WATCH: ‘We are the good guys’ — A deep dive into the war with Iran

Video

Tuesday, March 17, 2026

OPINION:

As the conflict with Iran enters another week, many are wondering what is actually happening and what comes next for the Middle Eastern nation. Will there be U.S. boots on the ground? Who is leading Iran? What stories are the legacy media not covering?

Washington Times Commentary Editor Kelly Sadler is joined by Robert Wilkie, the America First Policy Institute Security Chair, for an engaging discussion on the war with Iran.

[SADLER] We’re about to enter the third week in our war with Iran. I just wanted to get your perspective on how you think the operation is going thus far.

[WILKIE] Sure. I think it’s going well, as far as we can describe military operations at this stage. But I do think that in order to fulfill the goals of completely destroying Iran’s ability to threaten its neighbors, to threaten us, that this air campaign, as it has been planned in the last few decades, needs to go on for several more weeks. Right now, we are finally employing what I call the smashing power of the United States Air Force. Not precision attacks, but the munitions from the B-52s, B-1s, B-2s that actually shake the ground, and can get into those last underground command bunkers that the fanatical clerics and the IRGC command are still in.

[SADLER] So there’s been a lot of reporting about the Strait of Hormuz. Not many ships are getting through. The price of oil has spiked. Our Middle East partners have cut their capabilities, cut production. As a result, today, War Secretary Pete Hegseth said that the U.S. military is prepared to assist allied ships through the strait. But there’s also been reporting from the Wall Street Journal that Iran is still getting out a lot of its oil and using the straits for its purposes, and has been planting IEDs in the strait, making it dangerous for other ships to pass. What do you make of those reports? And can we assist our allies in the region in getting through the Strait safely?

[WILKIE] Absolutely. And there are actually a couple of answers to your question. First of all, I do think that if I were planning — and I’m not — I would have gone back to the old Reagan plans. I would seize Kharg Island, which is their principal refining and shipping off point. I would just put the Marines there and destroy the remaining offshore capabilities. We do have the means to escort these vessels. We actually did it for a number of years, starting with Reagan. And the other side of this, Kelly, is this tells you why President Trump has been beating the drums over the heads of European allies. In the past, we have relied on the minesweeping and escort services of the United Kingdom, the Royal Navy. That has completely collapsed. They can’t even provide one destroyer to give air cover for their Royal Air Force Base in Cyprus.

In fact, the HMS Dragon tried to come out of Scotland and had to turn back a mile or two because its welds were coming apart. The next ship will take another two weeks just to get to Cyprus. So we’re not being well supported by our European partners, although Maloney is sending a task force, I believe, with her large aircraft carrier, the Giuseppe Garibaldi.

But Britain, our principal naval ally, is nowhere to be seen in this.

[SADLER] And they are dependent — more dependent than we are as the U.S. — on the oil that comes out of that strait.

[WILKIE] That’s right.

[SADLER] So, although every American has seen the prices go up at the pump in the past few weeks, because of President Trump’s energy independence, energy dominance plan, we’re largely protected from those fluctuations.

[WILKIE] That’s right. It’s not like the Nixon years after the Yom Kippur War — the War of Atonement — when Egypt and Syria attacked Israel and the OPEC nations, principally Saudi Arabia, first decided to use oil as a weapon. Gasoline, I think, in North Carolina, where I was as a child, went from 38 cents a gallon to 60 or 70 cents. So it doubled in price. No, we’re not going to see that, but we will see temporary disruptions in the pricing of oil. But we are certainly able to withstand a shock in this country. We’re the number one exporter of energy. We have more reserves. Heck, we have more coal reserves just in the state of West Virginia than Saudi Arabia has oil and natural gas reserves, in terms of the power that they can deliver. So, yes, you’re absolutely right.

[SADLER] And we know that the president has tapped the strategic oil reserve and will be releasing from that. We know back in 2020, when he wanted to buy oil at twenty dollars a barrel, that basically Democrats prevented him from doing that. And Joe Biden completely depleted the reserves to artificially lower the price before an election. So that was political. But this is what the reserves are meant to do. And this is the reason why we have them.