The Daily - Trump Weighs War With Iran

Episode Date: February 24, 2026

The United States has been building up a military presence around Iran for weeks, even as negotiators from both countries plan to meet later this week in hopes of finding a diplomatic solution to the escalating tensions. David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times, explains what President Trump hopes to achieve through potential military action, and why he has chosen this moment. Guest: David E. Sanger, the White House and National Security Correspondent for The New York Times. Background reading:  Mr. Trump has said he is considering a targeted strike against Iran that could be followed by a larger attack. As Mr. Trump weighs military action, he has declined to make a clear case for why, or why now. Photo: Pool photo by Fazry Ismail For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.  Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From the New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is the Daily. For weeks, the United States has been building up an enormous military presence around Iran. Even as negotiators from both countries plan to meet later this week, in the hopes of finding a diplomatic off-ramp to the escalating tensions. Now, as President Trump signals a potential attack, our colleague, David Sanger, explains what the president hopes to achieve through military action and why he's chosen this moment. It's Tuesday, February 24th.

David Sanger, welcome back to the Daily. Rachel, great to be with you. The last time we talked about Iran on the show, we were in the middle of this brutal crackdown on anti-government protesters who were protesting the regime. And at the time, there was a huge question about whether the United States would take some kind of military action. That obviously did not happen, but in the week since, we have seen this massive military buildup in the region. So, David, can you just start by describing what that buildup looks like and what we understand about what exactly is going on in this moment?

Well, Rachel, the buildup is the largest we've seen in the Middle East since the run-up to the war in Iraq in 2003. Wow. There are two aircraft carriers in the region, the Abraham Lincoln and the Gerald Lennon. and the Gerald R. Ford, which has come back from Venezuela. There are fighter jets, refueling capability, bombers. They are all taking up positions from Jordan all through our bases in the region. And meanwhile, there's the last gasp of a diplomatic track underway. On Thursday, we expect that the Iranians will be meeting with the two main American negotiators. Steve Whitkoff and Jared Kushner to present a package that might satisfy President Trump's demands. But the president has made clear that he is thinking of everything from a limited strike on Iran to what could be a much larger military action that could take days or weeks.

You mentioned that the president has made demands. What are those demands exactly? Like, what does the United States want right now? And what are they trying to achieve either through these talks or through any kind of potential military action? You know, there's a bit of a murkiness on this issue. Usually when presidents get to a situation like this, they're pretty clear about what it is they are seeking. But in this case, the president has not been clear. The president's offered a dizzying array of rations.

for the military action that we may see. Donald Trump is urging Iranians to keep protesting, saying, If Iran shoots and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue. He's talked about supporting the protesters, of course. We talked about Hamas, and we talked about disarmament. He's talked about cutting off support for the proxies, like Hezbollah and Hamas. There's nothing that would do more good for this.

part of the world and for Iran's leaders to renounce terror, stop threatening their neighbors, quit funding their militant proxies. He's talked about taking out Iran's missile capability, the missiles that can reach Israel. These are all conventional weapons, but they pose a big threat to a major American ally. And then, of course, there's the one big reason he keeps returning to. You can't have peace in the Middle East if they have a nuclear weapon. and they can't have a nuclear weapon. And that is going after the remnants of Iran's nuclear portfolio.

I hope they're not trying to build up again because if they are, we're going to have no choice but very quickly to eradicate that buildup. The nuclear portfolio, we should mention, which the president had previously claimed that the U.S. had wiped out back in the summer. That's right, Rachel. And, you know, just to wind back the clock for a moment, You may remember that in June there was a 12-day war that the Israelis initiated against Iran. Right.

And that it ended with a U.S. attack on the three major nuclear enrichment sites that Iran has built up over the decades. And these were three sites that only the U.S. Air Force had the capability with bunker busters to get down deep enough to try to destroy. And in the course of doing that, they ended up burying under the rubble Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium that was enriched to a purity just shy of what you would need to make a nuclear weapon. And just to be clear, after the U.S. conducted that whole campaign, what would be left now to hit through some kind of military action? Well, there are still targets. There are places where the Iranians have made. nuclear centrifuges, the machines that spin at supersonic speeds and produce uranium, you could wipe out some of those targets.

David, the last time that the United States took a military action against Iran, it was in close coordination with Israel, which is obviously our biggest ally in the region. They have grave concerns about Iran's nuclear and missile programs. What do we know about Israel's involvement this time around? Well, we know that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyan, who has been talking frequently to President Trump, he came for a visit about two weeks ago, and what little leaked out from that session

indicated that the Israeli government was quite concerned that the U.S. wasn't paying enough attention to the missiles. And it's the missiles that can reach Israel that actually pierced the missile defenses last time and struck some civilian targets and killed some Israelis. And, you know, at the same time, The president has got some people in his ear, including Iran hardliners in Congress, saying you will never have an opportunity like you've got right now, that Iran and Ayatollah Khomeini have never been weaker.

They're economically on the ropes. There are protests in the streets. People are sick of their government and the repression surrounding it. and that after the war in June, they have never fully recovered militarily. Just take the moment to push them over the cliff. So the president may have in the back of his mind a great desire to seize the moment. But at the same time, this is risky business. This is a country of 90 million people.

They have considerable ability not only to strike back with missiles, but with a terror network that runs throughout Europe, and to some degree has shown some capability to operate inside the United States. They've got significant cyber capabilities as well. So it's hardly guaranteed that this is going to be a like one-night attack like you saw in June when they went after the nuclear sites. it's very possible that the Iranians could respond. The U.S. then escalates. The Iranians then escalate. And you're into a bigger conflict than anyone wants to see happen in the Middle East. Okay, so it sounds like there are a lot of people in the president's ear right now.

There's Netanyahu. There are the Iran Hawks in Congress. But one thing that I think has been very top of mind, at least since the protests in January, is regime change. and how a lot of these goals that you mentioned that the administration could be considering right now could lead to that, depending on what kind of military action they take. Is that part of the calculation here?

We have to assume that it's one of the biggest parts of the calculation. But the fact of the matter is, the president has stopped just short of that. And when the topic came up with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and some Senate testimony last month, he said, well, this would be big and complicated and we'd have to give a lot of thought to what that would look like. Well, a little late to come to the conclusion we have to think that through.

The fact of the matter is the government of the United States has been thinking about regime change in Iran for decades. Right. So there are a couple of big questions here, Rachel. The first is, can you bring about regime change with an air campaign? It's not clear at all that that's necessarily going to work. Second, if it does work, what's the assurance that the government that would come in would be any friendlier to the United States? It could just be another repressive regime.

And the other risk, of course, is that this could just escalate into a much larger regional conflict, which would be entirely understandable if the Iranians decided that the regime was at risk and they were going to throw everything into the retaliation. We'll be right back. David, when we think about a potential military strike in Iran and what that might mean for regime change, I am, of course, reminded about the recent action that the U.S. took in Venezuela when it removed the president, Nicholas Maduro. My sense is at least that that really caused other countries to sit up a little straighter in the face of U.S. pressure. And so I wonder whether that is coming into play here at all with how the U.S. is interacting with Iran in this moment.

Well, Rachel, I think it's definitely part of the calculation. I mean, first of all, there is a just overall similarity to the gunboat diplomacy here, right? You mass a naval fleet off the coast, you issue a set of demands. And if the demands are not met, you then use that military force to compel the country to change the way you wanted to change. But there's also a real difference here as well. because in Venezuela, it was a very targeted operation. They were aiming for one guy, Maduro. And when they pulled him out of there and sent him off to the Brooklyn Detention Center, they left the rest of his government fully in place. In Iran, however, it seems very unlikely that that model would work. First of all, it's a much larger country. It's 90 million people.

Second, it's a lot more complex, it's a lot better armed, it's got air defenses that Maduro never had, it's got a population that may go along with the removal of the government, but also has bitter memories of CIA efforts to bring about coups in Iran in the 1950s. And finally, if the U.S. was successful, it's not clear that you could leave the existing government in place. the way they have in Venezuela. You'd have to take out that entire structure run by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. You'd have to eliminate almost all of those loyalists to Ayatollah Khomey. So it's not clear that you would have someone in place to go run the country and to respond to those American demands.

Okay, so given the fact that a military action would be extremely complicated, in Iran. What would a more, quote, unquote, limited strike look like that the United States is actually considering? It's a good question, because there are all kinds of targets. They could go after the besiege, which is the local militia groups that have been used to put down the protesters. That way, at least, the president could say he's making good on his commitment. They could go after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. And you may remember that back in 2020, in his first term, President Trump ordered a drone strike on the head of the Kuds Force, the most elite part of the Iranian military, and managed to kill him. So you could imagine more attacks on the leadership

of the IRGC. You could imagine attacks that were just limited to those missiles and missile. sites and the launchers that Israel's most worried about. But all of those would gain mostly a tactical advantage. If the government didn't change, the military leaders will get replaced. Eventually, Iran will build more missiles or buy them. So the real question is, are you just mowing the lawn or are you bringing about real change? How concerned is Iran about all right? How concerned is Iran about all of this or any of this? Well, Rachel, the Iranians have made it pretty clear. They're deeply concerned.

I mean, first of all, we've seen them burying and reinforcing some nuclear-related sites or suspected nuclear-related sites that hadn't been hit back in June. Second, they've moved a good number of their missiles and other arms to the borders where they could more easily reach American bases or Israel to make the point that they're going to get some shots off. if they get attacked. Thirdly, there's the strange action by Ayatollahamini, who is 86 years old and presumably has some succession plans anyway, but as we've reported in the times, he's deepened those in recent times. So the Supreme Leader is clearly aware that the U.S. may be going for

regime change, and he wants an insurance policy against that. These are all. all the kind of preparations we've not really seen the Iranians take at this level before. At the same time, though, of course, there are these diplomatic talks. What kind of off-ramp, if any, is being considered right now so that we do not see this kind of escalation? Well, the talks have been stymied a bit by the problem that the U.S. is demanding that there is no uranium enrichment. In other words, that Iran get cut. completely out of the business of making any nuclear fuel. And there's an interesting idea that's been floated, which is to allow the Iranians to have a very

limited enrichment capability purely for medical and medical research-related purposes. It's got a nice humanitarian tone to it. It would be basically allowing the Iranians to produce fuel for a small research reactor that's been in Tehran since 1967, when in one of those great ironies of history, the United States gave the reactor to the Shah of Iran. And it's used mostly for production of pharmaceuticals. It's useful for cancer treatments and so forth. And this would allow the Iranians to say we're still enriching and allow the United States to say,

we've stopped all their nuclear weapons activity. But it's not clear the Iranians will give up that much capability. And it's not clear that President Trump would accept any continued enrichment of any kind for any purpose. Given all of that, David, is it possible that the military buildup that we've seen is not necessarily an alternative to diplomacy, but actually something that the president is using to sort of strengthen his hand diplomatically? Like, could he be using this threat of the military action as leverage to push for a diplomatic solution? at the talks later this week? It's very possible. That's the diplomacy part of gunboat diplomacy.

Of course, the flip side of that, Rachel, is if you have spent hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, assembling a huge force off a country's coast, the temptation to go use that is extraordinarily high. And if his real goal here is regime change, then he may not really be that in. interested in a diplomatic solution, because a diplomatic solution would, if anything, bolster the existing regime. It would remain in place. Just to take a step back here, the United States has viewed Iran as a threat for many, many years. So on the one hand, it makes sense that it would continue to be a priority. But on the other

hand, during the second Trump administration, the United States has really kind of laid out this worldview of spheres of influence, which we've talked about a lot on the show, the idea that the great powers can carve up the world and consider sections of it to be under their own purview. We've seen from the U.S. side that that has meant the Western Hemisphere. So I wonder where you feel like the Middle East fits into that worldview. Rachel, you're exactly right. This does not fit comfortably into the president's national security strategy that came out in November.

On the one hand, as you suggest, American presidents have been pushing back on Iran and the Iranian nuclear program for decades ever since the Iran hostage crisis, right, which came right after the Iranian revolution in 1979. The United States has sabotaged the Iranian nuclear program over the United States. years. It's mounted some of the most sophisticated cyber attacks in history against Iran's nuclear infrastructure. So there's always been a consistent effort to push back the day when Iran could get a nuclear weapon. And if you view it that way, then President Trump, in what he's doing today, is escalating and expanding what has been a long-running American policy across Democratic and

Republican administrations. But if you view it in the context of his national security strategy, well, Iran isn't exactly in the Western Hemisphere, right? And so he may just be seeing a moment to deal with a long-time adversary that is going through a period of remarkable military, economic, and political weakness. And I think that's really what's happening here. It's not as if the Iranians are in a position right now to attack us, right? Their nuclear program has been buried. Their economy is at a point of near collapse. They are not about to go out of their way to pick a conflict with the U.S.

Instead, the president might be engaging in what legal and diplomatic historians call a preventive war, a war where we are strong, our adversary is weak, and so we're going to hit them now because we've got a good chance. That is, in international just war theory, considered to be an illegal use of force. That may not stop the president. The president may believe that he'll go down in history as the one who solved America's long-running conflict with Iran that goes back to 1979. But if the president decides to take military action in the next few days or weeks, I suspect that historians will look back at this moment as a war of choice, not a war of necessity.

David Sanger, thank you so much, as always. Thanks, Rachel. Great to be with you. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. Mexican authorities appeared to have restored order in multiple cities after the killing of a major cartel leader set off a wave of violence that left at least 62 people dead. Mexico's most powerful criminal organization,

the Halisco New Generation Cartel, unleashed the chaos after its leader. Nemesio Osegara Servantes, or El Meno, died in a military raid on Sunday in Western Halisco state. And British police arrested the former ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson, following accusations that he had passed on confidential information to the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The move comes just days after the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten, Windsor, formerly Prince Andrew, on suspicion of the same offense, and months after Mandelson was fired once the extent of his friendship with Epstein was revealed.

Today's episode was produced by Carlos Bredo, Nina Feldman, and Claire Tennis Getter. It was edited by Maria Byrne and Mark George. Contains music by Marian Lizano, Alicia B. Etup, and Rowan Nemisto, and was engineered by Chris Wood. Special thanks to Eric Schmidt and Mark Mazetti. That's it for the Daily. I'm Rachel Abrams. See you tomorrow.