GOP Sen. Sheehy: ‘Decapitating the Regime Is the Number One Objective’, ‘Pretty Clear’ War Is Because of Regime Change
On Monday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Source,” Sen. Tim Sheehy (R-MT) said that it’s “pretty clear” that the war in Iran is happening due to regime change and “decapitating the regime is the number one objective” of the operation.
Host Kaitlan Collins asked, “Is that why you think the war in Iran is happening right now, is it because of regime change?”
Sheehy answered, “I think that’s pretty clear. There’s no question that what’s happening in Iran today is a result of decades, decades of exporting terror and evil all over the world.”
Collins then asked, “[T]he reason I ask why this is happening is because we hear a bunch of different reasons from the administration. It doesn’t seem like there is anyone settled on one reason. You just said regime change. Secretary Hegseth said this morning, it’s not a regime change war.”
Sheehy responded, “I think the reason you’re hearing so many varied reasons is the varied threats this regime presents. You heard about taking out their navy. Their navy has been used to shut down the Red Sea, the Straits of Hormuz, Suez Canal, the Houthi rebels, which are an extension of a militant group of Iran. You’ve got Hezbollah, which has been using its northern border with Israel to constantly pressure Israel, and, frankly, any Western presence in the Middle East. Hamas, of course, is an attack arm of Iran. You’ve got their medium-range ballistic missiles, their ICBMs, their nuclear arsenal, their international money laundering campaign for any terrorist organization and even drug-dealing groups. So, I think the reason you’re hearing different reasons is not because no one’s decided what reason it should be, Kaitlan, it’s because Iran has so many different threat vectors that attack the Western world, to include the U.S., that, to effectively restrain their ability to continue to cause chaos, we have to attack all those vectors.”
Collins followed up, “So does that mean the war doesn’t end until every single one of those things is eliminated?”
Sheehy answered, “I think the likelihood of each one of those tentacles continuing to carry out the policies of this terrorist regime is pretty unlikely if the regime’s gone, or if the regime has chosen, hey, we’re going to change direction. But I think that’s pretty unlikely.”
He added that putting boots on the ground would be unwise and he doesn’t think anyone plans to do that, “I think the reality is, decapitating the regime is the number one objective that, as I said, will have a number of threat vectors, whether it’s the fleet, whether it’s nukes, whether it’s ICBMs, medium-range, or taking out proxy groups, whether it’s Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, or the remnants of Hamas in Gaza, but weakening all those different vectors makes it harder for that regime to stay in place. And what we are seeing is a lot of organic support inside Iran. Unfortunately, so many of them have been killed over the last couple of months, but, hopefully, that organic support reached the point where they can topple their own government and [put] in place their own, hopefully self-governing system to succeed this.” And he thinks the U.S. should help them do so.
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