President Trump addressed the nation this week in what he framed as a progress report on the Iran war.

In his telling, a quick detour to the Middle East was necessary.

The world is safer because of it, and the American economy will be just fine.

But in reality, there were more questions than answers after the president's 20-minute address, especially as he vows to bomb on.

There's a lot to unpack.

And joining me tonight, Adris Ali is a national security correspondent at Reuters.

Peter Baker is a the chief White House correspondent for the New York Times.

Susan Glasser is staff writer at the New Yorker.

And Michelle Price is a White House reporter at the Associated Press.

Thank you all for joining me.

Um before we get to the president's speech, Adris, there was some breaking news just as we were coming to air.

Um an F-15 fighter pilot uh fighter jet pilot was rescued alive u by the US military after the plane went down over Iran.

First of all, what do we know about the incident?

And also, what does that say about maybe Iran's capabilities if it was responsible for this?

You know, firstly, I what we know right now is a two uh seater F-15 P jet was shot over Iran.

We don't know who was responsible, but I think it is likely that Iran was responsible in some way, shape, or form.

We don't know the fate of the second pilot yet.

But I think what broadly it shows is that a war is brutal, uh, unpredictable, and what President Trump and Secretary Hex have been saying, which is, you know, Iran has been destroyed.

militarily their capabilities, their air defenses just isn't true.

You know, Iran has a plethora of air defense systems.

Something as simple as a manpad actually can bring down a fighter jet.

So, I think it really raises questions about what the president, Secretary Hexath have been saying and really risk for the thousands of, you know, US personnel who are flying in and around Iran every day.

Yeah, Susan, we as we showed in the open, the president is trying to set a time frame for getting out of Iran.

That already there were questions about how realistic that is.

And now on top of that with this incident, um, do you think it's possible that we could wrap this war up in 2 to 3 weeks?

Well, again, I mean, part of the reason that I think the American public, uh, is suggesting in polls by an overwhelming margin, they're very skeptical about the war, you've seen a very negative reaction from the markets.

The reason is because while Trump said two to three weeks, he did not offer any kind of a sense of a realistic plan.

In fact, he actually suggested that the most serious economic consequence of the war, which is the effective closing of the straight of Hormuz, he basically said that he may just walk away from it and leave uh European and and Asian partners who rely upon energy uh imported through the straight that he would just leave that problem to them.

That's not a really a realistic scenario for winning as anyone would conventionally define it.

And so I think not only has Trump left the goals of this operation hazy, but I think he's been not only untruthful, but amazingly untruthful with the American people and with the world, both about what's already happened over the last month and about what he's trying to do with this war.

Let's stay with the speech now, uh, Wednesday night prime time address.

Peter, um, why did the White House feel that now was the time to deliver this speech?

What was the objective behind it?

And do you think it was effective?

Yeah, that's a good question.

The the thing about it, it's always better for a president in a time of war to go to the public and explain what he's trying to do, to explain the goals, to explain why it's worth American treasure and lives to take this action.

But it felt like a day one speech, not a day 32 speech, right?

It did not feel like a speech a month into the war saying where we're going to go from here.

It's and I think that it left a lot of people confused.

On the first day of the war, he told us that regime change was the goal.

He said, "Iranians, it's time for you to take over your country."

He says on Wednesday night, "Regime was never my goal."

He told us that the nuclear program was obliterated and now he says, "We need to obliterate it again."

So forth and so on.

We've been through this.

But he didn't outline a plan, a concrete plan or an understanding of what he wants out of this war.

He said at one point he wanted unconditional surrender.

Okay, but now he's negotiating.

What do you negotiate?

You can negotiate conditions.

So it's it's all over the map.

And I don't know that it satisfied the Republicans who wanted him get out there and talk who were very nervous about the impact on the economy and on their political prospects in the fall.

I mean, gas prices hit a record the day before this speech was delivered.

Do you think that had um a big factor?

Absolutely.

What he's hearing from his people around him and obviously from Republicans on the Hill is that the public isn't for this and they don't see why we're doing it and you need to explain why it's important to them.

And I don't know that he sold that case.

Well, and I I mean I think that's a really important point because people are not only not used to the American president, you know, really not speaking to them at a moment of such enormous international gravity, but let's just say for a second here, 19 minutes long that address was from the White House.

Uh it it really was basically a 19minute long truth social post.

uh instead of a meaningful strategy for why he's taken such a consequential decision that has plunged the global economy into turmoil.

I mean literally people are not being able to go to school 5 days a week in Bangladesh.

In South Korea they're working from home because Donald Trump did this and yet in 19 minutes what did he offer us?

Like essentially platitudes from his social media posting America is winning.

We've never been doing better than before.

That's not a strategy.

It's actually insulting to people to talk like this.

I think in a time of conflict.

And Michelle, one of the things that we've been talking about throughout the course of this conflict is the straight of Hormuse, that passage, that crucial passageway, um especially for oil tankers getting in and out of that region.

What, if anything, did the president say as far as whether or not that passage would be reopened, who would control it?

So, are those lingering questions that we keep asking?

I mean, it depends on what day of the week it is and what time of day it is because the answer keeps changing.

you know, in in the speech and in the days leading up to it, the president has said, "It's not for us.

It's for those who use it, who rely on it."

Uh this morning, he's suggesting that maybe the US could very easily go take the straight of horses, that it would only go on a little bit longer, that that it would bring great wealth to the US if we if we took it.

Um, and the president has been expressing privately in a video that the White House put up this week and then that was taken down some uh, you know, he he's expressed a desire to stay and try to get some of this oil and said, but he understands that there isn't patience in the US to stay.

And you can see he's kind of feeling out whether he might be able to prolong this.

But the question of whether this will wrap up in two or three weeks, it actually isn't up to just him, right?

Iran has this choke point.

They have leverage now.

And it's there's two parties here that decide when this ends.

Um actually we have uh we have the president here saying um that one of the things that you know has been a concern is obviously the financial markets.

Um and the president sort of framed the way out economically.

Here's what he had to say.

To those countries that can't get fuel, many of which refuse to get involved in the decapitation of Iran.

We had to do it ourselves.

I have a suggestion.

Number one, buy oil from the United States of America.

We have plenty.

We have so much.

And number two, build up some delayed courage.

Should have done it before.

Should have done it with us as we asked.

Go to the straight and just take it, protect it, use it for yourselves.

Peter, the relationship with allies over the course of this uh this conflict has been rocky to say the least.

Uh obviously messaging to them especially there.

What's the president looking to get out of this?

Well, it was surprising he didn't go further actually in the bellacosity we expected in that speech toward allies and particularly toward NATO.

He's been threatening to even get out of NATO out of all this.

In effect, what has happened was is it's a it's something it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Right?

He has said NATO is obsolete.

They won't come to our aid.

He then goes to war without consulting them, without asking them their opinion, without asking them if they would do something, if they thought it was a good idea or not.

And then when they say, "No, it's your war.

We don't particularly want to be part of."

They say, "See, I told you all I was right all along."

Now, he has backed off of the the the threat at the moment, but it does feel like that the alliance basically is all but over.

It's in name everything but name only.

Yes, they're still in NATO, but if you're in NATO, do you believe that the United States is a full-fledged partner with you or do you think that it's going off on its own and Europe is thinking uh the United States is going off?

Well, and Secretary General Mark Rut of NATO is coming to Washington next week to talk to President Trump.

Clearly they are concerned and he's been a Trump whisperer.

He's been into the sometimes the constonnation of his European uh colleagues who think he's gone too far.

Maybe he'll be able to smooth things over in some way.

But I think that this is still a fundamental break here that's not going to be repaired.

Yeah, Adric, I want to go back to the military portion of this.

Obviously, there have been concerns uh questions about how well this military operation has been going, who's calling the shots.

Interestingly, this week, um, the Army Chief of Staff, uh, Randy George was fired by Secretary Hegth.

Um, first of all, is that an unusual move to see in the middle of a war and what does it say about the military operation?

I think it's extraordinary to fire the head of the army, the largest branch in the military during a war and not related to the war itself, right?

He did nothing wrong about within the war.

Um, and so I think it's extraordinary.

Raises real questions.

Uh there are thousands of US military, specifically army soldiers in the Middle East actually manning air defense systems on the defensive side and airborne troopers from the 82nd Airborne Division.

And I think if you're someone who's deployed, you're looking sort of at the TV in the Middle East and saying, "What is going on?

Who are the people that I'm following?"

And you know, it just really raises a lot of questions.

And you know, the military is sort of like a freight train moving.

It's really tough to stop when it starts moving and and and I think the momentum right now is towards some sort of you know action potentially on the ground and I think not having a leader like Randy George I think really raises questions.

I mean you mentioned the 82nd Airborne Division they would be deploying any at any moment now.

So what happens if we're done in two to three weeks they pack up and they come back home.

How does that work?

You know I think as a as a president when you have sent troops to the Middle East and other parts of the world there's sort of this sunk cost fallacy, right?

You think that you have sent so many troops now you have to do something and I think Trump is one of those people who may look at it this way say look I've sent so many troops Marines 82nd Airborne Division parat troopers I should do something and I think it's going to be really tough to stop him from doing something just given the cost of moving so many people so far.

Yeah, Susan.

And one of the things that we've talked about quite a bit is Israel's role.

First of all, obviously this was a war waged by Israel and the United States together, but um Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu really pushing the president toward this this decision.

Um is there a world in which Israel continues its war in Iran alone if the US were to scale back or withdraw completely?

Um and also if you could talk a little bit about its offensive in Lebanon as well.

Well, that's exactly right.

Glad you brought up the offensive in Lebanon because what it shows is that Israel, you know, of course has its own very imminent security concerns around everything concerning uh Iran, right?

You know, so if this is a war of choice for the United States, it's much more existential uh at least in terms of the framing for Israel, for the Israeli public.

And what's happening here, this is not the first time Prime Minister Netanyahu is using this conflict as an opportunity to go after uh you know, not just Iran itself, but its proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon.

In Lebanon, this is not the first time that Israel uh has gone to war in Lebanon.

In fact, it's done it over and over and over again.

The question on everybody's mind is whether there's going to be a full-fledged Israeli ground assault in southern Lebanon.

We are hearing indications that that is certainly a possibility.

Seen reporting suggesting that Israel plans to take in effect a large swath of territory in le Lebanon to increase essentially what you might call their strategic depth to increase the kind of safe zone uh that they feel that they need.

I do think that the basic assumption here that both Netanyahu and Trump had going into this conflict was about is Iran's weakness.

that this was the moment to strike because they believed that Iran's proxies had been weakened ever since the conflict after October 7th.

They believed also that Iran itself had been weakened after their initial round of air strikes last summer.

Uh in some ways that's the original mistake of the conflict is believing that Iran was so weak that it would capitulate quickly.

It would be like Venezuela all over again.

Absolutely.

What are you all hearing about security guarantees for the region too?

Especially those Gulf allies that have gotten hit in the crossfire despite the fact that they said initially they didn't want did not want to take part in the war.

They didn't even want the US to use its bases to launch its war.

Uh now they're very much kind of pulled in.

Uh Susan, what are you hearing as far as their interest in having long-term security guarantees and the US possibly leaving this fight and them having to kind of uh lick their wounds and pick up the pieces?

Well, that's exactly right.

Whatever the range of opinion was among uh Gulf Arabs before the conflict at this point of there are many of them saying absolutely you've got to finish the job that you started otherwise you risk leaving us in uh a much more perilous political situation and strategic situation.

This goes uh to the point as well about sunk costs.

Uh Donald Trump unleashed the conflict without properly taking into account the consequences of it.

Now you have a global economic catastrophe and a regional security catastrophe.

I believe nine different countries including Israel have been struck by Iran in since the US began the war.

Right.

So all of the neighbors are feeling the military heat.

Both Donald Trump and his secretary of defense Pete Hexath have said publicly that they failed to anticipate that it that Iran would hit the neighbors.

So now the neighbors are saying absolutely you've got to finish this job.

But let's also remember on some level the US is there fighting arguably for the security interests of the Gulf Arab states and of Israel more as much or more than for the US interest itself.

Yeah.

Taking that into account, Michelle, you know, we've talked so much about how the president was surrounded by yes men and women uh people who kind of go along with what he would like.

How much of this is the product of just not having people pushing back um in his inner circle?

um the proper adviserss in place to be able to kind of flesh out some of the um the conditions and the the risks that were involved in a military operation of this nature.

I mean that's one of the ongoing questions we have on a whole host of subjects with the president.

You know, there's been some reporting that the briefings he's been getting are just like highlight reels of explosions.

Um, you know, I think that there is high confidence in General Kaine and that he is a straight shooter and is would give the president real information, real information on risks, but we don't have great detail on if he is the one giving the briefings every day, what information the president is getting, and if he is the one glossing things over to make them look rosier than they are, or if that's what he's being fed.

Well, I uh, one of the things I keep hearing is that one of the people who's been most frank with him is Treasury Secretary Vasset.

Um and obviously with the economy taking a hit now um does the is the president getting real and realistic advice on where the country could go?

I mean judging by u the address on Wednesday night where he was talking about essentially the American economy being in good shape.

You know the polls don't show that and economic indicators don't show that and so who is kind of talking to him about the economy or does he feel like he knows best when it comes to the economy?

It's kind of the last person in the room is always the thing with Donald Trump, right?

Who's giving them the last piece of information.

But in terms of the economic piece of this, there is a real awareness that this is a big political a domestic political problem staring them down the face that even if let's say the war wraps up next week, this is not going to be solved economically immediately.

It is going the repercussions of this are going to continue on and on.

And they are aware of that and that's why you hear him speak about maybe two to three weeks we'd like to wrap this up.

At the same time, there is this awareness that he has made all these promises about the reasons that we went to start this conflict and that if if it did wrap up, a lot of those objectives, shifting as they are, have not actually been achieved.

And he's kind of between stuck between a hard a rock and a hard place on his promises