Admiral Kirby, thank you for taking the time to talk to us.
Absolutely. Good to be with you.
President Joe Biden said in Jeddah during the GCC (41st Summit of The Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf), ‘We will not walk away and leave a vacuum to be filled by China, Russia or Iran.’ Yet right after President Biden's trip to the region, we see Russian President Vladimir Putin went to Tehran to meet Iranian leaders and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Is this trip a matter of concern to the administration?
Well, we'll let those leaders talk [about] the trip and whatever their agenda is, but I think, in part, what you're seeing here is a couple of things. One, I think it's further indication of just how isolated from the international community countries like Iran and Russia have become, that they are now meeting and talking about the provision of new drone capabilities to Mr. Putin. Number two, I think it's an indication that Mr. Putin is becoming desperate in terms of trying to replenish his inventory of advanced systems. Now he's got to go to Iran, which has domestic drone production capability, to get drones for his war. And number three, and this is probably the most significant sign, is that it's an indication that Mr. Putin has absolutely no intention of ending this war or sitting down in good faith with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Quite the contrary, he shows every indication — obviously because he's going to Iran, shopping for drones — to continue to prosecute this war, to continue to kill Ukrainians. He can still do the right thing, whether it's in Tehran or in Moscow. He can do the right thing by ending this war.
So you know this is his fifth trip to Iran. Do you see that as a diplomatic counterpoint to President Biden’s trip?
No. I mean, again, we'll let these leaders speak for themselves, but I think it might be a stretch to read this as some sort of counterpoint to President Biden's trip. We know that Putin is interested in Iranian drones. We know that the Turks and Russia and Ukraine are in talks about grain shipments potentially coming out of Odesa. So, I don't know if I would read it as a counterpoint to Biden's trip. In fact, quite the contrary, if you look at the split screen here: You had the president going to the region to have bilateral and multilateral discussions about what? About an integrated more cooperative Middle East, across a range of issues. And you’ve got President Putin on this trip basically shopping for drones and looking for ways to prosecute this war, and dealing with another nation, Iran, which is, again, increasingly isolated from the international community because of their growing nuclear ambitions, their failure to sign on to the deal that is on the table before them, their burgeoning ballistic missile capabilities, their support for terrorist groups, their threats in the maritime environment in the Gulf region. I mean, I can go on and on and on.
In terms of integration, President Biden's presser in Jeddah discussed Saudi Arabia's security needs, particularly the need to defend the kingdom given real threats from Iran and its proxies. What is the U.S. providing to Saudis?