The Duran Podcast - US-Iran conflict and Russian mediation

Episode Date: March 21, 2025

US-Iran conflict and Russian mediation

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the crisis that appears to be brewing between the United States and Iran. What are your thoughts here? We have the situation with the Houthis as well. And the situation with the Houthis has pulled in Iran. And we are talking again about a possible smash between the United States and Iran. Trump putting out some very alarming. messages and even a letter to Iran. Of course, you also have the Russians who could play some sort of a mediation role in order to calm things down. What are your thoughts on what's

happening in the Middle East? I mean, again, this blowout has come very suddenly and very fast. And one isn't quite sure why, in fact, because Trump went out of his way to get a ceasefire in Gaza, just before he became president, just before his inauguration, he got Whitgolf to negotiate it. Everything seemed to be, I wasn't saying it was stable, and I'm not going to try and make out that the situation in Gaza was peaceful, because it wasn't, but it was a lot less unstable and violent than it had been. But over the last couple of days, things have exploded. So, you know, there's going to be huge controversy about who started what and who did what. As far as I'm concerned, it looks as if the ceasefire was crumbling

for some time. And the Israelis at some point decided to cut off electricity supplies to Gaza. Then that caused the Houthis to react. Then that led to the United States being drawn in. And now, because of the Houthis being involved, we have threats against Iran who many people of the United States assume are somehow controlling the Houthis. And we've had all of these threats from Trump and apparently a letter from Trump to the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Hamanae. And the reports say that this is a very, very tough, even aggressively worded letter. it says that Iran has two months to agree a deal. It's not clear from which day those two months

are supposed to begin and that if it doesn't agree a deal within that time, then there is a real possibility of military action against Iran. And in the meantime, we have aircraft carriers moving towards Iran, or at least moving towards the Middle East. We don't know that they're going to be deployed to Iran, but it seems plausible that they are. And it's three of them. So So this is an enormous build-up force potentially threatening. Iran. Now, it's difficult always to know exactly how to read this. If this was all happening during Biden's time, I would definitely be saying that the

neocons were back in charge. They've been aching for an attack on Iran for a very, very long time. We saw how that all played out last year, a series of escalations, which were clearly intended to lead to a conflict with Iran. And then at the last moment, that was called off. And then we got reports in the autumn just before Trump was inaugurated that he'd been pressed to agree strikes on Iran by the Israelis. And he refused.

And that all came from Axios, by the way. is likely true, I'm sure it was true. So are the neocons back in charge is the anti-Iranian side of Trump's persona, which is very real and very strong, you know, taking possession of him? He is surrounded by people who really do not like Iran at all. People like Mike Woltz and Pete Hegs are not friends of Iran, to put it mildly. So maybe he's been swept along by that and by concerns that Iran might indeed be close to acquiring nuclear weapons. It could be that. Or, and there's the more optimistic take, which is the one that I'm going to take. I know they're going to get an enormous amount of pushback, that this is again Trump doing the art of the deal type thing, increasing the volume

of the pressure. He wants a deal with Iran and he wants it quickly. He wants to exert as much leverage on Iran as he can. He's going for maximum pressure. He's threatening the Iranians with military consequences. And at one of the same time as he's doing that, he's talking to the Russians to try to get the Iranians to the negotiating table so that he can get the deal done, which will enable him to say that the situation with Iran has been solved. I personally inclined to the second view, but I accept fully that I might be wrong. And even if Trump is trying to play this game of bluff and poker with the Iranians, given how dangerous this region is, given the kind of forces that are in play in Israel, across the Arab world, in Iran itself.

It's far from clear to me that this is the right way to do it, and it could still explode in his face in ways that he might not expect. So we'll see. Well, Netanyahu is going to jump on this, right? Absolutely. Well, he has already. I mean, he's used this to break the ceasefire, or rather to start resume bombing in Gaza.

Yeah, but I mean, escalating even beyond that to an actual conflict with Iran. Absolutely. I mean, Trump is saying that he's going to hit the Iranian nuclear facilities, right? Yes. That's the threat. Yes. This is what Netanyahu has wanted for God knows how long.

Exactly. We'll see what happens. Now, when he spoke to Putin, when Trump spoke to Putsu, they apparently spent a lot of time talking about the Middle East. You know, this is a very long conversation. 90 minutes, according to some reports. Some claim it was even longer. I can get to stick with the 90 minute position because that seems to be the correct one. But it's a very, very long call. And the Middle East apparently featured very high. And the readout, the Russian-American readout speaks about joint efforts to stabilize the situation in the Middle East. And the fact that through those joint. efforts, the Russians and the Americans will improve their relations and how both sides agree that they should be worked done to secure nuclear non-proliferation in the region.

Now, this is the Russian readout, but securing nuclear non-proliferation in the region clearly references Iran. The American readout is much more explicit. It refers to Iran and it says that both Russia and America agree that Iran should not be able to threaten Israel implicitly with nuclear weapons. It's not, the two are not really inconsistent with each other. Each country, Russia and America, were of their own perspective on this. But the point is, they don't want, the Russians certainly don't want a conflict.

an uncontrolled conflict between Iran and Israel. The Russians do not want Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. The Russians want a more stable situation in the Middle East. So we go back to that topic that we've discussed before. The Russians are in a good position to mediate between the Americans and the Iranians. They've just signed a treaty. with Iran, it's actually a formal treaty which people overlook. It needs ratification by both the parliaments of both countries. The Russians have ratified the treaty. I believe that the Iranians are due to ratify this month. The treaty explicitly says that Iran will not acquire nuclear weapons. It doesn't say it in those terms, but it says that Iran will abide by the

terms of the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. And it also, speaks about Russia, taking steps to ensure Iran's security and about Iranian and Russian security agreements. So there is a mechanism which the Russians could offer to the Americans in order to stabilize the situation. And we've discussed this before. They could say to the Americans, look, we've already got a treaty with the Iranians. It's actually a treaty, whereby the the Iranians have agreed not to acquire nuclear weapons. We are in talks with the Iranians about upgrading their military forces. We are present in Iran. Our people are actually there. We have contacts with the Iranian Defense Ministry. We are in a position, therefore,

to guarantee that Iran will not acquire nuclear weapons. And we can do that in ways that even the IA, well, certainly the International Atomic Energy Authority cannot do. But we can do that. We have that means. And we have a joint interest with you because we don't want to see Iran acquire nuclear weapons. So then they can, Russians can say to the Iranians, look, you don't want to be involved in a war with the United States and with Israel. We will help you to maintain your security.

We will provide you with weapons and technology and air defense systems and all of those things. But you've entered into treaty obligations with us that you're not going to acquire nuclear weapons. So let's see whether we can go forward and agree something with the Americans. You've got this big stoppile of enriched uranium enriched up to 60%. Why don't we do what happened before in 2015? You transfer all of that to us. We put it under lock in key. It remains yours, but we have care of it.

And then we can go to the Americans and the Israelis and say, look, you don't need to worry. The Iranians are not going to acquire nuclear weapons. We're looking after them. And in return, they're giving us these assurances that they're not going to acquire nuclear weapons either. So that is a possible deal. I'm not going to say it's going to come, and I'm not sure that all of this threats,

all of these deployments of carriers, all of that is going to persuade the Iranians to go down that route. They may say to themselves, well, Israel is an absolutely implacable enemy. The United States is aligned with Israel, in fact, is joined at the hip, with Israel. We've got to prepare and defend ourselves and maybe, given the threat that we're now facing, we should accelerate our nuclear weapons program instead. So this is a very high-stakes game and a very dangerous game that has been played. I'm not convinced that this is the right way to approach a deal, assuming that Trump even wants a deal. I think he does myself. But I don't, I'm not convinced that this is the right way to approach it.

But that Russian readout does say what it says. And maybe, just maybe, some kind of a deal might appear over the next few weeks, or at least months. Yeah, I don't think it was only the Russian readout. I think the US readout also mentioned it here. Yeah, the American readout also mentions it. And there's been comments from U.S. officials, and by the way, Russian officials. officials. So, you know, the fact that the Russians and the Americans are talking to each other about this is reassuring. And to those of us who remember the Cold War, as we've discussed

before, this isn't so unusual. You have many situations where the Russians and the Americans found that their allies were in conflict with each other. And the two superpowers were in conflict with each other. And the two superpowers would then step in, bring this conflict under control, and force the two allies to come to some kind of terms or peace agreement with each other. This used to happen all the time during the Cold War. I can remember how Whenever American and Russian officials used to meet, regional conflicts, as it was always referred to, discussion of regional conflicts always used to come up in the redouts that Eastside used to publish. So we're looking at something like a return to that.

But to repeat again, this is a very dangerous situation. There are all sorts of people in Israel, in the United States. I have to say this. In Iran itself, I mean, there are very hardline people in Iran. People, you know, some people tend to give the Iranians a pass on this. But there are some people in Iran who also feel that conflict is the only way out of this. So it's far from clear if this understanding between the Americans and the Russians exists and has matured to the point where it can be acted on, that it can actually work. We were here under Biden as well, I think about it.

I mean, we were actually in a much more dangerous situation. Yes, yes. A couple of years ago with Biden. We absolutely were, because of course, then there was no doubt at all that it was the Nihikons who were in control. And then also, there was no question of the Russians being able to step in and hold the ring and try to work with the Americans to stabilize the situation. So in some ways, the situation is very dangerous, but less dangerous than it was, say, a year ago.

True. All right. We will end the video there. The durand.com. We are on Rumble Odyssey, Bitchew, Telegraphen, and X. Go to the Duran Shop, pick-up some merch, like what we are wearing in this video update. There is a link to the Duran Shop in the description box down below. Take care.