00:00Well, for more on that story, let's bring in Sean Bell, who's a retired Air Vice Marshal and military analyst.
00:06Sean, thank you very much indeed for agreeing to speak to us.
00:10Now, from a military perspective, what's changed in this latest round?
00:17Good afternoon, Geoff.
00:18One of the challenges, I think, is if you remember the peace deal that was done, or at least the
00:24ceasefire, 17th of June,
00:26was 60 days, that expired in mid-August, and everything since then, we've seen this sort of slight standoff,
00:32really uncomfortable standoff between the two sides, and that really doesn't suit either Iran or America.
00:38Iran, as you've just been reporting, its economy is hurting, and for America, this is also having an impact back
00:45at home.
00:46And therefore, we always expected that actually the best way for either side to get a negotiation going, bizarrely,
00:52is to start out kinetic action, to start warfighting again.
00:57Neither side want to see this continue.
00:59Both sides want to get some sort of memorandum of understanding underway,
01:03but it is going to act as a catalyst for negotiators to their work behind the scene
01:08and start to kick-start the negotiations with both sides' needs.
01:12The challenge, of course, is that we're seeing, in each day, a steady escalation in the levels of violence,
01:18and I suspect that the Americans are getting hit quite hard at the moment.
01:23You don't normally hear about their casualties or the damage on the ground,
01:27but it does look like, with assistance probably from Russia,
01:31Iran is being very effective at targeting some U.S. military bases in the region.
01:36What more can you tell us about Iran's military capability at the moment?
01:39We're hearing from President Trump that they have very little, but that's not necessarily the case, is it?
01:46I think we have to go back to when I was in the Ministry of Defence a million years ago.
01:52We used to war game a lot of scenarios, and I've played Iran in this war game,
01:56and it's pretty clear America literally obliterates most of Iran's conventional military capability,
02:02but the Strait of Hormuz is the one advantage that Iran has,
02:07and therefore they've got all sorts of military equipment capability on Lorac Island,
02:12Qesham Island, all around the Strait of Hormuz.
02:14And that includes these fast patrol boats that can lay mines, anti-ship missiles, drones and missiles.
02:20They're all buried underground, a labyrinth of tunnels.
02:23There's no way that America will be able to find them all,
02:25and therefore it's pretty clear that they still also have this ballistic missile capability,
02:30capability, and I think that's key at the moment,
02:33because every time, we heard literally the other night,
02:35there were eight ballistic missiles fired at Jordan,
02:38all of those were shot down by American Patriot missiles,
02:41but it takes two Patriots to shoot down one ballistic missile,
02:45that was 16 Patriots, that's a week's worth supply.
02:48And it's been very highly advertised that actually the world is running short of Patriots,
02:52therefore it's pretty clear that Iran still has a very potent threat,
02:56particularly in terms of its ballistic missiles.
02:59Sean, there's been discussion, hasn't there, in Iran about whether its military posture should move
03:05beyond retaliation, more towards acting earlier against perceived threats.
03:12Militarily speaking, how significant do you think that shift would be?
03:17Well, I think there's some really interesting strategists working behind the scene.
03:21I think what I particularly have spent a while looking at is what are the options at the moment facing
03:26Iran and America.
03:27If I was a military advisor to Mushtaba Khomeini, I'd be saying get to negotiations,
03:33because Iran has probably never had a stronger hand, better leverage to enter those negotiations.
03:40The challenge, of course, there are some hardliners in Iran who don't want to talk.
03:44They think they've got the foot on the throat of President Trump at the moment.
03:47You've also got Russia, who probably sees merit in the war continuing,
03:51because the more patriots that are used up in the region, the fewer are available for Ukraine,
03:55and therefore would tip the balance.
03:57Meanwhile, you've got China probably putting pressure on both sides, saying, look, bring this to an end,
04:01because China takes all of its oil to one side.
04:04It's a lot more difficult when you look at it through the American lens to work out what are the
04:08choices available to President Trump.
04:10A continuation of military action, it didn't work before, it's not going to work again,
04:15they're running short of missiles, frankly, that's a busted flush.
04:19You can actually, therefore, look at some of the other options, things like economic fury,
04:23that I'm a military guy, it might have an impact, it is having an impact on the Iranian people,
04:29probably not on the IRGC.
04:31And the third option is to negotiate.
04:32The challenge, of course, though, is President Trump finds himself,
04:36he probably started the war with a very, very strong hand,
04:39but it now appears that Iran has a few aces up its sleeve,
04:42so there's no good options for America at this stage.
04:46Sean Bell, thank you very much indeed for that.
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