Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: US Iran talks are planned in Pakistan for Wednesday. According
Speaker 2: to CNN, Vice President jad Vance is expected to fly
Speaker 2: there tomorrow. Ian Bremer, your Asia Group president and founder,
Speaker 2: outlined for Cubrists that could derail in Iran deal. He
Speaker 2: joins US Now Ian it is the consistent headline fatigue
Speaker 2: and fog of war that we've been dealing with. First,
Speaker 2: the straightform MOOS is open on Friday, that Iran says
Speaker 2: it's closed on Saturday. Questions surrounding the US seizure of
Speaker 2: an Iranian ship, are you confident, like this market is
Speaker 2: that we are indeed in an off ramp to piece.
Speaker 1: No, No, not at all. I'm confident that we're in
Speaker 1: an off ramp for an announcement of peace. I think
Speaker 1: we will get a second round of talks. I think
Speaker 1: they'll go forward. I think Vance will get there and
Speaker 1: he'll talk to the Iranians. And it wouldn't surprise me
Speaker 1: at all if on the back of that there's some progress.
Speaker 1: Both sides are pretty close on many issues. Trump really
Speaker 1: wants a deal. Trump is likely to announce one, but
Speaker 1: moving from an announcement to an actual implementation that then
Speaker 1: lets us feel like we can get traffic in the
Speaker 1: straight back to normal. That's a lot a lifting that
Speaker 1: has to happen before then. There are a lot of
Speaker 1: ways that that can blow apart. We're not close to
Speaker 1: that in my view.
Speaker 3: How important is that to the president Outwardly? It's important
Speaker 3: for the Republican Party that the price at the pump
Speaker 3: not accelerate any further and hopefully come down. But I
Speaker 3: wonder if the President feels comfortable with crude oil in
Speaker 3: the eighty or ninety dollars range. It certainly hasn't hurt
Speaker 3: the energy companies that I'm sure lobby him, and it's
Speaker 3: obviously been beneficial to Russia.
Speaker 1: As well well. He seems to feel more comfortable now
Speaker 1: than he did when he gave the State of the
Speaker 1: Union and was talking about gas under two bucks at
Speaker 1: a station in Iowa. That's how he started his speech.
Speaker 1: Now he's saying, you know, oil is a lot lower
Speaker 1: than it could have been. He heard two hundred and
Speaker 1: two fifty three hundred dollars and it's under one hundred.
Speaker 1: Isn't that great? And that's because not only have prices
Speaker 1: gone way up under his administration and because of his
Speaker 1: decisions in Iran, but also because he doesn't have a
Speaker 1: mechanism to get them down. He knows that, So, I mean,
Speaker 1: he doesn't have a military plan that's going to open
Speaker 1: the strait anytime soon. And in some ways he's been
Speaker 1: slow rolling it. You know, you've got an aircraft strike
Speaker 1: carrier group that's now going the slow way around the
Speaker 1: Cape of Good Hope. You've got other thousands of marine
Speaker 1: expeditionary unit that's still on the other side of the
Speaker 1: Strait of Malacca. And so it doesn't look like there
Speaker 1: is an imminent military decision to escalate, nor is there
Speaker 1: a pl that looks like it would get prices down.
Speaker 1: So at this point Trump has to accept that come November,
Speaker 1: a big part of his efforts at the midterms are
Speaker 1: going to be underwater with affordability.
Speaker 3: So this is why you're confident Ian that we're going
Speaker 3: to get an extension of the ceasefire, right because that
Speaker 3: is supposed to end on Tuesday night. We're seeing now
Speaker 3: headlines that talks may actually happen Wednesday in Islamabad, which
Speaker 3: would be great timing to extend the ceasefire for no
Speaker 3: reason at all. The big problem though, is that that
Speaker 3: would allow the Iranians to dig out, as you put
Speaker 3: in your notes, some of their missiles that are US
Speaker 3: and Israeli attacks have buried.
Speaker 1: Well, that's already happened, right, I mean, over the last week.
Speaker 1: We already have the Iranians improving their military capabilities because
Speaker 1: there's a ceasefire on so I mean Trump Trump's willingness
Speaker 1: to provide a ceasefire implied that he was quite serious
Speaker 1: about an off ramp, because otherwise why would he give
Speaker 1: the Iranians that time. Now he's trying to show that
Speaker 1: he's serious and that there'll be consequences with the blockade
Speaker 1: I think that is and with the attack and the
Speaker 1: seizure of an Iranian vessel. At the same time, the
Speaker 1: ceasefire is still in place. The Americans haven't violated it.
Speaker 1: Trump has pushed the Israelis to accept a ceasefire with Lebanon.
Speaker 1: He's quite proud of that. He's been calling up global
Speaker 1: leaders and telling them what a great job he did
Speaker 1: at ending yet another war, this time between Israel and Lebanon.
Speaker 1: He's also been threatening the Iranians a fifth time by
Speaker 1: my count, and that if they don't come to the table,
Speaker 1: and agree with Trump on a breakthrough that he's going
Speaker 1: to blow up all of their civilian infrastructure. He's less
Speaker 1: credible on that one. But still, everything about Trump's activities
Speaker 1: and posturing in the last two weeks seemed to imply
Speaker 1: he wants to extend the ceasefire. Seems to imply he
Speaker 1: really doesn't want to go back to fighting if he
Speaker 1: can avoid it.
Speaker 2: But still, there is this US military blockade in the
Speaker 2: Strait of Hormus. I mean, this's just coming out now
Speaker 2: that they've directed twenty seven vessels to turn back, according
Speaker 2: to the US military Ian. To what degree does this
Speaker 2: place more economic pressure on Iran itself? And is that
Speaker 2: something that could move the needle further, that could bring
Speaker 2: them to the table, You have to hope.
Speaker 1: So it's putting more pressure on Iran. It's also putting
Speaker 1: more economic pressure on the United States, which improves America's credibility.
Speaker 1: Let's remember that Iran has a lot more money today
Speaker 1: than they did six weeks ago because the oil prices
Speaker 1: are so much higher, and because the United States wasn't
Speaker 1: imposing a blockade. In fact, until last week, the Americans
Speaker 1: had suspended oil sanctions on Iran because at that point,
Speaker 1: Trump was focused more on keeping prices down than on
Speaker 1: pressuring the Iranian regime. He has since flipped that logic
Speaker 1: on its head, and so now he's trying to do
Speaker 1: more to show the Iranians he's going to squeeze them.
Speaker 1: Is that really about economic pressure or is it about
Speaker 1: trying to show American credibility that if you persist with
Speaker 1: a refusal to come to the table and come to terms,
Speaker 1: that the United States is capable of waiting you out,
Speaker 1: and do the Iranians find that credible? I mean, the
Speaker 1: real danger here is that Iran. I mean, you saw
Speaker 1: Trump said I'm no more, mister nice guy, if you're
Speaker 1: the supreme leader of Iran, or if you're the leaders
Speaker 1: of the IRGC and Trump has already with the Israelis
Speaker 1: killed your father and your mother and one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty of the leaders of your country have been assassinated,
Speaker 1: and then you're saying no more, mister nice guy. Plausibly.
Speaker 1: You didn't think he was mister nice guy even before
Speaker 1: he said that, right, plausibly. So I think that you
Speaker 1: know the problem is America is trying to negotiate, having
Speaker 1: already blown up the negotiations with a group of leaders
Speaker 1: that may not be focused just on how do we
Speaker 1: get to yes with the United States. There may be
Speaker 1: a willingness to engage in retribution. There may be some
Speaker 1: ideology that is not about just survival as a regime.
Speaker 1: This may be kind of a challenge that the Israelis
Speaker 1: had with Hamas in Gaza, for example. But I don't
Speaker 1: think the Americans are prepared to do the damage to
Speaker 1: Iran that the Israelis were to the people of Gaza
Speaker 1: to get to their military outcomes. And so that limits
Speaker 1: the ability of Trump to force the Iranians to do
Speaker 1: what he wants.
Speaker 3: And to what extent has Pudin and Russia been a
Speaker 3: beneficiary of this war? And how is China positioned.
Speaker 1: Russia is a near term beneficiary, probably the biggest of
Speaker 1: the near term beneficiaries, again like Iran until last week,
Speaker 1: selling a lot more oil and gas and fertilizer, and
Speaker 1: that's what the Russians have to export at much higher
Speaker 1: prices because of the war.
Speaker 3: And those sanctions remain lifted. By the way, what the
Speaker 3: sanctions on Russia that they have been lifted.
Speaker 1: Russian sanctions have been suspended just as the Iranian sanctions
Speaker 1: were suspended by the United States. They are still suspended
Speaker 1: as of today, and so the Russians are making a
Speaker 1: lot more money. Also, of course, a lot of the
Speaker 1: military capabilities that had been available to sell to the
Speaker 1: Europeans who were providing them to Ukraine, those military capabilities interceptors,
Speaker 1: missile defense, they are now going to the Gulf region.
Speaker 1: So the fact is that the Russians no longer have
Speaker 1: to worry as much that the Ukrainians are going to
Speaker 1: be able to repel them the way they have. Having
Speaker 1: said all of that, Ukraine today is the most capable
Speaker 1: and trained military in Europe. And I don't think that
Speaker 1: was Putin's intention four years ago, but that is the
Speaker 1: reality today. And Putin has not been able to take
Speaker 1: any land from the Ukrainians in the last three months.
Speaker 1: In fact, he's actually lost some land in occupied Ukraine
Speaker 1: that the Ukrainians have taken back. So when I look
Speaker 1: at Russia today from a global perspective, even though their
Speaker 1: position has improved somewhat in the past weeks of the
Speaker 1: Iran War, I wouldn't want to be in their position.
Speaker 1: It's also true that the trans atlantic relationship getting a
Speaker 1: lot weaker, more fractious that is an improvement for Putin.
Speaker 1: He likes big existential questions around NATO, the Americans calling
Speaker 1: NATO allies cowards. Putin likes all of that, but his
Speaker 1: biggest ally in Europe, victor Orbon and Hungary just lost
Speaker 1: to an anti Russian Hungarian right wing populist Petter Magyar
Speaker 1: with a constitutional majority, which means that the Europeans, even
Speaker 1: with the new Bulgaria elections, the Europeans are going to
Speaker 1: have an easier time raising more money for Ukraine, raising
Speaker 1: more loans for Ukraine, putting tougher sanctions on the Russians.
Speaker 1: So I really don't think Putin's in a materially better
Speaker 1: position as a consequence of all this, China is in
Speaker 1: a materially better position long term because so many countries
Speaker 1: are angry with the United States. This war that the
Speaker 1: Americans launched in Iran is enormously unpopular with almost every
Speaker 1: country in the world except Israel, and that has led
Speaker 1: many governments to want to hedge more with other countries,
Speaker 1: including with China. So long term, even though this hurts
Speaker 1: the Chinese economy, they're not a big energy exporter that
Speaker 1: they don't like to see these prices going up anymore
Speaker 1: than the Indonesians or the South Koreans, But long term,
Speaker 1: China sees themselves as in a better strategic position.
Speaker 3: Ian, I hate to wrap you because I would love
Speaker 3: to have you for longer. Ian Bremer of the Eurasia Group,
Speaker 3: President there and founder. Thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3: Always great to get some time with you.