On Wednesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Source,” Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) said that he prefers Iran not having missiles, “But I don’t think that’s the key issue here. I think that they have to be able to defend themselves.” He also said that “we went in there with a very clear purpose that we wanted to destroy their missile systems, their navy, their military, decrease their ability to fund other foreign terrorists, and, of course, be able to eliminate their ability to have nuclear weapons in the future. I’m going to argue that we’re 85% there on the missile systems.”
Host Kaitlan Collins asked, “Senator, are you okay with Iran having missiles?”
Marshall answered, “I’m hesitating. I’d prefer that they not. I certainly don’t want them to have long-distance missiles. I don’t want them to have nuclear-armed missiles. I would prefer they didn’t. But I don’t think that’s the key issue here. I think that they have to be able to defend themselves. And I just kind of come back to the big picture here is that the Middle East countries like this agreement.”
Collins then cut in to ask, “You think Iran needs to be able to defend itself?”
Marshall answered, “I do, I think that they have to be able to defend themselves. Otherwise, we turn this into a forever war. You’re never going to get them, short of boots on the ground, surrendering everything, an unconditional agreement, if you will. But, again, what I’m getting at here is this agreement has the support of all the — most of the countries in the Middle East. And I think that’s going to give it more of a long-lasting relationship, a long-lasting success as well.”
Collins then said, “But unconditional surrender and razing their missile industry to the ground. Those were two things the president said at the beginning of this war he wanted to do. Neither of those have happened. Now he’s saying that they should keep their missiles.”
Marshall responded, “Well, listen, I think we went in there with a very clear purpose that we wanted to destroy their missile systems, their navy, their military, decrease their ability to fund other foreign terrorists, and, of course, be able to eliminate their ability to have nuclear weapons in the future. I’m going to argue that we’re 85% there on the missile systems. We’re 100% there on the navy. And certainly, we just destroyed their economy. Look, their economy, no one’s talking about that. We have destroyed their economy in so many ways. They have 70% inflation. The average GDP income right now — per capita income in Iran is the equivalent of somebody in Haiti, which is the poorest country in this hemisphere. So we have destroyed them militarily, economically. We’ve negotiated this from the position of strength, and that’s why it’s one more reason why it’s a solid document.”
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