Rare Access to U.S. Drone Shot down by Iran
HARLOW: The Iranian president taunting the United States today, saying that President Trump's new sanctions shows that America is desperate and out of options. Well, right now, Iran is holding its annual Holy Defense Week with a huge set of military parades. It is also showing off its ground forces and weapons, including the one that took out that U.S. drone back in June. Our senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh is there.</s>NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): It's a fun day out for all the family, as long as the kids never get their hands on this, the new missile system Iran says downed a top American drone this June. That risked war as President Trump almost launched air strikes in retaliation but called them off at the last minute. But after a week of U.S. bluster over military action, they're not worried here. And, instead, putting that drone, or really what they say is left of it, on display. The RQ-4A global hawk can fly up to 400 miles an hour at 60,000 feet for 34 hours with a wingspan of a Boeing 737, but the U.S. said it was over international waters. Iran said over theirs. You wouldn't be able to tell that from the debris, just the message that Iran took it down anyway.</s>WALSH (on camera): Well, they say that it was destroyed over the Gulf and a lot of the wreckage went straight underwater. This is all they were able to salvage. Very conveniently, though, the American insignia remains intact.</s>WALSH (voice over): A fully intact U.S. predator drone is also here. We are told it was hacked as it flew over Iran. The knock-off Iranian version shown behind being launched. Older American models, Israeli, British, we can't touch them or verify independently what they are.</s>WALSH (on camera): It was no accident that a couple of days after the Saudi Arabian government displays devices that it said entered its territory, Iran puts on a substantial display of what it says it managed to capture over its lands or near it. A very friendly welcome here from an Iranian pilot, whose face we can't show, said his name is Mike, talked about premier league soccer and describes in English how some of these drones were hacked as they flew over Iran. But the message here clearly one of confidence and a desire for Iran to show quite how much it's been able to salvage from the drones that have flown over its territory.</s>WALSH (voice over): Learning from, even stealing American technology is nothing new. But more and more are in on it. These drones are master class, Iranian officials have said, in reverse engineering. In Tehran, American sanctions may bite, but they want you to know Iran can too. Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Tehran.</s>SCIUTTO: Thanks to Nick Paton Walsh on the ground in Iran for that report. Joining me now to discuss the Iran crisis, Nicholas Burns. He's former U.S. undersecretary for political affairs and former U.S. ambassador to NATO. Ambassador Burns, thanks so much for joining the broadcast this morning.</s>NICHOLAS BURNS, FORMER U.S. UNDERSECRETARY FOR POLITICAL AFFAIRS: Thank you, Jim.</s>SCIUTTO: So let's begin with the president. So Iran has now carried out really a series of provocative acts. You have the attacks on tankers. You have a shoot down of that U.S. drone. And now you have, the U.S. believes, an attack on Saudi oil facilities. The president has not authorized a military response and, in fact, called one back minutes from it happening. Has he, in effect, emboldened Iran?</s>BURNS: Well, I think, Jim, the president's problem this week, especially going to the U.N., is that he appears weak in response to these actions by the Iranians over the last six months. And in the -- in the hard bitten world of Middle East politics, with both the Sunni Arabs and the Iranians, the president doesn't appear to be standing up to the challenge. Now, he's got a little bit of time. He may want to use this week to see what kind of support he has out there. I think it's very little, frankly, with the Europeans, the Russians and Chinese. But he has to do something because Iran, Jim, is posing a major threat to the free flow of oil and gas in the Middle East. For 45 years, the United States, working with Israel, working with the Arab states, has tried to keep the Gulf open. Iran is trying to shut it down, show that it can shut it down. There has to be a stronger response, whether it's covert, cyber or a military, in my judgment from the president.</s>SCIUTTO: So -- but then what happens next? So let's say he carries out a strike -- and you saw Lindsey Graham, to be clear, he says that the president needs to restore deterrence, as you've been saying there, so there's agreement. So you -- let's say he were to retaliate, in effect impose some costs for the military action by Iran, what next, because the president has pulled the U.S. out of the nuclear deal, he's continually ramming up sanctions, which is biting with the Iranian regime, but he has not been able to get European allies on board for that. So what is the -- what is the next step? The president talks about speaking to the Iranians, but what would they speak about?</s>BURNS: I don't think there's much -- I mean there's always used to have a diplomatic channel to the Iranians just to pass tough messages and warnings and to establish that deterrent. The administration gave that away. John Kerry had established it with the Iranian foreign minister and Secretary Pompeo does not want to talk to them. So that's a problem. I actually think, Jim, there has to be a tough American response. But what has to happen with it is a diplomatic effort by the administration to try to get the Europeans to support us, at least in sanctions. That's tough when we've walked out of the nuclear deal and we've threatened secondary sanctions against European countries. So I think the administration needs to build up this diplomatic option and needs to keep the Russians and Chinese at bay if, in fact, we're going to try to re-establish deterrence and we have to against the Iranians.</s>SCIUTTO: But as you know, the president runs every one of those decisions, whether it be with Iran, China, Russia, you name it, Ukraine, through a political lens as to how it affects his own political fortunes as 2020 approaches here. Given that drive from his perspective, but also, I imagine, a regime like Iran asking the question, will President Trump still be here in a little over a year, does that give you the conditions for some substantive resolution to this?</s>BURNS: No, I think this is a long-running problem that's going to fester. But you're exactly right, the problem in Iran right -- with Iran policy is the president appears to be putting his short-term political interests ahead of what many people think is our national interests. The same thing may be happening on Ukraine, of course, where he asked the Ukrainian president essentially to investigate Joe Biden and interfere in our election. The president puts his presidential interests, his political interests over the national interests. We have real interests in the Middle East. The president has to act on behalf of those interests and of all Americans. I don't think he's standing up to it right now.</s>SCIUTTO: Ambassador Nicholas Burns, nice being with us this morning.</s>BURNS: Thanks, Jim. Thank you.</s>HARLOW: All right, the murder trial starts today for a former police officer who shot a man sitting in his own apartment. We are live from Dallas, next.