MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Shaheen

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

MATTHEWS: One strike, the last strike.

Anyway, I want to bring in Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, a

member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Senator, here we go again with the same crowd. The ones that brought us to

war with Iraq are now pushing for a war with Iran, and John Bolton.

SEN. JEANNE SHAHEEN (D-NH): Well, I don`t think a war with Iran is in the

United States` interest.

And we have certainly had inconsistent messaging when it comes to Iran.

The president pulled out of the JCPOA in a way that now, a year later,

we`re seeing Iran start to talk about enriching uranium and acquiring a

nuclear weapon.

He`s pulling out our troops in Syria and Iraq. And a small number of

troops were there keeping Northeast Syria stable, keeping U.S. influence

there when Iran and Russia were coming into Syria. And he`s alienated the

European allies in a way that means that they are less likely to help us

get Iran back to the table to address a nuclear weapon.

MATTHEWS: Senator, you know the history. And everybody at this table

knows the history. Iran is a real country. You may not its leadership

right now, the ayatollahs, but it`s a real -- Persia is real.

It wasn`t created by Winston Churchill or anybody. It`s a real country

with a real military force that was developed over the years by the shah,

with Western help, Israeli help. It`s got a real military reality.

Why would we want to go to a fighting, shooting war with a country like

Iran? It is not like fighting with Iraq or something like that. It`s not

a paper tiger. It`s real.

SHAHEEN: It is.

MATTHEWS: Why do we want to do this?

SHAHEEN: And -- well, Iran`s a bad actor. They are supporting terrorist

groups across the Middle East.

But they have a real military, as you point out, and it`s really not in our

interest. And we are -- we have sent a carrier strike group to the Middle

East. We have sent B-52 bombers. We`re talking about additional troops

going in, in a way that could lead to inadvertent contact which could

escalate into conflict.

And that`s really not in America`s interest.

MATTHEWS: What do you mean of your colleagues? What do you think of your

colleagues that seemed to have learned no lesson from the Iraq War, 100,000

people dead, 4,000 of our people dead, a lot of maimed, a war that got us

nowhere, except it took away the buffer between us and Iran, between Iran

and the Israelis?

SHAHEEN: Right.

MATTHEWS: It served no purpose in helping Israel, no matter what the

motive for the war was. It certainly didn`t work out that way. It wasn`t

the road to Jerusalem is through Baghdad or anything like. That didn`t

work out, the neocon line. Didn`t work out.

So why do they want to do it again? Why is this guy Cotton -- is he nuts?

Why does Cotton want to go to another war?

SHAHEEN: Well, I think that`s not clear.

As you point out, we should have learned something from this history, that

we need to be increasing our diplomatic stance in the Middle East, rather

than increasing our military stance. It`s one thing to be clear that we`re

going to be strong, but we also need to work with our allies in Europe and

to try and get Iran back to the table.

MATTHEWS: Well, we miss John Kerry, I can tell you that.

Senator Jeanne Shaheen, thank you so much.

SHAHEEN: We do. Thank you.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source