CNN Enters TEHRAN… Reporters "Held Hostage" by NIGHTMARE They Defended

CNN has decided to visit Iran's regime and I don't think this worked out the way they expected.

We just crossed the border and are now inside of Iran. The Iranian government has granted us a visa to come here and to report to the Republic of Iran. We're now trying to make our way to the capital, Tehran, as fast as possible. But of course the distances in this huge country are immense. In total the Iranians are saying that they can continue this campaign for a very long time. They say that their missile arsenal is still immense.

Oh really? So according to them, the regime who invited them in is going to survive for a long time. Is that suspicious to you?

So CNN's back in Iran.

Fairly good progress towards Tehran. It is a very, very long drive though.

Which is interesting because my texts still haven't been delivered to my family members because there's a regime imposed internet blackout, but CNN has been able to report from inside the country and has been allowed to send their footage out to a US news network. So the gas stations, there's no long lines as gas stations fuel seems readily available I think one of the reasons there aren't long lines at the gas stations is because and I'm going out on a limb here a Lot of people are staying inside because um, the country's getting bombed

Yeah, really well stocked even with with fresh things like for instance fruits and vegetables

Yeah, the shelves are probably pretty stocks because most people can't afford groceries right now

You just don't see any sort of degree of panic anywhere. This is like going on a tour of North Korea. They only show you the good parts and you're a hostage the entire time. Watch how suspicious this shot is.

Coffee along the way we've been driving for several hours. The hostage takers wanted to get coffee. Number one is that first of all all the shops are open. Look how small that coffee is. Coffee obviously also available as well

This is what it right there from the left So it looks like

And you see another interception round coming up one two three four Five another one coming up from the sea. This is a large-scale attack. That's wild right now

I'm gonna move this so you can get out here to the balcony and

Stay with me in Israel According to CNN buildings to your left in Israel is more dangerous than Iran out here to the balcony and stay with me here guys. This is in Israel. According to CNN, Israel is more dangerous than Iran right now. Things are better in Iran. If you're in Israel, you might want to move.

Look at this.

This is what it's actually like. And where are the Iranians shooting their missiles? This is a city. That's where they're shooting their missiles.

Did you see the panic of the people who are getting stopped at armed checkpoints and being threatened You see the panic of the people who are watching state-controlled television today as the IRGC said if anyone shows any enthusiasm Or excitement for what the US and Israel are doing How about the state TV host who threatened an Iranian women's national team and said that they should be punished harshly and considered treasonous

Because they chose not to sing the national anthem. Taking a quick break for a coffee along the way. We've been driving for several hours.

I am so glad you found a good cup of coffee. It is so hard to find quality coffee during wartime. Next time you want some coffee, let me know. I have so many places in LA I could suggest to you. You don't need to drive all the way to Iran.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

So they have permission to be there and if you've got permission from a regime to go photograph their world you are a prisoner the entire time. But here's what's really going on in Iran. And the IDF says that

it's moving to its next phase. Next phase. This ongoing conflict with Iran shifting the focus to eliminating Iran's missile program once and for all. That missile program is bad news.

Of strikes in Tehran. And CENTCOM says the US and America's closest ally in the Middle East Yeah, that missile program is bad news. Very top of their game. We are fighting to win through combined us and israeli combat power

We will continue decimating iran's ability to project power outside its borders now today israel's prime minister benjamin netanyahu is holding security consultations with his cabinet to determine the next steps in phase two of this operation and again

We expect these strikes to expand and continue in the days ahead

The so things are just getting worse for the regime. They're not winning. Surviving for a long time, that's not on the table. And these claims about them having unlimited missiles?

Well, I think the message is pretty clear. Everybody got it. You know, how remarkable, successful this operation truly is. I'm stunned by how much we're able to accomplish pretty much on pace. I mean I knew full well That at day three we wanted to have reduced their retaliation capability by 75% in terms of ballistic missiles and we hit that mark and now we're up to as reported 86% 86%

Truly remarkable here what we know about the enemy and and because we have such exquisite knowledge about them to is out there saying the regime's gonna be around for another 50 years and according to what we're hearing from the general here and from all the armed forces and from all the footage and even from Israel this thing is not gonna go

on for that much longer. I just left a classified briefing on Iran and here's what I can say. What can you say? It is so much worse than you thought. You are right to be. What? Trump administration has no plan. Are you has no plan This illegal war is based on lies and it was launched without any imminent threat to our threat Donald Trump still hasn't given a single clear reason for this war and he seems to have no plan for how to end it either Like a lot of you. I am really angry I am angry at what Donald Trump is doing.

And I will keep doing everything I can to fight to end this.

Look, if you and I were like her and we spent all our time watching the wrong news channels, we might feel the same way. We might think that there's no nuclear weapon, that there's no ballistic missile, that they're not firing off weapons

into residential areas right now. We might think all that stuff, but you know what these people are really upset about? Listen to this. Iran's trying to pick a new leader. It's not going well.

The president says he has to be personally involved in picking who gets to run the country. Inside Iran, the runner up is Khamenei's son. But Trump says this, they're wasting their time. Khomeini's son is a lightweight. He's unacceptable to me. We want someone that will bring harmony and peace to Iran.

And according to Wikileaks, Khomeini's son doesn't have what it takes to lead the nation. Intelligence cables reveal Khomeini Jr. Mossad already has him targeted.

So we've got this unrivaled intelligence. We know what's going on inside the regime. We know everything about it. But for some reason, there are people who want to see them survive. Why is that?

Donald Trump has dragged us into a war the American people do not want. He has put American troops in harm's way. Oh, so now they care about the troops. I unequivocally oppose this war of choice and everyone should.

A war of choice, they're calling it.

And the bottom line, when it comes down to it, is that if we want to stop Donald Trump with this random decision that he has arrived at.

A random decision.

Then Congress must act, and Congress must act immediately.

So protecting the American people against a regime trying to pursue a nuclear weapon who's already got long-range ballistic missiles, that is a random choice. It's not like this regime is in bed with America's enemies or anything.

So we are seeing widening of the war, and Hezbollah predictably has launched attacks on Israel in support of Iran. Great. But really the story of this war is the extraordinary tactical successes from the United States

military decapitating Iran's leadership, destroying their ballistic missile inventory and their drones. Those efforts are ongoing. We own the skies and we've seen an incredible fusion of our intelligence capabilities so we can find and fix these targets and then finish them with precision strikes. Now where we go from here that we'll all be tracking, the Israelis used to like to say

that they would mow the lawn when they had to mount these counterterrorism operations that did not result in eliminating the threat permanently. If we do not arrive at some sort of a permanent solution here, either a change in the regime in Iran or a change in their behavior, then President Trump is right. We would have to look at coming back and doing this again, which is why I think the president wants to induce Iran to make a deal. That's what this

has always been about from the very beginning when we deployed our military assets to the region. It's about Iran coming to the table in good faith with no intent to rebuild a nuclear program or have a ballistic missile capability.

Now think to yourself, before you get worried about what kind of deal is gonna come out of this, the people that are launching ballistic missiles into residential parts of Israel and residential parts of Saudi Arabia, attacking hotels and airports,

these people, can they really be trusted to come to a negotiating table and say that, yes, we will now be on our best behavior in the future and those missiles we've been firing at innocent people, we're just gonna get rid of them and you can trust us. Is that an acceptable deal to people who are smart enough

to know that these guys are a threat to begin with? I don't think so.

Threaten the region and beyond. And just so everybody can see, this is what President Trump said to Reuters. We are going to have to choose that person along with Iran. We're going to have to choose that person. He also had a true social post today. There we go. Saying that unconditional surrender was what is going to be demanded here.

So the deal now is unconditional surrender and the people who are putting a stop to this regime get to pick the new leader so there will not be a new regime leader there will not be a new supreme leader there will be somebody else and a different form of government on the other end of this.

With Russia could we please talk about this Washington Post headline Russia is providing Iran intelligence to target US forces officials. Oh really? Why would they do that if they're peaceful and this is a war of choice? This might not be a surprise to you, but it will be very unwelcome news. I imagine that's overlooked.

It's old news. Old news. The Trump administration is well aware of this, going back to the first Trump administration when the Russian intelligence was providing the Taliban. That's just what they do. That's their currency in return for receiving Iranian drones and having Iranians create these, build these drone factories in Russia.

Which they need for the war in Ukraine. If you want to have peace in Ukraine, you want to help stop Putin, stop letting Iran arm Putin. How about that? It's fascinating because the same people telling us that, oh Iran, they're just an an innocent nation this is a war of choice everything's perfect over there they got gas stations they got coffee there's no bombs there's no nothing everything's fine they could survive forever. The same people telling us all that are the same people telling us that Trump is abandoning Ukraine and that

Trump is a pawn of Putin. Well Iran helps Russia, helps Putin so why would you not want to get rid of Iran and

stop Putin's ability to wage war? Russians provide tactical and strategic intelligence on their main enemy, the United States. Now it hasn't really had a whole lot of effect. We're doing pretty well in spite of whatever Russian intelligence is making its way to

take over.

And whatever Chinese weapons Iran has. There was no early warning intelligence that would have saved Ayatollah Khamenei's life. So I wouldn't put too much stock in the value of this, but it just shows us that this is the axis of dictatorships. Russia, Iran, China, North Korea, they're all working against U.S. nationalists.

That's right. Thank you. They're all working together. You have this regime support network here which used to include Venezuela and Cuba. They're out of the picture. Iran's the only puppet state left. How do people somehow separate these two? Look here we have Putin and the regime on the same screen. What do you mean they're not working together? You want to stop these wars of aggression? You want to stop Europe from getting invaded? You want to

protect Ukraine? Well this is how you do it. So Dan, you know, that it plays right into this language that we see in a lot of the media's reporting of this story, that this is a very expanding theater. But when I looked this morning, you know, I think in all these attacks on the Gulf states, which have been a big curiosity point for a lot of people covering this story, and certainly a lot of the analysts.

Yeah. for a lot of people covering this story and certainly a lot of the analysts. Yeah, I mean Iran has launched reportedly a thousand drones at the UAE but you're right, the results have been far from devastating and we are taking the fight to the enemy, that's why and that's why we're not going to let up.

By attacking their allies, they've isolated themselves completely. By attacking their allies who had nothing to do with the assault on Iran to begin with, all this regime has done is said, hey, look, we don't plan on surviving this thing. We are going to collapse. We're not going to be around very long to deal with the consequences of all of our neighbors

aligning with Israel and the United States against us.

He wants to personally be involved in picking Iran's next leader, arguing it can't be someone who will be continued the former Ayatollah's hardline policies.

No, it can't be.

Like his son. He also sent this message to members of the IRGC. Listen.

I'm once again calling on all members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the military and the police to lay down their arms. They're only going to be killed. Yeah, that's a great idea. Just surrender. Perfectly safe with total immunity or you'll face absolutely guaranteed death. And I don't want to see that.

He said, guys, just surrender peacefully.

Don't fight anymore.

Right.

Should we provide more of a procedure how to do it? Yeah. Where to go? How to identify? You know, we're telling people how to get to the State

Department should we tell them how to get in touch with us?

Of course, I mean you see CIA all the time advertises literally for agents inside of Iran or inside of China to get in touch with us secretly. We should be doing the same thing for members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or anybody who's ready to-

They can flee the country, they can leave, they can run away from their mobile ballistic missile launcher. Get out of your vehicles, get out of your jets, get out of your mobile ballistic launchers, and just flee to another country and seek asylum. That's a quick and easy way to do it. Better yet, drive on whatever road CNN was on, where there was no problems,

and just go back the way they came and you'll be out of there. You with the Bush administration you knew what Iran was up to you knew the challenge of that nuclear program and the ugly terrorist activities that they were up to. Terrible man. Your thoughts about where

this campaign is right now and the need to do it. I think it's almost over. The need to do it is very very strong. The Iranians were to be able to hold hostage the region with ballistic missiles. They had as many as two to three thousand. By the way, Israel had to do it for their own defense doctrine, their own protection, if you will. So that was a big part of it. And we need to destroy the vestiges of the nuclear program. It was obliterated, but they've worked on new things. And we need to give, just as the president said, we need to give the people an opportunity

to come back out on the streets. And so that's what the president has given them. And that's why he was wise to offer asylum and ask for them to disarm. So here is Pete Higgseth, the secretary of war yesterday

on the role of Iran's leader in this operation.

The president said earlier today in an interview that he would like to have a say in who's the next leader of Iran.

Is this an expansion of your military objective?

Well, there's no expansion. Ultimately, I think the president's having a heck of a say

in who runs Iran.

Like, what are we supposed to think? That the country's gonna be allowed to implode and that a bunch of strongmen are going to gather whatever remaining weapons and missiles are left to just retake over the country and bring in a new supreme leader? I mean, what a ridiculous concept. You know there are going to be regime sympathizers inside America and on certain television networks

in this country that say, oh, Trump is interfering with democracy. He's going against the will of the people over there they want to have a new supreme leader I mean they love their last one so much oh Trump he's so

terrible give me a break. Given the ongoing operation we have so there's no expansion in our objectives we know exactly this was always the objective. America's reach is global our focus here

though those missions these missions are narrow they're scoped. So so the president took out 40 of their leaders, nine more, and then just blew up the panel of experts who was going to pick their next leader. So let's go to the big board and see some of these names that you might recognize and tell me who you think the president might be able to work with, if any. So you got the Khomeini's grandson and you he got Hamani's son that the president says is unacceptable. What else

can you tell us about that panel? Yeah, it's it's a group of hardliners and I'm not so sure that any of them will work with us. I know that the CIA and the Mossad must have detailed profiles on each. But look, the son of this late Supreme Leader is another, you know, the new boss, same as the old boss, very tough guy. And most of these are hardcore regime clerics. And so I think that's what, I think we're going to have trouble working with any of

them. Yeah. Mike, how, when the insurgency happened in Iraq, and originally was the Ba'athists, Saddam Hussein's loyalists, and then what happened after?

What did Iran do in those years after with the insurgency. The other problem you have to understand here is that when you have a regime that's in charge of a country like Iran for 50 years, there are gonna be systems that are set up in that country to run the roads, to run the police, to take care of everything,

all the infrastructure, everything, and you're gonna have hardcore loyalists that are part of the actual infrastructure in the country. You need a new leader and you need time to redo the support systems of that country so that it can function. Now luckily we've seen mass uprisings from the people of Iran and this is where the idea of this being a smooth peaceful process,

as smooth as can be given everything that's happened recently, comes into play because you have massive numbers of people. These are people who work in government. These are people who work at schools. These are people who run businesses. They all want to see change. So the leadership of this country, it really is a group of people at the top,

a small regime oligarchy here that have their beliefs and have their pyramid of control that sits on top of the rest of the country and subjugates it in some manner. So the real question is gonna be, once there is a new leader, once there is a new government,

what's gonna happen underneath all that? Are there really enough people to take the place of all of these people that have been in power and run this place effectively for the people? Or is there gonna be like a stealth regime, a stealth resistance effort that exists after the fact

and tries to destabilize things? That's a big question, but I think the answer is pretty simple. It looks like the United States military and Israel's military are trying to answer that question for us. They are not going to leave this regime with the infrastructure to take back power. But what do you think is going to happen here? Do you think CNN's right?

Is the regime going to be around for another 50 years? Is the regime going to be around for another 50 years? Let me know. I'll see you soon.