Mike Baker

Even if you assume some of these positions are negotiable, there's still a bigger question, whether Iran is actually negotiating in good faith.

Because we've seen this pattern before, agreements on paper, followed by gradual steps away from those commitments over time.

And despite the White House running with the narrative that they're now dealing with a whole new regime, the reality is they're still dealing with the Islamic Republic.

Now, many of the faces in leadership positions may be new, but there's no reason to believe, at least not yet, that we're somehow dealing with a kinder, gentler, more reasonable government.

All right, coming up next, Russia sends submarines toward UK waters in what looks like a covert operation targeting undersea cables and pipelines.

I'll be right back.

Hey, Mike Baker here.

Welcome back to the PDB Afternoon Bulletin.

A new warning out of the United Kingdom today details how British officials exposed a covert Russian submarine operation targeting the country's critical undersea infrastructure.

According to British Defense Secretary John Healey, this appeared to be a coordinated Russian operation involving an Akula-class attack submarine alongside two specialized spy subs, assets that operated in the Atlantic north of the UK for nearly a month

before being pushed out.

And I want to point out an interesting detail in Healy's speech.

He said the Russian attack submarine may have been a decoy.

It was potentially designed to draw attention while something else was happening beneath the surface.

So you ask, what were they up to?

Well, the two spy submarines are tied to Russia's main directorate of deep sea research, known as Gugi.

Mm-hmm.

It's a clandestine unit with a fun-sounding name that Western officials have been monitoring closely for years.

Their focus, well, their focus is the seabed.

I'm talking, of course, about undersea cables and pipelines, the infrastructure that quietly powers global communications, financial systems, and data flows.