Ben Rhodes

So the only way they might believe it is if it looks like the regime is about to fall.

But again, what does it mean for that regime to fall?

Like what what is in place after like whatever?

Like the thing that drives me the most crazy, Tommy, is when I see the kind of people that you have more patience to fight with online than me being like, you know, you don't care about the Iranian people or whatever.

No, I don't, if you're just seeing them as a tool on your geopolitical chess game, to me, that's a definition of not caring about the Iranian people.

Because if this place collapses into civil war, that could be fucking awful, you know?

I mean, part of what I think the protesters, so people don't ask me what should happen.

I think part of what these protesters are doing is they know change is coming.

Like the Supreme Leader is going to die soon, or you may have to like, you know, just leave power because he's old and he's losing control.

And can there be some kind of pathway to just a different system in Iran that might not be exactly what, you know, the U.S.

and Israel would impose on Iran, which is probably like the Shah again, you know.

Well, that's what I'm saying.

Like, I don't think that that's what the Iranian people want.

You know, I'm just going to go out there on a limb.

Yeah.

Can there just be some Iranian process to negotiate a pathway in a different direction?

That will take time.

But that's better than the regime collapsing and there being a civil war, or it's better than the Supreme Leader being ousted, but then the IRGC is in charge, right?

And again, I don't know, like Trump bombing...

I mean, this is when things start to if we're doing if we're bombing Iran within like weeks of removing the leader of Venezuela after we bombed Nigeria on Christmas.