Steve Bannon Says Pentagon's Iran Strike Plan Is 'Gasoline on the Fire'

Steve Bannon said Thursday that reports of Pentagon plans to resume strikes on Iran after the November 3 midterms are inflaming a war most voters oppose. On War Room, he called the post-election timing a provocation, not a way to calm things down.

The former White House chief strategist was reacting to the War Room reporter Neil McCabe, who said the Pentagon was "leaking to various media outlets" that it was preparing new attacks for after the vote. McCabe said that was at odds with President Donald Trump, who he said wants to "quiet the war down." Bannon disagreed.

"That's just saying hey we know how much people hate this and we're going to wait after the vote takes place that's not quieting it down I think that's throwing gasoline on the fire," Bannon said.

He aimed his criticism at the Pentagon and the timing, not at Trump by name. He asked why the Pentagon would "think it's smart to be putting out all this information about a possible next level kinetic activity right after the midterms."

What Has Been Reported About Post-Midterm Iran Strikes

The New York Times reported that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth discussed renewed strikes on Iran with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to Time. Possible targets include Iran's energy infrastructure, its nuclear facilities and its missile and drone arsenal. Trump has not approved the strikes.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday at Ovda Air Base in southern Israel during an unannounced visit, The Times of Israel reported. A Netanyahu spokesman confirmed the meeting and said the two discussed "threats in the region."

Trump has tied the end of the war to the vote. He said last month, according to Time, "I think the war is going to end immediately after the election."

Bannon was unmoved. He also questioned what more strikes could achieve: "if it ain't obliterated now I don't know what it's going to take."

Iran War Polling and Bannon's Two-to-One Claim

Bannon asked his producers to "put that chart up" and said, "this is not a close one it's like two-thirds one-thirds people don't want to go back." He did not say where the chart came from.

Public polling broadly supports the direction of his claim, if not that exact question.

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll published March 31, 66 percent said the U.S. should end its involvement quickly even if the administration's goals were not met. Twenty-seven percent wanted to keep going until those goals were achieved.

Trump sits at 37.5 percent approval and 59.4 percent disapproval in PolitiKool's polling average. That is a net rating of minus 21.9 with less than two weeks until Election Day.

Steve Bannon Says Heartland Voters Are Tired of Foreign Wars

Bannon tied the issue to Trump's rally Thursday in Sioux City, Iowa, saying people there "are not into the United States being in all these foreign wars." Later in the show he returned to the point, saying the folks in the heartland "do not see why we're continuing to be in these foreign wars."

He also cited his own family's military service in the region: his time aboard a destroyer sent to the North Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf in 1979 and 1980, his younger brother's time there in 1986 and 1987, and his daughter's service in Iraq around 2010 and 2011. Speaking of that family, he said, "We hate all of it we want to come home okay we should come home." He went on to call Netanyahu "a disaster" and said Qatar, Turkey, the UAE and Saudi Arabia are not U.S. allies.

The remarks extend Bannon's break with Trump over his endorsement of Netanyahu earlier this week. He argued that ending the war would have changed the midterms: "President Trump would have been up two-thirds one-third this would have been blown out."

Whether Trump approves the strikes now under discussion is still open. So is whether he raises the war with voters before November 3.