Col. Douglas Macgregor: America’s Attack on Iran Could Start WW3 (Transcript)

I think the decision has been made. In fact, I have sources on the inside telling me that it’s been made.

What’s taking time is to assemble the air and naval forces that have to launch the attacks. You remember a few months ago, we had enormous numbers of naval and air assets in the region. Ultimately, we withdrew them and it takes time to reassemble them. Once they’re assembled, we will attack.

Military Preparations and Trump’s Strategy

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: So Trump’s announcement that he will still think for another two weeks, this is just the required preparation to get the strike group in place.

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: I think he was told by the Secretary of defense, look, we’re not going to be able to act quickly. It’s going to take us a few days to get it together. And so he said, well, that’s fine because, you know, Donald Trump loves to play with the media. There is nobody certainly in my lifetime who’s been better at manipulating the media than Donald Trump. And so this gives him an opportunity to do that.

But in reality, the decision to attack has been made and the forces are still assembling. Remember, a lot of ships had to be replenished. In other words, they need to be reloaded with food, water, as well as munitions and missiles. And then you had to bring in carrier battle groups to replenish and also replace forces that were already in the region.

Now you have huge numbers of aircraft that are being moved into nearby installations so that they can fly. And I think we have in the neighborhood of 30 to 40 refueling assets for air refueling. So once it’s all in place, they will attack.

The Challenge of a War of Attrition

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: But you say this war will go on for a while, but to what extent is that possible? Because in a war of attrition, one has to be able to replenish its ammunition and everything else. But it looks as if Israel is already struggling with its interceptive missiles. The Iron Dome appear to be less powerful or convincing than it has been sold to the public. Not that I’m contesting that it would be a long war, but to what extent would America be able to perform differently than Israel? I know America has greater firepower, but it’s also to a large extent, more exposed in the region, isn’t it?

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: Well, you’re coming to an important point. You have Israel, which is on the ropes, let’s be frank. They’ve seen a substantial portion of their country destroyed. They’re not going to admit it, but I think that Netanyahu has been pleading with Trump to get into the game quickly. You’ve got to come in. We’re running out.

We had many, many large aircraft globemasters that landed within the last 24 hours to try and provide theater. High altitude interceptors, missiles, as well as Patriots and others. We have troops on the ground in Israel that are helping to man the radars and the THAAD batteries. So this is a very difficult situation.

And Israel has always been at the end of a short tether when it came to warfare. In 73, we had to fly in enormous amounts of equipment in order to replace the losses and help the Israelis to get back on their feet. But at that point, they were the victims of an attack. This time they victimized Iran.

Iran: A Different Kind of Adversary

And Iran is different from the other states that they’ve faced. Iran is a large continental power. The United States is preeminently an air and maritime power. We are not going to commit large ground forces. We don’t have them to commit. And Iran is almost the size of Western Europe. Put France, Germany together, part of Spain and northern Italy, and you have Iran that’s an enormous area. You don’t mobilize forces and move into a place like that quickly. So I don’t see much evidence for that.

I think people need to understand what the goal is. And if I could take a minute to try and outline for people what the goal of the war is, then perhaps they’ll understand what’s really happening.

The True Goals of the War

This is a war for the Jewish state’s hegemony across the entire region. That has to be understood. The Jewish state’s hegemony, we think, is in our interest because it involves the conquest and securing of the oil and gas fields in the region.

Now, the war against Russia has been lost. Remember, that war was always about removing Putin, ultimately fragmenting Russia, stripping it of its resources, and turning what was left into a vassal state owned largely by the banks in London and in New York City. That failed. That war has been lost. Russia is not going to lose Putin anytime soon. And its state is intact, and its military power is greater and more powerful than ever in its history, I would argue.

So now we move down to the Middle East. The same people with the same backers, the same financial oligarchs, institutions and political advocates that argued for a war against Russia to do what I just described, destroy the state and then strip the country of its resources. They are the same people who are advocating for war on behalf of Israel against Iran.

Netanyahu’s Control Over US Policy

And everyone always knew when this war began that we would have to come into it. Mr. Netanyahu never harbored any illusions about that. Why did he decide to do what he did? Because he has control of the United States. This has to be understood. Mr. Netanyahu has infinitely more control and influence over the US Congress than President Trump does. And President Trump is effectively his instrument.

He’s not going to do anything or say anything that Mr. Netanyahu doesn’t want him to say. He’s been on the phone recently to Mr. Netanyahu, and people that overheard the conversation have mentioned that, you know, he talks in gangster terms about what they’re going to do. Well, we’ll break their legs. You know, they’ll pay a price for this, and on and on. It’s this tough guy talk that is common in New York City. He likes that.

And so he’s very much on board with this war. And he, too, is convinced that he and others will profit from Iran’s destruction.

The Reality of Iran’s Capabilities

Now, I don’t think it’ll work. And I think that we’re going to discover there are limits to air and missile power, and we’re going to see that; we’re also dealing with a very different state from what we would have seen 20 years ago. So that many of the scenarios that we’ve run through war gaming probably are irrelevant because Iran is far more technologically advanced today and far more capable than it was 20 years ago.

We tend to talk about Iran the way the Israelis do. They treat it as though 46 years have not passed and Iran is just this backward Muslim state that can be bullied and attacked at will. That’s not going to happen. And if we get into this, we are going to sustain losses.

The Complexity of the Planned Operation

And the operation that we’re talking about launching in the very near future involves hundreds of aircraft. It’s very complex. Everyone thinks it’s simply a function of fly B2 bombers that are invisible, invulnerable, invincible at 40,000ft over Iranian airspace and drop these munition penetrators that are supposed to punch through mountains and destroy the so called enrichment radiation uranium enrichment facilities.

In truth, this is going to focus I think primarily on the destruction of the regime. And they’ve targeted everything down to police stations in Tehran and other cities. They want to try and paralyze Iran, make it incapable of holding itself together and responding.

Now, again, I don’t think that’s going to work because I think the Iranians had some surprises for them. But this is where we’re headed secondarily. We’re talking about damaging these uranium enrichment facilities or nuclear development facilities. I’m not sure we believe that we can destroy them with the conventional munitions.

The Nuclear Option

And I’ve already heard talk about MRR. These are minimal residual radiation warheads, in other words, low yield nuclear warheads designed to penetrate these places and that they might come into use. I think that would be a very bad idea because I think that would open Pandora’s box in a major way.

So I think there’s a certain amount of reality intruding and thinking about how far you’re going to get punching through mountains. But I see much more confidence in their thinking about what they can do to destroy and dominate Iran itself. Again, I think it’s very dangerous. I think the whole thing is very complex and I don’t think ultimately it will work, but we will see.

International Support for Iran

In the meantime, the Chinese, the Russians and others, Pakistanis, and not just those, but other countries have poured assets into Iran to help the Iranians defend themselves. I think some of these will make a difference. So this is no cakewalk. And this is going to be very dangerous and very complex. And even on the best day it might not work.

The Propaganda Campaign

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Well, it does seem the, as you mentioned, the objective of decapitation, destroying the nuclear sites and of course, subordinating Iran. But you also see Israel hijacking or hacking some of the TV stations and they had, you know, calling on Iranians to have this uprising. So, yeah, for some reason you will have major millions of Iranians supporting the country who’s bombing them and going against their own government.

But are they, how much have they underestimated Iran’s military capabilities, obviously. Have they also underestimated the mood in Iran? I mean, I’m sure there’s many people have real grievances, if not even hatred towards a government which they don’t care for. I’m not, I think it’s a bit exaggerated, to be honest. But you always find grievances. But the idea that they would side with the enemy against their own government. Is this too much wishful thinking or how do you explain the very extravagant objectives which have been set?

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: You mean the idea that we are bombing these people while we are also telling them that they are our friends and we are their friends is a bit contradictory?

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Yeah, somewhat.

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: By the way, that we’re bombing you to liberate you from a government that you don’t really want, and your friends in Israel are putting together another governmental structure with the former or the Crown Prince’s son or the former son of the Shah, whatever you want to call him, who is a willing puppet of Israel, who will come in and take over and put everything right. I mean, stop and think about it all. It’s all crazy. Doesn’t make any sense.

Now, that doesn’t mean there aren’t people that dislike the government. There are a lot of people in the United States that dislike the government. But I haven’t seen large numbers of Israeli and American flags on the streets of Tehran or Isfahan or Tabriz or anywhere else flying saying, oh, come and come and save us. We love you. Haven’t seen that.

Now, I have seen in the United States in Los Angeles, in Chicago, may have seen it in Seattle and some other places, Mexican flags flying with large numbers of Hispanics cheering the destruction of America. You know, that I’ve seen, but I haven’t seen any American or Israeli flags on the streets of Iranian cities. So to be perfectly blunt, I think it’s nonsense.

Now, that doesn’t mean that you can’t do a lot of damage to the infrastructure, cause enormous chaos and confusion, potentially even cause people to run out of water that they can drink and starve the way they are in Gaza. I suppose that’s possible, but I don’t think it’s a viable plan.

Comparisons to Iraq 2003

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Well, all this talks about weapons of mass destruction and being met as liberators. It all sounds awfully lot like 2003 with Iraq. But unlike Iraq, the United States had massive ground forces and also the technical and military capabilities were overwhelming.

The Iraq Occupation Mistake and Current Middle East Strategy

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: Well, I would, if I may just stop you briefly, and I would tell you that had we just gone into Iraq in 2003 and removed Saddam Hussein, then turn the country over to the nation’s military leaders and urged them to invite the United Nations in to help supervise the restoration of government and elections and so forth, and then left, we would have been very successful. Certainly in the south when we came in, the Shiites were very happy to see us, there’s no question about it. But then they kind of hoped that we would leave.

You know, this is the problem. Benjamin Franklin used to say, guests in your house like fish after two or three days stink. The point is that it’s one thing to welcome somebody to come in and remove somebody else for you and then leave versus somebody who comes in, removes who was there and then ultimately turns out to be worse than what you had and kills large numbers of you in the process.

So, you know, you’re right. Iraq and Iran are different. But we need to understand what we did in 2003 that was very stupid. We occupied. You never occupy if you can avoid it. And there was no reason to occupy in Iraq. There was no reason to dismantle the government, its administration.

And we need remember who was responsible for that. His name is Paul Wolfowitz. And that little coterie of people that took over the Pentagon, intelligence and everything else in the Bush administration that were insistent that the road to Jerusalem and freedom went through Baghdad, I mean, just imagine what an asinine statement. But that’s what they said.

The same kinds of people, exactly the same, pushed the war in Ukraine against Russia. They are pushing the war now on behalf of Israel against Iran. We were always going to be involved in this fight because there is no alternative to our participation, only complete failure and eventually destruction of Israel. So we had to come in on this fight.

By the way, the same financial interests in London and New York City that wanted to destroy Russia, destroy its state, destroy the government, you know, turn it into a globalist paradise, introducing millions of non Europeans into Russia, the same globalists who wanted to strip Russia of its resources. They are the ones who want to get control of the oil and gas resources in the Middle East and especially in Iran. And they want to break it up into small parts that they can then treat as vassal states of the greater Israeli state, which in reality is a vanguard for the globalist victory that they’re hoping to achieve in the Middle East.

Military Strategy and Regional Access Challenges

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Yeah, I remember the Iraq being the pathway to Iran, but how possible is it to again, Trump set this high goal of complete surrender the Iranians, but with merely air strikes and naval assets? This seems to be, yes, somewhat difficult, but also because how do you access enter Iran?

Would the Americans attack through the same corridor of Israel uses through Syria and Iraq, or would the United States attack from the sea? But if so, they can’t get into the Persian Gulf when. And it’s still unclear to what extent, perhaps even Pakistan will help intercept any missiles launched against Iran.

Again, so far it’s all speculations, but there’s many of the neighbors who are not quite happy about this scenario. But if the goal is simply to make Iran one big Gaza to inflict much punishment, what can be done and what can be expected of retaliatory attacks?

I mean, has the United States moved many of its strategic assets away from vulnerable places? Does it still have the fleet in Bahrain? Or has. Has, I guess, what preparations are being made?

US Military Preparations and Strategic Reality

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: My understanding is that all the US Military personnel have been removed from Bahrain. I think we’re trying to move U.S. uniformed and intelligence personnel to safe places in the region, or at least places that are unlikely to be attacked. How many have we managed to move at this point? I don’t know. I think that’s also had an impact on delaying the operation. But Bahrain, which is a very important place to the United States, particularly United States Navy and Air Force that has been evacuated.

But I think the larger issue is much more straightforward. We have to understand what these goals mean. And then we have to ask ourselves, first of all, does this make any sense? I don’t think it makes any sense. I think it’s insane. And I’ve opposed this kind of thinking from the beginning.

We don’t live in the Eastern Hemisphere. We’re Americans. We live in the Western Hemisphere. What are we doing? What are we trying to do? Is this going to improve the situation for Israel? I don’t think so, because the loss that I think is inevitable in this contest will make it very hard for Israel to survive.

And if they try to threaten the use of a nuclear weapon, if we don’t do what they want us to do, or if any of their neighbors don’t do what they tell them to do, they’ll end up being on the receiving end of a nuclear weapon. These things have a bad habit of showing up in other people’s hands. So I wouldn’t write it off. Just because Iran hasn’t built a nuclear weapon doesn’t mean one couldn’t become available if the Iran, if the Israelis threaten that.

But here’s the key thing, and you’ve come back to this again and again. We are not a continental power. Neither is Israel. Israel is a small colony that sits on the, you know, the Mediterranean. And it is acting as though it’s a great power because it has unconditional support from us. And we think that we can do to Iran what we plan to do to Russia.

The entire global south is coming on side with Iran. Many European states are going to come on side with Iran that haven’t done so yet. And then, of course, you have the usual suspects, you know, India, China, BRICS, everybody involved in that are going to side with Iran. And more and more technology, equipment and support is coming into Iran.

The only thing we in the United States will achieve as a result of our actions is to become a pariah state all over the world. We’re going to be hated and despised for what we’re doing. We already are. But it’s only going to get worse because the war is going to get worse.

Now, will the war last a week, 12 months, 18 months, 10 days? I suppose a lot of that depends on the destruction. And right now, the destruction on the ground in Israel is substantial. And you have to ask yourself the question. 92 million people in an area the size of Western Europe versus far fewer than the seven plus million that live there. Normally, in an area a little smaller than New Jersey, who is going to come out on top?

Can the aircraft carrier battle groups and the United States Air Force make a profound difference to that outcome? I’m skeptical.

Possibility of Trump Changing Course

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Yeah. My last question, though, is to what extent? Well, how do you see the possibility of Trump changing his mind in terms of not attacking directly? Because I spoke earlier today with John Mearsheimer. He believed that Trump might change his mind now because, well, they weren’t able to do this decapitation strike. Iran proves to be much more powerful than expected. It turns out this is a huge punishment for Israel. It’s doubtful how much more they can absorb.

And also, there’s a huge pushback, not just among the American public, but also Trump’s base and his own team Tulsi Gabbard, for example, she does not seem happy with any of this. Do, do you think this will. Any of this will be able to convince him to change his ways, or is you think the decision has definitely been made to. Yeah, to. To attack.

Trump’s Commitment and American Public Perception

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: I stand by what I said at the beginning. That decision has been made. And asking Donald Trump to retreat from that is very, very difficult. You know, we have a bad habit historically of making policy pronouncements that are unrealistic, that involve overreach, and then we can’t retreat from them. We went through that with Lyndon Johnson in 1965 and for three years in Vietnam until finally he left office. You can’t do business that way.

But we do, because President Trump is largely impulse and emotionally driven, and he’s influenced by his supposition that we today are the nation we were in 1991. We’re not. In other words, he looks through the window at the White House, out across the Washington Monument, and the beauty that he sees. And he sees what he believes to be unchallenged power, prosperity. That makes any contest with anybody, you know, a foregone conclusion, especially against a state that he’s being told is a backwater, led by this strange old man wearing a black turban. How could he take that seriously?

So I don’t see him changing his mind. I see no evidence for that at all. And I think he’s going to carry through on this.

Now, you mentioned something else that I think is very important to explore. You said, look at all the pushback in the United States. I don’t see it. The American people aren’t paying that much attention. The average American is worried about whether or not he can get a six pack of beer tonight and watch the game on TV. As long as he can afford gas for his car and he goes to work without disruption, doesn’t make a great deal of difference to him. And remember that he believes that war is something that happens on someone else’s soil.

Now, he can be rapidly convinced that he’s wrong if things go badly here at home in the United States. We just admitted an estimated 30 million people into the country about whom we know absolutely nothing. There is no strategy for mass deportation. The assets for it don’t exist. This has all been badly handled.

The man who’s in charge is Mr. Homan is focusing understandably on what he knows as a policeman on criminals that are well identified. But that’s a fragment. And there are many, many, many more out there that he knows nothing about.

My point to you is you. If you listen to President Trump, listen to what he says, and then ask yourself, what has he done? Remember he said, when I was president, I built the wall. No, he didn’t. Now. Now he’s saying, see, you don’t see people pouring into the country. But he’s missing something. All the illegal ports of entry are being used by the drug cartels to move drugs and human trafficking into the United States and also being used to bring in truckloads of cash from the United States into Mexico.

What I’m trying to tell you is optics are one thing, reality is another. President Trump has always been very much about optics. And optics right now in the United States are these magnificent pictures of aircraft carrier battle groups steaming through pristine waters in beautiful sunshine with all these airplanes. But we have learned over many, many decades, the ultimate impact of these things is minimal, if any.

And again, we go back to the original point you talked about. How do you support this? How do you rearm? How do you replenish? It’s very difficult. We’re betting, once again, too much on what the Israelis bet on. To begin with, a knockout blow, Big mistake. This is a continental power. It can absorb serious punishment and it will fight back.

What happens when we do start to take losses? What happens if we lose any capital ships? What happens when the bases that we occupy are blown up? Then the Americans, who are otherwise enjoying their beer and watching the game will say, wait a minute, what’s this? How many of us were killed? Why? What are we doing there? I don’t remember being asked about this. Was there any debate in Congress? No. Mr. Netanyahu owns Congress. There’s no debate. They’re all lining up to have their pockets filled with cash and doing whatever Mr. Netanyahu wants, and so is Mr. Trump.

Nuclear Escalation Concerns

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: At this point, though, do you think the Americans or Israelis could use tactical nuclear weapon?

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: I think there is a real possibility that in desperation, the Israelis will. And ultimately there may be voices arguing for that. That’s why I mentioned the MRR. Minimal residual radiation, low yield nuclear warheads. There could be. I think it’s a very serious mistake. I think that’s a degree of escalation that we should not move to under any circumstances.

But remember, you’re dealing with arrogance and self delusion. That’s a dangerous combination that inevitably results in failure. And we are all about arrogance, all about self delusion. I wish it were not the case, but. But it is.

PROF. GLENN DIESEN: Well, Colonel MacGregor, thank you so much for allowing me to ask you about this. I know you’re not just very busy, but especially this week. You’re doing these interviews all the time, so. Yeah. Thank you so much for your time.

COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR: Once again, I hope I’m entirely wrong and something good happens, but I don’t think so. Thanks. Bye. Bye.

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