The Duran Podcast - Waltz, Neocons pushed for war with Iran

Episode Date: May 7, 2025

Waltz, Neocons pushed for war with Iran

All right, Alexander, let's talk about what is going on with the U.S. and Iran. What is going on with the U.S. and Yemen and the Houthis. It looks like Waltz, if you go off of the reports from the Washington Post of the New York Times on various other outlets in the U.S. mainstream media outlets, it looks like Waltz was moved. Exiled. I like to say exiled, exiled, exiled to the U.S. because the UN is not very important for Trump. It's an important position, the ambassador to the UN, but for Trump, he's not, he's not so hot on the UN. But Walt has been moved to the UN.

And it looks like the reason is because he was, he was working, consulting, conspiring with Netanyahu when it comes to Yemen and the Houthis. And the entire, and the entire, conflict that the U.S. has with the Houthis, I've been saying it for a while. I don't understand what it's about. And Trump has never clarified what the objectives of this are really about. They say it's about opening up the shipping lanes, but these are shipping lanes that the Europeans depend on. We've gotten all kinds of mixed messages about what's happening with Yemen and the fact that the U.S. is bombing Yemen and their strikes. at Yemen. And we have the NBC interview with Trump where he talks about Iran as well. So maybe

we can touch on that also because Trump is saying that he wants complete disarmament, no nuclear weapons, not even for energy reasons in Iran, which I think is a big ask. Anyway, let's start. What do you want to start with Iran or you want to start with Yemen? I think you're absolutely correct to say that these two events are connected deeply with each other. Now, the military attacks on Yemen, on the Houthis in Yemen, were actually initiated, as we all know, by Biden, the Poland, not by Biden, but by the Biden administration. And the idea was that you'd attack the Houthis and you'd open the Red Sea to commercial shipping, because commercial shipping had been effectively blocked by the Houthis. Houthis who've also been launching missiles against Israel. And the Houthis say that they're doing all of that in order to support.

Operation Aspida, I remember it. Operation Aspida is what they called it. Yeah, because of the Greek, it would go on. Yeah, absolutely. That's what Biden called it. Absolutely. And everybody knows that in some form or rather the Houthis are aligned to Iran. and some say go much further than that and say that they're actually proxies of Iran.

The Uthis are also known to be in a particularly tough and well-organized military group. They have a lot of support within Yemen, apparently. Well, I mean, unquestionably, Yemen is a very, very difficult country to occupy and capture because it's very, very rugged, very, mountainous. Its people are very tenacious. They have a long martial history going all the way back to the time of the Arab conquests of the 7th century, just to say. So, you know, it seems very strange that the United States under Trump should drift back into continuing a war. which Biden started and which wasn't succeeding because all those attacks by Biden,

Biden's people, you know, the airstrikes on the Houthis were not actually achieving what they were supposed to achieve. Anyway, out of the blue, along comes Trump. He says that we're going to finally deal with the problem of the Houthis, a huge amount of US naval and air power is deployed against the Houthis. There's all kinds of attacks on the Houthis, and the result is exactly the same. The Houthis are still there. They're still attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea. There's a lot less of it, which is why you hear about fewer attacks than you used to, but that's probably more the consequence of the fact that very few commercial ships now go

through the Red Sea. So it's not worked. And we also see that there are attacks on American ships. And obviously we don't get a huge amount of detail about this, but at least in one case, damage visibly was done. An American aircraft carrier had to swerve, suddenly to avoid a Houthy missile. And the result was that an F-18 fell into the seas. You know, a ship was lost, a major aircraft was lost in that way. And, of course, the Houthis are claiming that they're shooting down lots of American predator drones or Reaper drones. Maybe they are, maybe they're not. I'm not able to say, but anyway, that's what they're saying.

The point is it isn't succeeding. And all of this, along with a major drumbeat, a threat, now against Iran, with which the United States was supposed to be negotiating to try to find some kind of way to avoid a conflict and at the same time to bring Iran's nuclear enrichment program under control with fears, unless that happens, Iran will at some point develop a nuclear bomb. So it seems to me briefly that what happened is again we had a tassel within the administration, the Trump administration. We had one perspective, which is the one that Trump seemed to be going with when he was inaugurated. And for about a week after, tried to negotiate a deal with the Iranians.

try to secure a ceasefire in Gaza, talk about the fact that if the United States can be sure that Iran won't be able to produce nuclear weapons, that safeguards are created to achieve that, that the United States would be prepared to de-escalate with Iran and reduce tensions, talking contacts with the Russians about seeing whether the Russians can play a role to achieve all of that. And we saw a lot of steps now. We floated that possibility on one of our programs back in January, but we see that it's actually, it appeared to be moving forward quite far, lots of discussions about this between the Americans and the Russians and the Russians and the Iranians. So everything seemed to be

moving quite well in terms of that diplomatic track. And then suddenly we get the swerve towards confrontation. The ceasefire breaks down. There is renewed conflict in Yemen. There's the renewed threats against Iran, which are being made not just by Trump himself, but by people like Pete Hagsas. And then into the middle of all of this, suddenly we hear that the National Security Advisor, Mike Wals, has been sacked, or at least not sacked, as he rightly said, exiled to the UN. And now we're getting media reports in the United States that Trump has discovered that Walsh was working very, very closely with the Israelis and coordinating with them and was trying to. to basically work with the Israelis to persuade Trump to launch an attack on Iran, which at the moment at least, Trump still doesn't want to do. So I have to say it straightforwardly, all of the evidence again is of a deeply divided

administration. You have people like Whitgolf, other people, J.D. Vance, maybe, Tulsi Gabbard, possibly. I don't want to spend too much time analyzing things too closely. But people say, you know, we've got to scale down commitments to the Middle East. We don't want to get involved in a war with Iran. Marjorie Telegreen has been talking about this. There is that side of the Trump movement and factions within the administration talking in that way. Trump himself sometimes talks in that way.

And then we get the visceral pro-Israeli, neocon types, people like Mike Wolts, who are working with the Israelis in order to try to engineer a conflict with Iran. It reminds you very much about the situation with Ukraine, by the way. So again, similar divisions, Kellogg advocating. working with the Ukrainians. Now we see walls advocating for, working with the Israelis trying to bring the administration,

Donald Trump, back to a neocon position, which is basically confrontation and ultimately war with Iran. And Trump himself, sometimes he tilts in favor of one side, Sometimes he tilts in favor of the other. Sometimes he goes with Wigoff, who both with Russia and Iran is the person who talks mostly about compromise and is the negotiator. Other times he goes with the more hardline people with waltz until recently with Hegseth, people like that who want confrontation with Iran.

and the whole situation is unstable and chaotic. And in the meantime, it's already created a military crisis because the United States finds itself launching missile and airstrikes against the Houth. It's killing people, a lot of people, apparently, no doubt causing the Houthis some damage, but ultimately achieving nothing. Exactly. killing a lot of people, but achieving nothing. And it seems like this is a conflict with Yemen that the U.S. cannot win.

No. I mean, they have no strategy with regard to Yemen. There's no diplomacy, obvious. There's no diplomacy. There's no dialogue. And they're bombing Yemen. They're killing people. but what's what's the goal to all of this?

That's the part that I haven't quite understood because you get different messages. You get, oh, well, we're doing this so we can open up the shipping lanes. But then you get a message saying, well, the shipping lanes are not really that important to the United States. They're important to Europe. Why should we be in conflict with Yemen in order to prop up the Europeans? And now we have this tariff war with the Europeans. I mean, you're getting all kinds of mixed messages with regards to the shipping lanes. the Houthis, their message is very straightforward and very to the point as to why they're doing what they're doing.

And it's connected to Gaza. It's connected to the recent strikes from the Houthis are connected to the announcements from Israel that they're going to broaden the operations in Gaza. They're going to expand the operations in Gaza. So now the Houthis are saying we're going to implement an air blockade. So, I mean, on the one hand, you have the Trump administration, which is divided, which is chaotic. It's trying to deal with Ukraine, not successful. It's trying to deal with Iran. On, on again, off again.

I mean, you know, there's no direction. And now it's opening up another front with Yemen. It hasn't solved the most important issue, which is Gaza. hasn't solved it. And it seems like they're not even talking about it anymore. It's just kind of disappeared. Whitkoff was negotiating. And then the negotiations broke down.

Now we have this blockade on Gaza. The hostage situation has not been resolved. And now we have Yemen all of a sudden, just all of us coming up. And you have waltz in all of this, exchanging messages with these rays, with the Naniyahu, who knows? I mean, the Trump administration is not solving any problems.

They're creating more, it seems. And I haven't even talked about China. No, I know. No, you're absolutely correct. Now, to understand neocon thinking, I mean, what they're trying to do with the attacks on the hooses, for the neocons, including Mike Wolves, I suspect, definitely for some people in Israel, the people who are in the driving seat,

Prime Minister Netanyahu and his top officials, the attacks on the Houthis are a step towards the larger objective, which is a war against Iran. It always has been. So by getting Trump to authorise attacks on the Houthis, they are bringing Trump closer to the point of launching attacks on Iran itself. Now, one can see how it was done. The Israelis would say they were incredibly successful against Hezbollah. We decapitated their leadership.

We inflicted massive blows upon them. You should follow our copybook. You should do with the Houthis what we did to Hezbollah. Decapitate their leaders, launch these precision strikes. against them, infiltrate their organization. And of course, that's what the United States has done. And, of course, we see that it isn't working. So one can understand how Trump and his people might have been lured onto this course. But the objective is, as I said, ultimately to get the United States tangled with Iran. So you then come back, because this is again how the neocons work.

They always, when one escalation fails, remember what we always say, they have no reverse gear, they demand a further escalation. They say the reason you are not succeeding with the Houthis is because the Iranians are backing them. So in order to defeat the Houthis and to achieve victory and to open the Red Sea, you need to break Iran. And we have Hexas coming out and saying this, basically, we know, we know, extraordinary posts that he published, warning the Iran, we know what you're doing, we can see exactly what you're up to, we're coming after you. If, you know, you continue on this way, again, with the Houthis. And we have this very angry comment on truth social by Trump himself that he's going to impose secretary. sanctions on anybody who buys Iranian oil and that anybody who dares to buy Iranian oil can do no business with the United States.

So you can see how this has been worked, that it's Iran that is the ultimate problem, that the only way we can resolve this is by going after Iran itself, finishing off Iran and then all of the problems in the middle. East will be, will be sorted. And forget about diplomacy. Diplomacy isn't going to deliver anything. We must go after the head of the snake. Iran is vulnerable, is lost in Syria. Its air defense system is being destroyed by the Israeli airstrikes of October. So this is an open target, and we should go and we can win. And we can see how the maneuvering is going on. There's pushback. As I said, Vance, I'm guessing Gabbard, Marjorie Taylor Green and people like that.

They are strongly opposed to this approach. But there's divisions within the administration. And the president himself can't make up his mind. Sometimes he tilts to the one side. sometimes he tilts towards the other. He's just got rid of Walsz because he's discovered the extent to which Wals was actually working for the Israelis

rather than for him. At least that's what the American media is now telling us. But he still seems to be hardening his stance against Iran. Yeah. Even with Waltz, he couldn't quite bring himself

to dismiss Waltz entirely. He had to move him to the UN. And Waltz is going to do damage at the U.S. Absolutely. He's going to do a lot of damage. Absolutely. Nikki Haley did a lot of damage in the U.N. Waltz is going to do a lot of damage there as well. But I think that shows you the power of the neocons. Yes.

And the hold that they have on Trump, he was not able to completely remove Waltz. No. And he still got, with regards to Ukraine, still has Kellogg there. So what does Trump need to do? Well, he needs to do exactly what you said. He needs to sack the neocons, confront people like Lindsey Graham, who I suspect is playing a significant role behind the scenes and say, look, this is my administration. I run it the way I wanted to. War with Iran would be a disastrous idea. And we've got the makings of a deal. there, which exists, by the way.

Whitkoff is absolutely right about this. We've got the makings of a deal, and we should do that deal, and, you know, Netanyahu won't like it. Some people, the neocons in the US, won't like it. The Maga base will. And, you know, we can then start to work towards some kind of stabilization in the Middle East. Unfortunately, I don't think that's what's going to happen.

because I think that, firstly, Trump is afraid to break with people like Lindsey Graham and the other neocons and that whole group of people. But I think on this issue, on this specific issue, he also has his own visceral feelings, which, as I said, complicate things, which is like lots of Americans. He doesn't like Iran, or at least he doesn't like the regime there. wants to see the regime overthrown. He probably dislikes Iran every bit as much as some people. In Israel, Israel do. His heart, if you like, is in conflict with his head. So he finds it even more difficult to make a decision on this than he does with, say, Ukraine. And ultimately, given that this is so, I have to say this, I think we are probably, again, on the countdown towards an attack on Iran. We know that the Israelis actually proposed it both before he became

president and after he became president back in November and then again, apparently in January, they came up with lists of targets and proposals about how an attack on Iran could be organized. We know that we now know from the media in the United States that Waltz was helping the Israelis to lobby for that attack on Iran. Trump didn't like the fact that Walsz was playing that role, but we see that he's not breaking with Walsz, as you rightly said, he sent him to the UN where Walsh will take a very, very, can be absolutely guaranteed to take a very strong neocon pro-Israeli line, just as Nikki Haley did. And we will probably find ourselves in exactly the same situation that we always seem to be in with the United States drifting into a.

all out clash with Iran. I have to say this, I think sooner or later, one way or the other, this clash is going to come. It's going to start with an Israeli attack, a big Israeli attack, on Iran backed by the US, and I'm afraid it could escalate into something more. Just the final thought, the US is screwed on foreign policy. I don't have a better word. They don't have any diplomats, Alexander. I was thinking about it now. Wals at the UN. What business does Waltz have at the U.N.? What business did Nikki Haley have at the U.N.? He's not a diplomat. He's not a diplomat. Rubio, not a diplomat. Kellogg, not a diplomat. None of these people have any diplomacy experience, negotiating experience. Trump's best negotiator, his absolute

best negotiators, his best diplomat, is Whitkoff. And Whitkoff has no position, no support, no department in back of him. And he also doesn't have foreign policy, diplomacy experience. It shows. But he's his most rational, most effective diplomat. And the diplomat that is pushing for some sort of peace or off ramp in all of these crisis areas. And now there's so many of them, we're losing count. We're losing count at how many fires now are popping up. And yes, they came from Biden. Absolutely. A lot of them came from Biden. All of them came from Biden. But Trump is not extinguishing any of them. Correct. And it starts with Ukraine. That was an easy one. That was an easy one for the U.S. to walk away. Iran, like you said, is a slam dunk. Easy. We don't

want Iran to get nukes. Iran doesn't want to get nukes. Russia says they'll mediate. Deal done. And then you can focus on Gaza, on a two-state solution. But, no. Your thoughts just to wrap up the video. You're absolutely correct. The one thing I would add is you're absolutely right to point out the fact that the current administration has no diplomats, nor did the previous administration, nor did the administration before that one, which was of course Trump's, nor did Barack Obama's administration actually.

I mean, the United States has not had diplomacy since I would argue George H.W. Bush, who at least had people like James Baker and Brett Scowcroft. But these were old men even then, and now, of course, they're gone. So, you know, there is no diplomacy on the part of the United States. This is the direct product, the disastrous effect of decades of near-cold control of the American government. I mean, the United States stopped doing diplomacy 40 years ago, and it has no mechanisms to carry it out any longer. All right. We'll end the video there. The durand.com.

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