STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Earlier this week, President Trump said there was no way to know that the war he started would spread so widely. Speaking with reporters, the president commented on Iran's retaliatory attacks against its neighbors.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: So they hit Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait. Nobody expected that. We were shocked. And the other one, you know, they fought back. They could have yielded.
INSKEEP: Iran did not yield, and instead, the war has escalated again and again. To understand how this has happened, we've called Nate Swanson, who was a career government official. He was the director for Iran at the National Security Council under President Biden. He then was part of an Iran negotiating team under President Trump before the conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer accused him of disloyalty and cost him his job. Mr. Swanson, welcome to the program.
NATE SWANSON: Thank you for having me.
INSKEEP: Let me begin with what the president said earlier this week. Could anyone have predicted a big regional war? Did anyone predict a big regional war?
SWANSON: Yes. I think people could have predicted it. I'm sure people in the United States government did. And also, I did.
INSKEEP: Because you wrote an article about this in Foreign Affairs before the president started the war, as I understand.
SWANSON: Yeah. That's right.
INSKEEP: What was your forecast as an expert on this for what would happen if the United States struck Iran?
SWANSON: Look, I think there was this perception going into the war that the president had defied critics over and over again, this idea that the United States could take major actions and have no repercussions. Maduro, Soleimani strike, last June's strike on Iran's nuclear program all basically happened with no repercussions.
INSKEEP: True.
SWANSON: But going into this war, you could just see that the Iranians were viewing this differently. This was existential. They had seen this coming. They consider this a continuation of the June war, and they made it quite - I mean, they said themselves that this was going to be a regional war if it happened. So, I mean, it was relatively high chance of happening. So...
INSKEEP: OK. So let's work through the strategy of each side, as you understand it. What do you perceive the Iranian strategy to be, step by step, over the last few weeks?
SWANSON: Yeah. I mean, really, I think a turning point for them was the - Bibi's visit to Mar-a-Lago at the end of December, where basically, you know, there'd been this fragile ceasefire in place since the June war, and Bibi goes and gets permission from the president to attack Iran basically at the time and place of his choosing, you know, to target the missile program. So I think at this point, Iran knows the war is coming. They know it's going to be very big and if not decisive, not regime change, it's going to happen every six months or so. So I think at that point, Iran knows they need to go big.
I mean, Israelis - this goes back to October 7. I think, you know, it's a much more existential question. It has a lot to do with this concept that they're no longer going to accept threats. You know, they used to say Hamas would say these crazy things, but no one believed it. In this case, you know - so that was no longer acceptable. And Iran's been saying crazy things for 47 years about Israel, so it was no longer acceptable. So I think that's the Israeli motivation. And the U.S. motivation was they thought it'd be easy. You know, we had this track record of success, and so why not do it again? And just ultimately, that's where the major miscalculation came.
INSKEEP: What attitude do you think the administration has taken toward expertise like yours over the years?
SWANSON: Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Look, it depends. You know, I mean, I think, obviously, this is a government that's unique. It doesn't have a normal policy process. It is, you know, more top-driven than any government, including Trump's first administration, than ever before. That's a unique feature. You know, that's his prerogative, I guess. You know, I will say that it is clear that, you know, DOD and IC analysis is getting to him. You see it because, you know, it's all leaked to The New York Times or Washington Post shortly thereafter, but, you know, it is getting to him. But ultimately, you know, he's making all the decisions, and these are Trump's decisions. So...
INSKEEP: OK. Let's think through the U.S. strategy then. You say you think the initial U.S. strategy was it'll be over by now. It'll be easy.
SWANSON: Oh, yeah.
INSKEEP: It'll be quick. Trump will get to dictate the new leader of Iran, which is a thing that he talked about doing at one point. That hasn't worked. The U.S. has to adjust. Sometimes you do in war. Do you think you perceive or understand the U.S. strategy now?
SWANSON: No. I think it changes. You know, I mean, as you said, you know, right when he announced the war, it was regime change. A day later, it was regime degradation, and then it was complete surrender. Then he wanted to pick the new supreme leader. So, look, I think it's shifting by the moment. And I can't really tell you what the endgame is now, and I don't know if the White House can either.
INSKEEP: Let's talk through the events of the last 24 hours. We heard about it from Aya Batrawy. There was a strike by Israel on the Pars gas facility, which exploits the largest natural gas deposit in the world from the northern side of the Persian Gulf. Qatar exploits that same field from the south, and Iran then retaliated by striking in the south. And then last evening, President Trump made this statement, which I guess I can summarize by saying, he says the United States didn't have any part of this, didn't know it. Israel did it. They're not going to do it again. And Iran better not strike again either or we'll do disastrous things. What do you make of all that?
SWANSON: I mean, it's hard to say. I mean, I think it's quite significant. I don't know if it's the president saying it to distance himself from the attack. I mean, I don't - I mean, there's no way the Israelis would conduct an attack of this magnitude without, you know, U.S. knowledge and some level of acquiescence. So I think we can dismiss that possibility. I don't know if it's to calm markets, if it's buyer's remorse or if it signals, you know, something broader, which is, you know, that - his recognition that there's no easy way out of this. There's no good options for ending this war, and so at some point, he's just going to have to force an ending. So I don't know which one of those it is, and maybe it's some combination of all those options at this point.
INSKEEP: OK. Let's talk about options then. Suppose you were still in the government and had not been pushed out by a conspiracy theorist, and the president called you up and said, I've got this problem - Strait of Hormuz blocked. I need to do something. What are my options? Can you give me an option?
SWANSON: I think there are two. I think, you know - or roughly two. The first is what - the direction we may be headed or where we were headed yesterday, which is to double down the war, to invest more troops, to invest more operations. You know, there's this rumor of sending a, you know...
INSKEEP: Ground troops of some kind, yeah.
SWANSON: ...A small island to potentially - yeah, exactly - to potentially take Kharg Island or whatever. So I think that's a possibility. I mean, the other option, though, and what Iran is clearly messaging is that they want this war over, but they want it over on their terms. And the terms they want is to basically keep this war from happening again. So they've tried to put so much pressure on the United States that we will not allow Israel or the Gulf to do this war again. And so that's what's happening. And so those are the two options.
INSKEEP: So the other option, I guess, is a durable - agreeing to a durable peace. Nate Swanson, resident senior fellow and director of Iran strategy at the Atlantic Council now. Thank you very much for your insights.
SWANSON: Thank you very much.
(SOUNDBITE OF LEATHER WINGS' "THIS WILL DESTROY YOU") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
