[00:00:00] Announcer: Secrets and Spies presents Espresso Martini with Chris Carr and Matt Fulton. [00:00:25] Chris Carr: Hello everybody and welcome to a sort of special Espresso Martini 'cause we wanted to look a bit further at the strikes on Iran's nuclear sites. That happens almost like 24 hours after, or maybe thir 48 hours after we recorded our previous episode. Um, and where Trump had left us on a cliffhanger saying, oh, um, it's gonna be two weeks before I make my decision. And then, Lo and behold, he goes and bombs the nuclear facilities. [00:00:51] Matt Fulton: Yeah, spoiler alert, that was a lie. [00:00:54] Chris: Yeah. Yeah. So I, I felt like we probably should come back and have a bit more of a chat about that. And then in our last section, um, today we will just talk a little bit about the new official James Bond news, because official James Bond news is quite rare. There's an awful lot of click bait out there that gets people into a, a tiz, but this is actually some genuine news, which is quite exciting. So we'll go and start in a bit. So Matt, I'll let you talk us through Iran. 'cause you, as I said before, you are in-house sort of Iran expert here, so I will hand over to you. [00:01:25] Matt: Yeah. Thank you. So yeah, I'll, I'll get us started here on breaking down. There's a, there's a whole lot to, to, to talk about here. So, um, after days of Israeli airstrikes on Iranian nuclear and military infrastructure, president Trump authorized the first American combat operation inside the Islamic Republic. Since 1979, the US bombing campaign dubbed Operation Midnight Hammer. Launched on June 22nd and and centered on three sites, Fordo, naans and Isfahan B. Two Bombers from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri dropped a dozen, uh, 30,000 pound GBU 75 Bunker Buster Bombs or mops. On the deeply buried cascade halls at Fordo. While submarine launched Tomahawk Cruise missiles struck Isfahan and Naans. But in the days since, uh, growing Rift has emerged between the White House's triumphal rhetoric and the intelligence community's more sobering assessments of what the strikes actually achieved. According to a New York Times report, Trump's decision to strike came after a week of calculated misdirection and internal chaos. While he publicly claimed to be undecided, even telling reporters he'd wait two weeks before making any call, the strike plan was already in motion. He authorized the attack from his Bedminster, New Jersey golf club on Friday evening. Just hours before B two bombers began the 18 hour flight to Iran, the Pentagon built deception into the mission. One group of bombers flew westward over the Pacific as a faint while the strike package approached from the opposite direction. The operation was time to avoid tipping off Iran, but also to buy Trump political space. You could back out at the last minute, as he famously did in 2019. This time though there was no turning back. Reporting suggests the White House intended this to be a one-off strike, hoping to disable Iran's most hardened enrichment site at Fordo and forced Herron to negotiate from a position of weakness that night immediately after the strikes. Trump and defense secretary Pete Hegseth, both claimed the strikes obliterated Iran's nuclear program. But the truth is more complicated. The Fordo site buried under a mountain and hundreds of feet of granite and reinforced concrete was always going to be a tough target. Analysts at the Defense Intelligence Agency or DIA had warned prior to the attack that multiple waves might be required to ensure total destruction. Instead, 12 mops were dropped in a single sortie targeting ventilation shafts and known service structures above the centrifuge halls. The plan was to channel the blast through the facility's architecture. Early satellite imagery showed no signs of surface subsidance suggesting the underground halls may not have collapsed. A post-strike technical assessment from the Institute for Science and International Security, uh, drawn from satellite imagery and IAEA data finds that Iran's enrichment capabilities suffered a massive blow, naans, isfahan, and fordo all sustained major hits, conversion facilities, centrifuge halls, and uranium metal processing lines were destroyed. Notably, the uranium conversion facility at Isfahan. A key bottleneck for weaponizing enriched uranium is likely inoperable for years. IAEA director General Raphael Grossey. Said the four dose centrifuges are no longer operational, citing their extreme sensitivity to vibration that would've been caused by, you know, a few hundred thousand pounds of explosives coming in on top of them. Still, he stopped short of calling. The program wiped out the DIA's initial battle damage assessment or bda A was more restrained. A classified stri report designed to help commanders determine whether a target needs to be hit again, which leaked to CNN, and the times concluded the bombing setback Iran's program by only a few months. The underground structures at Fordo and Deon's were not believed to have collapsed and Iran's uranium stockpiles had likely been moved before the attack. Enrichment could resume quickly at clandestine sites and officials warn that some nuclear infrastructure might remain intact. The White House dismissed this as fake news and accused leakers of treason. While CI, A director John Ratcliffe later offered a revised view stating that the program was severely damaged and would take years to rebuild. There's also a divergence between US and Israeli assessments. Israeli officials, while stopping short of calling Fordo, destroyed, believe the cumulative impact of US and Israeli strikes, including assassinations of nuclear scientists and destruction of centrifuge. Factories has severely crippled Iran's ability to produce a bomb. Axios reports Israeli intelligence, intercepted communications suggesting Iran's military is concealing the full extent of the damage from its political leadership. So where does that leave us? Iran's nuclear know-how its stockpiles and possibly even more secretive facilities remain intact. While the cascade halls at Fordo and Naans and other facilities at Isfahan may be out of commission for now, it's still not clear whether Iran is permanently deterred or more determined than ever. As of now, a ceasefire is in place after Iran launched a token ballistic missile strike against US forces at Allude air Base in Qatar. But the, the intelligence picture is fluid and Iran's ultimate response over the weeks and months ahead remains uncertain. Whether this was a decisive blow or merely a bloody prelude is a question. Still waiting for an answer, Chris? Uh. What do you think? Well, [00:06:52] Chris: um, yeah, I suppose my initial thoughts are the, the attacks themselves weren't a great surprise. I had a feeling that they were gonna happen. The only surprise was when they happened. Mm-hmm. In fact, um, I actually found out about it from my wife. She's, um, she mentioned something about some strikes against Iran and the way she phrased it, I assumed it was Israel. And then when I looked at the news like half an hour later, it was like, oh, America struck Iran. Oh my God. You know, like, talk about delayed reaction. Yeah. Um, and I, and I don't mean that as a, a celebratory tone or anything. I mean, I, I, I'm personally, I'll put my position out there. I don't think that this was a great idea. Um, and I, and I think in some respects that Trump is making the mistake of breaking international law like Netanyahu has done with his strikes. Um, and there's a whole ethical debate about, um. A whole sort of preemptive strike, uh, you know, whether it should be done or not. And there's certainly been debate among, um, American senators who've viewed the intelligence about whether Iran actually posed a threat to America itself, which would allow for preemptive strikes under American law. So there is some very wonky, shaky legal grounds for this attack that probably need to be navigated. Maybe we can talk a bit more about that in a bit. Um, then the one thing that I will say, I'll give the Trump admin and the Pentagon planners credit for managing to stage an attack of this type with no leaks prior to the missions execution, which is not and easy feat in this day and age. Um, but it was interesting that the New York Times noted that planners were concerned that Trump was giving away things with statements that he, uh, sort of put out there, like when he left the group of seven in Canada to um. You know, for, he basically said that he wasn't gonna, he wasn't leaving to broker a Middle East ceasefire, but something much bigger and then later telling people to stay tuned. Yeah. He can't keep his mouth shut. Yeah. And, and days before he'd said to people to evacuate Tehran, um, I mean, maybe there wast another plan to actually attack Tehran. Um, and then maybe they decided that wasn't a good idea. I don't know. Um, but it, it sounds like Trump was the, the biggest threat to this mission in many respects with his sort of weird tweeting, uh, or he wasn't even tweeting actually, his true social, what do you call a post on truth? Social socialing. I dunno what you call that. Truthing. [00:09:16] Matt: I've heard, uh, what did I, someone had a really good joke about, um. Like a, uh, a secretion or someone called it, like, it was like a really gross kind of a Yeah. [00:09:27] Chris: Secretion. Sounds about right. Yeah. So he, he actually could have been the biggest danger to the OPSEC of the whole thing. And the Pentagon apparently built in their own deception plan, um, to the attack, which was to send a second group of B two bombers that left Missouri and headed west over the Pacific Ocean. Um, in a way that flight trackers be able to monitor. Monitor that. Yeah. They said [00:09:47] Matt: they were going [00:09:47] Chris: to Guam. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. And then I remember, I think I saw you and some other people would be talking about like the geography of Guam and Whitman Air Force Base and various other things. 'cause the attacks themselves did come from Whitman in the end, didn't they? Um, and it was a 37 hour flight for the B two bombers involved, um, directly from Whitman. And, um, you know, that could not been a, that might, that probably was not a lot of fun for the pilots on those planes being in there for 37 hours. No. Um, and I've got some details about that. Yeah. We can talk about a bit later. But, um, but yeah. Um, and then just from the UK I think, um, the mood among a lot of commentators on the line appears to be sort of fear and cynicism. Um, that claims around Iran's nuclear program are kind of a repeat of the 2003 weapons of mass destruction claims. Um, which obviously led the US and its allies to invade Iraq. Um, and there was some, there was some fear in those initial days that. This could be the beginning of a, a ground war with Iran, which I think the American administration would like to avoid completely. I haven't seen any signs to say that America don't see any signs of that. He's planning to do any actual thing. And even Trump himself has been, uh, has sort of said that this was about targeting the, um, nuclear program, not regime change. Um, even though the Israelis seem to be. Kind of moving towards regime change. Um, but, uh, but there's been, again, no real solid signs that that's even happening. But there have now been crackdowns in Iran since then. There's been reports of uh, I think something like 700 plus arrests and even executions. Um, so anybody who might be suspected of being a dissident against the Iranian regime, this must be a very bad time because the Iranian regime that's appeared quite weak and feckless in recent times is really kind of clamping down on things now. And so for ordinary Iranians, that's not gonna be good. And, and it's the thing as well, I always find a bit frustrating with the anti-war protest. I understand why there are anti-war protests and I, you know, I have some sympathies with them. I always find it really difficult when certain leftist groups start sort of taking their sympathy one step further and start siding with the Iranian regime and put out slogans and things that kind of make out the Iranian regime are all warm and fuzzy and just misunderstood. There are even people in the foreign office who seem to think that Israel and America pose a greater threat to the Middle East and Iran. Do I? You know, I think that's quite. Um, what's the word I want there? I, I think that's called a bold claim to say that Israel and Iran are more of a threat to, um, sorry, Israel and America are more of a threat to the Middle East, but, you know, I'll leave that to maybe wiser people to answer that for me. Um, so yeah, it, it, it's, it's, these strikes are sort of not really changed much in terms of the hearts and minds that we were talking about last week. I don't think it's won anybody over, um, to be more, um, pro America or pro-Israel at this time. Um, but I think the people who, you know, do support Israel and, you know, um, probably think that these strikes are a positive. I can understand wanting to get rid of Iran's nuclear program. I just think dropping bombs on it is possibly not the best way to do it. But, you know, it's easy for me to say that from my, uh, Flass in London. So, Matt, what are your thoughts on, on all of this? [00:13:04] Matt: Yeah, I, I think, um, one Ken, uh. Criticized or have justified reservations about the, um, timing and necessity of, and strategy behind these strikes without, you know, then resorting to believing that Ron is a, you know, small defenseless being who didn't do nothing bad to nobody ever. That's just not Yeah. That's, that's not, that's not the case. No. Um, I it's not true. I mean, they've killed [00:13:32] Chris: British and American soldiers in Iraq Yes. For most recent stuff. Um, you know, yeah. [00:13:37] Matt: Yeah. Um, so all that aside, I was touch on the legal question real quick around it. I am not, um, nearly an expert on presidential war powers. Um, so to, to launch a sort of like preemptive strike on a foreign target overseas without, uh, congressional authorization or anything, as you said. Yeah. There has to be like a clear. Threat to us personnel interests, you know, that sort of stuff to, to, to authorize that, but to, to, to, you know, allow that. But then there's, you know, define imminent threat is when you then sort of go from that. Um, yeah. You know, the, the intelligence, there's a whole bunch of questions about the intelligence pre-strike, you know, that the Israelis use to, to, to justify it. I, I mean, as we said on the last one, I think there were rumblings and questions within the Iranian nuclear program, specifically as it came to, um, developing a nuclear warhead that could be put on top of a ballistic missile that came to the forefront after the collapse of beads, regime, and Hezbollah. Um, and that. Probably gave the Israelis that was sort of what they needed to, you know, justify doing this. I think, um, well-intentioned, intelligent, reasonable people could, you know, degree, could, could, can disagree on whether or not that was enough. Um, and whether that posed an, an imminent threat to the us you know? Yeah. That's all, that's all worthy of debate. But I think as far as, you know, like, does this violate international law? Did he have the authority to do this? I don't, I don't think anything's gonna come of that question, you know, like, he's not gonna be impeach over this. Whether he, whether he should or not is a different question. Please don't, please don't yell at me, um, listeners, but you. He's, he's, he's not going to be impeached over this. So it's, it's sort of, and to me it's sort of like an academic argument. [00:15:42] Chris: Yeah. I'll be honest with you, impeachment for me has sort of lost its effectiveness anyway. It feels like a certificate. You just get printed out and says, oh, you've been impeached and fuck all happens. [00:15:50] Matt: Yeah. Yeah. It's sort of, yeah. Okay. And then, and then what? And then even it's, even if it's, it's okay, you get Vance. [00:15:55] Chris: Yeah. Yeah. So Matt, obviously you've been monitoring this, so do you want to talk us through sort of what is known about the strikes and sort of where they sit with the kind of is, uh, with the Israeli campaign, that's been kind of going on for days prior to the US intervention, [00:16:10] Matt: so. The, the thought there, the thinking, I mean, this is sort of an operation, a scenario that has in some way been kind of planned and, and thought about and discussed in the think tanks and academic circles to say nothing of within, you know, US and Israeli defense establishments in the intelligence communities for, you know, 20 years as the joke goes. Bebe's said that Iran's been a couple months away from building a nuclear weapon for 20 years. And that is, that is true. Um, part of that discussion, which has always been that, you know, if, if the Israelis tar, uh, started a campaign against the Iranian nuclear program, and I think before they got F 30 fives, you know, stealth fighters, um, it was questionable if they would've been capable of doing this. I think, uh, they're getting F 30 fives, having a stealth mm-hmm. Attack capability and also the collapse of, um. The Assad regime, opening up Syrian airspace are the two kind of key things that made this technically possible for them. I mean, there were, there have been rumors for years that like, um, I don't know this for a fact, but again, a, a rumor that, you know, the Israelis had say like a, um, sort of classified agreement with the government of Azerbaijan to use, uh, airfields in their country as sort of like a staging ground for strikes, um, on the nuclear program right before the F 30 fives. And they would've had, you know, the capability to strike directly from Israel. Right. So that would, that, that discussion has been, had been ongoing for years as to how they, if they could pull this off, like how would they do it? I think one sort of central, um, conclusion from that was that they could start it, but they couldn't end it. Right. And that was also probably a thinking of the Israelis, is that, well, if we start it, we're gonna force whatever US administration was in office. You know, you could say Obama, Trump won Biden, now Trump two, you know, they would've had to come in and clean up the mess that we started. Um, I think, I don't know that I hold this view myself, but I think there is an intelligent and useful argument to be made that once these strikes began, it would've been, you know, okay, we never should have gotten here in the first place. Incredibly dangerous. We sort of known that and have talked about this for, you know, 20 years. But okay, we're here now for better or for worse. We're here now. This is happening. You know, what are the best decisions that we can make in the moment? And I, I think there is a intelligent, credible argument there to be made that, you know, okay, once these strikes began, um. It would've necessitated our involvement because you can't, it would be more dangerous to leave the job half done than to, you know, let it, let it, you know. Um, so there's, there's, there's that, yeah. The debate that we're sort of having here now about, you know, the, uh, the intelligence assessment post-strike and everything, and a lot of this, the, the news cycle here in the US for the last week or so has been driven by the CNN and, and New York Times reports about a, uh, preliminary, um, intelligence assessment out of DIA, um, the, uh, defense Intelligence Agency that it was assessed with, you know, low confidence that, uh, that the nuclear program had only been set back by a couple months and strikes had not been, um, fully able to destroy the cascade halls at, at Fordo. Mm-hmm. So there's something to be said there about that assessment. So, um, when. Intelligence agencies disagree all the time. US intelligence agencies disagree with each other all the time. I think that's good that we have, you know, um, thorough, rigorous academic debate and discussion within the intelligence communities. Right? And then in a way that's sort of part of what the office of the director of National Intelligence is meant for in the National Intelligence Council is to sort of navigate those debates between the various agencies and everything and try to bring it all together and come to some kind of a consensus, right? To then present to Congress and policy makers, you know, uh, military leaders. Um, so, uh, us in, within the US Intelligence community assessments and estimates are supported by information that vary in scope all the time, uh, quality and also sourcing all the time. Um, consequently when you see, uh. Their, you know, assessments are an on something, right? Issue X in this case it's whether or not, uh, fordo was, you know, obliterated we'll say, which obliterated is not a term that, um, the intelligence community or military leaders would, would use. They're far more, yeah. Um, sterile and cautious in their, in their language. But that's a, that's another, um, issue. Well, it's [00:21:21] Chris: a bit vague and grand, isn't it? The oly, right? [00:21:24] Matt: Yeah, it's, it's sort of, it's, it's meant for, for TV and, and chest slumping, which is where we are. But, um, so consequently, so they'll, they'll ascribe their, they'll ascribe high, moderate or low levels of confidence to their assessments. And low confidence generally means that the information's credibility and or plausibility is questionable, or that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytical inferences, or that we have significant concerns or problems, um, with, with the sources. So that sort of. When, when DIA comes out and says, we assess with low confidence that Fordo was entirely destroyed, that the cascade halls were were collapse and everything, when they judge it with, with low confidence, they're saying, we don't really know for sure because the, in the information that we're drawing this from is scattered and incomplete, and it's been less than 24 hours. At the time this assessment was made less than 24 hours following, um, this strike. Uh, so again, I think, you know, on the Saturday that night of the attacks and then going into Sunday, I had a bunch of people reaching out to me, you know, friends and stuff, like asking me about the strikes and everything. If you were like, am I gonna be drafted? I'm like, no, you're not. You're not gonna be drafted. Like, go, go back to bed. I'll let you know if you need to worry about being drafted, but we're not anywhere near there. Like, please don't, please don't do that. Yeah. Big day. Cool them up. Yeah, please don't do that to yourself. It is really not, really not necessary. Um, so you know. I just that night, like, I think, yeah, before the B twos even got back to Missouri, they didn't get back until Sunday. It was during the day at some point. [00:23:05] Chris: Well, yeah, it was a 37 hour mission. So a significant amount of time. Yeah. Yeah. We'll, [00:23:10] Matt: we'll let, let's get into that next. Um, but so they, uh, when Trump came out and said right after and said, you know, these sites were entirely obliterated. I mean, I said to people, they were getting ahold of me that night and into Sunday and everything. There is no possible way that he can possibly know that. I mean, yes, even the president with the entire, you know, military and the intelligence community at his sort of fingertips, you cannot possibly know, you know, before the sun had even come up over four D could not had possibly have, have known that that was his sort of mistake, his his desire to, to. Manufacture a quote, you know, perfect war for the TV cameras, right? To, to, um, I think, uh, settle the nerves of some of his sort of non-interventionist maga base, you know, that like, this is a one and done, or this is it. Like, boom, we go in, strikes in out 20 minute adventure. You know, no, no more bombs after this. I think it was sort of born from that. And also to show that, you know, him to just immediately declare mission accomplished and to use that language as obliterated is reckless and, and, and irresponsible. Um, yeah, you could not have possibly have, have, have known that that night. I mean, so when the intelligence community does BDA or battle damage assessments, um, I don't know. So this, this is, this intelligence assessment that we're talking about came out of DIA, um. They have a, under their directorate for analysis, they have a, a center, it's called the Underground Facility, um, analysis, uh, center. Um, I haven't seen their name tied to this assessment. Just my sort of like, educated guess is it would've come from them. I mean, these people that are study, um, the, the wonky term is, um, is, uh, it's um, HDBT or hard and deeply buried targets and the Underground Facilities Analysis Center, they do that 24 7 study that 24 7. So, um, underground, you know, command centers, nuclear facilities in say, Iran, Russia, China, North Korea. Elsewhere as they pop up. Um, there's also an outfit under the DTRA, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, which is not part of the intelligence community. It's a, it's a service agency under the DOD. Um, they have an outfit called, um. Called the hard target research and analysis center or, or, uh, hat rack, uh, they're sort of referred to. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. But when they go back and they do that BDA, that battle damage assessment. Right. And then it gets pulled into the rest of the intelligence community and, you know, okay. So they're looking at, um, satellite imagery. They would be looking at infrared imagery of the sites around forea, uh, probably radar imagery from, um, satellites and also, uh, reconnaissance aircraft drones. Do you think [00:26:14] Chris: any seismic surveillance as well? 'cause I'm, I'm imagining if you. Yeah, managed to blow up an underground facility. There's gonna be some sort of rumblings that could be detected somehow. [00:26:24] Matt: Yeah. So the seismic data that would probably also just sort of my gut kind of understanding, educated guess here would come through, um, aftac, which is the, uh, air Force Technical Applications. Um. Center, they're, uh, headquartered down in, down in Florida. Um, and their job is to do a lot of, uh, monitoring, um, treaty compliance around, uh, non-proliferation regimes and nuclear weapons and everything. They have a, uh, global network of, um, seismic monitoring stations. Hmm. So, yeah. How much, um, I mean, so that would've been, like, they would've, their job is to detect like a, uh, if the Iranians tried to clandestinely conduct an underground nuclear test or something. Right. So those seismic sensors would've picked that up and they would get data on that. I would imagine with the amount of ordinance that was dropped on Fordo and Aons, um, that it definitely would've registered, registered something if, if they could then take that data and try to, you know, work backwards and come to a conclusion of, okay, based on all of this, yeah, we think the extent of the damage is gonna be this severe. I mean, there's also, and this was some of the reporting that the Israelis are doing this right now too. Um, they would, you know, listen for signals intercepts of, uh, Iranian personnel, military officials, scientific officials, you know, talking amongst each other about the damage at Forea. And Aans is fahan the extent to which the uranium, uh, highly rich uranium stockpile would've been compromised or not. Right? So we would listen for, for stuff like that. Also, keep in mind the Iranians could get on the phone and say a bunch of bullshit 'cause they know that we're listening. You know, so you have to also then take that into account and try to cross reference those assertions with other sources and methods. Right. Um, human sources on the ground that the US or the Israelis could have, you know, that you would get word from them to say, you know, yeah. I talked to someone who was at, uh, Fordo the other day and he says, you know, these tunnels are collapsed or whatever, and this is how bad. It's been set back. All that stuff takes time to come together. Which goes back to my point that for Trump and Hegseth to say that, you know, that night that it was totally obliterated. Um, you cannot, you, you can't possibly know that. [00:28:42] Chris: Yeah. Well, they, this is it. I think the Trump administration need to learn or should learn lessons about moderating the early proclamations about things. Yeah. That allow proper assessments to take time. I think a responsible president should go on television and say that we've done this. We are now waiting for confirmation how effective it's been. There's nothing wrong with that, but because Trump is all builds around this sort of weird idea of masculinity and everything's gotta be perfect, yeah, it kind of feeds into this stupidity that then, you know, his early claims might be inaccurate or they might be accurate. And the problem is critics of Trump and his actions will always believe any early assessment and see, see later ones as politically motivated, right? And it, and Trump just doesn't help himself. Is, is my constant criticism of Trump, is he is his own worst enemy because he could, this could well have been the most historic, effective, uh, devastating, whatever, you know, language you wanna use, strike against any, uh, Iranian sight in the history of mankind. But with the way Trump sort of handles all these things, it kind of just ends up becoming a right odd mess. [00:29:50] Matt: Yeah. He, he really, he really can't get out of his own way. I mean, this is such a self-inflicted own, and I mean, I think if there's, I mean, we'll, we'll probably talk about this more over the course of the episode, but if there's any sort of like, um. If there's anything that I think listeners should go away with the belief on, you know, the question of, okay, did these strikes work or not? I think we have to, I think right now, the, the news cycle and a lot of the discussion around this, around that DIA assessment and, you know, the obliterated word, I think we're getting sort of wrapped around the axle in a very kind of dumb beltway media argument. Yes. Trump and Hegseth were very irresponsible with their words, and they should not, they should know better and should not have done that. [00:30:38] Chris: Mm-hmm. If you notice Dan [00:30:39] Matt: Kain, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, even at that same press conference where Hegseth used that word, obliterated, even I believe. Saturday night and Sunday morning when they held another one. Um, did not, did not say that. He said, you know, the BDA is still essentially Yeah. The BDA is still, we're still working on it. We don't know yet. We're looking at it. We'll, we'll we're putting that together. That's the correct answer. That's the, that's what a professional would say in that setting. Right. Um, but I think, you know, the question of how far back has a nuclear program been put, um, you know, there's some other, uh, analysis from the ISIS think tank, the good isis, um, that really, yes. Yeah. It made me chuckle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That, that looks at, um, I mean they were around long before the terrorist group isis, and I remember at the time in like 2014, it was like, oh shit, is ISIS gonna have to change its name now? Um, I have a family neighborhood, a dog named is. Yeah, but a lot of their, uh, assessments and everything shows that there is real serious and, and lasting damage to the Iranian nuclear program. I think it's a mistake to sort of hyperfocus on the US strike on Fordo and what those mops did. I think we need to take a more holistic look at the Israelis, the week of Israeli strikes beforehand. The US strikes also any sort of offensive cyber operations that may have happened over the course of this that we are yet unaware of. Um. Special Forces operations, which I believe just yesterday that I was on Blue Sky over the course of the, uh, over the course of the war and saying like, I would watch out for Israeli special operations rates targeting that, uh, uranium stockpile, you know, like going on the ground and getting it and taking it out of Iran. Um, like a heist essentially. Well, there's [00:32:34] Chris: plenty of photos of it being picked up, so I'm imagining you could track the trucks where they're going, et cetera. And I'm sure the Israelis know what's going on. [00:32:42] Matt: Right. I mean, that's the other thing too, like, you know, we pro, just speaking of the US intelligence community, we probably would've had regular, um, a. Regular eyes on, uh, those nuclear sites, probably at least from October 7th, and then once the Israeli strikes happened 24 7, like unblinking Sarah on those sites, anything that came or went out of them we were watching. And that probably definitely factored into the strike plan. Right. But, you know, going back to, I think we need to look at all of this in a sort of cumulative way. The, the US strikes, the Israeli strikes, any sort of cyber operations that we're unaware of. Special forces, uh, Israeli Special Forces operations on the ground that we may be unaware of. Also, the dozens of Iranian nuclear scientists that have been, um, assassinated over the course of this operation. Um, also, whatever the Israelis. May or may not do in the future. Yes. I know there's a ceasefire in place right now. I don't think we're gonna have Israeli airstrikes again, at least in the near future. But that doesn't mean Mossad won't keep doing what Mossad does, um, behind the scenes. [00:33:57] Chris: Do you know what was interesting when Trump first announced those, um, the ceasefire and he was, because he was just heading off to this NATO conference, and I think he was trying to do a victory lap of, Hey, I've just bombed this thing and hey, I've got a ceasefire. And then immediately Israel violates it and I've never seen Trump used. Was it the F word he used against? [00:34:14] Matt: Yeah, he said, he said Israel and Iran have been fighting each other for so long that they have no idea what the fuck they're doing, which I think is a bit of, and then he like immediately just like stomped off to, to his, to his, to his helicopter. Um. I, I think there's probably a bit of projection there. Um, but you know, yeah, it's, it definitely says something. I mean, I think if a president dropped an F-bomb in front of the press on live television, it in, you know, previous times it would've been a really, um, big deal. But they You mean like [00:34:47] Chris: the tan suit affair? Probably, yeah. [00:34:49] Matt: Yeah, yeah. God, exactly. Can you imagine what Fox said if Obama came out and dropping that bomb on live television and the Holy mother of God? But you know, I mean, you can make that comparison for a, about five things that happen every single day now. Yeah. Uh, yeah. What if Obama did that? Yeah. Um, but no, I, I, I think the more sort of responsible idea, and probably correct one is it's been set back. Somewhere between a couple months to a couple years, I think there has been real damage. Is it, you know, are there gonna be able to recoup or are, are, are the Iranians gonna be able to, to, to recoup from that damage? I mean, eventually, you know, um, so, but there's also the question of what then comes from these strikes. You know, there's, uh, just starting yesterday, there were rumblings sort of coming up that, uh, the US is trying to sort of restart negotiations for an actual nuclear deal, which is what you would need to ultimately shut down Iran's path to a nuclear weapon. Um, you cannot do it by force, not the price to you. I mean, you could do it by force, but the price to do so is not anything anyone is willing to pay. That is, you would need troops on the ground to do that. You can't do it from the air without any sort of blood loss on our side, it's not possible. So you do need a diplomatic resolution to this, right. There's reporting now that they're sort of talking about, um, unfreezing, uh, about, I think it was like 6 billion in Iranian funds and sort of helping them construct an actual civilian weapons, uh, an actual civilian, uh, power program that would be under, you know, IEA monitoring and everything. I don't know quite where that goes. You know, there's something about, um, Israeli counter-terrorism operations in Gaza, preoc, October 7th, Israeli counter terror operations in Gaza and the West Bank to, to an extent. Um, you know, they would like routinely every, every so years, let's say, right? They would sort of come in with, you know, airstrikes or, or special operations raids and just sort of keep the Palestinian militant presence in Gaza or the West Bank from getting, you know, too powerful, too outta control. Right? Um, the Israelis would call that mowing the grass. And of course, you know, there's the implication then that the civilian populations that are caught up in these operations are just sort of weeds that need to be, you know, once in a while cut down. And, you know, I, I leave that there for people to make of that assertion what they will. However, um, I think it's true that once you do something that's really difficult for the first time, it becomes infinitely easier to then usually becomes infinitely easier to do it again. And I think there's, going forward in the months and years ahead, there's a chance that that's also what we see, um, of, uh, of between Israel and Iran. You know, will there be a sort of, um, mowing of the grass once in a while that Israeli Air Force feels it needs to undertake against the Iranians? Right. I mean, so there, um. The Iranian air defenses have been shattered. I'm really curious to see if they get Russian or Chinese help to try to rebuild that. You know, will the Israelis allow them to do that [00:38:06] Chris: is another, so, I [00:38:07] Matt: mean, these are all open questions that we just don't really have the answer to right now. It's, um, it's, uh, it's, um, too early to tell, but again, I go back to, if there's one thing I want listeners to, to take away from this is, you know, yeah. Trump and Hegseth were, um, irresponsible and got way ahead of their skis and coming out and saying that it was, you know, quote obliterated and this is done. And now trying to sort of. Pummel the Press Corps and intelligence agencies into submission to sort of warp reality to what they want it to be. That's a big concern. However, I think the more likely, uh, outcome of these strikes as a whole US Israeli strikes and covert action as a whole. Um, I mean, yeah, the Iranian nuclear program has been, has been seriously battered somewhere between a couple months to a few years setback. I don't know what within that range. However, it will take some sort of a diplomatic solution to fully take an Iranian nuclear weapon off the table. The monster is not dead yet. [00:39:09] Chris: Yeah, yeah. Well the report you shared with me from the Institute for Science and International Security, which is the good ISIS that we mentioned earlier. So they, they actually, it felt like, 'cause they looked at the whole, um, picture including the US strikes. [00:39:24] Matt: That'll be linked in the show notes. It's a really good report. I highly encourage listeners to go, go read it is, [00:39:29] Chris: and it feels like, in fact the whole, um, you know, the Israeli Operation Rising Line and then Operation Midnight hammered the American one actually have. Together. Delta's a devastating blow to Iran's nuclear program. And so in that regard, it does seem to have achieved its objectives right now. The I idea of it, um, the US doing a one and done, and whether they've actually completely obliterated for those. Another question entirely. Yeah. But it certainly, it feels like it does significant damage to it. I wouldn't rule out personally they, um, whe whether the US will want to do this, but I suspect that they might feel they might need to do a repeat mission. Um, did they find intelligence to suggest that fordo still could, uh, could be salvaged? Right. I dunno what your thoughts on that are. [00:40:14] Matt: That's also another really interesting question. I mean, in the discussion in the lead up to the strikes, right? At least, you know, in the public spaces that I'm, you know, listening to and everything, there was always sort of the assumption that it would not be a one and done mission. Right. That you would need to take a couple swings at Fordo to fully knock it out. Right. And I mean, that could very well have been what the intelligence community and, and the Pentagon, um, told the White House and they were like, Nope, we wanna do a one and done. We wanna have a perfect war. And that's it. And I mean, so that's, you know, that's okay. You know, that's, that it, it's true that, yeah, that they just didn't wanna do that. Yeah. There's, there's also then, you know, okay, the question of Will, will we do another round of strikes on Ford O Um, I think the timeline for that has passed. You know, he seems pretty, Trump seems pretty set on. Um, so moving on from it, Trump seems pretty set on declaring victory and. And moving on from this. I think if there was a, a window for a second strike, um, that would've come sometime between Saturday night and, you know, [00:41:23] Chris: yeah. [00:41:24] Matt: Tuesday. I don't think he would've rushed to declare a, a a, a ceasefire. I think he probably unilaterally just declared a ceasefire and then sort of forced everyone to go along with it, is sort of my read of it. But, um, you know, I think he got, he got spooked by the poll numbers on this, which are putrid for him. Um, and also he got spooked at the chances that Iran would close the straight of foreign moves, which would ratchet up gas prices everywhere. [00:41:53] Chris: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. [00:41:54] Matt: Also in the US during peak summer travel season, which isn't fun or popular, um, I think he got spooked by that and sort of reinforced his idea that this needs to be a one and done thing. I think that the sort of status quo that we ever arrived at right now, that would have to break down before we see another strike on Ford O. There's also the question of, you know. 14 mops were used in this operation, um, 12 on 4 0 2 on Naans. Right. Uh, the public number that I've seen as to how many, how many of these weapons we have was 20. I also think it's also, also probably certain that the real number of our stockpile is not gonna be publicly available and like almost 99.9% sure that that true number is classified. Uh, however, I think it's probably true that we don't have, um, tons of these weapons to just throw around, you know? [00:42:50] Chris: Well, they're very specialists and expensive, aren't they? So you're not gonna build a lot of them. [00:42:53] Matt: Yeah. Well that's the other thing too. You know, so this weapon was, the mop was sort of designed to strike Fordo specifically. You know, I mean this, like when we were talking last week and everything and I said, you know, um, the Pentagon and SCOM are very much insistent that they could do this thing. Um, I don't. My thinking was that that Target fordo has been a, that's been a target that people, that there are people in the intelligence community and in the Pentagon and centcom who their job, like, they get paid to obsess and think about nothing but that single facility and how would we destroy it if the time ever came to do that. And in a way, you know, the GBU U 57, that that mop was designed to destroy that facility. So, I mean, I think also if you look at some of the, the test footage, um, I'm going off on a bit of a tangent here. If you look at on the, on the test footage of that, uh, that Dan Kane put out in a press conference yesterday, it was, uh, a test of the mop at the. Test bed at White Sands. Really cool. It actually overlooks the, the, the Trinity site. Yeah. Um, you know, that explosion did not collapse the tunnel that it was tested in. It destroyed everything in anything in that tunnel would've been destroyed, but it did not collapse cave in the roof of that tunnel. So again, I go back to if we're sort of obsessing over the word obliterated and whether or not the Cascade halls at Forea were collapsed or not, I think we're sort of focusing on the trees and missing the forest here. [00:44:27] Chris: Yeah, totally. Totally. Um, one other thing just to add, there was a really good piece you shared from Lawyers, guns and Money that was talking about how [00:44:36] Matt: by Cheryl Rofer, a blog post there. Yeah. She's, uh, she worked at, um, Los Alamos for many years. [00:44:43] Chris: Oh, did she? Did she? Yeah. Yeah. And it talks a little bit about like how the Iranians use sort of concrete and, uh, stone in, in, in sort of layers mm-hmm. To help divert sort of blasts and shock waves from any bombings. And so, um. Not only is it deep down, but obviously rocks and things can actually, um, weaken the effects of the blast, the further down you go. So it's, it's very interesting. [00:45:08] Matt: It's like a strata, it's like a, it's like a, it's like a layer cake. [00:45:10] Chris: Yeah. And so, yeah. Um, yeah. So I, it, it's, it's, that side of things is very interesting. One other question. Well, there's two other questions I'll ask you about all this. So, um, what are your thoughts on the Iranian retaliation that happened against the US Basin Qatar, and, um, how is that, you know, it, it doesn't seem to have escalated things. No. But what are your thoughts on all that? [00:45:32] Matt: It was, it was symbolic. It was a token strike. I mean, all air assets, um, had been evacuated a deed, um, a long time before, uh, like mm-hmm. A few days, or at least a week before these strikes happened. I think it was before the Israeli strikes happened. We started evacuating stuff outta that base. Um, it was. Coordinated between the US and the Iranians, like what time we're gonna do this. And also Qatar, it was a very staged, orchestrated, um, symbolic response. I think they fired, um, seven missiles, six or seven missiles at, at the airfield, um, which would match the number of B twos that were used to strike the nuclear facilities. Um, so it's, I mean, they, they had to do something, but that, that day, like I was watching, you know, the, the Patriot interceptors try to offend these, um, strikes off and I'd said, you know, if that's all it is, they're not, they're not interested in, in, in taking this further. [00:46:35] Chris: Yeah, the war zone have quite a good piece about the patriot batteries that we use to defend the base. Um, I'll put that in the show notes. And apparently you have 44 American soldiers who are responsible for defending the entire base. Um, and the oldest soldier was a 28-year-old captain, and the youngest was a 21-year-old, private only in the military for less than two years. Um, and the Pentagon is saying that, you know, they believe that this was the single largest patriot engagement in US military history. So [00:47:03] Matt: also, um, biggest B two strike. Yeah. In history. [00:47:06] Chris: Yeah. Yeah, indeed. And well, one would hope it stays that way, but, but, uh, you know, um, so one other question as well is, um, how is Trump now sort of doing politically for all this? Because obviously when we spoke last week, there were, there's the isolationist wing of the, um, of. I say the conservatives now, sorry, of the, the Republicans. Republicans, yeah. Is, yeah. So there's an isolationist side of Republicans, which are kind of ma uh, which are kind of married to maga, the Make America Great Again movement. And then you kind of got what we're talking about the NeoCon side of things, or a bit more interventionist, maybe sort of George Bushy kind of view on the world. Um, so where is, how is Trump's sort of doing? So you mentioned some polls earlier. You know, what's, what's going on your side of things. [00:47:48] Matt: The polls on this are really bad. I mean, while it is broadly understood and, and agreed upon here that Iran should never have a nuclear weapon. Yeah. The idea that, you know, we should have done these strikes to stop it. That's, it's, it, it, it's not, it, it's not popular like across the board. Um, there's been a big effort, um. By them since this has sort of warped the discussion into, you know, if you question our strategy behind these strikes or the lack thereof that you also then hate the troops, which I think is just really kind of gross. I mean yeah, I [00:48:24] Chris: saw that very George Bushy. Yeah, [00:48:27] Matt: yeah. [00:48:27] Chris: Freedom Fries George Bushy. [00:48:29] Matt: But, but, but also dumber, you know, in a way, um, you know, I mean, so those, those men and women are the 509th bomb wing that flew the B twos that, uh, were a part of this strike. I mean, so those pilots and their enablers in the operations, maintenance and, and mission support groups, I mean, their job in this is to get those, get those bombers, um, into Iranian airspace, undetected drop their ordinance on time, on targets at the aim points that they've been given to sort of set the fuses appropriately to do what the planners. At the Pentagon and CENTCOM in the intelligence community said they should do to destroy the facility and then get out undetected. And they did that. They, they, they, they did their job. Whether or not the plan that they were given and meant to execute as derived was capable of achieving a broader strategic objective is not their concern. [00:49:22] Chris: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. [00:49:23] Matt: You know, so to, to say that if you, to use them as human shields, I think is just really gross. No one's saying that they didn't, that those pilots didn't do their jobs. They did do their jobs ex exactly as, as they were meant to, that there was no strategy behind it. Or that the strategy was half baked and, and poorly considered is way above their pay grade. It's not what they do, it's not their job. [00:49:50] Chris: And Trump's posts that could have endangered the whole thing as well, you know? Yeah. Or, or weakened the effectiveness of it. Yeah. You know, that, that could be considered unpatriotic, couldn't. Yeah. You really wanna get into that. Yeah. [00:50:02] Matt: So that's what I think about that. I mean, yeah. This is nothing to do with just to, to, to criticize the strikes and the effectiveness of them is to say nothing of that. Those pilots and their enablers, their support personnel on the ground, um, did not do their job policy. By all accounts they did. Whether the strategy behind it was achievable or sensible is another matter. It is not their concern. No. [00:50:22] Chris: Any thoughts on the kind of brewing maga civil wall that seems to be happening at the moment over this? Um, 'cause Tucker Colson, I don't know if there'll [00:50:29] Matt: be a, [00:50:30] Chris: yeah, [00:50:30] Matt: I dunno if there'll be much of a civil war. Um, I think a whole lot of people got sort of bullied into submission to sort of find their way around to. I think if this went further into, you know, sustained round of airstrikes and really escalated, you would have more problems. But, um, this really kind of, at least militarily for us, really seems to be done for the foreseeable future. Whether something good or bad comes from that, I don't know. But militarily for us, this seems to be done for now. And because of that, I don't, um, I mean there was a real schism within his base for sure over this. Um, I don't see it really going. Much farther than it, than it has just 'cause it, it, it, it is kind of done. [00:51:13] Chris: It kind of, all of this reminded me a bit of the Moab episode of 2017 where, uh, Trump dropped the biggest bomb Oh yeah. The biggest conventional bomb on an ISIS base. That was in Afghanistan. Yeah, it was, yeah. And it killed like 36 ISIS fighters and it very symbolically, obviously bomb. Um, the bomb is the biggest one in US Arsenal before kind of going nuclear. Mm-hmm. And it just felt, again, like it's sort of like I'm a tough guy, kind of move symbolically. Um, and it's, yeah, I could, I could make some [00:51:43] Matt: jokes, but I won't fair enough as to what I think is fair enough. The reasoning behind that. Um, yeah. Dr. Fre may have, some, may, may have some ideas, but. [00:51:53] Chris: Indeed. Indeed. Well, Matt, uh, jokes aside, is there anything else you'd like to add on, on Iran? Um, or do you, or you happy? [00:52:01] Matt: No. Um, if, uh, any folks have any, um, questions or anything that they would, uh, like to ask about, um, please get in touch with me, however, however you can. Um, and, uh, if I am able to answer it and it's not classified, I'm, um, happy to do so. We're gonna have, um, more discussions about this with some other folks going forward. Yeah. Next, next month. I won't say who yet 'cause I don't like saying it before they're recorded 'cause things happen. Well, no, exactly. [00:52:30] Chris: Things happen. Yeah. Uh, but in the world of podcasting, anything can happen. We'll talk more about [00:52:36] Matt: this and if, um, if, if anyone wants to, you know, ask me about it or talk about it, I'm, I'm happy to do so. Get in touch. Cool. [00:52:44] Chris: Cool. Thank you for that. Well, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back with more. So welcome back everybody. So our final piece is some, uh, you know, worlds away from Iran. It's actually some, hopefully some exciting new news. Um, so this is official news about the new James Bond movie that's been in development. How, I suppose for a while we've had everything from regime change to, you know, all sorts of things have been going on behind the scenes of the New Bond movie. How long [00:53:25] Matt: does a project have to be stalled before it's considered to be in development? Hell. Is there like a scientific measure of that or is it just sort of vibe based? I [00:53:32] Chris: don't know. That's a very good que sometimes development help means it can be decades. I mean, there's been some films that have been Yeah, 20 years. I'm trying to think a good example off the top of my head, but there are some, I mean, one of them that didn't end well was a sci-fi film, and I'm trying to remember the name of it now. Uh, and it, and it basically, the source material was used by lots of other sci-fi movies by the time it came out. Um, it kind of felt a bit sort of dated and been seen before. John, John Carter's the film I'm thinking of. Oh yeah. Um, and yeah, not a good film, but the source material has inspired so much sci-fi that we know Well, bankrupted the producers, [00:54:10] Matt: I think. Right? [00:54:11] Chris: It did, yeah. Yeah. And a similar thing happened to Dune as well, which, uh, eventually got brought back to live via Denny V nerve, um, in the, in the interpretation. Now that's considered the, the best version of it. Um, you know, you had the David Lynch film that. Very badly. Um, and the studio messed around with it a lot, uh, uh, without his permission. Um, and yeah. What [00:54:33] Matt: was the name of the director who wanted to do the other Dun adaptation? That there was like storyboards and all kinds of concept art drawn up and then it never happened. [00:54:40] Chris: Yeah. Alejandro. Yeah. [00:54:41] Matt: Alejandro, uh, Joe Roski. Yeah. He had a, he has a DO adaptation that got. There was all kinds of stuff made for it and it just never got off the ground. We're sort of getting away from Bond though. Um yes, yes [00:54:53] Chris: indeed we are. But there is a connection 'cause Denny Vil nerve who directed the new Dune, is now going to direct the new James Bond film. Um, it was confirmed by Amazon MGM studios. So Vil Nerve will direct with Amy Pascal and David Hayman as producers, which is, I I think fantastic news. I think actually, um, in many respects, Danny Milner is probably the best director out there to handle this, in my opinion. Yeah, I think, um, it's really hard because it depends on the tone they're going for. Uh, but before I go into my thoughts, Matt, what are your thoughts on this news? [00:55:24] Matt: Um, I mean, I know when we had the discussion about this, when it was announced that the broccoli were leaving and Amazon had sort of fully executed their coup, shall we say, um, that. My, I had, I had big misgivings. I did not really have a lot of reason to trust Amazon. I was just sort of very kind of, no, no, I did not like how it seemed to have gone down with the broccoli being essentially kind of forced out of what was really, yeah. I mean, their kind of family business, you know? [00:55:54] Chris: Mm-hmm. Um, it felt like a very corporate maneuver, didn't it? Yes. [00:55:57] Matt: It did not inspire confidence. And something I said at the time was, you know, it could be bad, it could be good. We gotta wait and see what they do with it. And as far as, you know, picking Deville nut to do this personally, I, I got, I got. No complaints. This is great. I'm really eager to see who the writer is and of course, who is picked to play Bond. But beyond that, like, cool, I hope they get out of his way and let him do what he wants. [00:56:19] Chris: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, well, James Bond now be uh uh, Timothy Chalamet. [00:56:24] Matt: Wouldn't that cause riots over there if we had an American actor? Uh, [00:56:28] Chris: well, we, we've been close to it. It was, um, uh, James Brolin was the closest American actors at becoming James Bond as Friday. 'cause he, he was gonna replace Roger Moore for Theorize only. Um, and then Roger Moore came back. So there's actually some footage of James Brolin as James Bond on YouTube, where you can watch him do the scene from Russia with love that all bond actors are supposed to do as their audition. Um, and I'll. I wasn't feeling it. I like James Bros. An actor. Yeah. But as James Bond, not quite, um, is, is hard. Um, [00:57:02] Matt: I have a feeling it's gonna be, and this is, I mean, there's been, there's so much clickbait about who's gonna be the next bond and has been for years and it's all kind of nonsensical. And a lot of, a few, uh, people have quite literally aged out over the course of, of this speculation. Um, I think, you know, it's gonna be, uh, a, someone an, an actor from the British Isles, uh, dark hair, kind of late twenties, early to mid thirties, and a few credits under his belt, but not a household name. [00:57:31] Chris: Well, this is it. Yeah. 'cause the part of the reason they'd like that is number one, they want an actor who, who can show that they can act and they've done so successfully. Then they want somebody who's not gonna cost them the earth, because that's why you won't hire Henry Caval or somebody really well established. Yeah. It's just too expensive for that first movie. Yeah. Um, and then, uh, yeah, those are kind of the two key things really that probably motivate that early thing. And then they want somebody who's sort of in their thirties as Michael G. Wilson put it before he was depose, um, that's gonna stay with the franchise for about 10 years. Um, and so when you look at like Daniel Craig fit the profile you've just described, except for he had lighter hair and there was the whole hair gate over Craig, but, oh God, I took a [00:58:15] Matt: blonde bond and outrage, I took great offense to that. I was like, what the fuck? We can be, what do you mean blonde? Blonde? Good blonde guys can't be blonde. What do you mean? [00:58:24] Chris: Roger Moore had kind of, uh, fairish hair, you know, isn't. So we will see. But no, I, I think Denny Dunner is for me, is the sort of choice I would like because I think his films, I think, you know, his films are gonna be more atmospheric. Um, there'll be, you know, I think there'll be stylish thrillers that will feel grounded. I think you won't have any of the whimsical nonsense that led to like, um, die Another Day, which was the final Pierce Brosnan film, which I thought was. Bad. Um, and um, then it'd be interesting to see how they tonally shift away from Daniel Craig. 'cause then Craig's bomb was quite introspective, but, um, and stylish in places. Definitely. Yeah. I, I liked a lot of the movies. I think, you know, I've said this before, I think like my, I I, I actually quite like no Time to Die. I always thought it was his second strongest film. 'cause Casino Royale for me was a knockout, the Park Bond movie. Mm-hmm. Um, a lot of people who don't even like James Bond, like that film, it just did something and he never managed to match it, sadly. Um, there was something about Lightning in the bottle, that particular movie that worked so well that he never quite caught. [00:59:35] Matt: Yeah. They got screwed by that writer's strike that came when they were doing Quantum of so and everything, which probably, um. Lost their momentum. Well, I think [00:59:43] Chris: they lost [00:59:43] Matt: confidence. [00:59:44] Chris: Yeah. I think they lost Con, I think Quantum was going in that I always like quantum solos. It's an imperfect movie, but it was kind of going in, it had that youthful bond thing that they set up in Casino Royale, which said they completely ditched with Sky for, made him like this has been middle aged guy. Um, uh, and like, it, it just, I mean it was interesting for drama, but I think Skyfall in a way became a bit of a step backwards and, and then pushed him down this road where he started getting into more bond tropes again. And for me, I think for me the biggest, um, so with the whole broccoli, uh, eon broccoli business, like was it a good thing to have. Got rid of them or not. Um, one of the things, there were warning signs, I think, early on about, um, I felt that, uh, eon were running outta steam with the franchise a little bit. Mm-hmm. You know, he had, he had long periods between the movies, and then he had Specter, which I felt was a very derivative move. And it felt like the Rices had just sat with the James Bond DVD Box set and literally picked out scenes from other movies and then recontextualize 'em into Spectrum, fed [01:00:47] Matt: a bunch of old scripts to chat GBT. Yeah. I mean, chat GBT wasn't around at this time, but No, it was, unless they had [01:00:52] Chris: the experimental model. Right. Yeah. [01:00:53] Matt: Yeah. I six had an experimental chat. GPT. Yeah. Um, yeah, just fed it all and said, make a on script is sort of what it, I mean, it was a shame too that they sort of, I mean, I thought the, the potential of having blow fail as like a big bad had a lot of potential and could have been really cool. I think Christoph Waltz was like. Perfect for that role, for the modern iteration of that, and it just feels like they kind of, um, did not execute on it well. Yeah, [01:01:18] Chris: no, and I think the mistake with Sam Mendes, he, he tried to take James Bond into a slightly superhero direction because of the success of Marvel movies. And I think it led some very questionable choices like, uh, blow felt being James Bond's Half Brother. Um, even my problem with Skyfall, as much as I enjoyed it when I watched it, my biggest problem is I find Silver the villain, a bit too comic Booky, and there's too much contrived stuff with Silver's Master plan to get captured by bond. That really, to me, on repeated viewing, just like, I'd usually just switch it off by the time silver gets there. 'cause it just, for me, the first half of the movie works quite well until Bond meets silver and then it all rapidly goes downhill. Right. Not that I, I, I think Javier Bar's an amazing actor. I just think he, I. It was just some poor choices were made, I think, with his character, in my opinion. Uh, I'm sure there be people out there who, who think this is sacrilegious. I apologize. It's just, yeah. My thoughts on that. Um, and then obviously No Time To Die has been the most divisive bond film among Bond fans. I have no idea about people who casually watch James Bond, but the amount of pieces I see online almost as a daily basis where no Time to Die comes up and somebody says it's the worst bond movie ever made, and blah, blah, blah. And I think the problem is killing James Bond again. The killing of James Bond at the end of, um, no Time To Die. Did feel a bit like spaghetti being thrown at the wall by Eon and not sure what to do next. [01:02:40] Matt: Well, I think they wanted, they wanted finality to that. Yes. And I think Craig really, I feel like Craig really wanted that. [01:02:48] Chris: Oh, it was, he apparently insisted on it from day one. Yeah. I dunno, I dunno, the full winds announced this, but a, it's been reported that maybe it was, I think it was after they did Casino Royale. Some reporting that he and Barbara Broccoli were like, I don't know, in a car somewhere and talked about this. And Craig expressed this desire to kill bond off at the end of his run. Um, and I think what they should have done, they should have done what they did at the end of the born movies where you think born's dead and then suddenly you see him silhouette in the water and he just slightly moves. Or like the dark, you put that put end of the credits, put it in the end, the credits. Yeah. It would've given people some hope and then it would've totally bypassed the Yeah, it would've kept all the emotion and the moving. And also it happens in, um, if Fior only lived twice where James Bond is, um, you know, assumed dead and he lose his memory and then he comes back in the man with a golden gun if you go with the books. Right. Um, and lost his memory and then he tries to assassinate m and all sorts of stuff. So, so it's not like this is completely outta the realm of James Bond, but, uh, you know, yeah, [01:03:47] Matt: I am, I am over overall, I still wanna see who's writer and who's hired to play, um, bond himself, but. I mean, as far as like, you know, decisions, um, that would inspire confidence by Amazon. I think hired hiring Jenny Vno is, um, is, is is great. Love it. Yeah. [01:04:05] Chris: And you may even see Roger Deacons come back as cinematographer. Well, good, good point. Good point happen. Who, who's the DB [01:04:12] Matt: for the, for the bond? For the, for the Dune, um, films. His name is, uh, well isn't it Roger Deacons? I thought originally No, it wasn't Deacons the first one. It wasn't Deacons. I [01:04:21] Chris: thought Deacons did the first one. [01:04:22] Matt: Greg Frazier is Dune part two. Yeah. Uh, he did, he did. Greg Frazier did, did both Dunes. Ah, cool. Yeah, that could be him. Deacons did, uh, blade Runner. Then he field nudge Blade Runner. [01:04:34] Chris: Yes, he did. And that was, yeah, I really, you know, I Deville know films. I, I like 'em all pretty much. Um, I, I'm big fan of Arrival. Mm-hmm. I think it's my favorite of his. Yeah. Um, real Love Prisoners. Um, oh yeah. Sicario, let's not forget Sica, which is a brilliant movie in many ways. Um, I have issues with some of the story, but, um, but it is a very stylish movie and yeah. I'm curious what this means for the timing of Dune Messiah. Well, apparently Dune Messiah's happening before Bond, so I think what it is, bond will probably come out 2027. Yeah, we got a little, we got a little ways to go because they, he's busy. They're about to start shooting d the new Dune in the summer, um, as soon as, and that will dust due out, I think next year. So I suspect, you know, a lot of directors, you know, in the lucky position, they kind of like go from one movie to another and, and it kind of happens. So he'll be pre doing pre-production work, probably on Bond as he [01:05:27] Matt: Yeah, they'll be doing the script and everything while they're, while they're shooting Dune and all that. Yeah, [01:05:31] Chris: yeah, yeah. Because they still gotta hire a writer and stuff. So I suspect that, um, you know, he'll be working on this when he is in post-production on the New Dune movie, um, and then yeah, slip into the new film. So, uh, yeah, I [01:05:44] Matt: would be, I would be curious if it would, we would get, uh, John, John spots. John Spa. Yeah. Or I'm not sure how you pronounce his last name, or, um, Eric Roth who did the screenplays for, um, dune would be sort of. Most sort of logical partnership to To reaching up. Yeah. For, for Bond, I could see that. [01:05:59] Chris: Yeah, I can imagine it. And I, I'm looking forward to seeing what they do. 'cause I think, um, you know, it's been many a problem with the Bond movies for some time. Um, and so I think I, you know, as we were saying earlier, obviously the, the, the corporate takeover as it felt like of, of the Bond franchise didn't leave much to be desired. But now seeing what we're seeing, um, I'm excited. I'm excited. Yeah. Um, and I'm hoping this will be a fresh start. And, and you never know, I, Denny, Denny Mel may pull off the most memorable bond film yet. We'll see. Yeah, we will see. Um, he, fingers crossed he may do it. Yeah, he may. Yeah. Cool. Cool, cool. Well, Matt, thank you very much for your time today. Is there anything else you'd like to add before we wrap up or [01:06:40] Matt: No? No. Um. Yeah, this was a, this was a good discussion. Uh, we'll see, we'll see how, how everything with Iran, with Iran goes. It's gonna be, um, yeah, you're gonna need some sort of a diplomatic resolution to fully settle this question. And whether that is achievable or not is, uh, I, we'll have to see. [01:07:01] Chris: Yeah, time will tell where this will go. Um, but uh, yeah, I mean, people are still squabbling over the assessments at the moment, so we'll see where we go from there. Well, thank you very much, Matt. Thank you everybody for listening, and we will catch you next week. So take care for now. Bye. Bye-bye. [01:07:31] Announcer: Thanks for listening. This is Secrets and spies.