don't mind.

So this is what this person wrote. I posted it on my Twitter feed as well. I'm an Iranian from inside Iran. Long live the Shah King of Zapata. With heartfelt gratitude, the people of Iran think Israel. For 46 years, we Iranians have been held captive by a corrupt Islamic ideology that has oppressed us. Now, with the support of you, our dear Israeli friends, we may finally rise from the ground that has crushed us for so long and stand alongside

you to fight this destructive ideology. We must admit that we are far weaker against this regime as their forces are deployed in our streets, preventing us from gathering. We are ashamed that our country, Iran, is no longer in the hands of Iranians and has caused insecurity for you, our longstanding friends. Yet, we firmly believe that light will triumph over darkness. May God protect you and all the people of the world. Iranians love Israel. And so does Ben Mulrooney.

Welcome back to the Ben Mulrooney show. Military procurement and the state of the Canadian military has been top of mind for a number of people for a very long time. Hasn't been top of mind for the Liberal government until about six weeks ago. But it's been top of mind for a lot of people. The sorry state of our proud armed forces has been something that needed to be addressed. It is being addressed now. But how we address it moving forward, the devil is in the details. There is news that the European Union says that Canada is likely to sign a defense procurement agreement with the continent when Prime Minister Mark Carney goes to Brussels later this month. I don't know what that means so I'm gonna talk to somebody who knows so please

welcome to the show General Rick Hillier. General, thank you for your service and thank you for your time. And thank you, glad to be on the show. So decoupling ourselves from the United States in a lot of ways is probably important for us as a nation. You know, being able to explore different trade negotiations and different, you know, being less dependent on them is probably a very good thing for this country. So no reason why we shouldn't explore being less dependent on them from a military procurement, from the military procurement angle as well. But what does, what does it mean to sign a defense procurement agreement with the European Union? Well, Ben, first of all, I would say we're never

going to decouple ourselves from the United States of America. And I think that would be disastrous if we did. We are bound by geography and birth if you will in this North American continent and we are going to be proud of our relationship with the Americans which we have to figure out going forward. However at the same time nothing wrong with diversifying as we've talked about many many times diversifying into Europe diversifying across provinces in Canada and doing all those things. I think what it does is an agreement with the EU and I think it's very positive, I'm very optimistic on it with a couple of little sort of, you know, concerns, not concerns

but things I'd watched very carefully. I think it just gives us opportunity to first of all supply European countries as they rebuild to be part of European companies that are helping the Europe defense forces rebuild. That's good for Canada, good for Canadian business. Maybe we could be engaged and I believe we will as a consequence of this in the development of future systems

that will make us more secure and more capable. And that's a very, very good thing here. And this is not new to us. I mean, just look at the new transport airplane we just bought based on the 8 Airbus 330. We just bought nine of those that's from Europe. We have our search and rescue helicopters we bought in Europe. Those are big purchases. Parts of our new surface combatants are being provided by DCNS and other companies from Europe and now we get an opportunity to participate in Europe's rearming and be part of that, you know,

total of over a trillion dollars spent in the next five years. So great opportunity, good diversification. I just have a couple of small concerns. So this doesn't tie our hands and force us to buy military equipment from the EU, specifically over buying it from anywhere else? Not at all.

I think what it does is just ensures that we will have free access or freer access to the European market and European companies equally will have opportunity to compete on a fair basis here in Canada for the kinds of capabilities that we need. And we will have more joint capabilities with more of our NATO allies, particularly important. For example, for the defense of the Arctic where other countries, including the United Kingdom and Sweden are part of the joint expeditionary force,

the kind of land vehicles you need. We need in Canada to replace the old tired beaten up BV 206s, which we bought back in the 80s. That kind of thing will now give us more capability, more common capability, and that's a good thing when you're operating together with friends and allies, and we will be operating with them. Well, I'm glad you brought up the Arctic general because just yesterday in the newspaper, there

was a piece about the ballooning cost of our F-35s that we bought. It's gone over the originally budgeted number by about 50%. And so there's this argument that some are putting forth that maybe what we should do is recognize that this is way too expensive and it's not necessarily a piece of equipment that we need right now. And instead of putting all of our money into F-35s where we're still going to have to train pilots, our pilots aren't even trained on these things, maybe we should be focused on building up

a very robust network of drones that we could use to patrol the Arctic and secure our border. What do you say about something like that? I don't think then that we have any choice. The only, you know, fifth generation stealth type fighter airplane in the world is that the F-35. If we're going to operate with the Americans across the Arctic, and we are, and they are going to be flying the F-35 and are visible on the radar screens for a large part of their approach to let's say Russian aircraft, etc. or anything else from that matter. And we show up there with aircraft or drones that are not invisible and they're not going to want us there. We're going to be isolated from it from that perspective. All of our allies in Europe are gone or going to the F-35. I was just in the Netherlands in May and talking to the Wing Commander

and Squadron Commander in the Air Base at Leeward, they had just finished converting to the F-35. We have, I believe, fundamentally a need to have that airplane as part of the Alliance, as part of our defense of the North. But that doesn't mean, and that's why the increased investment is necessary, that we are not gonna need be those you know ultra long endurance drones

those things to compliment satellite coverage to give specific focus we're going to need that also and that's why that significant increase in defense procurement uh... has been out to my mind we're going to need all of those things not just one piece of it and you can't abandon one aspect of a defense triangle or stool and expect that stool to be stable on two legs. But generally, you know, what I'm realizing is I see these costs balloon, that it has

so much less to do with what we budget and rather much more to do with what we get for that budget. And it doesn't matter if we say we're gonna hit 2% of our GDP for defense spending. It doesn't matter if we say it's 2%, what are we spending the 2% on? And if we have an inefficient system with waste and redundancy and a willingness to put up with cost overruns,

we could very easily hit 2%. It's just not going to amount to a fighting force worthy of the people who want to sacrifice for this country. I agree 100% Ben and there's one thing that our procurement system cannot be described of as being and that's efficient and getting the best deal for the best price. It's happened, I mean, look, we've been 15 years trying to procure the F-35 or the right fighter, which is the F-35. And during that 15 years, we have spent billions of dollars and nary an airplane to be seen.

We've got to get really astute. Here's one thing I would suggest to our prime minister, two things right away, suggest to our prime minister. Number one is put a two year clock on procurement. from the time we sent out the first request for interest the RF eyes that say hey we're looking for a capability like this from that until contract is signed two years put that put that one that we would rebel revolutionize defense procurement just by doing that the second thing I'll tell you this and a lot of people won't like this I'll say it anyway, we are not going to be able to change that procurement system

and do what's right and spend the money that's being allocated by government with the present public service of Canada leadership. See that's what I was going to ask you. If something as simple as putting a clock on things would change things for the better, what, what, where's the friction point in the system preventing that to happen? You're saying it's the public service? Why? Well, no, what I'm saying is that we have become over the past decade, a completely risk adverse public service, senior leadership, not wanting to take any risks, not wanting to wear any blame, and certainly not being encouraged in that, but elected officials that now as to change if we're going to spend this money we're going to spend 10

billion extra dollars in defense and security in the next 285 days who thinks we can do it's probably yeah get some leadership I knew to the Privy Council but you got to do that with deputy ministers, with associate deputy ministers, and ADMs and DGs also. You've got to change the leadership to change the General. Listen, we're going to leave it there. I want to thank you for joining us. I wish we'd had time to talk about Israel's offensive in Iran, but we will get to that another time. I would love your opinion, your insights on that. That was General Rick Hillier. All right, when we come back,

we're gonna be talking about the role of the Ayatollah in Iran and how this could be the end of days for that person. Don't go anywhere, this is the Ben Mulroney Show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. A lot of people are boning up on their knowledge of Iran today. They've always known that it existed. They've always known that it was probably

a bad actor, but beyond that they didn't know too too much about it. And we are learning about the role of the Ayatollah in the supreme leader, supreme religious leader of that country, and the role that he has played over the years in the regime and how right now we could be seeing the end days, end of days for the Ayatollah, but could we be running the risk of replacing one bad actor with an even worse one? So here to discuss this is a Toronto Star based reporter,

Alan Woods, who wrote a piece about why the fight, why this fight with Israel could be the Ayatollah's last. Alan Woods joins us. Alan, thank you so much for joining us. Good to be here, Ben. Thanks for having me. So a lot of people who are unaware, or are not steeped in knowledge of Iran, know that it is a religious

autocracy. Who is the Ayatollah? What is his role in that government? He's the supreme religious leader of the Shiite theocracy, which is Iran. And since 1979, it's been an Islamic regime. So before that it was a kingdom ruled by the Shah, and after that it's been ruled by Ayatollah's men, two of them, and the one we have right now Ali Khamenei is second. He's been around since 1989 and he is, he makes the calls, right? I mean there's a president and there's a parliament, but he's the one who really makes the decision. Yeah. Yeah. The buck stops with him. Exactly.

He's the one whose pictures are in all the schools, for example. Precisely. Yes. And so, you know, as we're getting to a place now where realistically we can have a conversation about, you know, what could happen in an Iran where the religious theocracy has been overturned. And so I guess the question that some people have is, are we going to be better off in a world without the Ayatollah or could we see something worse take its place? Let's hear from someone, Lindsey Graham, Senator Lindsey Graham of the United States, about what he thinks of the lay of the land. Be all in, President Trump, in helping Israel eliminate the nuclear threat. If we need to provide bombs to Israel, provide bombs.

If we need to fly planes with Israel, do joint operations. But here's the bigger question. Wouldn't the world be better off if the ayatollahs went away and replaced by something better? Wouldn't Iran be better off? Tom Cotton is coming on. He made a great observation. The endless war is Iran. Since 1979, they've been attacking the entire region, chanting death to America, death to

Israel since they're very founding. It's time to close the chapter on the Iranian Ayatollah and his henchmen. Let's close that chapter soon and start a new chapter in the Mideast, one of tolerance, hope and peace. Listen, I want to live in that world, Alan, but you know, experience has shown us that sometimes even our best efforts to replace a bad actor with a good one don't go according to plan. Yeah, there's all sorts of risks. Certainly, no one is arguing that the Atoll is a force for good in the Middle East or a force for good in the world.

I mean, Iran is providing Russia with drones to attack Ukraine. I mean, there's all sorts of reasons to be against Iran and the Islamic regime. And certainly, there's a large portion of the population who would love to see the Supreme Leader gone as well. But there are all sorts of precedents that suggest that, you know, there could be trouble. It's almost, they feel the vacuum. The ideal situation probably is something like in Syria where it's a domestic opposition, a rebel group has come in, forced the ruler from power, and there's been sort of this peaceful, almost peaceful transition to something like a democracy and that's what we hope for in Syria.

But there's also, you know, for every situation like that, there's situations like Iraq where you've got, you know, chaos and civil war and violence and terrorism and and situations like Libya, where there's actually two governments and they're fighting against each other and there's been no resolution to that conflict in years. So, you know, you got to be careful what you wish for. Yeah, well, that's it is. But how much credence do you give to the argument that, yes, listen, the Shah was certainly was not perfect. And a lot of that behavior led to the reaction that was the Iranian revolution. But by and large, it was a secular country,

seemingly a good neighbor, one that projected tolerance to the world. And so fundamentally you have that bubbling under the surface, right? The regime, a lot of people viewed as a, the regime of the Ayatollahs has been holding those people and that culture hostage and once liberated, that culture will be able to take root again,

take control and possibly not go back to the days of the Shah but possibly with the Shah as a figurehead of be the foundation for a democracy in the region is that naive I mean I'm not sure that there's any country that wants to go back to having a king, I think they'd like to have, you know, representative democracy. I mean, we ask Iranians, you know, in Canada, around the world, and even in, you know, Muslim in Iran, they'd like to choose their leaders. Yeah.

Choose their own policies. But he's been, but the Shah has been, who's been in exile, that's the son of the last living Shah, he is sort of the de facto face of the opposition and possibly a future liberated Iran, which people like myself hope translates to a democratic Iran. But my point is there could be a role for the Shah to play in either a transition or the erection

of a democratic Iran. So there could be, but installing anyone after a regime has fallen or tumbled or been ousted or been overthrown is probably a perilous, a bit of a gamble. But yeah, yeah, sure, there's all sorts of possibilities for a post-Ayatollah Iran, but I think we're not there yet.

No. Far from it. Even the reports are that Israel had every intention of going straight after Ayatollah Khomeini and that Donald Trump vetoed that saying that there was no Americans who had been affected or killed or attacked. And so he's not going to he's not going to authorize such a an operation. But does he have the ability to know if he has the ability to tell Israel not to do that? I mean, I'm pretty sure that he told them not to not to attack in the first place. And they did so. You know, he said he

vetoed it. But I don't know that he necessarily has an undisclosed veto on what they do. Yeah. I mean, listen, I, I, I'm the last one to claim that I know what's in what's said between Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu. You probably have a better idea than I do of what happened at those levels. But, you know, the fact is that America supplies military weaponry to Israel. Israel is dependent upon those military supplies. And so if those dry up, all of a sudden, various enemies and adversaries of Israel are licking their lips in the Middle East. So it's not wise probably to cross Washington into Israel. Well, you know, to those who look at the possibility of the complete

dismantling of the Iranian regime as too great a risk, I say to them, well, that's a risk for tomorrow. That's a worry for tomorrow. But the inevitable risk that we run today by doing nothing is that they will obtain nuclear nuclear capability. And I don't trust them not to launch at the on anyone at the first available opportunity. It's just that to me is the immediate risk, how we deal with it after that's a problem for tomorrow. Yeah, I mean, there's that argument that there was a deal in place, uh, you know, 10 years ago signed by, uh, Obama and, uh, and all the UN Security Council countries that,

uh, that did put limits in verification and inspection on, on Israel's nuclear, um, regime or program. Uh, and they were Donald Trump who three years later in 2018 came out came around and ripped it up. And now there's no there's no inspection. No, no, no guardrails. Hey, we're gonna have to we're gonna have to leave it there, my friend. But thank you very much. It's a great, great piece of reporting in the Toronto Star. We really appreciate it. W Network and Stack TV invite you to enter for a chance to win the ultimate fan experience.

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