Ian Bremmer: Between the U.S., Israel and Iran, ‘Iran Is the Least Capable’

EXCERPT:

BREMMER: "I think that of the three parties that are fighting here, the United States, Israel and Iran, Iran is by far the least capable. They‘re very aware of that. They‘ve lost any deterrent capability, and therefore they have become the most risk-averse. And that‘s not what we‘re used to seeing from the Islamic Republic historically. They‘ve lost their proxies. They‘ve lost the ability to scare the Israelis or the Americans away from attacking them with impunity. And the counter strikes that we‘ve just seen from Iran, which will be presented to their own people as incredibly strong and strident, in the same way that they‘ve presented to their own people that the American attacks on Fordo were marginal and didn‘t cost much damage, that‘s what they‘re saying internally, with their control of their own state media, it‘s all disinformation. What we know externally is that they warned the Americans in advance and calibrated these attacks against the most well-defended American bases to help ensure there weren‘t going to be casualties. So this is Iran trying very, very hard not to precipitate further escalation from the United States.”