Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2: This is a breaking news update from Bloomberg instant reaction
Speaker 2: and analysis from our three thousand journalists and analysts around
Speaker 2: the world. This is special coverage from Bloomberg Radio. I'm
Speaker 2: Doug Chrisner in New York Wednesday evening. In a rare
Speaker 2: primetime address to the nation, President Trump provided an update
Speaker 2: on the war in Iran.
Speaker 3: Thanks to the progress we've made, I can say tonight
Speaker 3: that we are on track to complete all of America's
Speaker 3: military objectives shortly, very shortly. We're going to hit them
Speaker 3: extremely hard over the next two to three weeks. We're
Speaker 3: going to bring them back to the Stone ages where
Speaker 3: they belong. In the meantime, discussions are ongoing. Regime change
Speaker 3: was not our goal. We never said regime change. But
Speaker 3: regime change has occurred because of all of their original
Speaker 3: leader's death. They're all dead. The new group is less
Speaker 3: radical and much more reasonable. Yet, if during this period
Speaker 3: of time no deal is made, we have our eyes
Speaker 3: or in key targets. If there is no deal, we
Speaker 3: are going to hit each and every one of their
Speaker 3: electric generating plants very hard, and probably simultaneously. We have
Speaker 3: not hit their oil, even though that's the easiest target
Speaker 3: of all because it would not give them even a
Speaker 3: small chance of survival or rebuilding. But we could hit
Speaker 3: it and it would be gone, and there's not a
Speaker 3: thing they could do about it.
Speaker 2: President Trump, they are delivering a rare prime time address
Speaker 2: with regards to war in Iran. He said, the US
Speaker 2: is getting very close to finishing the job in Iran.
Speaker 2: The hard part, in Trump's words, done insofar as Iron
Speaker 2: is concerned, and the country is no longer really a threat.
Speaker 2: Let's talk a little bit more about what we heard
Speaker 2: today from the President with our special guest, Christina Raffini
Speaker 2: is with us. She is co host of Bloomberg This Weekend.
Speaker 2: Also on the line, Bloomberg's Jeff Mason. He is White
Speaker 2: House and Washington correspondent. Thanks to you both, Christina, let
Speaker 2: me begin with you. What did you make of what
Speaker 2: you heard tonight.
Speaker 1: One of the interesting things we did not hear was
Speaker 1: something we were expecting to hear, and that was the
Speaker 1: President name NATO. We understand he's been very frustrated with
Speaker 1: NATO allies. He kind of second referenced it at one point.
Speaker 1: He said America doesn't need things out of the Strait.
Speaker 1: We have our own oil and gas. And to all
Speaker 1: you allies who basically wouldn't help us, if you want it,
Speaker 1: go protect it. He also gave a bit of a timeline,
Speaker 1: although there weren't as many specifics as a lot of
Speaker 1: people were hoping for. He said, our objectives are about
Speaker 1: to be fully achieved. We're on track to complete those shortly,
Speaker 1: and then he said in the next two to three weeks.
Speaker 1: And for context, he then began listing the duration of
Speaker 1: other American wars, including Vietnam and the Iraq War, which
Speaker 1: meant much longer, and that it's you know, this has
Speaker 1: only been thirty two days of conflict, Jeff.
Speaker 2: He seemed to be delivering an ultimatum. Vice President jd.
Speaker 2: Vance is set to relay some messages through mediators, and
Speaker 2: essentially it comes down to this, if there is no deal,
Speaker 2: the US is going to hit each and every one
Speaker 2: of Iran's electrical generating plants very hard. That seems to
Speaker 2: be illegal, doesn't Well.
Speaker 4: I don't feel like I can comment on whether it's illegal,
Speaker 4: but I can say that it is certainly a threat,
Speaker 4: and that may be one reason why we're seeing s
Speaker 4: and p futures going down already as President Trump was speaking,
Speaker 4: and that's probably the opposite of what he was hoping
Speaker 4: to achieve, because he did reference the markets tonight, and
Speaker 4: he talked about the fact that stock markets had dropped
Speaker 4: a little bit because of the war, and then he
Speaker 4: said what he often says, which is he said he
Speaker 4: saw the markets coming back as he's been talking about
Speaker 4: ending the conflict, and thought it seemed happy about that.
Speaker 4: I think tonight was largely a sales pitch by the president.
Speaker 4: It's a late sales pitch, and I don't mean late
Speaker 4: on a Wednesday evening. I mean late in the process
Speaker 4: of the war. He launched this war four and a
Speaker 4: half weeks ago, essentially with a social media announcement, and yes,
Speaker 4: he has spoken to reporters and in that way addressed
Speaker 4: the American public over these weeks, but this was his
Speaker 4: first time coming out and laying out the logic for
Speaker 4: going into the war and laying out his next steps.
Speaker 5: And that's what he did with this address tonight.
Speaker 4: But I wouldn't say we learned a whole lot more
Speaker 4: about the war or the process, other than him sticking
Speaker 4: to a two to three week timeline for getting out Christina.
Speaker 2: Earlier today, Iranian President Mussud Przeskyn took the, let's call
Speaker 2: it unusual step of issuing a letter directly addressed to Americans,
Speaker 2: and in it, he said, continuing along the path of
Speaker 2: confrontation is more costly in few ChIL than ever before,
Speaker 2: and he noted that attacks on infrastructure directly target Iranian people.
Speaker 2: Did it surprise you that there was no reference made
Speaker 2: to that letter.
Speaker 1: Not really. The President doesn't like to I don't think
Speaker 1: he wants to give credence to that administration or that
Speaker 1: power structure in Tehran right now. But it was an
Speaker 1: interesting move by Iran because that's something we've seen Americans
Speaker 1: usually come from the State Department or American presidents have
Speaker 1: often issued statements in Farsi for the Iranian people. They
Speaker 1: often are trying to appeal to the people, especially during
Speaker 1: the protests or as President Trump said tonight, regime change
Speaker 1: was not our goal, but regime change has occurred. If
Speaker 1: you're trying to appeal directly to the population to overthrow
Speaker 1: what you view as a corrupt and as you said
Speaker 1: several times, evil regime, that is something we are more
Speaker 1: commonly seeing from the US to Iran. I don't remember
Speaker 1: in recent memory the President of Iran appealing directly to
Speaker 1: the American people, but these are unprecedented times. The other
Speaker 1: thing the President said that I thought was interesting was
Speaker 1: when he talked about regime change. He said, but regime
Speaker 1: change has occurred because all the original leaders are dead.
Speaker 1: This is true. They have taken out of a lot
Speaker 1: of Iran's leadership, but the current leader is the son
Speaker 1: of the former leader, and a lot of the mullahs
Speaker 1: and power structure that are electing him are still in
Speaker 1: place from the old regime. And if anything, analysts have
Speaker 1: told us these strikes knocked out of a lot of
Speaker 1: potential moderates, and you're getting mostly extremists who are in
Speaker 1: the government right now, with the exception of perhaps the
Speaker 1: president and the Foreign Minister and maybe the Speaker of
Speaker 1: the House in Tehran. So that's not exactly accurate. And
Speaker 1: calling it regime change is also not accurate, because these are,
Speaker 1: for better or worse, mostly the same people who were
Speaker 1: in power before this assault started.
Speaker 2: Jeff, we understand that British Foreign Secretary of Ed Cooper
Speaker 2: will be chairing a virtual meeting with counterparts from some
Speaker 2: thirty five countries, and the aim apparently is to discuss
Speaker 2: a plan to restore freedom of navigation in the Strait.
Speaker 2: The US, from what I d stand, is not due
Speaker 2: to attend this virtual meeting. Where do you think things
Speaker 2: stand with some of our allies, particularly those in Europe.
Speaker 5: Well, it's hard to say.
Speaker 4: I think they've certainly had a wake up call from
Speaker 4: President Trump.
Speaker 5: And that didn't just start with this war.
Speaker 4: That started with his return to office, generally when he
Speaker 4: started to be critical of NATO again as he was
Speaker 4: during his first term. Although I will say I asked
Speaker 4: him a question of one of his first press conferences
Speaker 4: last year about whether he remained committed to Article five,
Speaker 4: which of course is the part of the NATO Treaty
Speaker 4: that guarantees mutual defense, and he said yes. But there
Speaker 4: has certainly been a number of questions about that since,
Speaker 4: and he is raising them himself by being critical of
Speaker 4: NATO allies, Britain in particular, I might add, for not
Speaker 4: jumping in to help protect the straight of hor Moves
Speaker 4: and help get ship to help improve the shipping passages
Speaker 4: through there. So to your question, and that was a
Speaker 4: long wind up, sorry, The fact that the United States
Speaker 4: is not taking part is probably a sign that these
Speaker 4: other countries realize that Trump is serious when he says
Speaker 4: We're going to leave in two to three weeks and
Speaker 4: we don't really care what happens to the Strait of Hormuz.
Speaker 4: I mean, he says that it will it will just
Speaker 4: automatically start working better. But I think most reasonable people
Speaker 4: who are familiar with that area of the world will
Speaker 4: know that that's not the case. And so these countries
Speaker 4: appear to be looking like they want to talk about
Speaker 4: it in order to come up with a strategy.
Speaker 2: Speaking with Bloomberg's Jeff Mason, who is our White House
Speaker 2: and Washington correspondent, as well as Christina Ruffini, who is
Speaker 2: co host of Bloomberg This Weekend. By the way, you
Speaker 2: can catch here Saturdays and Sundays on Bloomberg TV and
Speaker 2: Radio beginning at seven a m. Eastern time. Christina, let
Speaker 2: me go to you. The conversation that we had yesterday
Speaker 2: late in the day was the possibility of some type
Speaker 2: of UN action as it relates to the UAE, maybe
Speaker 2: using the use of force to keeping the straight open.
Speaker 2: Do you think that's got any chance of succeeding.
Speaker 1: I think the UN is at its weakest that we've
Speaker 1: seen it in probably the last two decades. But following
Speaker 1: up on Jeff's point, the President said, when this is done,
Speaker 1: it will just open up naturally because they want to
Speaker 1: sell the oil, referring to the Strait of Hormuz. What
Speaker 1: Jeff was talking about is something that allies are really
Speaker 1: concerned about, and that's probably what's precipitating that mention that
Speaker 1: that meeting you mentioned it from the UK and this
Speaker 1: effort to try to get some sort of coalition together
Speaker 1: with the UN, with these nations to open up the street,
Speaker 1: because it is looking more and more likely, and I
Speaker 1: think the President's words hinted at it tonight. He doesn't
Speaker 1: really care if the strait is operational. He's going to
Speaker 1: do his thing, and the US is going to leave,
Speaker 1: and all those GCC countries, all those Golf allies, all
Speaker 1: the Asian countries that depend heavily on oil coming through
Speaker 1: that street, some of them who thought they had very
Speaker 1: close ties to the United States are gon be in
Speaker 1: trouble if the US is not there to finish the job,
Speaker 1: and that's going to fall to some sort of coalition
Speaker 1: of other nations. Maybe the UN is the mechanism by
Speaker 1: which they make that happen. But I would reckon it
Speaker 1: probably happens between a collaboration of EU and GCC countries.
Speaker 1: I think it probably happens outside that body. But perhaps
Speaker 1: talking about it at the UN will be helpful in
Speaker 1: getting that started. But this is a real issue, and
Speaker 1: allies are really concerned that this could actually happen and
Speaker 1: they could be left in a worse straitun unintended than
Speaker 1: when this war started, because Iran could be controlling the
Speaker 1: strait and then potentially profiting off of it if it
Speaker 1: starts to charge tolls or control passage.
Speaker 2: Jeff, let me go to you. Is President Trump getting
Speaker 2: advice from anyone outside that inner circle so to speak?
Speaker 2: Do you think?
Speaker 4: You know? It's always sort of tricky to figure out
Speaker 4: where President Trump is getting his advice. We know that
Speaker 4: he talks to, of course the inner circle of advisors
Speaker 4: that you were referencing, also an outer circle of friends.
Speaker 5: He calls some.
Speaker 4: Of the natural US allies and leaders of friends as well,
Speaker 4: but it's hard for me to say to what extent
Speaker 4: he's listening to them. I always come back, when asked
Speaker 4: about this, to something that he said. I believe it
Speaker 4: was in twenty sixteen, before he won the first election
Speaker 4: that he won, which he was asked then where he
Speaker 4: gets his advice, and he said from myself, And I
Speaker 4: think that that still applies in twenty twenty six He
Speaker 4: is his top counselor, he is his top spokesperson. He
Speaker 4: likes to be the number one in charge, and he
Speaker 4: likes to be the one delivering the message, and he
Speaker 4: likes to be the one.
Speaker 5: Making the decisions.
Speaker 4: Now that's not to say he's not listening to some
Speaker 4: others and getting some advice, certainly from people like Marco Rubio,
Speaker 4: Steve Woodkoff, Jared Kushner, and.
Speaker 5: Probably his own vice president.
Speaker 4: As you noted earlier, who's becoming a little bit more
Speaker 4: involved in more recent days.
Speaker 5: But the buck stops with him, and he's the ultimate decider, Christina.
Speaker 2: Before this conflict began, the administration was somewhat stressing the
Speaker 2: issue of affordability. And I know now that the Cleveland
Speaker 2: now cast from the Cleveland Fed has the inflation rated
Speaker 2: around forecasted around three and a quarter percent. Where do
Speaker 2: you think this leaves the president as we talk more
Speaker 2: and more about the run up to the off term elections.
Speaker 1: I mean again, I hate to give Jeff Mason too
Speaker 1: much credit, just kidding. Jeff is brilliant, but he was
Speaker 1: right saying he was right and saying this was part
Speaker 1: of that. This is a sales pitch because midterms are
Speaker 1: if you are the president, just around the corner. And
Speaker 1: even if this is resolved tomorrow, which the President said,
Speaker 1: it's not going to be right. He's looking at a
Speaker 1: two to three week timeline before the US operation is
Speaker 1: even finished. That's not to say whether or not the
Speaker 1: strait is working by then. And even though the President
Speaker 1: emphasized many many times he said, you know, thanks to
Speaker 1: my economic policies, we have drill, baby, Bill, drill, the
Speaker 1: US is financially independent. The oil prices will come down,
Speaker 1: the stock market will go up. That's pretty aspirational because
Speaker 1: every analyst I've heard on Bloomberg this week is saying
Speaker 1: this is not like flipping a switch. There's a tail
Speaker 1: to this. It's inputs for chemicals, it's fertilizer for farmers.
Speaker 1: It's the global oil price, not just what we're paying
Speaker 1: in the US. That impacts everybody's price at the pump.
Speaker 1: And that's something that voters are really going to notice.
Speaker 1: And you know, Trump voters are very, very loyal, but
Speaker 1: it's expensive to live in the United States right now,
Speaker 1: and families are under a lot of pressure, and that's
Speaker 1: really really going to hurt him, and it's really going
Speaker 1: to hurt Republicans ahead of the midterms when they're already
Speaker 1: looking at an uphill battle.
Speaker 2: Jeff, what do we know about the build up of
Speaker 2: additional US troops in the Mid East region?
Speaker 4: Let me answer that, and then I want to get
Speaker 4: back to the politics briefly. As far as the build up,
Speaker 4: we know that in recent days and weeks that the
Speaker 4: United States has sent more troops to the region, which
Speaker 4: led to some speculation about potent boots, putting boots on
Speaker 4: the ground. That's definitely not something that the President addressed tonight,
Speaker 4: which I think you can interpret in two ways. Number One,
Speaker 4: you would, I don't think, be wrong to conclude that
Speaker 4: he's signaling that that is definitely not the direction he
Speaker 4: wants to move, or else he wouldn't be repeating the
Speaker 4: fact that he wants to conclude the war in the
Speaker 4: next two to three weeks. You could also conclude that
Speaker 4: it's a headfake and that the President is still considering
Speaker 4: it and that's why he has sent troops in the
Speaker 4: into the region in order to continue to have that option.
Speaker 4: So that'll be something that you know, allies and enemies
Speaker 4: will will have to figure out as as this war continues.
Speaker 5: Briefly back on the politics, though, I also wanted to.
Speaker 4: Say I said earlier that this was a sales pitch.
Speaker 4: One of the things that was a sales pitch, I
Speaker 4: think was him listing the number of when Christina mentioned this,
Speaker 4: as well listing the major wars of the last century
Speaker 4: and how long they took. And I'm just I'd be
Speaker 4: very curious to see some polling after the speech as
Speaker 4: to whether that logic resonates at all, both with his
Speaker 4: base and with an American public that heard him say
Speaker 4: as a candidate in twenty twenty four that he would
Speaker 4: not launch new wars Christina.
Speaker 2: Earlier in the week, the president was focused on trying
Speaker 2: to recover enriched uranium in Iran, but apparently he told
Speaker 2: Reuters that it's so far underground he doesn't even care
Speaker 2: about it any longer. Talk to me about what you
Speaker 2: perceived to be the maybe subtle shifts in objectives.
Speaker 1: So the Washington Post was out with some good reporting
Speaker 1: today about the President asking for an operational plan for
Speaker 1: US Commando's special forces to go in and try to
Speaker 1: retrieve that uranium. That to me immediately seems like an
Speaker 1: almost impossible and incredibly dangerous task because, as the President
Speaker 1: mentioned in his speech, the US hit s Fahim, thetans
Speaker 1: FDAU those new clear sites very heavily last June with
Speaker 1: those big bunker busting bombs, and according to the President,
Speaker 1: greatered them and at the time destroyed the nuclear the
Speaker 1: nuclear program. Now tonight, the President said that Iran was
Speaker 1: on the door of a nuclear bomb and they were
Speaker 1: mirroring the race. Everyone I've spoken to nuclear experts say
Speaker 1: there's no evidence that Iran was any closer to that
Speaker 1: breakout time the time it takes them to flip the
Speaker 1: switch and create a nuclear weapon than they were when
Speaker 1: the US attacks those nuclear sites last summer. The issue
Speaker 1: is is this has been a talking point for the President,
Speaker 1: and so he wants to show that he's trying to
Speaker 1: prevent a Ran from having a nuclear bomb. He has
Speaker 1: a plan for getting that uranium, but now it seems
Speaker 1: like he is backing off of that. That could be
Speaker 1: potentially because those plans came back and were not feasible
Speaker 1: or just simply because he realized that it contradicts his
Speaker 1: own argument that the US destroyed these sites. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, he's also saying that Iran was about
Speaker 1: to get a nuclear and both those two things can't
Speaker 1: really be true.
Speaker 2: Jeff, I'll give you the last word as we get
Speaker 2: set to wrap up.
Speaker 4: I appreciate you giving me the last word instead of Christina,
Speaker 4: But what I would like to say is actually building
Speaker 4: off of her brilliant remarks just there, which is politically
Speaker 4: their conservatives, and I spoke to one of them today
Speaker 4: who are concerned that President Trump.
Speaker 5: Is not finishing the job. That he made the.
Speaker 4: Decision to go in and start this war, controversial decision
Speaker 4: but one that is certainly supported by a lot of
Speaker 4: Iran Hawks and right leading people in the foreign policy establishment,
Speaker 4: and they were worried ahead of this speech today that
Speaker 4: he is done with it, ready to get out because
Speaker 4: of the multiple reasons that we've already cited, and that
Speaker 4: that will actually still leave a threat in Iran that
Speaker 4: he could have taken care of now if he had
Speaker 4: just stuck with it.
Speaker 2: Jeff, thank you so very much. Bloomberg's Jeff Mason, our
Speaker 2: White House and Washington correspondent, And a very special thanks
Speaker 2: to Christina Raffini, co host of Bloomberg This Weekend, and
Speaker 2: you can catch here Saturdays and Sundays on Bloomberg TV
Speaker 2: and radio beginning at seven a m. Eastern Time. Thanks
Speaker 2: to you both,