President Trump emerged from a lunch meeting with Republican senators declaring that oil prices are falling and the Iranians are giving him everything he wants. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Brett Baier that critics of the memorandum of understanding are modern-day Baghdad Bobs and that sanctions relief is a carrot that can always be pulled back.
Bill Roggio, senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and editor of the organization’s Long War Journal, joined Dan Proft on Chicago’s Morning Answer to offer a sharply different assessment of where things actually stand.
Roggio said the Baghdad Bob comparison aimed at American hawks is offensive and that the administration is the one putting lipstick on a pig. He said the Strait of Hormuz is not open in any meaningful sense. Prior to the conflict beginning on February 27th, approximately 140 to 160 ships passed through the strait daily. Since the deal was signed, the maximum daily traffic has been somewhere between twenty and forty ships, a fraction of normal volume. He said Iran issued a threat just today that any ships not passing through the specific channel it has designated could be targeted, with some vessels attempting to navigate along the UAE and Omani coasts to avoid Iranian control. He asked the most direct question available: if this operation was so successful, why do the Iranians still essentially control the strait, why is their government still in power, and why did the United States have to sign a deal that looks bad on paper and worse in practice?
On the administration’s strategic approach, Roggio said the fundamental error was that the Trump administration got what he called Chalabied by the Iranian opposition, a reference to Ahmed Chalabi, the Iraqi exile who told the Bush administration that Iraqis would welcome American forces with open arms after the 2003 invasion. He said the Iranian opposition similarly told the Trump administration that the Iranian people would rise up once military operations began, and that never happened. When the expected quick victory did not materialize, the administration began improvising. He cited Trump’s own post-deal statement that continued bombing for two, three, even four weeks would not have reopened the strait, and asked whether Trump knew that going in or learned it during the campaign. Either answer, he said, is problematic: if he knew it, the initial approach was misconceived; if he learned it, the administration rushed into a war without adequate planning.
Roggio said the best course of action would have been a sustained multi-day strike campaign last summer during Operation Midnight Hammer, destroying the navy, air force, military production infrastructure, nuclear facilities, and leadership targets, and then walking away with the mission accomplished rather than extending into a protracted campaign that the administration lacked the will to see through. He said a single day of strikes followed by a declaration that the entire nuclear program had been destroyed was puzzling then and remains puzzling now.
On the memorandum of understanding itself, Roggio said he sees zero concessions from Iran. The United States is providing sanctions relief, lifting the naval blockade, and potentially enabling $300 billion in reconstruction aid. In exchange, Iran has agreed to negotiate about its nuclear program, which is not a concession but merely a statement of willingness to talk. The strait remains under Iranian control. The regime remains in power unchanged, with the son replacing the father and colonels promoted to generals but no fundamental transformation of the governing structure. He noted that Iran’s support for its terrorist proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis, is not addressed in the memorandum at all, and that FDD colleague Mark Dubowitz has reported Iran deploying as many as 150 IRGC officers to Lebanon to direct Hezbollah operations even as negotiations continue.
He compared the memorandum’s structural deficiencies to the deal Trump signed with the Taliban, noting the same critical flaw: no enforcement mechanisms whatsoever. He said the document is shorter and less detailed than a car rental agreement, giving the Iranians all the wiggle room they need to claim that whatever violation is identified simply is not addressed in the text. He said Bessent’s claim that sanctions relief is a carrot that can be pulled back ignores the reality that once money flows and economic relationships are reestablished, the political cost of reimposing sanctions becomes prohibitive, exactly as Iran intends.
On the broader question of American credibility, Roggio said his skepticism of the war began before the first strike was launched, not because he doubted American military capability, which he called capable of achieving any mission assigned, but because he doubted American will. He cited the administration’s capitulation to the Houthis in the Red Sea campaign as a precedent that suggested the pattern would repeat with Iran, and said it has. He said the messaging from the administration has been abysmal from the beginning, with mutually contradictory statements about timelines, war aims, the status of the regime, and who the United States is actually negotiating with. He noted that Secretary of State Rubio, who should be leading negotiations, has been sidelined in favor of Vice President Vance, which Roggio interpreted as a powerful signal about Rubio’s actual assessment of the deal’s merits.