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Chapter 1: What happened after the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran's supreme leader?
Trump says much of Iran's military is knocked out, and he seems to be deciding what to do about the country's future in real time. He's trying to make a deal with the regime that he's encouraging people to overthrow, which really shows that there isn't a clear, defined endgame. Plus, scrutiny is growing over the Trump administration's case for war.
And the Middle East conflict sends stocks spinning. It's Tuesday, March 3rd. I'm Alex Osola for The Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today.
Chapter 2: Who is currently running Iran after Khamenei's death?
It's been three days since the U.S.-Israeli strikes killed Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. President Trump today told reporters that who comes next in Iran isn't obvious, and many of the country's would-be leaders have been killed. We had some in mind from that group that is dead today.
Chapter 3: What options does Trump consider for Iran's leadership?
And now we have another group. They may be dead also, based on reports. And he suggested that someone inside the regime should be in charge. It would seem to me that somebody from within maybe would be more appropriate. I've said that.
Chapter 4: What are the implications of Trump's military strategy in Iran?
U.S. officials are also saying that President Trump is open to supporting groups in Iran who could fight to dislodge the regime. Journal national security reporter Vera Bergen-Gruen joins me now from Washington. OK, Vera, on a functional level, who is actually running Iran right now? So after the death of the supreme leader,
The country formed an interim council, and there's basically three people. They're still heartline clerics, and they're waiting to select a successor. But obviously, they're in the middle of this massive military assault.
And we have little visibility into who's actually running a lot of those decisions, because besides the Supreme Leader, a lot of his inner circle, a lot of the very top officials that the U.S. kind of looked at as power brokers have been killed as well.
Chapter 5: How is the Trump administration justifying the strike on Iran?
We just heard a few clips from President Trump here about who he thinks should be in charge of the country. What role is the U.S. going to play in the successor to the Supreme Leader? Trump has floated quite a few options, and he's offering really contrasting visions as to how that could work.
He obviously, on Saturday, when he launched the military operation, called on Iran to rise up, to take over their government positions. basically encouraging a coup or a revolt.
At the same time, he has been very clear that he would love what he calls the Venezuela model, which is working with an insider in the regime to keep most of it in place, keep it stable, and declare victory because he took out the top bad guy, basically. So, you know, these are obviously very different things. He's trying to make a deal with the regime that he's encouraging people to overthrow.
which really shows that there isn't a clear defined endgame. What is the best case scenario for the administration? What are they looking for in a successor? It really depends who you ask. The president, he's been quite clear that he does not want boots on the ground. He does not want to do nation building.
Chapter 6: What are the potential impacts of the conflict on global markets?
The best case scenario is finding someone who is already has authority in the country, who can take over, who can manage all this mess. And he can get out, say that he's deposed the foreign leader of this brutal regime. and declare victory. A lot of other people in the administration disagree with that.
A lot of the hardliners who have been pressing Trump to take action, you know, really want the entire repressive structure dismantled. But several people I spoke with who were in Trump's first administration said he had two rules. One was military action had to be one and done. You do one overwhelming show of force. We saw this in Venezuela. We saw it in Nigeria.
Chapter 7: How are oil prices affected by the situation in Iran?
We saw it in Iran last year. And then you get out and you declare victory. He broke that rule now in this extended military engagement. We have six dead American troops. And, you know, he said this could last for four weeks. The second rule was no boots on the ground, no U.S. invasion.
He basically built his whole political career on saying that he had learned the mistakes of the post 9-11 war on terror and he wasn't going to commit U.S. troops to any extended quagmires in the Middle East. This is the closest he's ever come to really testing that.
Chapter 8: What are the key political developments in the U.S. related to Iran?
That was WSJ reporter Vera Bergen-Gruen. Thanks, Vera. Thanks so much. President Trump said today that much of Iran's military has been, quote, knocked out. Meanwhile, U.S. embassies and diplomatic missions remain under fire in the Middle East, with two attacks today on the U.S. embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The U.S.
has shut down embassies in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Lebanon indefinitely, and consular operations are largely suspended in several countries. The State Department says it's working on getting military and charter flights for American citizens who want to leave the region. Meanwhile, back in the U.S., President Trump's reasons for striking Iran are facing growing scrutiny.
He's made a number of accusations about the regime's threats to its neighbors, American troops, and the U.S. itself. Speaking from the Oval Office today, President Trump said he ordered the strike because he was afraid that Iran would attack first. I thought we were going to have a situation where we were going to be attacked. They were getting ready to attack Israel.
They were getting ready to attack others. But experts and U.S. officials with access to classified information say the administration's assertions are incomplete, unsubstantiated, or flat-out wrong. WSJ national security reporter Alex Ward joins me now with more. Alex, ahead of the strike, President Trump had said a number of different things about why the U.S. should attack Iran.
He threatened strikes over the crackdown on anti-regime protesters. Then in negotiations, Iran was refusing to dismantle its nuclear and ballistic missile programs. Trump also mentioned Iran's decades-long aggression towards the U.S., but in the lead-up to the attack, senior administration officials argued that Iran was developing intercontinental missiles capable of reaching American shores.
What's behind that claim, and what does other evidence show about this? So the U.S. was receiving intelligence that the Iranians were trying to really go whole hog on building up a missile arsenal. They believe some of the material they found in Iran's possession could be used for more missiles or even do ICBM work, an intercom ballistic missile, which is an ocean-spanning missile.
And they've been testing satellite launch vehicles that literally put satellites into space, which is like directly conducive toward making an ICBM. But the question for basically all the administration's arguments are, you know, was this looming threat an imminent threat? I rattled off a bunch of different stuff.
Does that mean that the Trump administration was shifting its justification or that all of these things were kind of taken together? The administration had multiple arguments for why this needed to happen. You did list them. Then they were really trying to make the case for the why now, Friday night, Saturday morning.
Basically, their case was the Iranians are weak and they're making these moves towards nuclear development and missile development and they might strike Americans. They're basically making a defensive case, saying that they're doing this out of self-defense because the American homeland was going to be or was nearly going to be directly targeted.
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