with the end of the iranian regime, and that s why i m just puzzled why they are being as aggressive as they are, even though, of course, they have been isolated and strangled in some senses economically by what i regard as wrongheaded u.s. policy. republican leaders put out a statement, i m quoting, there must be a measured response to these actions. do you agree that there should be a response? and what would you think a measured response would look like if you supported any kind of action? yeah, i do, anderson. as you probably know, i have been sounding the alarm for months now that the president s people, john bolton and mike pompeo, have been trying to get to precisely this moment, this moment when we are on the brink of a potential military conflict. they, of course, have been urged on by leaders in the middle east and saudi arabia and the uae and elsewhere. but, yes, so here s where we are. we are in a box right now because on the one hand, a
soon, anderson. i don t know that, but it certainly seems in terms of the posturing with what the president has said that, look, we will have to wait and see if there will be a military strike. all of this pressure growing on him from his allies, like i said, lindsey graham, that he will look weak if he doesn t do something in response to this latest act by iran. he has been downplaying it consistently. he is someone who has said repeatedly he doesn t like intervention. he campaigned on that. but there are several provocative acts by iran with the latest one being the downing of the u.s. drone that has the president in a tricky situation here. he tried to, again, give himself some wiggle room by saying i thought it was an accident. iran made it clear it was intentional, though. we will have to see if the administration does choose to take any military action or look at other ways to respond, anderson. pamela brown, appreciate it. cnn s fred plankton is in teheran where he joins us. p
talked there about john bolton. what is the next step for this white house? is there a sense of when a decision might be made? reporter: it certainly feels like something could happen soon, anderson. i don t know that, but it certainly seems in terms of the posturing with what the president has said, look, we will have to wait and see if there will be a military strike. and all of this pressure growing on him from his allies, like i said, lindsey graham, that he will look weak if he doesn t do something in response to this latest act by iran. he has been downplaying it consistently. he is someone who has said repeatedly he doesn t like intervention. he campaigned on that. but there are several provocative acts by iran with this latest one being the downing of a u.s. drone that has the president in a tricky situation here. he tried to again give himself some wiggle room by saying i thought it was an accident. iran made it clear it was intentional, though, and so we will have to see if
president s comments give the iranians a way out if they choose to take it, but it seems they aren t taking it. mike, why do you think they are not taking it? they re trying to put pressure on the entire international system ahead of the g20 meeting at the end of next week. they want, they want all of the members of the jcpoa, china, russia, the e.u., all of them to swarm donald trump and say, you know, you need to actually negotiate with the iranians, you need to relieve some of the sanctions pressure on them and so on. so they re trying to turn up the heat in general. cedric, isn t there tremendous potential any kind of u.s. military action, as with any military action, one doesn t necessarily know the ripple effects, things can spiral out of control, you can t necessarily predict how somebody is going to react or how, you know, whether they re a rational actor or not. is the u.s. ready for an actual war with iran? unfortunately, anderson, i don t think we are.
there is something to be done about it. we know the president is very reluctant, as he looks at all of this intelligence, still to commit to a significant action in iran. he has been for several days downplaying the tensions, if you will. calling them minor, the attacks minor on the ta minor on the tankers, trying not to escalate it. anderson? can it be recovered? the iranians made claims about that. we checked with the u.s. military. the weather out there has been bad. we are told the seas are very choppy. the winds are pushing towards the iranian coast, and it is making it difficult for the u.s. to mount any effort to try and get any of the debris back. the iranians claim they have some, but they haven t shown it to the world yet. if the u.s. does decide to respond militarily, is there any idea what that might look like?