Thomas Small

Oh, gosh, I wish I knew the answer to that question, Francis.

I mean, I'm not a military expert, particularly.

At the beginning of the war, I thought it would be more or less achievable to win the

the Arabian Gulf, the Persian Gulf for America's side in this conflict to neutralize the possibility that the Iranian regime would close the strait as it did.

I would have thought that's a very straightforward, the obvious thing to do.

It did seem that that was on the cards.

We saw the three aircraft carrier groups moving into the region.

A lot of commando groups were moving in, American ones, including, it seems, based on things that have come out recently, to Israel, working together with the Israeli partners.

The whole idea was going to be to take those very strategically key islands in the Persian Gulf and control it.

That might have required some troops to land on the Iranian shore to project that power

you know, further into the into the mainland.

Obviously, it wouldn't have been easy.

You know, it's extremely mountainous there.

There are lots of valleys.

The Iranians have prepared for a long time for that eventuality.

So, you know, there would have been some casualties, of course.

But it it strikes me as that was absolutely an obvious thing that should have happened.

The fact that it didn't happen

that Iran was able to close the Strait, it remains closed, really, is the thing that sort of stymies a lot of people truly to make sense of it.

Unless, as some people say, the military apparatuses, you know, the military, the materiel was not in place, was not enough to take it sort of with confidence.