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Speaker 1: And those US strikes in Eastern Syria overnight conducted by

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Speaker 1: American F sixteens against Iranian link positions in eastern Syria

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Speaker 1: at this base. US Secretary Lloyd Austin releasing a statement saying, quote,

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Speaker 1: these narrowly tailored strikes in self defense were intended solely

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Speaker 1: to protect and defend US personnel in Iraq and Syria.

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Speaker 1: They are separate and distinct from the ongoing conflict between

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Speaker 1: Israel and Hamas. This is significant because since the conflict

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Speaker 1: developed on October seventh, following that massacre here in southern Israel,

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Speaker 1: we've seen a number of attacks on not just Israeli

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Speaker 1: interests across the region, but also American interest.

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Speaker 2: One of the first things I did when I heard

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Speaker 2: about these attacks by the US and the Middle East

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Speaker 2: as I went to Mike Lions Twitter feed at mag

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Speaker 2: Major Mic Lions Mag Mike Lions to see what he

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Speaker 2: had to say about it, and I thought, well, we

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Speaker 2: got to have him on the radio today to see

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Speaker 2: where we are with that. Mike, Welcome to the Armstrong

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Speaker 2: and Getty Show again. Thanks for having so How big

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Speaker 2: a deal is this? I'm I'm the complete layman on

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Speaker 2: this stuff. It just doesn't feel like enough with the

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Speaker 2: number of times that Iran has struck us. But what

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Speaker 2: are your feelings as a guy who knows what he's

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Speaker 2: talking about.

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Speaker 3: No, it's not. Had a conversation over the weekend with

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Speaker 3: a couple of former colleagues and it's like, it's about time,

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Speaker 3: and you know, the fact of the matter is they

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Speaker 3: have been attacking US forces there aaron is the most

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Speaker 3: responsible country for US soldier deaths within Iraq when we

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Speaker 3: were there from you know, two thousand and three through

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Speaker 3: twenty eleven, I mean the IEDs and everything they did,

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Speaker 3: We've done nothing. And then a lot of it is

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Speaker 3: we just continue to believe that all of a sudden,

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Speaker 3: we're going to wake up in the Iranians are going

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Speaker 3: to be friendly, and they're going to change, and something's

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Speaker 3: going to be different. But just not the case. If

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Speaker 3: you're a soldier in combat right now in Syria or

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Speaker 3: in Iraq and it's a combat zone, you're concerned about

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Speaker 3: what's the you know, what is our government doing to

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Speaker 3: protect you there? Aside from you know, maybe vehicles. We

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Speaker 3: obviously hear that there's an individual was killed in a

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Speaker 3: in a bombshelter, but that's nice but at some point,

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Speaker 3: again enough is enough. And right now, the whole gamble,

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Speaker 3: the whole assumption is that the Iranians are not going

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Speaker 3: to escalate. They're not going to do anything to force

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Speaker 3: an escalation. So they continue to go around with the

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Speaker 3: you know, the margins here and make small little things.

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Speaker 3: But at some point, again enough's enough. They have to decide,

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Speaker 3: just like Israel. Israel has decided enough's enough. They're not

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Speaker 3: going to do louder rents repeat this time. They're not

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Speaker 3: stopping in guys. They're not going to take any pressure.

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Speaker 3: They're not going to take any pressure from the outside world.

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Speaker 3: They're just not gonna They're just going to keep going.

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Speaker 2: So, as you said, Iran was behind a whole bunch

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Speaker 2: of attacks and deaths of Americans, well for a long

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Speaker 2: long time. So what is the hesitation with the United

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Speaker 2: States facing off against Iran? What what is their military capability?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, no, it's not much. It's more from the sky,

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Speaker 3: it would be soul based, it's regional, it's uh, you know,

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Speaker 3: it's it's the terror funding that they do. They don't

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Speaker 3: provide an existential threat to us. And I think I

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Speaker 3: think the problem is we're psychologically disarmed from them because

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Speaker 3: we would destroy them, and the rest of the world

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Speaker 3: would say, what's going on in the United States, Like

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Speaker 3: why did you do this? Meanwhile, they continue to kill

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Speaker 3: our soldiers and and and harm our allies and do

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Speaker 3: all these things. So again we've got to decide enough's enough,

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Speaker 3: and we've got to you know, somebody used this expression'll

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Speaker 3: punch them in the nose? Well kind of what does

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Speaker 3: that mean? You know? Do we attack their pentagon? Do

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Speaker 3: we attack their their capability to manufacture oil and petroleum?

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Speaker 3: So if we do that, though it upsets the economic

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Speaker 3: balance of power, You've got to think that we would

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Speaker 3: need allies to do this, and I think that ally

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Speaker 3: is Israel. So that fuse gets lit right October seventh,

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Speaker 3: and that views is continuing to burn right now. So

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Speaker 3: the question is what war would Iran do? Will they

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Speaker 3: back down the sum are that around's going to bock down?

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Speaker 3: They're not going to do much more.

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Speaker 2: But we have to just say, uh, well, do you

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Speaker 2: agree with that assumption or not.

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Speaker 3: I don't think it's a good assumption to make from

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Speaker 3: a military preparedness perspective. No. I think that let's say

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Speaker 3: the Israelis when they decide to go. So Israel wants

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Speaker 3: to fight, it's kind of war. They don't want to

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Speaker 3: fight the war Homas wants them to fight, right, So

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Speaker 3: they're going to do this ground war when they're good

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Speaker 3: and ready, and that's going to mean they've got either

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Speaker 3: better intel on the hostages, that they they're going to

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Speaker 3: be assured that they're going to win, that they're not

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Speaker 3: going to take a lot of casualties. But once that

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Speaker 3: starts and they commit there, then who knows what happens

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Speaker 3: in the north. Who knows? Then if the Uranians decide

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Speaker 3: to help has Bella more and they encourage them, and

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Speaker 3: next thing you know, they've opened up another front to

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Speaker 3: the north, and now Israel is already facing an existential threat.

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Speaker 3: So I don't I just don't think it's a good assumption.

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Speaker 3: The assumption is being made that the Hutis are not

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Speaker 3: going to do anything. Has Bellahs kind of tired, Lebani

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Speaker 3: Lebanon is not going to want to do anything. The

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Speaker 3: Uranians are going to eventually back down rather rent repeat

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Speaker 3: here we go, will eventually bring the Israelies up for

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Speaker 3: you know, for war crimes because they're going to attack disproportionately.

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Speaker 3: But the world's not getting that Israel is at war.

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Speaker 3: They've said they're at war. They've the defense managers said,

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Speaker 3: is the time for pieces, the time for war. This

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Speaker 3: is the time for war. They're going to destroy as

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Speaker 3: use for us as much as possible as they can

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Speaker 3: until they feel that that this is that their goals

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Speaker 3: are accomplished.

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Speaker 2: So what's our uh, Because we've talked about how we've

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Speaker 2: got two aircraft carriers now and all the support that

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Speaker 2: goes with aircraft carriers and two thousand troops have put

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Speaker 2: on and put on notice to deploy and all the

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Speaker 2: in terms of our assets in the region currently, how

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Speaker 2: how well are we stocked the.

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Speaker 3: We're good from a strategic perspective and from from putting

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Speaker 3: air defense platforms in place to support Israel, because what

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Speaker 3: the Ranians would likely do is fire multiple long range

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Speaker 3: missiles at at Israel going to attack Tel Aviv. They

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Speaker 3: have no capability to do any kind of a ground force.

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Speaker 3: They couldn't get there. That wouldn't happen. They could unleash

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Speaker 3: these terror organizations that have come from the north. So

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Speaker 3: what the defense they need are iron dome rockets and

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Speaker 3: patriot missiles and SAD so that is kind of bullets

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Speaker 3: hitting bullets. It's another complex air defense system against ballistic missiles.

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Speaker 3: Is what is what we're doing, which is fine, which

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Speaker 3: is exactly what we should be doing and allowing. You know,

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Speaker 3: that's our level of the terrence right now. So Israel's

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Speaker 3: trying to restore the terrens with their neighbors, and they

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Speaker 3: do it disproportionately. That's why that's their level of the turns,

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Speaker 3: whereas ours right now is proportional. So for example, we

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Speaker 3: attacked these two, we tacked a bunch of logistic bases

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Speaker 3: inside of Syria. So again from a military perspective, okay,

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Speaker 3: we took away some capacity for these malicious to fight,

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Speaker 3: but really didn't make any kind of impact on the ground.

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Speaker 3: That's they're going to still come back and start to

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Speaker 3: attack American troops there. The question is how do we escalate?

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Speaker 3: Where we escalate there is attacking those places inside Iran,

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Speaker 3: and you know that opens up another level of discussion.

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Speaker 2: So the President was asked on sixty minutes a couple

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Speaker 2: of weeks ago, we've got a war we're supporting in

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Speaker 2: the Ukraine, supporting the Ukrainians against the Russians. Now we've

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Speaker 2: got supporting the Isras. Can we handle two different fronts?

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Speaker 2: And then of course you've got to throw in the

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Speaker 2: idea of if we are busy with those, does China

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Speaker 2: decide to do anything anywhere? Can we handle all this stuff?

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Speaker 2: Are we big enough and powerful enough to handle all

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Speaker 2: these things at one time?

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Speaker 3: Well, we could, we'd have to mobilize, we'd have to

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Speaker 3: do things, you know, we'd have to create a situation

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Speaker 3: where you know, in the past thirty years, the United

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Speaker 3: States has really not gone to war. The military has

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Speaker 3: gone to war. So ask a military family and ask

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Speaker 3: the soldiers that have been deployed, you know, three or

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Speaker 3: four times over six or seven years, and the damage

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Speaker 3: that's created to that military environment because that's happened. But

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Speaker 3: the United States would have to deploy. The United States

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Speaker 3: would have to mobilize. And I haven't seen that yet.

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Speaker 3: I haven't seen that appetite yet. And that's the that's

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Speaker 3: the hard political decision that some political leader would have

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Speaker 3: to make. The reality would have to kind of hit

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Speaker 3: us in the face. We're acting different in the Middle East. Also,

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Speaker 3: because there's no nuclear power we're eventually up against, right,

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Speaker 3: I mean, in Ukraine, were giving Ukraine the means, so

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Speaker 3: they don't lose. Right, We've not really given them the

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Speaker 3: means for them to win, because then that would tip

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Speaker 3: the balance. And potentially Russia does something and they have

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Speaker 3: nuclear capability, So that's out there. But what's different here

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Speaker 3: in the Middle East because there's no other nuclear power

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Speaker 3: that we have to kind of face off with. Now

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Speaker 3: you brought up China again, who knows another wild card?

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Speaker 3: We have to assume that they're going to sense weakness

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Speaker 3: and countries and leaders make these calculated decisions and history

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Speaker 3: about whether they go or whether they don't go right,

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Speaker 3: you know. So again you look at how World War

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Speaker 3: one started, World War one started, and all these bad

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Speaker 3: assumptions that everybody didn't think were going to happen, Well,

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Speaker 3: I'm sure they're happened, and they happened for four years,

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Speaker 3: and everybody can say, oh, it's going to be over

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Speaker 3: by Christmas and never never went that way. Yeah, where

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Speaker 3: we're at right now, we're all facing off each other saying, oh,

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Speaker 3: that's not going to happen because they would never his

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Speaker 3: Bla would never do that, and the Ranians would never

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Speaker 3: do that, and the Chinese would never do that. I mean,

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Speaker 3: it's really bad. Assumptions got us into those places in

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Speaker 3: the past, and if we don't learn from him, then

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Speaker 3: shame on us.

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Speaker 2: Well, I know you're an expert in military history. I've

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Speaker 2: read a lot of military history. If it seems like

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Speaker 2: every big war in world history began with the side

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Speaker 2: believing it'll be over by Christmas or summer or spring

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Speaker 2: or whatever it was, and it doesn't work out that way.

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Speaker 2: I'm looking at cable News right now and they're talking

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Speaker 2: about close call with the Chinese fighter plane or whatever.

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Speaker 2: They ran one of their ships up against a ship

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Speaker 2: in the Philippines the other day. So we had Ian Bremer,

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Speaker 2: the political scientist, on last week and I asked him

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Speaker 2: about why wouldn't China go now? And he thought, well, economically,

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Speaker 2: there's just no way they're going to do that now.

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Speaker 2: But you know, it's one guy's decision. President she and

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Speaker 2: if he looks at Joe Biden and thinks the guy

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Speaker 2: is old and a little lost in the United States

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Speaker 2: is busy, there's never going to be a better time.

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Speaker 2: I just I don't know. I can't imagine why now

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Speaker 2: wouldn't be a good time.

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Speaker 3: The question is whether our country will declare war. That's

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Speaker 3: what it's going to take for the country declare war.

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Speaker 3: Then we're all in. We're mobilized, national guard units, industry changes,

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Speaker 3: We're now providing weapons, go back to the Ukraine. We're

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Speaker 3: providing weapons to the Ukraine. We're taking stuff from the

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Speaker 3: nineties that was about to expire. But what we need

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Speaker 3: to do now a complete refresh of all of our

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Speaker 3: defensive systems, because that's kind of happening here. Our enemies

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Speaker 3: could be drawing down our supplies, and now's the time

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Speaker 3: to go. If you're China, now's the time then to

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Speaker 3: go to war the United States, because you know, we're

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Speaker 3: tone out in world wars for a reason, right, because

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Speaker 3: we can crank up the industrial machine pretty quickly if

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Speaker 3: we have to. If you ever go to the World

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Speaker 3: War Two Museum down in New Orleans, it's pretty amazing

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Speaker 3: that you see how quickly if the United States wanted

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Speaker 3: to crank up the war machine, we could do that.

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Speaker 3: But again, we end up losing the beginning of those

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Speaker 3: wars and we take a lot of a lot of

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Speaker 3: casualties because we're just we're not ready to the point

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Speaker 3: where the enemy has got that capability.

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Speaker 2: One more quick thing before we let you go the

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Speaker 2: it's three weeks tomorrow since the horror happened in Israel.

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Speaker 2: I think most people probably thought they'd be in there

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Speaker 2: with tanks faster than now. Does it make sense to

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Speaker 2: you to to strategically wait and get your ducks in

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Speaker 2: a row like.

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Speaker 3: This, Yeah, it does. I sat in the desert for

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Speaker 3: a couple of months in desert storm, and then watch

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Speaker 3: for thirty five days in the air campaign, and we

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Speaker 3: still faced off at an enemy that had capability. I

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Speaker 3: think Israel is torn between knowing that if they go

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Speaker 3: large scale on the ground that's not a good outcome

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Speaker 3: for the hostages that are there, and I think they're

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Speaker 3: doing everything they can. The raids that they're doing right now,

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Speaker 3: they're doing quick across the border raids, try to gather intelligence.

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Speaker 3: But I think that they're faced with that decision knowing

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Speaker 3: full well now again when the time comes, they're not

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Speaker 3: going to allow Hamas to hide behind civilians, because they're

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Speaker 3: going to say, if you're a civilian in the northern

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Speaker 3: part of Gaza, you're a combatant. Right, everyone's been warned,

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Speaker 3: everybody's been told to get south, Go south. They'll they'll

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Speaker 3: likely have no fires on too. I mean there's a

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Speaker 3: reason why the Egyptians won't left the Palestinians in, and

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Speaker 3: the Jordanians won't let the Palestinians, and there's like the

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Speaker 3: rest of the Middle East does not want to help

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Speaker 3: Israel solve this problem. So they're going to solve the

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Speaker 3: problem by just you know, destroying it, by flatting it.

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Speaker 2: Thanks for your time today. It's good to talk to

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Speaker 2: somebody who actually knows what they're talking about, because you know,

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Speaker 2: my blathering is of no use. Mike Lions, thank you

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Speaker 2: very much, thanks for having me. And as I mentioned earlier,

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Speaker 2: you can find him if you want to follow him

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Speaker 2: on Twitter at mag Mike Lions, and he's one of

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Speaker 2: the first places I go when anything militarily is happening

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Speaker 2: to get his opinion, or you see him on CNN

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Speaker 2: on a regular basis Armstrong and Getty