I'm John Batchel with my colleague, Colonel Jeff McCausen, United States Army retired, artillerymen, CBS News, visiting Professor Dickinson College, Diamond Sixth Leadership and Strategy.

There's a new ambassador designate for the Middle East, Governor Huckabee. There is a principal negotiator, Steve Whitkoff.

I learned this from Jeff's reporting.

I want to get to the position that right now with Hamas in ruins,

with Hezbollah, not just on the back heel, but without prospect being reigned upon by the IAF as it peppers northern Israel's rockets,

with the Houthis untouched and still interrupting the traffic in the Red Sea, with the Tehran regime

no longer with air defenses after that counterstrike by Israel. What is to be done?

Jeff, I mentioned talk out of the Middle East and here in the United States as well.

Between now and January 20th, Mr. Netanyahu, having separated himself from his

Minister of Defense, Mr. Galan, and brought in Mr. Katz. Mr. Katz is saying, now's the time. Iran's

the enemy. What that means is open to interpretation. But there is very little, if anything,

between the IAF and striking at Iran. Is that a credible decision between now and January 20th?

Well, it's certainly possible, John. We saw them do a pretty effective strike against the

Iranians here a few weeks ago, and there are now additional reports that that attack was

more successful, perhaps, than we imagine in destroying a factory that the Iranians depend

on for the production of propellants for

their ballistic missile systems and others, and may have set back the Iranians over a year

in their ability to expand their arsenal. And then you're right again, it certainly suggests

that penetration of Iranian air defense is easier and they took down a lot of their air defense.

But whether or not the Israelis

want to mount a major attack and what it would take to go after the nuclear facilities, the energy

facilities, et cetera, would require, to my mind, probably a multi-day air campaign, require vast amounts

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