President Donald Trump changed the topic from his war in Iran to preview a possible invasion of another country during a phone call with CNN's Dana Bash.
The broadcaster phoned in to her colleagues on "CNN News Central" moments after hanging up with the 79-year-old president Friday morning to give an overview of their call, and she said Trump seems to be considering additional military conflicts.
"Broadly speaking, heinsists that on a scale of 10,with 10 being the best, hethinks that the war is, I wouldsay, at 12, maybe 15," Bash reported. "He saidthat the U.S. is doing very wellmilitarily, quote, 'better thananybody could have dreamed.' Hesaid that he rebuilt themilitary in his first term. He's using it in his second, andthen he quickly turned to Cuba. He said, without being asked, Cuba is going to fall prettysoon, by the way, but Cuba isgoing to fall. They want to make a deal so badly."
"I asked,how so?" she added. "He said, 'They want tomake a deal, so I'm going toput [Secretary of State] Marco [Rubio] over there and we'llsee how that works, but we'rereally focused on this one now',meaning Iran. 'We've got plentyof time on Cuba,' just morequickly on, obviously, what'sgoing on with Iran, and you werejust talking about this with ourcolleagues in the region."
The president expressed indifference to rising fuel costs, saying that he believed that was a short-term issue that would soon be alleviated.
"Iasked about rising gas pricesand he said, that's all right, it will be short term, it willgo way down very quickly," Bash reported, "and Isaid, well, they're pretty highnow, and he said, 'No, they'renot, they're up a little bit,not much, but it will drop torecord lows,' and so I asked,well does this mean that you're going to figure out the Straitof Hormuz soon again, somethingyou were just talking about. Hesaid, quote, 'It's alreadyfigured out, we've knocked their navy because, you know, when youknock out the navy they can't dowhat they wanted to be able todo.' The navy is almost, he said, 'we just hit the 25 mark, can youimagine that? Big ones, 25 shipsare down. We're doing verywell.'"
"I also asked about the gulfcountries being hit, [and] he said, 'They're doing unbelievable andthey're fighting,'" Bash added. "'They, meaning Iran, 'made aterrible mistake when theyattacked them. The UAE isfreezing the assets and theyhave the assets all of them, andthey got hit enough where theywere going to freeze them. They're brave people.'"
Trump also reiterated his insistence that he should decide who would be Iran's next leader, Bash said.
"I do wantto tell you one other importantthing that he discussed with me,and it was about a five-minutediscussion, and that is who thenext leader of Iran will be," she said. Youknow, he told our colleague Barak Ravid yesterday that hehad, like, three people in mindand that he wants to pick theperson."
"I asked him aboutthat," she continued. "I said, how is that goingto work, and he said, 'It's goingto work very easily. It's goingto work like it did in Venezuela,we have a wonderful leaderthere. She's doing a fantasticjob and it's going to work likethat,' and I said, okay, but areyou okay with having a religiousleader again, a differentayatollah, and he said, 'Well, I may be, yeah I mean, itdepends on who the person is. Idon't mind religious leaders. Ideal with a lot of religiousleaders and they're fantastic,'and then he went on to say, 'I'msaying there has to be a leader that's going to be fair andjust do a great job, treat the United States and Israel welland treat other countries in the Middle East, they're all ourpartners.'"
"So that was the gist ofour discussion on the war, andwhere he thinks they are andwhat the impact is having whenit comes to gas prices," Bash added.