The PDB Situation Report | September 12th, 2026: The Iran Conflict Just Entered a More Dangerous Phase & Pentagon Considers Postwar Pullback

Mike Baker (0:07)

Welcome to The PDB Situation Report. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, we're tracking the latest escalation of the latest in the Iran conflict. Behnam Ben Taleblu from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, he joins us to break down what it means and where things could go next. You know what, it's anybody's guess. Later in the show, on the 25th anniversary of the 9-11 attacks, can you believe that? 25 years on. We'll look at reports that the Pentagon is considering a smaller US military footprint in the Middle East once the war with Iran is over. There's the caveat. We'll be joined by Steve Yates, great friend of the show of the Heritage Foundation, for more on what that could mean. But first, today's situation report spotlight.

The latest route of fighting with Iran is raising new questions about just how far the Iranian regime is willing to push its attacks on American forces.

We now know that Iranian missiles damaged roughly eight US. F-15s at an airbase in Jordan while an A-10 Warthog, its great plane, was hit hard enough to lose a wing.

No American casualties were reported in those attacks. The strike followed US attacks on five Iranian oil tankers, launched after Iran attempted to hit an American warship. The pace of escalation, as you might now guess, seems to be accelerating and the risks of a wider confrontation are of course growing with it.

Let me bring in Behnam Ben Taleblu. He's a Senior Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Iran Program. Behnam, thank you very much for coming back on the Situation Report. It's very brave of you.

Behnam Ben Taleblu (1:48)

Always a pleasure. Thank you so much.

Mike Baker (1:52)

Of course, Fran. Well, where do we even start?

Give me your assessment of where we're at right now with the Iran conflict. I know that's a huge playing field I've just given you, but take it away and tell me what your assessment is, what you're thinking.

Behnam Ben Taleblu (2:10)

I just got to say the Iran conflict is playing out right now just in the shadow of the quarter century anniversary of the 9-11 attacks, and that really does focus the mind about the capabilities that America's adversaries, even if they're weak, even if they're unorganized, even if they're scattered, can still pose to us and to the homeland and to American citizens all around the world. So it really does focus the mind.

Zooming in, I think the president is adopting something of a zero-tolerance policy towards Iranian instability in the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz. Actually, I see a pretty successful streak of moves by the US since leaving the MOU. I see those 13 days of strikes against Iran South, that's really blinded the regime. What the US was doing on the opposite side of the Strait, which was really digging around the Strait of Hormuz, moving rocks around to make sure that larger ships could pass through there, slowly using the US Navy to escort them. So I see actually the US militarily having opened the Strait, and then even Admiral Cooper of CENCOM saying that there was de-mining and that central part of the Strait wasn't subject to mine. So I see the US having achieved a win here. It's trying to get media markets, shippers and insurers in the private sector to feel the win, and the Islamic Republic is intent on not letting us get that economic win. That's precisely why they're targeting the tools that have helped open the Strait, and that's the US Navy. And if I had to call Donald Trump's doctrine something right now against the Iranians, the targeting of their oil tankers, I call it Ronald Reagan meets Hammurabi. Ronald Reagan in terms of the forceful response against the Iranians' oil assets in the Persian Gulf and Hammurabi because an eye for an eye, except this time according to Pete Hegstad, Secretary of War, it's two eyes for one eye.

But this regime is weak, still lethal, however, and it's showing with missile attacks on Jordan or ASBM attacks on US Navy vessels, that it is still intent on fighting, and which are without the mid terms, which are without oil markets being what they are. I think the American public should know that.

Mike Baker (4:19)

Well, yeah, you've raised a lot of important points here. Let me try to unpack some of that.

The oil markets, just over the end of this past week, oil pricing hit over $100 a barrel in response to what they're seeing right now. So from a global energy markets perspective, it doesn't seem like they feel as if things are going in the right direction. And then you look at the shipping and you raised the idea that the US has opened this strait and from a technical perspective, I completely agree, right? I think the demining effort appears to have been very successful.