Former Republican U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, host of the Matt Gaetz show on OAN, talked with former Top Gun fighter pilot and author Ed Rush about military strategies in Iran.
“I want to talk about Iran first. We’ve seen Uncle Sam dominate the skies over the Persian Empire. How do you see that impacting the military strategy at this stage of the war?” Gaetz asked.
“I mean, as a pilot, you know, it’s great to see air dominance. That’s literally the first thing you want to do when you take to war,” Rush said.
“As a Marine pilot, I could say that you know, there is only so much air power can do,” Rush continued.
“I do want to get into what you see as the limits of air power in this campaign to accomplish the objective?” Gaetz asked.
“The first you can do with air power is air superiority, and that’s like the most important thing to do first in war, cut off communication lines. Stop what’s called the CADS or the enemy IADS, integrated air defense systems,” Rush said.
“Make it so that you can fly anything, anywhere, including helicopters, drop troops off anywhere. That’s really like one of the first things you do in any sort of traditional combat, but then what you do is you start to take the ground. And that’s really where the air power begins to be very limited,” Rush explained.
“Once it comes to actually taking the ground, that’s where air power begins to get limited, and we’ve seen that, like in the last 30 years of war,” Rush continued.
“What do you think it will take to accomplish those objectives on the ground?” Gaetz asked.
“That’s really the question is like, what are the objectives? You know we’ve been to the bargaining table, I think three times now with the people, a group of people that you know, clearly lie for a living,” Rush commented.
Gaetz and Rush talked about the potential of the military to take Kharg Island. They discussed taking the island and the strategical difficulties of actually holding the island.
“I think you have to start taking at the very least some strategic targets like Kharg Island,” Rush said.
“I think at the very least start taking some ground that is important to Iran so that we can start to put a little stranglehold on their energy,” Rush commented.
“It would be the Marines that would do that. We all know it from the planning. It would be the Marines having to execute an amphibious assault on Kharg Island. I think they would be very effective at doing that. My concern is how we would hold Kharg Island? You have elevated positions in the Persian mountains. You have embedded missile systems there,” Gaetz commented.
“Should we think about taking Kharg Island and holding Kharg Island is two very different mission sets,” Gaetz explained.
“I think it’s one of the reasons why we haven’t done it, and basically the moment you take that island, the entire shift of the entire area of operations turns into that island,” Rush said.
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