The Team House - Iran–US Ceasefire Deal: Is It Legit? | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS

Episode Date: May 25, 2026

The guys break down the proposed Iran ceasefire extension, the Strait of Hormuz crisis, frozen assets, sanctions relief, and whether the war actually left the U.S. or the Iranian people better off. They also dig into Gulf security concerns, Israel and Hezbollah, the political backlash from Iran hawks, and what the conflict means for U.S. military posture in the Pacific.The episode then shifts to Cuba, Tulsi Gabbard’s resignation, the future of ODNI, and Russia’s massive strike on Kyiv — including Ukraine’s air defense performance, Russian hypersonic weapons, and the lack of a strong U.S. response.GhostBed ⬇️https://www.ghostbed.com/teamFOR 10% off! Support the show on Patreon:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseSubscribe to our newsletter!!!!https://teamhousepodcast.kit.com/joinAndy's new article:⬇️https://warontherocks.com/the-operational-case-against-israels-gaza-campaign/Jack's news outlet:⬇️https://thehighside.substack.com/Find Jon Hackett here:⬇️Jon's Twitter:https://x.com/jonathanhackettJon's LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejonathanhackettJon's books:https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0C5L659N5?ccs_id=e11a2062-f8d3-498e-bfd7-7d2f3869caf6Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejonathanhackettTwitter: https://x.com/jonathanhackettCheck out Mick's new podcast here:⬇️Apple Podcasts:https://podcasts.apple.com/at/podcast/pub-and-porch-applied-stoicism/id1836955475Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/1k3QPmkAMwnGJxMLDwUSSd?si=n6piIu8XRcag1Z0K43A3bQYoutube:https://www.youtube.com/@UCd0Hq6QFk8CoTu5j-VU0Ong Find Mick Mulroy here: Fogbow ⬇️https://fogbow.com/Lobo Institute ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/Twitter ⬇️https://x.com/mickmulroy?s=21&t=-Ze3F_Ix2vlJ18KFvORTCALinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/Bluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.socialMick’s publications ⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/publications/publications-of-michael-mick-patrick-mulroy/Whitefish security summit ⬇️https://whitefishsecuritysummit.comFind Marc P here:https://x.com/MpolymerFind Andy Milburn here: Twitter ⬇️https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023Substack ⬇️https://amilburn.substack.com/Andy’s book ⬇️https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-OperationsBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.socialFind Jason Lyons here: LinkedIn ⬇️https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?uBluesky ⬇️https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.social"Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio00:00 — Start / Memorial Day, sacrifices, and the Eyes On crew checks in02:17 — Iran ceasefire extension, Strait of Hormuz, and the proposed MOU04:28 — What the U.S. and Iran actually appear to have agreed to06:44 — Sanctions relief, frozen assets, and the political backlash from Iran hawks09:19 — Did the Iran war actually leave America better off?11:20 — Iran’s economy, IRGC resilience, and pressure on ordinary Iranians13:13 — Gulf states, UAE concerns, and regional support for a ceasefire15:52 — Lebanon, Hezbollah, Israel, and unresolved ceasefire complications18:31 — How the Gulf may rethink security after the Iran war20:27 — Strait of Hormuz tolls, mines, insurance rates, and reopening risks23:29 — Highly enriched uranium, verbal commitments, and Trump’s political problem27:21 — Did the U.S. misunderstand the political reality of the war?29:25 — U.S. military strain, carrier deployments, and risk in the Pacific31:04 — China, Taiwan, and shifting attention toward Cuba33:01 — Cuba sanctions, regime pressure, and possible U.S. military options39:32 — Rubio, Vance, 2028 politics, and the MAGA succession fight45:30 — Tulsi Gabbard resigns and the future of ODNI48:32 — Russia’s massive strike on Kyiv and Ukraine’s deep-strike momentum49:31 — Ukraine’s air defenses, Russian hypersonics, and civilian resilience56:56 — U.S. silence on Russia’s attack and Europe’s role going forwardBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Aizon Geopolitics. I fired everybody now. It's just Greeks only. No, I'm just kidding. I'm here with Mark Polymeropoulos. We might be joined with a couple of the other guys. Everyone's traveling. It's Memorial Day weekend.

So happy Memorial Day to everybody. Take a second while you're grilling or trying to stay away from the rain that's here in New York to think about why we celebrate it. So, you know, people that gave up their lives for what we have and stuff like that from every single war we've been into. So happy Memorial Day to everybody. Mark, how you doing? I got a nasty cold, but unlike our other colleagues, I've chosen to join this podcast today.

Thank you. Yeah. The hero move. No, but I, Dee, great comments just now about Memorial Day. You know, there's so much to kind of say about that. But just the idea of, you know, those who paid the ultimate sacrifice, I think back to friends and colleagues at CIA who lost their lives. This is a very difficult day for their families. and so it's always it's always good to kind of stop you know step back take a pause whatever

you're doing on this weekend as you said grilling and enjoying something you don't have to mourn you don't have to you know kind of lock yourself in your room but do take a moment to think about those who made the ultimate sacrifice and I think you know one of the things when I've thought about this in other Memorial Day is and talked to in essence Gold Star families and they actually told me they said you know what enjoy the day because their son and daughter would have wanted that and I thought that was important too so no thanks for thanks for mentioning that yeah of course we got Andy Andy Milburn's here Andy how are you I'm doing peachy you look lovely being on various Alibagic channels today speculating the

questions they ask about what's going on in Trump's mind and I always say hey I would be a I wouldn't be on your damn channel for a couple hundred bucks. If I could get inside Trump's mind, I would be a millionaire. Yeah. All right. So we said happy Memorial Day and stuff like that and for people to take, you know, a little bit of time and actually think about what it means. And, you know, let's, I guess, get into it.

I mean, Andy's been on, you know, Arabic TV for probably the last couple days talking about this deal that was supposed to happen. What was it called? the memorandum of understanding or whatever kind of bullshit they tag on to it. It was for a 60-day ceasefire extension that would talk about hopefully opening up the Strait of Hormuz, lifting the blockade on the Strait of Hormuz or Iranian shipping, and obviously stop the hostilities and also set up a framework to talk about the nuclear stuff. A lot of stuff's been going on back and forth on social media.

Both sides have been trying to get there, I guess, they're talking points out there. We don't really know where it's going to end up. We all thought it was going to happen either yesterday or today. It doesn't seem like it's going to happen today either. It's going to take a few extra days. There was some mention about how the new Supreme Leader's, like, the method of communication is like, takes a while because he's obviously not picking up his cell phone to avoid, you know, getting fucking catching a J.D.M. or whatever. So here we are, speculating again. Everyone's spinning the neocons.

on the right are freaking out because, you know, they just want to blow things up at all times. And, you know, it's just, my two senses like the, what's happened in the straight of, in Iran over the last two and a half months is a nightmare. We're the same situation and same like basic, you know, aspects that we had about a deal or possible deal on February 27th and today are, it's a different reality. So I think people need to understand that before they start popping off that we're living in a different world than two and a half months ago. So you boys mud wrestle over who wants to go first. Go ahead, Andy.

Yeah, I mean, the obvious point up front is the gap between President Trump's framing of this and Iran's version, that's the story that's got headway here in the Middle East and probably around the world. right so the headline is a deal is largely negotiated but of course the devil's in the details right and that the devil in this case is on is in what has each side actually agreed to so far and as you pointed out not a lot all right so you know they've they've agreed to the they've they've agreed to talk basically now Iran's made substantive agreements up front. We haven't seen movement on that to open the Straits of Hormuz, right? Washington says Tehran has committed to surrendering its highly enriched uranium stockpile. Tehran says that it said nothing about the nuclear program at all, and that all of that's going to be

negotiated in the next 60 days. So there's certainly contradiction in so far in the detail of what actually has been agreed. So 60-day framework, Iran opens a straight, and clears minds. That's my understanding. They've agreed to that. The U.S. lifts the naval blockade, okay? That's a significant agreement and holds out $25 billion in frozen assets. Okay, we haven't said, the U.S. hasn't said that's going to be released, but they say that's

going to be part of the negotiation. But all the hard questions, you know, enrichment, sanctions, regional proxies, ballistic missiles, all of that has been deferred. So really, I mean, it's both sides have an incentive not to go back to war. That's clear. Neither side wants to go back to war. I think that is clear, too, despite all the chest beating. And this MOU buys time, but it doesn't, hasn't resolved the conflict.

Yeah, Andy, I think that's a good synopsis of what we know so far. And of course, everybody kind of is watching social media, you know, religiously on what gets released by, you know, what kind of the dribs and drabs of the details. I think, you know, a way to also frame it is that it's not actually a deal. It's just, it's an extension of the ceasefire and you're kicking the can down the road to then talk about what could be in a deal. The one thing I think we should focus on, and I'll go over. kind of something I just I think I sent to you guys earlier. I think there's a lot of questions that

have to be answered big picture. But the thing to focus on is that sanctions relief, the $25 billion, whether it's release of funds, however the Iranians get a hold of that. That's a really big deal because that's stuff that can't be taken back. You can't bomb that back. The Iranian economy is a disastrous state. And one of the things that the U.S. did have, and really, you know, the allies, if you want to call it, that did have his leverage in terms of the deteriorating Iranian economy with the notion they can't pay their soldiers, unemployment, up, inflation, everything. $25 billion is a lifeline, the regime. So I think that to me is one kind of aspect of this.

That really has to be looked at closely. The other thing, Dee, you mentioned it in the opening is the kind of the apocalyptic meltdown from kind of the pro-war crowd on social media or on the Hill. I mean, you have everybody from kind of the current crew from the kind of the pro-Israel think tanks, like Freedom and Defense of Democracies, then to Mike Pompeo, to Hugh Hewitt. Lindsey Graham. Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, you know, and that goes to kind of the GOP Hawks in politics, who are melting, really melting down.

And I wonder if this is having an effect on Trump. He pushed back. I just saw now on True Social with something his kind of really odd-looking human communications director in this kind of really kind of wretched post back to Mike Pompei, a former CI director of secretary of state telling him to shut the fuck up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, so this is going to have some kind of effect. So it's going to be interesting to see if, as, you know, Barack Reveed of Axios has just reported that a deal won't be signed today. There's still some outstanding items.

Does Trump start backtracking after this opposition? I don't know the answer to that. But what I think we should do is kind of, and maybe it's a little early because we don't know the details. But, you know, you do have to ask kind of the big picture questions. You know, are we in the United States, you know, those of us who do care, and I think everyone here is in that camp, the strategies might might differ from the administration. you do want to constrain the Iranians. The Iranians are an enemy of the United States. But are we better off right now after the war? You know, and, you know, you can go down the road. You know, is the Iranian nuclear program been diminished, eliminated? Well, you know, I think that remains to be seen, but I think the pretty easy answer is no. The ballistic missile and drone inventory has it been damaged, sure, but is it gone? The answer is no. You know, is a regime in Iran that's going to be more amenable to future negotiations in place, or is it more hard line? Looks like it's pretty hard line.

And then kind of the biggest thing for me, and I'm still one of these kind of, you know, believers in the notion of America is the bright shining city on the hill, although we don't always act that way, is the idea of Trump promised the Iranians, remember back, I think in January, that help was on its way. So are the Iranian people better off now? And I think the answer to that is an unequivocal no, especially if we give a lifeline to the regime. Remember, there was an idea, and I actually subscribed to this. If we had done nothing and not started this war, there were protests on the street, the crackdown was terrible, but the Iranian economy was in such a place and the popularity of the regime was at an all-time low, there could have been organically over the next year or two collapse of the regime. But have we, ironically enough, by starting this war and now giving the hardliners a lifeline, have we kind of now are we in a position in which the regime is strengthened and will live longer? and that is not good for the Iranian people. And I think these are, you know, I'm trying to be as kind of nonpartisan as possible.

These are questions that one should ask. You know, are we collectively and then the Iranian people better off at this point? And I'm not sure the answer is a good one. Yeah, that's a good point. And, you know, if we had John Hackett on, he points out, and this is backed up across, you know, the more intellectual media outreach. the fact that the IRGC has isolated itself from the Iranian economy, if that makes sense. It has so many tentacles out and has money and businesses and interests, both overseas and

within Iran that have proved to be resilient, in fact, even bolstered by the war. So you've got this dichotomy. How do you like that, D? All right, between, you know, the fact Iran itself is suffering widespread layoffs, the people are suffering, skyrocketing inflation, medicine, gasoline prices, shooting up, infrastructure damage estimated about $300 billion. Remember, a lot of that is dual use or civilian infrastructure. You've got reports of ordinary Iranians stockpiling water and batteries, anticipating a new round of strikes.

And it's hard to say whether that is bringing pressure to bear on the regime. To Mark's point, the regime seems to be bolstered and even more isolated from the effect. on not just the economy, but kind of the popular opinion than it was before, which is not a good thing from anyone's point of view. You know, regardless, the $25 billion in unfrozen assets is almost, I mean, as far as the Iranian economy is concerned, an existential necessity for and so perhaps that is indeed i mean that's certainly a strong incentive for iran to be at the negotiation table but yeah i i would absolutely agree with marks mark's summary i mean we are not noticeably we united states u.s interests certainly not the global economy is in no better shape

than it was before and the iranian people are significantly worse off i i was interested you know from am in the Middle East that there is there is strong GCC support for the memorandum but they they want security assurances from the United States going ahead you know I mean especially from the UAE which is born the brunt of Iran's attacks during the war and you'll notice on on social media shows clips from Iran's state television of shooting missiles into a UAE flag and it's kind of an implicit threat right so UAE is no shrinking violets certainly but they are they all the Gulf countries or certainly benefit from a peace proposal they the the the fact that the

The Straits are closed, are hitting them very strongly, all of them. You know, whatever you may read about, by the gas lines, bypassing, you know, across the board, it's not just oil, it's helium, it's LNG, and they're feeling it the bite economically. They want Trump to agree to this MOU. I would say the only sticking point, probably Israel, and a sticking point that I don't know if it could derail peace talks, going ahead, aside from all the other things that we talked about, the details not being sorted out. But what is happening in Lebanon? You know, Lebanon hasn't been brought into the terms of the ceasefire, but potentially Iran, who knows, Iran may take a, may try and bring Lebanon in,

and it's unlikely that the Israelis are going to agree to cease shalacking Hezbollah as terms of this cease fine. We'll see. My understanding is that Lebanon was brought in. Yeah, at least second tier, like at least some second tier in terms of like what they wanted. And that's why the Israelis are upset about this because that's kind of a no-go for that. Okay. Yeah. Well, that's, that's a buzzet with development. Your mattress is one of those things you don't think about until it's too late until you're

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the show love you bye and so you know but but i think that well there's a couple things andy i want to ask you one is um i agree that the gcc countries wanted this to end um uh we can talk about israeli politics and how this again affects the you know upcoming israeli elections because i think it it will um but but i think the you raise something about um security guarantees and i think there is and you're there in the region although you never tell us exactly where you are It's very mysterious. But you're there in the region. And so I think that everything I've read, and correct me if I'm wrong, that there is going to be a reassessment country by country on what to do about with the Iranians.

For example, it looks like the Saudis are more interested in some type of or the Amanis as well, some type of kind of, I don't know, non-aggression pact with Iran. But the UAE, of course, who has gotten totally in bed with the Israelis. and you can say that that might have been smart or not, but they probably feel differently. And so I think each country, I mean, the UAE, when you pull out of OPEC, I think each country is going to kind of reassess where they are in terms of how to counter the Iranian threat. And, you know, you have countries like Oman and others that might cozy up to Iran again.

UAE won't. Saudis may. There's the Saudi-Pakistani kind of cooperation. agreement where you have the Pakistani military there. Just so it's, it's, you know, is this, you know, I guess the question of view is, you know, do we need to have a discussion on kind of the fundamental rearrangement of some security relationships? And many of these, I think the United States does not come out on top. I think countries may choose to go at it alone because we did start this war.

And in, and while they wanted us to end this now, because of the Strait of Hormuz, obviously, and the damage to the economies, I also think they probably have the notion that we did not finish it. And so, you know, you might have talked about this beforehand in a previous podcast. You know, you poke a bear or you kick a bear in the nuts. Did you say this or maybe someone else did you kick a bear in the nuts? You better finish that bear off or it's going to be angry. And so, you know, do you think there's a kind of discussions going on in the halls of various foreign ministries

and national security councils and the GCC? countries on, okay, what do we do next? Yeah, undoubtedly. I mean, it's hard to tell exactly what's happening from social media, but I can say certainly that the U.S. has lost credibility in the region, you know, and that may be an understatement. And, you know, in the media was the fact that the Arab leaders called Trump on Saturday to express support for the MOU.

I mean, that's undoubtedly true. But at the same time, I don't think there's a good deal of confidence that they will be protected from the consequences of whatever happens yet. You mentioned UAE leaving OPEC discussions about UAE leaving the Arab League. And so you're seeing a kind of a breakdown of cohesion too that is not good news for U.S. interests. discussions perhaps of bilateral agreements, as you pointed out, that don't involve the United States. So for now, Gulf states are backing diplomacy, but they're going to be watching closely, and they certainly are going to maneuvering to get security assurances or ensure that security assurances are embedded in any final agreement coming from Iran, not just from the United States.

Now, what happens if it comes out and they're, you know, the memorandum of understanding for the 60-day extension has some language in there where the straight of Hormuz is open, but it's under the, because they've been taught guys of like, you know, Iran and the surrounding countries essentially taking a toll and splitting it between themselves. I mean, how is that? Have you guys heard anything about the GCC countries being okay with that? because I know they just want to open up the straits so that you start getting some money, but... I think it's so first of all, from the U.S. perspective, it's surprising because we... I think, you know, on this show, we've talked about

the fact that the U.S. will never agree to Tulse, and in fact, the president himself has said that, but I think we're seeing a weakening of that position. And there's news here, I was reading today, that the Toles may be portrayed, all right? because perception is a big deal in the Middle East, but they may be presented as being an environmental thing, right? This is an environmental toll for cleanup that we're paying.

A fee. They're using fees, right? Exactly, yeah. And there's talk about, you know, obviously, Oman, as well as Iran being recipients, which would, of course, be good for Oman. So I think there's going to, to be some negotiation room for negotiation on that to answer your point d i don't think the golf

countries would be against that as long as these it depends on what the tolls are how prohibitive they are if they if they're prohibitively high and they slow down commercial traffic and they change the economic uh calculus of exporting oil via the straits and that's going to be absolutely a no-go um but the the offer by Iran to open the streets, to clear mines that it's already deployed. And mine clearing is technically complex, time-consuming, can't happen overnight.

But it does mean that any reopening is going to be gradual. There's not going to be instantaneous. I mean, obviously, we'll see the stock market shoot up because the stock market's being kind of separated from reality. Right? Yeah. Yeah, but, you know, we're not going to see instant relief of pressure on the global economy. Reopings can be gradual, and there's a real risk of accidents.

And in the end, insurance rates aren't going to come down right away either. So, you know, there's a practical military trip wire embedded in the diplomatic process of miscalculation, of mine strike, some, you know, errant IR, not rogue, but we've seen how decentralized the IRGC has become. But isolated incidents, the Iranians still have hundreds. You know, I've seen estimates of 400 fast attack boats still out there. So, you know, there's certainly, there's certainly room. The risk is still there, and that's going to mean that insurance rates are going to remain high.

And so the effect on the global economy is still going to be severe regardless of outcome. One of the things that's really interesting is this notion of what to do about the highly enriched uranium. And apparently the Iranians, and this is rather incredible if you think about this, that the US would accept this, Trump keeps claiming in public, I think the New York Times reported that the Iranians have given a verbal commitment to allow to lead the country. a verbal commitment. I mean, that to me is rather extraordinary. That's what we're going to go on. The Iranians who are master negotiators, as the old adage, you know, they've never won a war, they never lost in negotiation. They probably have, well, they don't drink necessarily, but they're popping champagne corks. The idea that the U.S. would actually be okay with this, just a verbal agreement from the Iranians to me is

quite amazing. And it shows perhaps the desperation the Trump administration wants that they want an agreement. I think, you know, one of the things that's really interesting, again, as I'm sitting here right outside Washington, D.C., is, you know, how politically disastrous is this going to be for the president? And, you know, because at the end of the, you know, I don't like the idea and I don't subscribe the idea that the U.S. lost this war. That's such a strange, simplistic thing. I mean, the U.S. military put a beating on the Iranians. And so, you know, to say that, that's kind of a weird, just kind of one-liner that. But, and of course, all conflict ends, it's very murky. I mean, even when the U.S. can do really well in something, it's always, there's always

tradeoffs. It's always kind of messy. But the idea that the U.S. lost this war, that doesn't make all that much sense. But they certainly didn't, certainly didn't win. And so, you know, how kind of the Trump and kind of his accolites deal with this is going to be quite interesting. And, you know, at a time where, you know, is approval ratings are an all-time low. The economy is a mess.

And you have so many Republicans on record having kind of supported the maximalist demands. It's going to be interesting to see all these people, D, that we just talked about, who were kind of over the last 24 hours hammering the administration for this, are they actually going to come around or not? you know, Bill Crystal, who, you know, had a bulwark, former, you know, former neocon, became a very strong Trump critic, I think said something right. He said, you know, it's going to happen. Wait to see the next couple days.

You're going to see all these people hammering Trump, his allies, are going to come around and they'll try to somehow get behind this, this agreement. But politically how this, you know, that's going to be the dominant theme in D.C. over the next couple of days is how this is played. Just because, you know, our maximalist demands, you know, we're not met. Now, sometimes they never are, but it looks like it's not even close. Again, and I'm not sure it's helpful for the Democrats to start screaming, the U.S. lost this war.

I mean, that's just not true. But we didn't win. And it became just a giant economic disaster and perhaps a strategic mess too. So it'll be politically, it's going to be very interesting to see in the next couple of days. Yeah, I mean, strategically we haven't accomplished any of our goals at all. I feel like we've taken steps back from, that. So you could technically, you know, arguably say that we did lose this.

I mean, especially for people that are like not paying attention to this day to day and like hour to hour like maniacs like us do. It does not look good. And another like just a dovetail like back to your point about like the neocons. Yeah, that would mean they need to show courage and they don't do that ever. They're going to fall back in line like good little boy. and girls like they're supposed to do. I mean, that's the easy, I wish they could bet that on Polly Market.

I'd make a fucking boatload. The, you know, the, the, who won the war thing, probably too early to be resolved. But it's certainly true that, I mean, it's very, that, that we didn't display a good understanding of Klauswitz, right? You know, we, we have tried it, the Iranians, but the war turns. on a different pivot, the war ended up being about economic pressure and leveraged Straits of Hormuz. And to a certain extent, it ended up about being global perception and America's standing and credibility. And it would be hard to argue that we were successful in those two areas. Again, we'll see how the negotiations work out. But there is a good argument to say that although we are

trite it Iran's military, military capability. We didn't destroy it, that we misunderstood the political context of the war, and in that sense did not achieve success. And we've got a problem, I mean, not a problem. Well, yeah, it is a problem. I mean, our investment right now, as far as military is just massive right now, and that's an open question, what we're going to do. we have to retain them there for a while and that's a significant cost we've got three aircraft carriers

now in the Middle East that's the first time that's happened in right since the beginning of the Iraq War 23 years ago 12 accompanying ships in those in those carrier groups there's that's like with three aircraft carriers that's like 200 aircraft aircraft alone assigned to the carriers, then 15,000 additional personnel just with the carrier groups. I mean, it's massive naval force, and it's 41% of all U.S. Navy ships. I don't know who worked out the 1% on that, but so 41% of the entire U.S. Navy right now deployed worldwide in this one region. It's a great time to invade Taiwan, isn't it?

I don't think that we can sustain this posture indefinitely without cost to other commitments. And I mentioned Taiwan, I mean, Pacific. I know we don't care about NATO, but NATO's eastern flank. But the deal gives Trump a face-saving way to begin drawing down without appearing to retreat. All right. Yeah, I mean, so although the U.S. economy has been relatively isolated compared to the economies of the rest of the world, that won't last for long. And we talked here about the second order effects of, you know, fertilizer, of shortage of helium. It isn't all about oil.

And so that also is pressure down the road that's already gathering momentum. So it's, you know, Lydell Hart, B.F. Lydell Hart, who was a British strategist, was a former British Army officer, he famously said, the object of war, as in the purpose of war, is to attain a better peace, right, for those involved, for those who initiate the war, go to war. It's hard to argue that right now we're in a better peace, right, than we were before a war. And that's the thing that's going to have to be kind of resolved when we see the MOU and what kind of transpires.

But, Andy, you bring up a really interesting point because, you know, the world doesn't stop. We have the issue in the Pacific in terms of China. You know, Trump went for his summit. Wichy and Beijing, I think it'd achieved nothing. But there's, you know, at least before this current national security strategy, kind of China was the long-term pacing threat. And the biggest concern we had in U.S. national security strategy was the Pacific, a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan. And if you take a look at the ordinance expended in our military, I'm not sure we're

even remotely capable of doing anything now with an administration that I think I'm not sure we'd even react. And our allies in the Pacific know this. But let's switch to actually the next near-term conflict, which is Cuba. We do have a carrier within the vicinity of Cuba now. And it's clear that, to me, at least, that, you know, Trump has been laying hints all this about this nonstop. Marco Rubio has as well. You know, there's the idea that Trump wanted to take care of three issues in his second term.

Politics be damned, and that was Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba. I think the outcome in Venezuela is at very, very best mixed. Iran, probably even less so, but now we're going to kind of see what happens with Cuba. And I do think you're going to see it. You know, if there's this 60-day ceasefire, everyone's going to shift south to the Western Hemisphere and see what's happening. You have, obviously, Mark Rubio talking about this all the time, but the visit of CIA Director Ratcliffe to Havana. again, carriers on station there. And I guess one of the questions that we have to kind of ponder is, you know, let's, obviously we have a very strong economic squeeze on Cuba.

And in fact, over the last several, but about a week ago, we put on essentially secondary sanctions, which is a huge thing because in the past, Americans couldn't do business there, but now nobody can. And so, you know, what comes next there? I think is kind of the biggest question. And I guess one of the things we'd have to kind of contemplate is if you all can think about it too is, or the American, you know, again, economic squeeze of Cuba got it, probably the right policy. I'm all for this. In fact, military moves against Cuba, you know, are we really going to do this again? What does that even entail? Are we going to actually send in, you know, special operations forces to snatch a 90-year-old?

old or 94 year old. I don't know. Ralph Castro is 94. I mean, and, you know, do the American people have appetite for another military adventure? You know, even though Trump wanted that kind of hat trick of Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba, Cuba via military means, to me, you almost kind of scratch your head and saying at this point, when we talked about, you know, no more never-ending wars, Trump's campaign pledge, are we really going to do this again? And with the, you know, look, there's not going to be the same kind of economic effects at all. But at some point, I mean, this is getting pretty wild when you think about if we actually employ the U.S. military, again, for a third conflict over the last several months.

What are your guys' thoughts? Yeah, I mean, I would, if I was involved in the discussion, I would ask, to what end, what do we gain, right? I mean, in Venezuela, as it was very loudly publicized, there was the prospect of harnessing some of the profits from oil, right? But in Cuba's case, very, very difficult to discern any substantial benefit that we would get from going to war. I mean, even squeezing them economically like we're doing. I mean, it's affecting the poorest of the poor. They have no power for like 20 hours out of the 24-hour day.

But, like, you know, there was a gaggle of like left-wing, left-wing Twitch streamers and influences that went over to Cuba like a month ago. They were able, you know, they're spreading the good word of the Cuban government, right? Like, they were able to stay in a super nice hotel with power and internet and be able to stream. but the reality is on the ground that like most of the people that are in Cuba are fucking poor they can squeeze like you know the regime's not so much suffering as as compared to like the actual person that lives in Cuba like actual citizens so it's like the economic squeeze unless you can really like pinpoint and uh and strategically hit the regime without affecting the people on

the like the actual citizens of Cuba I don't know if I'm with that either because like they're against, they're getting, fuck, it's like a blockade essentially on Cuba. And I'm sure Raul Cashel still smoking his cigars, having his caviar, whatever the fuck, and regular people are getting screwed. Per usual. When I talk to kind of my, I have an interesting, you know, contacts and friends set with some of the Cuban exiles down in Miami. And so, you know, that is the big question is, you know, would this economic pressure

be enough to have the regime fall apart? And there, there's some dispute on that. Or does there have to be more of a push from kind of the, from the U.S. military. But, you know, look, there is, you know, Cuba is a national security threat to the United States, not imminent, but there are listening posts there. There's, you know, Signals intelligence collection from the Chinese and the Russians, of course. It's a thorn in our side. I mean, is it, is it a, you know, is it a top five issue for U.S. security players? Of course not. Do we want to have kind of some type of regime change there? Yes. And that's, and look, if you look at the U.S. demands, I mean, Marco Rubio's kind of three demands, which make total sense are, you know, lift, you know, release political prisoners, you know, ensure that there's no more political or religious repression there and then open up the area to private investment. And so, you know, the idea is will, will a Cuban government ever agree to some of this? I think it would be in everybody's interest if they did so without military intervention. But, you know, it will, you know,

and I think the constituency on this, you know, for Trump is South Florida. Now, I thought kind of the Republican Party has Florida locked up anyhow. So even politically, it doesn't make it. all that much sense. But it's going to be, I guess, just, you know, in this discussion that we're having now would be the same discussion that the American people should have, you know, if there ever were to be military intervention and say, you know, okay, why are we doing this? Keep the economic blockade on, got it. But U.S. military forces there, you know, and then we get into the kind of the problem, and you see this, of course, with some of the press reporting that there was clearly leaks from the administration about, you know, U.S. intelligence assessments that said, you know, Cuba could

unleash drone swarms against Key West, which, you know, you know, and then, you know, this seems to be to start, starting to justify, you know, some type of U.S. military move. And so I think, but, you know, everyone kind of rolled their eyes at that. But let's, let's, putting this all aside, let's be very clear. They are laser focused on this. Everybody I talked to with contacts within the U.S. administration, say Cuba's next and soon. I think Jack has said that too when we've talked to him.

You know, Jack has just been down at whatever, soft week down in. Tampa. And so Cuba is on everybody's mind. And I think Trump got bored with Iran and he wants to do this thing next. And so, you know, we can disagree with it all we want, but I think we're going to be talking about this next week and the week after. And the big question is, is, you know, if we see kind of, you know, Andy's old colleagues somehow, you know, arriving on Ospreys in Havana, and you do have to kind of sit back and say, you know, what are we doing? How in the world does this happen? And, and of course, you know, did the American people actually, you know, you know, vote for this.

And clearly, I think the answer on that is no. And like, yeah, I'm with you, when you mentioned about like South Florida and the Cuban, and the Cuban diaspora there,

how it, like, affects, like, Florida's not a swing state anymore at all, right? Like, so I understand that they're,

like, very powerful. They, you know, they spend a lot of money in politics, especially local. But yeah,

this will not even be a blip on the radar of like, on campaign, whether it's the, midterms or the primaries coming up in 2027 into 2028 you know if they if we look at let's just playing devil's advocate if we pull this off if there was some kind of successful intervention economic or military um rubio is the nominee uh no shot i'll bet money with you right now a hundred percent i mean how much today's the day even if they take over cuba and they wheel

old Raul Castro on a fucking wheelchair down over here in Brooklyn to roommate with Maduro. It's $5.2, May 24th, 2026. I'll bet you $100 that it will not be Rubio. If it's a success, I bet it will be. I'll generally. I'll say success, failure, it will not be Rubio in 2020. I think he's already actually in a very good position. Vance has been, you know, pretty much minimized in so many ways.

I mean, it's clear that Trump is favoring Rubio a bit now. I don't know who's going to endorse. But anyway. So I think if we're getting into it, I think Vance is actually being pretty strategic by removing himself from the Iran. Debuckle and the likely soon to be Cuban debacle. I think he's doing the right thing politically. And I disagree with everything he says or believes.

It's too weird, dude. Yeah, but honestly, he gets on the mic and he's pretty good, man. Like, and that's what this is now, politics, is vibe-based. I would disagree with you. 100 bucks. I want that hundy. Get it crisp ready for me. All right.

That's, um, everything that Vance campaigned on has, has evaporated, right? Do you remember, you know, one of his leading points was no more wars. Yeah. No more wars than them at least, right? I mean, and, and yes, he's been a front runner. in negotiations or maybe not a frontrunner,

but he was involved in negotiations. I noticed no longer. But he doesn't seem to be, he seems to be ignored, right? But who knows? I mean, Dee, I understand what you're saying, too, about track record means nothing. Back to Cuba, you know, I mean,

the U.S. is already essentially at war with Cuba economically. I think, you know, probably that pressure, that war is working faster than any military option would. I think, I don't know. Of course, I don't know. But, you know, when Trump says, hey, we may stop by Cuba after finishing Iran, I think that's, I don't think he means imminent military action. I think this is all the pressure campaign, you know, within it. And that's kind of a placeholder for escalation, right, to see. the kind of maritime interdiction, potentially that we saw in Venezuela.

But I would be astounded if there were military. He said the other day that Southcom has been tasked to come up with some, and people kind of got in a kind of a little bit nervous about that. But that's normal. I mean, there's nothing to that. That's what you do. Contingions. That didn't mean anything.

So like what would it, like, let's speculate. a little bit. Is it going to look like what Iran looked like or is it going to look like what Venezuela looked like, like a J-Soc raid to go snatch the octogenarian from his fucking palace? You gotta be the forum. It's got to be that. I mean, good Lord. Rather than like airstrikes and

you know. And I would say the Cuban military, and this is dusting off stuff that I probably shouldn't even talk about or know all that much about, but I don't think there, you know, this is a decrepit old military. I don't think there's going to be any kind of military match for the United States. And so yeah, but well, you know,

We'll see. But I'm telling you, you know, read the U.S. You know, the tea leaves here. I'm in the Washington area. Everyone's talking Cuba now nonstop. Now what that means, who knows. And so we'll see. But the other point, too, and I think, you know, there's enough open source in which, you know, we will see, you know, there's the whole idea of signal versus noise. There's a lot of noise now. But, you know, the signals would be when you start seeing, you know, certain soft units deploy. I mean, the crazy thing about and a year old world is that there's nothing secret anymore. Every time there's some movement from, you know, from Virginia Beach or Fort Bragg or from, you know, or, you know, air elements anywhere in the AFSAC world, I mean, people like within 55 seconds put it out on Twitter. And they've been right every single time. You know, the Venezuela stuff, when we saw soft going down there, you're like, all right. And then Iran, too. Once they move, that's a pretty, pretty compelling sign that something's there. So I think when you kind of, if you can do the signal versus noise, right now is a lot of. of noise. Although I would say signal is also, there is a carrier there. That's a data point.

But at the end of the day, I mean, you know, I think we all should kind of take a moment and sit back and say exactly what you said. If we actually launch a military operation against Cuba, you do kind of sit back and scratch your head and said, how in the world is this president who ran on it? I mean, literally his campaign thing with Kamala Harris is she's going to get us in a war with Iran. And he will have had three wars. One of which was with Iran. That's just extraordinary. Yeah. Don't forget Greenland because that's on our fucking bucket list, too, dude.

Also, a little bit of, like, the rumor mill, rumor mill-ish. Like, soft week was happening last week in Tampa. The 160 is supposed to do a demonstration there, and they pulled out last minute because it had to be somewhere. So I don't know what that means, but take that as you'd like. Right. Again, that's kind of the signal thing. You've got to kind of think about it.

But now, you know, who knows? could be stuff that we don't know about this happening in the world hey did you come up next week about the Tulsi Gabbard resigning I can't no no we didn't that happened yeah so that was very sad I wanted to touch on Ukraine too because Keith got smoke last night by Russia but yeah let's talk Tulsi real quick very quickly on on Tulsi you know there's not much more to say other than someone who doesn't have the presence here cannot be the DNI period you know

Intel Chief 101, kind of in Washington, D.C., is that whether you're the head of, you know, CIA or particular at DNI, you have to have access. You have to go see the president, call the president, basically have, you know, direct access at any time. And she had none of that. And, you know, the writing was on the wall for a lot of things. Of course, she was in opposition to Iran war. That's the worst kept secret, but that she was not involved in any of the planning, wasn't in the Oval Office sessions, wasn't in the sit room, and then tried to just save.

job by running around doing these kind of crazy conspiracy stuff. Also being on the raid in Georgia with the FBI, which why the ODNI would be there. I have no fucking idea. Well, that was just designed to curry favor. But, you know, so she's out, no surprise. You know, her deputy, Aaron Lucas, former CIA case officer, but not a heavyweight in the policy, you know, national security circles here. And kind of the big picture, which I've been kind of talking about a lot in the media in the last

couple days is that, you know, Tom Cotton, who is a very influential senator, the head of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, wants to abolish ODINI, period. End of story. And so I think that's what the discussion is going to shift to what in the world does the DNI do anyhow. And ultimately, CI Director Ratcliffe has won out. I mean, he has an office in the White House. He golfs with the president. So whoever is going to take over that job is not going to have that same kind of juice. And there's the question of even in the kind of the post-9-11 reforms, you needed some kind of coordinating function. Can something else do that rather than an office with a thousand people in it? All of who have been seconded from the other agencies.

So there was so much redundancy. Final point on this is in that as a field officer for the agency, and even when I was at headquarters as a manager, I never had contact with ODNI or the DNI for anything. Really? Nothing. Zero. Had no bearing on my life. When you're in the field and the DNI comes out, you scratch your head and say, oh, shit, we've got to try. brought them over to the liaison chief in whatever country we're in, but I don't even know what they do.

You know, CIA is still the top dog when it comes to kind of the overseas presence. And so what was most interesting just about Tulsi's departure is, number one, what a strange person she is belonging to this kind of odd cult in Hawaii that I'd eat toenails. No kidding. and number two, that she was so viscerally opposed to basically every policy choice the administration made. So it almost took too long. And finally, you know, obviously her husband's sick with some with cancer. And so, you know, you wish them well. Yeah.

Yeah. I was rooting for it, really. I hope she, you know, I wish she did, like stayed the whole four years. All right, Ukraine, Russia. We've seen over the last couple weeks probably, maybe more than that. Ukraine's reaching to Russia has been deeper and deeper. Russia is there, at least the air defense seems to be dwindling more and more. They have to move it around.

You saw it with the Victory Day parade and stuff like that. And you are seeing just overall more and more drone attacks inside of Russia deep inside, like 1500 kilometers and stuff like that. So like the momentum kind of perception has been shifting over the last like almost three weeks. and yesterday Russia launched a massive attack on Kyiv obviously hit fucking civilian targets and stuff like that because they don't give a fuck and they're evil so let's just have a little bit of a talk about that Andy you go for it let me hear you

yeah so yeah last night it was the Ukraine is saying 690 assets right drones and missiles targeted Kiev alone. And, you know, Kiev, although every district was hit, I think it's a sign of how good the interception rate is and how, you know, I have some personal experience to this, obviously, but how efficient their civil defense procedures are, just getting civilians into shelters that only two people were killed. You know, unfortunate for those who know those two people. But you think about the scale of the attack.

I mean, it's just hard to imagine. You know, I mean, I'm trying to think of, so here, so where I am in the Middle East, I mean, this country was hit by a few missiles and drones. and the scale of, I won't say panic, but fear among expats here was pretty high. And yet, you know, it was nothing compared to what Kiev goes through night after night after night. You know, and so two killed, I mean, there was 77 injured, but when you're thinking of that, that many missiles and drones.

And I want to add to how the Russians have improved the technology on the Shahid drones since the initial strikes. And a key point was during the strikes, they used a hypersonic weapon called the Orshnick. In fact, they used at least two Kimzal missiles and three or four zircon hypersonic missiles. But the headline was the Arrishnik. And, you know, Putin has talked about this saying it travels like a meteorite and cannot be stopped. And there's some truth in that. It cannot be stopped. And so the Russians hit, they didn't hit Kiev.

They hit a town to the south of Kiev with the Arshnik. And I don't know whether that's because they were concerned. It would be intercepted or it might just be a demonstration. of the fact that they could do it. But that is, you know, using hypersonic weapons. We've, we talk about defending against hypersonic weapons, right? But I mean, the Ukrainian air defense systems are so far ahead. Even though they're air, I'm not talking about the technology.

I'm talking about just how they operate them. We need to be learning from them. So anyway, an extraordinary event. the ukrainia it was uh catastrophic as far as to in terms of property damage but uh thank god you know more civilians weren't killed so why do the russians do that aside from the fact that are all shithets um so Putin the Russians are under they're under a lot of pressure right now uh they've stalled in dombas they're taking as we've talked about here no exaggeration this is according to our usi which is a uh

British think tank. They're taking 30 to 33,000 casualties a month, right? A thousand a day. Actually, it's a thousand, a thousand a day on a good day. It's between 1,200 casualties a day. And the Ukrainians have been slacking their oil infrastructure, as you point out, D, very far away from, I mean, far into the Russian hinterland. And then a few days ago they hit a drone unit one of the Russia

Russia's prominent drone units in Ukraine they hit it in in Lujansk and they struck their headquarters by all accounts wiped out the entire unit it was a very successful strike Putin lost his shit over that

he claimed that they'd hit a school and that's 18 children were dead but of course Putin wouldn't have lost his shit over that. And so that's why he's saying they launched this strike. From kind of a strategic level, there's really four things Russia's communicating, if you can call it communicating.

One is, you know, to Ukraine, it's a consistent message that it doesn't matter what's happening at the front. There's no city, there's no infrastructure, there's no part of your territory that's safe. not even the capital. And then to the west, I think this display of the Orschenik was saying, hey, can't be intercepted. That might be why they didn't try and hit Kiev, because if it had been intercepted, then that wouldn't have looked good. So, you know, they're trying to say, we've got this.

Putin's all about threats of escalation. And the Orschnik, of course, can be armed with a nuclear warhead, blah, blah, blah, blah. But even without a nuclear warhead, there are doubts whether any air defense system in the world can intercept it. And it's definitely a concern. And probably an implicit message to Washington, although we don't seem to be listening to Russia, that Ukraine's not settled. You go ahead and be consumed with Iran. But Ukraine, we're still at war with Ukraine. Any U.S. pressure on Russia for a peace deal comes while Russia is demonstrating its own escalation,

right and then of course the european leaders uh von der laden macron callus and khani who are all nemesis right i know kani's not a european leader but he's i mean he's pro-nado um they've all condemned the attack obviously uh the u s hasn't really said it hasn't said anything about it uh but but the eu has promised more air defense support ukraine so this could be something that's backfiring on russia we'll see. And then finally, Zelensky, I mean, Ukrainian intelligence, I'm sure Mark will agree is, to say it's world class is an understatement, but Zelensky warned of exactly the strike less than 24 hours before it happened. And I think that might be why they had so few casualties. The civilian population was pre-warned. That wasn't because the Russians warned them.

It's because their intelligence picked up, picked it up. And so that, that the warning was accurate. The attack happened anyway, tells you something important. Russia calculated it calculated that forewarning, that even with forewarning, that, you know, they could, they could impose costs on Ukraine, though, as we've seen probably the costs weren't as high as they expected them to be. You know, Andy, one of the things that is, it was most interesting about this, it's tragic if you care about, you know, U.S. foreign policy is the lack of U.S. response. This was a terrible war crime.

It should have had absolute condemnation from the U.S. side, but at this point, I think a lot of us have given up. And the one thing that, you know, it is to me actually perhaps a positive that Trump doesn't care anymore. And Rubio actually came out the other day. Secretary of State saying, hey, we're not even going to try. Neither side is interested in a peace deal.

Good. But the best thing that could happen to Ukraine in Europe is for the U.S. to stay out of this. Because when we were staying in it, under the Trump administration, it was a debacle. And there was a couple commentators who thought, you know, Trump's going to get bored of this. It's not, it's too hard. You have kind of these, you know, the dynamic duo of Kushner and Witkoff as envoys, Whitkoff in particular, who are disasters. But the farther they stay away from this.

And then, of course, the Ukrainians in all of their capabilities improved really dramatically. And so to me, this was a, you know, it was, it was embarrassing that the U.S. didn't say anything. The Europeans did. Let's see what kind of concrete actions happen. And at the end of the day, you know, it's the less, frankly, the U.S. is involved in putting any pressure on Ukraine, which is where the pressure would come, the better. The idea that somehow we would come down hard on Russia for this. I think that's just, you know, we would have in the past, but not under this administration. And so what I think you mentioned before, those casualty numbers certainly are something else. Oh, final piece, you're 100% right in terms of Ukrainian intelligence.

And I will say that the one area in which the U.S. is still contributing. And it's this one of these strange mysteries of Washington is that my old outfit is still heavily involved. And it's most heavily involved in not the paramilitary side of the house, more so than helping on targeting, but on that provision of intelligence. So I wouldn't be surprised if it was the combination of U.S. and Ukrainian collection that was allowed for proper forewarning. And we've seen this before as well. I mean, and you spent a lot of time there, but I also do kind of recall,

and you were there firsthand, you know, the warnings you get were, you know, were in advance. And that's because the intelligence net that was set up. but ultimately let's see how kind of Europe comes through air defense is a critical need but some of the other stuff's not anymore i mean all the things that we were kind of howling about whether it was attackums or tomahawks all that stuff i mean ukrainans are doing pretty damn well with their domestic kind of indigenous capability on drones it is no you could you would be a much better person to address this but you could probably spend an hour talking about how it's the finest fighting force in europe right now um maybe that's exaggerated but maybe not uh And so, but boy, if you're, you know, someone like myself who was involved in the U.S. national security world, the idea that U.S. is silent after what happened is just embarrassing. Agreed on all. All right, boys. Fightsly concluded. Well done.

Dang, I know. That was beautiful. Beautiful little bow on it. I want everyone. You're here. I have this death flu. You know, Andy's from millions of miles away. And our other colleagues are off gallivanting around.

Yeah, they're on flights. noted who showed up yeah exactly everybody do us a favor if you want to check out any of the guy's stuff andy's book mark's book mark's twitter andy's twitter whatever andy's got a new uh article out on war on the rocks i'll put that link in the description as well i still gonna dive into that i saw some some controversy on social media and you just trying to make people mad you know i still got to jump into that just getting people upset hey i'll tell you this is an this it's an operational argument i see a clear of morals i stick. I'm just saying operationally, it was, this is why the plan was so flawed. The campaign in

Gaza was such a mess. I promise. I'll be in no sense. I'm going to jump in and read it and I got a comment on it. I did see someone, and it doesn't even matter who said like, who is this Andy person? Is he qualified to comment on this? I like that one. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I'm getting a lot of people who came to friends. I think he's probably has a thing or two. He's got a couple experiences in urban warfare. You know, you could criticize what you said. You don't want to go down that road. Yeah. Yeah, so check out that article.

That link is going to be in the description. It's for War on the Rocks. Follow the guys. And, of course, if you want to help support the show, you can go to patreon.com slash team house. You get episodes ad-free and early of both eyes on and the team house. We have a really cool one coming out today with a World War II veteran, first time ever, which is exciting. And, yeah, guys.

Happy Memorial Day, and we'll see you next time. Thank you guys. Thanks, everyone. Hey, guys, I want to take a moment to tell you about the Team House podcast newsletter. If you go and subscribe, it's totally free. And what it will do is aggregate all of our data, all of our content that we put out, the things that are on the Team House, on our geopolitics podcast, eyes on, things that I write journalistically with Sean Naylor on the high side, anything else that we have.

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