Secretary of State Marco Rubio wasn’t about to let CBS’ Margaret Brennan shape the narrative when it came to Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
In a tense exchange on Face the Nation, Brennan attempted to cite intelligence assessments suggesting Iran merely wants to be a “threshold” nuclear state.
Rubio was having none of it.
“Why do they have a space program? Is Iran going to go to the moon?” Rubio asked sarcastically.
“No! They’re trying to build an ICBM, so they can one day put a warhead on it—”
Brennan interrupted: “That’s a question of intent, and you know in the intelligence assessment it was that Iran wanted to be a threshold state—”
That’s when Rubio went in.
“How do you know what the intelligence assessment says? How do you know what the intelligence assessment says?” he pressed.
Brennan replied, “I’m talking about the public March assessment.”
But Rubio wasn’t backing down.
“Well, that’s also an inaccurate representation of it. That’s an inaccurate representation of it. That’s not how intelligence is read. That’s not how intelligence is used.”
Then he laid out the cold, hard facts—no intelligence report needed.
“Here’s what the whole world knows—forget about the intelligence,” he said.
“The IAEA knows they are enriching uranium WELL beyond anything you need for a civil nuclear program.”
“So, why would you enrich uranium at 60%? If you don’t intend to one day use it to take it to 90 and build a weapon.”
“Why are you developing ICBMs?”
“Why do you have 8,000 short-range missiles and 2,000 to 3,000 mid-range missiles that you continue to develop?”
“Why do you have all these things?”
Rubio concluded with a blunt assessment:
“They have everything they need for a nuclear weapon. They have the delivery mechanisms. They have the enrichment capability. They have the highly enriched uranium that is stored.”
“That’s all we need to see.”
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