Sen. Mark Warner:
Well, Geoff, I actually believe that classified information needs to say classified, and I’m not going to comment on any of those public reports about classified information.
I will say, ask this, the question I just posed, can dropping the bombs alone completely take out Iran’s nuclear capabilities? Because the conflict was already in process, did Iran in any way move any of the enriched uranium to other sites? The question is also — is, now that the United States has attacked, is this — has Iran agreed not only not to strike back against our close to 40,000 troops, whose safety is paramount, in region?
And are they not going to strike directly? Does that also go to their proxies in the region, Hezbollah, some of the Shia militia groups? Does that also go to Iran not taking cyber action against the United States? So I wish the administration — the administration should have had that report to us today. They should have, frankly, notified the whole Gang of Eight before this attack.
But they need to get up here and answer the very legitimate questions that we as senators have, but also that Americans have. Are we still in harm’s way? Has this job been fully carried out? And, if not, what next?
Listen, I would hope it all would work out as the president has proposed, but we can’t rely on hope alone. And, clearly, Iran — I don’t want to mince any words. Iran should not have a nuclear weapon. This is a rogue regime. But there are reasons that previous presidents, including President Trump in his first term, didn’t take this kind of action, because these same questions about, can you take it all out with bombs only, without additional activities, and then what next?
I think the American people and we, as their elected representatives, need those answers sooner than later.
