Ex-CIA Officer John Kiriakou on the Truth About Iran, False Flags, and What’s Really Happening in DC

**Tucker Carlson** (0:04)
John, thanks for doing this.

**John Kiriakou** (0:05)
Thanks for the invitation.

**Tucker Carlson** (0:06)
So a lot of us have been trying to figure out how we got into this war with Iran. I think the reporting is clear at this point that there was really nobody at the White House or in the American intelligence community who was telling the president, yeah, this is gonna be really easy.

**John Kiriakou** (0:23)
Right.

**Tucker Carlson** (0:23)
But he came to that conclusion anyway. There's a lot of speculation as to why. But tell us about the process. You're the president, you're trying to figure out what's gonna happen if you declare war on this country.
How do you find that information? Where does that come from?

**John Kiriakou** (0:40)
Well, I can tell you how President George HW. Bush did it and how President George W. Bush did it. It's a process. Right. You have to-

**Tucker Carlson** (0:48)
Formal.

**John Kiriakou** (0:49)
Formal process. You have to commission estimates from the intelligence community.
You commission intelligence, finished intelligence reports from the CIA's Directorate of Intelligence. You get an idea of what the State Department is thinking about it. You're talking to your Secretaries of State and Defense, the National Security Advisor. But then, and I think this is even as important, you need to talk to your friends and allies. You need to know what the European countries are saying or seeing, and then our Gulf allies, the Arab allies. We really needed to engage with all of them. And then there's going to be a consensus at some point, at least among most of those countries. And then you come up with a policy. I think that that's not what took place in this case.
As you know, you've heard the same criticisms that I've heard in the Gulf.
The complaints are that they were not consulted as allies. They were just sort of brought along. And I was in Europe a couple of weeks ago, and a couple of weeks before that, and I heard the same complaints that they weren't consulted. The only apparent consultation that was taking place was with the Israelis. And the Israelis really, really wanted this to get done.

**Tucker Carlson** (2:06)
So why would you as a practical matter need to consult other countries? Because there is this sense, like as an exceptional nation, we don't need anyone's permission to act. But again, not as an ideological matter or a matter of politeness or good form, but as a practical matter before launching a war, why do you need to talk to the Europeans and the Gulf States?

**John Kiriakou** (2:25)
At the very least, you're going to want political cover. You're also going to want to give them an opportunity to come up with Plan B for their, let's say, oil or gas needs or transportation issues. You don't want them to be taken by surprise because they're going to resent you in the end.
And we didn't do that and they resent us. I'll give you an example. I was in Ireland two weeks ago and at the hotel they told me I was probably going to have to leave extra early for the airport because they were expecting the largest demonstration in Irish history, which took place the next morning and it was all because of home heating oil prices and gasoline prices. We didn't consult with the Irish or the British or anybody else before launching this thing. They were already having problems because of the cutoff of home heating oil coming from Russia, because of the Ukraine War, and then this was just doubly difficult for them. And so gas was, we figured it out, gas was $12.50 a gallon.
I mean, if you don't have an electric-

**Tucker Carlson** (3:37)
Gasoline.

**John Kiriakou** (3:37)
Gasoline, $12.50 a gallon and home heating oil was astronomical to the point where people were just freezing.
And they're blaming us for it. So you wanna be able to consult our friends and allies so that they have a chance to come up with a plan to make the hurt on their own people a little bit less severe.

**Tucker Carlson** (4:00)
Ireland is an enemy of Israel's. The prime minister and many cabinet ministers in Israel have said that they hate Ireland, they hate Europe, they hate Europeans.
So do you think that the president's reluctance or failure to bring them into this conversation reflects Israel's priorities?

**John Kiriakou** (4:21)
I hate to say it, but I do, actually. I think that the Israelis...
Look, I understand what a close friend and ally Israel is, and always has been. I get it. But I feel like sometimes we act in Israel's best interests rather than in our own best interests. I think this is one of those cases. The Israelis, of course, are going to jump up and down and yell about the Irish and the Spanish and the Italians.