'Now they pay,' Hegseth says after U.S. strikes Iran following Hormuz closure

You're watching live now from Fox.I'm Austin Westphal.We're getting some breaking news out of the Middle East.The U .S.carrying out strikes against Iran in retaliation for Iran saying that it was firing at a vessel that was transiting through the strait in an unauthorized way.

Let's bring in retired Marine intelligence officer, national security analyst, and the host of the Strap Podcast, Hal Kempfer.He's here with me.Hal, let's just start off with some of the decision -making coming from the White House at this hour.At hours like this, U .S.CENTCOM said at the end of its statement that all of this, unsurprisingly, is going being carried out at the direction of the commander in chief.

So this is not the first time we've been in a situation like this before.Basically, what we're hearing is that this was a Cyprus flagged container ship that the Iranians fired at.You and I were talking offline a little bit earlier today about how it comes to be that Iran fires at some of these ships.There's many accounts and there's many different you know, pieces of reporting that analyze these types of things.But it seems to me that there's a little bit of disunification, if you will, within the Iranian ranks.Can we just firstly speak about where things stand right now?

Are you hearing anything about more strikes happening in the Middle East?Does this appear to be over?Where do you think stand right now?

As of right now, from what I can see from CENTCOM and all the reporting is that we're in the middle of doing airstrikes on a variety of different places along the coast, from the Strait of Hormuz all the way up to the northern Persian Gulf.And there's also some reports of strikes down south.With that, I would say they're not different in terms of the target sets we've seen previously.They include any radars, coastal radars at the coastline.may have, but also drones, anti -ship missiles, surface -to -air missiles.Last time we hit a number of small boats, those gunboats, which the Revolutionary Guard Corps has hundreds of those in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.

We hit a lot of those, 60, I heard may have been much more than 60.I would imagine that we're going to be hitting those more as well.Now, this is all in response to a strike, which I believe was in Omani waters of a Cyprus flagged commercial vessel, the motor vessel Galaxy.And there's one person who's missing.Hopefully they find them, but the reality is that in that situation, it doesn't look too hopeful.There was a fire aboard the ship, the engine's been disabled, so the ship has to be basically towed into a port.

And this is very provocative.Now, this is the same day that Foreign Minister Roxy has led a delegation to go to Oman to talk about rekindling negotiations to pursue the diplomatic route, and then this thing comes out of nowhere.And that goes to your observation, your question, which is really about this other faction.And there's more and more reporting that there's this hardcore Revolutionary Guard Corps faction that seems to be running completely separate apart from the rest of government.So whatever Arakshi or President Pozeshkin or, you know, the Speaker of the Legislature, Galibov, whatever they agreed to, they kind of make up their own minds.And it's said that there is a group or a cell or something like that that is actually ordering

these strikes in complete contravention to what the rest of government is saying.And this goes to what we saw this last week with Ali Khamenei's funeral.We never saw his son, who's the new Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, and there's a lot of questions now.He never showed up over the five days, in no way, shape or form did he show up over the five days.Nobody's seen of him since that strike that killed his father.Nobody's heard from him directly since that strike that killed his father.

If he's alive.There's no proof of life that we're aware of.There are people who said that they've talked to him, but that's about it.And they read statements that he supposedly authored, but that's about it.And when you see this disunity, this lack of a, dare I say, supreme leader having control over Iranian policy, that kind of underscores that maybe Moushava Khamenei isn't actually in charge.Whether he's alive or dead, he's definitely not in control of the government.

One of the big questions people have in these moments is what's the likelihood that we return to some semblance or full -on kinetic activity once more?Anytime a situation like this has broken out in recent weeks, it's been a short skirmish, if you will.It usually is held to Striking back and forth a couple of times on each side sometimes a little more sometimes a little less But it always does return to the negotiating table What's the likelihood that that does not happen this time and that full -out war breaks out again?

Well, there is a concept in under international law and the law of war the law of land warfare that it's called proportionality And what you're seeing is they do these strikes and we respond in what we consider a proportional response now our strikesterms of pure kinetics are certainly much further afield than what you see the Iranians doing.Part of that is because it's our capabilities to do that.But we're also trying to communicate our intent across a number of areas and make it very clear to the Iranians that their conduct is completely unacceptable and what they're doing is unacceptable.And so we are we are responding and we tend to limit it.Now, one of the questions with that is, are there other players involved?

And that's one of the things that came out of the last series of strikes.There's a number of airstrikes that continued after we had said we stopped.And there's a lot of speculation as to who did those airstrikes.I've no doubt that we know, I've no doubt that the Iranians know, and I have no doubt that whatever country or countries that did those airstrikes know full well But publicly, nobody's saying anything about that, although Iran did kind of call out the United Arab Emirates right after that for supporting U .S.military efforts, and I thought that was rather interesting that they did that.

uh there could be other stuff that may linger after our strikes are done uh some others and it's just kind of making a message you know the uh other countries if you look at their airstrike capability they have a lot of planes we have a couple of carriers out there we have a well one carrier definitely in position now and we have uh obviously aircraft at our bases around the region But these countries have very advanced aircraft.Most of the aircraft that they have, the strike aircraft, are ones that we sold them and we trained them on.So they can go in and do a number of things.And I think there might be a larger, very quiet political play here to make it very clear to the Iranians that the number of strike aircraft available to hit Iran could double or tripledepending on what the Iranians do.

I'm going to focus in on one piece of this statement.It's toward the back half of it.And I, again, see that we're getting more viewers on the stream.So I'm going to kind of reset here.And let's just go from the top.Here's what we know so far about the strikes.

U .S.CENTCOM has sent out one statement about this so far.It reads as such at 715 p .m.Eastern time.

The U .S.military began launching the third round of strikes this week against Iran after IRGC forces blatantly attacked a Cyprus -flagged container ship transiting Hormuz.A civilian crew member is missing.The vessel is unable to continue the journey due to an onboard fire and significant engine room damage.Iran was provided yet another opportunity to demonstrate adherence to the Memorandum of Understanding after being held accountable for earlier attacks on commercial vessels.

but has failed again.In response, the United States is imposing a heavy cost by continuing to degrade Iran's ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships freely transiting the strait.The strikes are being carried out at the direction of the commander -in -chief.Hal, they say they're imposing a heavy cost by continuing to degrade Iran's ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships that are transiting the strait.Does that tell us that they're firing at perhaps drone -launching sites, missile -launching sites that are along the strait.One question that a lot of people have, I always see it in the comment section underneath our coverage, is Iran still has hardware in these areas?

The U .S.hasn't already cleared these things out.

There's a lot of targets out there, correct, Hal?There's no shortage of Iranian military targets to hit along the strait.or elsewhere within the country.They have a lot of drones.They have a lot of anti -ship missiles, a lot of ballistic missiles.They have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of these gunboats, these fast boats that they have going around the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz.

Some of those have been used to turn back shipping in the Strait.And the big thing with the Iranians is they like having control of the strait.The straits provided them leverage that they just have not had forever.So they do not want to give that up.And despite multiple times they've agreed to reopen the strait, the ink is hardly dry on whatever's been agreed to before they turn around and do something provocative.And the big question is, Is there a unity within the regime?

And there seems to be great disunity.This is a day where, you know, Foreign Minister Roxy lands in Oman.He's talking to them, trying to rekindle negotiations, trying to pursue the diplomatic route.And then this strike happens on this Cypriot cargo vessel, the motor vessel Galaxy.And there may have been, you know, there's a person missing.He may have been killed.

We will find out.But this definitely ups the ante in terms of what's going on with this back and forth strikes that are happening.So we're hitting a variety of different areas, but we're hitting everything you can think of that we've hit in the past.And it may not just be us, it may end up with other countries weighing in.I don't know which countries those are, nobody's publicly releasing that, but it's very likely some of the Gulf states.May one or more of the countries in the Gulf may have been participating in the last series of strikes and could potentially participate in this series of strikes.

So what typically gets us back to a point where the diplomatic channel resumes.Right now, that's not where we're at.We're at kinetic action right now.Typically, how do these things ramp down?I mean, we were, as you were saying, INCA just dried.We have seen time and time again that it is possible for these ceasefires to be tested and then return back to a place where they still stand strong.

What's the most likely path towards diplomacy this time, Hal?How do these things typically cool down when we're, you know, right now, it seems like the two sides are certainly far apart from returning to the negotiating table.But over time, what typically gets them back there?

Well, the course of action that we have pursued with this, are buried.What we have seen in the past is that the pain for Iran, particularly economically, becomes so great that they come to the negotiating table and agree to something.What we've also seen with Iran is when they agree to something, they don't necessarily follow through on what they disagreed to.And that gets to that schism within the regime, where there appears to be this separate group this cell or whatever they want to call it, that has freedom of action to do these strikes.Even when the government has agreed that we're going to reopen the street, we're going to do these other things, they will go in there like what we see with this.And there are reports that this group may have been responsible for this strike.

Now, when they do this strike, it's not just that group that gets fired upon.We hit a variety of targets all around there.But this group,to be a real challenge as this split or divide within the government becomes greater.We're running into a position where, and certainly President Trump has been very clear about what he thinks of the Iranian negotiators and what he thinks about the Iranian regime.And it wasn't in any way considered positive terms.

but where we come to these agreements, but it means nothing because the negotiators on their side are basically have no ability to enforce what they agreed to.And this element of the Revolutionary Guard Corps will kind of do whatever it wants to do.And as long as they keep doing these strikes, even if it's a limited capability to do these strikes, as long as they're able to do that, they're going to trigger a response from our side.And so this could go on for a very long time.

I'm just kind of going through some of the news wires here, Hal.And I got to say, at least from our vantage point, and for those that are watching this on YouTube later, we're having this conversation just before 9 p .m.Eastern time.I'm checking some of these news wires.It doesn't look like any significant updates have been coming through within the past 45 minutes or so.

So I'm going to take that as a sign.At least there's no new information coming out of the region from the sources that we're tracking here.What we're going to do is we're going to button this up for now.We're going to be checking in with the Associated Press's Will Weiser in about 20 minutes or so here.Hal, we're going to slide away for a quick commercial break.Before you go, Hal is the host of the Strat Podcast.

And Hal, I usually like to ask on Saturdays, what's coming up on Strat?Are you going to be talking about this?

Well, I was, it's interesting, the last ride I just did, what, two days ago, was talking about Iran and what's going on now.and and yes I will be as far as I could tell it's definitely going to be we're going to record it tomorrow it'll be on Iran because this has changed things and I think the big thing which are two big things are things I just alluded to which is this clear schism within the Iranian regime and where that takes us and of course the other part is if the Gulf states are actually involved in military strikes in Iran.the capabilities that adds to what can be done in response to Iranian provocations.I hate to use the overworked term strategic inflection point, but I think we are at an inflection point in this war that it can go a couple of different ways.But if it goes the military way, it won't be like it was before.

All right, let's take a quick commercial break.We have a lot more to discuss.There's some updates on the Russia -Ukraine war as well.We'll get into that a little bit more when we return in about two minutes.