1 00:00:01,400 --> 00:00:03,100 GEOFF BENNETT: Today, the British and German foreign 2 00:00:03,100 --> 00:00:06,633 ministers visited Israel and urged the government to show restraint. 3 00:00:06,633 --> 00:00:11,533 But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said only Israel will decide how to respond to 4 00:00:11,533 --> 00:00:14,300 last weekend's unprecedented Iranian missile and 5 00:00:14,300 --> 00:00:18,933 drone attack. And Israeli officials have indicated they will respond. 6 00:00:18,933 --> 00:00:21,600 Nick Schifrin speaks to experts now about what 7 00:00:21,600 --> 00:00:25,733 that action might look like and how it will affect the region -- Nick. 8 00:00:25,733 --> 00:00:29,633 NICK SCHIFRIN: For decades, Geoff, Israel and Iran have fought one another in the shadows and 9 00:00:29,633 --> 00:00:34,633 through proxies, until Saturday night, when Iran launched the first ever state-on-state attack 10 00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:40,733 between these two countries, with more than 300 missiles and drones flown from Iran toward Israel. 11 00:00:42,666 --> 00:00:46,633 That attack was a response to an Israeli strike in Damascus that killed senior 12 00:00:46,633 --> 00:00:51,433 Iranian commanders. What will Israel do next and what might Iran do in response? 13 00:00:51,433 --> 00:00:56,066 We get two views. Eric Edelman served as U.S. ambassador to Turkey and was 14 00:00:56,066 --> 00:01:00,200 undersecretary of defense for policy in the George W. Bush administration. 15 00:01:00,200 --> 00:01:05,000 He's now at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a research institute. 16 00:01:05,000 --> 00:01:09,400 And Vali Nasr was a special adviser in the State Department during the Obama administration. 17 00:01:09,400 --> 00:01:14,066 He's now a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. 18 00:01:14,066 --> 00:01:17,666 Eric Edelman, Vali Nasr, thanks very much. Welcome, both of you, back to the "NewsHour." 19 00:01:17,666 --> 00:01:19,633 Eric Edelman, let me start with you. 20 00:01:19,633 --> 00:01:24,466 As Geoff just said, this attack by Iran was unprecedented. Do you expect Israel 21 00:01:26,000 --> 00:01:29,900 to retaliate in a significant kind of way? And should they? 22 00:01:29,900 --> 00:01:31,433 ERIC EDELMAN, Former State Department and Defense Department Official: 23 00:01:31,433 --> 00:01:34,466 Well, I think Israel has no choice but to respond, Nick. 24 00:01:36,300 --> 00:01:39,700 This was, as you said, unprecedented, but the scale of this attack is what's 25 00:01:39,700 --> 00:01:44,666 really sort of breathtaking, very large attack with both ballistic cruise missiles and UAVs, 26 00:01:47,466 --> 00:01:52,433 clearly meant to overwhelm Israel's layered air defenses. 27 00:01:54,533 --> 00:01:57,833 And I think it is impossible for Israel not to strike back in some way. But Israel is 28 00:01:57,833 --> 00:02:02,800 in a quandary, because part of its success in inflicting a pretty humiliating defeat 29 00:02:04,900 --> 00:02:09,733 on what is one of the main tools of coercion available to the Iranian regime was through 30 00:02:11,700 --> 00:02:15,033 the work of its allies, including the U.S. coordinating a lot of efforts with CENTCOM, 31 00:02:16,466 --> 00:02:20,800 also the U.K., France, but also Arab partners. 32 00:02:20,800 --> 00:02:25,066 And Israel doesn't want to alienate them. So the calls for restraint are clearly 33 00:02:25,066 --> 00:02:30,066 having an impact. The Israeli war cabinet has met, I think, 34 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:35,400 four times now trying to determine exactly how to respond. And it's a difficult decision for them. 35 00:02:36,900 --> 00:02:38,766 NICK SCHIFRIN: Vali Nasr, is that how you see this strike, 36 00:02:38,766 --> 00:02:43,466 breathtaking scale designed to overwhelm Israeli and allied defenses? 37 00:02:46,200 --> 00:02:47,200 VALI NASR, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University: I think Eric's 38 00:02:47,200 --> 00:02:49,400 analysis is actually correct. 39 00:02:49,400 --> 00:02:53,400 So what we have been seeing is that the rules of the game have been significantly shifting 40 00:02:55,666 --> 00:02:58,800 with every attack and counterattack. So Israel hitting the consulate in Damascus was viewed 41 00:03:00,700 --> 00:03:04,933 by Iran as sort of a new sort of red line that Israel crossed. Iran's attack 42 00:03:07,033 --> 00:03:11,200 on Israel is significant, not only in terms of the number of missiles that were used, 43 00:03:12,566 --> 00:03:15,000 but that it was also launched from Iranian territory. 44 00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:19,633 It was done in a brazen way. And the doctrine that went with it is that, from now on, if you attack 45 00:03:21,966 --> 00:03:25,733 Iran, we attack you directly. Now, how Israel responds to this -- and I do agree with Eric that, 46 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:32,533 both for domestic political reasons and for strategic reasons, it's very, very difficult 47 00:03:32,533 --> 00:03:37,533 to see a scenario in which Israel would not react, could also, if you would cross, another red line. 48 00:03:39,800 --> 00:03:44,033 So we're in an escalatory cycle where the rules of the shadow war 49 00:03:44,033 --> 00:03:49,033 are no longer holding. And with each of these attacks, we may be crossing a new Rubicon, 50 00:03:50,500 --> 00:03:54,233 and that eventually can open - - end up in an open conflict. 51 00:03:54,233 --> 00:03:56,500 NICK SCHIFRIN: But, Eric Edelman, I mean, there are people in Israel, 52 00:03:56,500 --> 00:04:01,300 including inside the war cabinet, who are arguing for a much more robust and immediate response. 53 00:04:03,633 --> 00:04:07,533 And they argue that anything short of a direct military strike by Israel on Iran will allow 54 00:04:09,800 --> 00:04:14,100 Iran to have reset deterrence and not -- and prevent Israel from creating their own new line. 55 00:04:18,733 --> 00:04:23,300 ERIC EDELMAN: Well, I mean, I think that Israel has many, many tools at its disposal. 56 00:04:23,300 --> 00:04:28,300 And one of the things I think that's asymmetry here is that the very complex, 57 00:04:30,333 --> 00:04:34,833 layered defense that Israel has available to it is not something that Iran has. I think 58 00:04:37,066 --> 00:04:41,033 Israel has lots of ways, including nonkinetic ways with cyber, to inflict real costs, impose 59 00:04:44,633 --> 00:04:49,633 real costs on the Iranian regime in a way that does reset deterrence without actually getting 60 00:04:53,533 --> 00:04:58,533 into the kind of escalatory spiral that Vali was discussing, which I agree is a possibility. 61 00:05:00,600 --> 00:05:04,133 But, right now, I think this was a very - - should be a very disturbing defeat for 62 00:05:06,300 --> 00:05:11,266 the Iranian regime. The fact that I think that they're concerned about it has been demonstrated 63 00:05:13,266 --> 00:05:16,833 by the crackdown on domestic dissent that we have seen in the last 48, 72 hours. 64 00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:22,933 And, right now, it's not even clear that they could launch a second volley, since they may 65 00:05:22,933 --> 00:05:27,933 have used up a lot of their medium-range ballistic missiles in the first go-round. 66 00:05:30,066 --> 00:05:33,333 And the failure rate may have been as high as 50 percent. So if you're sitting in Tehran, 67 00:05:35,366 --> 00:05:38,633 I think you might be more worried about an escalatory cycle than Israel is right now. 68 00:05:38,633 --> 00:05:40,566 NICK SCHIFRIN: Vali Nasr, 69 00:05:40,566 --> 00:05:43,266 two U.S. officials did confirm to me that the failure rate was 50 percent. 70 00:05:43,266 --> 00:05:47,333 But in terms of what Iranian government is saying, they are saying that they 71 00:05:47,333 --> 00:05:51,333 could actually go bigger next time. And President Raisi specifically said that 72 00:05:51,333 --> 00:05:56,333 even a small attack by Israel on Iran would yield a larger strike on Israel. 73 00:05:57,800 --> 00:05:59,700 Is that bluster or is that real? 74 00:05:59,700 --> 00:06:03,533 VALI NASR: I think it's both. In other words, definitely, there's bluster, 75 00:06:03,533 --> 00:06:06,800 but there's also definitely very tough rhetoric in order to dissuade 76 00:06:06,800 --> 00:06:11,800 Israel from doing something that would then force the Iranians to escalate. 77 00:06:13,833 --> 00:06:16,833 But I would say that exactly the ambiguities that exist here, what can the Iranians do, 78 00:06:18,300 --> 00:06:21,466 how afraid are they, would they react, at what level they react, 79 00:06:21,466 --> 00:06:25,466 is exactly why Israel is pondering its response and why you have two foreign 80 00:06:25,466 --> 00:06:30,466 ministers visiting Israel in order to ask Israel to restrain itself. 81 00:06:32,233 --> 00:06:36,033 But, partly, this is not entirely a military issue. It's not a question 82 00:06:36,033 --> 00:06:41,033 of just what fail rate Israel's missiles had, but the way in which this crisis over the last 83 00:06:43,033 --> 00:06:48,033 10 days impacted global markets, impacted psychologically Israel, 84 00:06:49,933 --> 00:06:54,233 economically, but also the way in which the United States and Europe reacted to 85 00:06:54,233 --> 00:06:59,233 the urgency of the situation basically does give Iran a certain leverage here. 86 00:07:01,266 --> 00:07:03,900 In other words, once Israel attacks Iran, we don't know when Iran would react, 87 00:07:03,900 --> 00:07:08,466 but we may go through another 10 days, 15 days of this sort of thing. And then, 88 00:07:08,466 --> 00:07:13,466 if the Iranians decide to react, and then Israel reacts to Iran's reaction, essentially, 89 00:07:15,566 --> 00:07:19,133 Israel and Iran are not -- no longer the only two parties that are affected by this crisis. 90 00:07:19,133 --> 00:07:24,133 The global economy, the Arab governments around them, Europe and the United States are affected, 91 00:07:26,100 --> 00:07:28,100 and they're quite worried. And that's also a factor that's playing in here as well. 92 00:07:28,100 --> 00:07:30,633 NICK SCHIFRIN: Eric Edelman, very quickly, because we only have about 45 seconds, 93 00:07:30,633 --> 00:07:35,200 the U.S. is trying to urge Israel not to strike back at all. And they're urging 94 00:07:35,200 --> 00:07:39,666 sanctions internationally. They're talking about that air defense coalition expanding. 95 00:07:39,666 --> 00:07:44,033 Could that reassure Israel not to strike? 96 00:07:44,033 --> 00:07:47,900 ERIC EDELMAN: I think that what I have heard from U.S. officials is 97 00:07:47,900 --> 00:07:52,733 that they expect that there will be some retaliation by Israel. 98 00:07:52,733 --> 00:07:57,733 Exactly how it goes, I think nobody really knows right now. And there has been, as Vali was 99 00:08:00,200 --> 00:08:04,033 suggesting and as you have suggested, Nick, some hesitation the Israeli side about how far to go. 100 00:08:04,033 --> 00:08:05,566 NICK SCHIFRIN: Yes. 101 00:08:05,566 --> 00:08:08,100 ERIC EDELMAN: But I think you're going to see some response. 102 00:08:08,100 --> 00:08:11,266 NICK SCHIFRIN: And, Vali Nasr, does that necessarily mean exactly what you were just 103 00:08:11,266 --> 00:08:16,266 worried about, another round and more weeks of concern for the whole region? 104 00:08:18,066 --> 00:08:20,400 VALI NASR: Well, it depends on what the nature of that response is. 105 00:08:20,400 --> 00:08:23,600 And then we're going to see all these European diplomats, 106 00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:28,266 U.S. through back channels, Arab diplomats turn their attention to Tehran to try to 107 00:08:28,266 --> 00:08:33,100 preach the same thing to the Iranians to - - not to react to the Israeli attack. 108 00:08:33,100 --> 00:08:34,533 NICK SCHIFRIN: Yes. 109 00:08:34,533 --> 00:08:37,466 Vali Nasr, Eric Edelman, thanks very much to you both. 110 00:08:37,466 --> 00:08:42,466 ERIC EDELMAN: Thank you. VALI NASR: Thank you.