CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview With Sen. Rand Paul

Interview

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Let's discuss all of today's late-breaking developments with Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. He's a member of the Foreign Relations and Homeland Security committees.

Senator, thank you so much for joining us.

SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: Did the president's decision to kill General Soleimani make Americans safer or less safe?

PAUL: Well, I think that's a good question.

And I think the stated purpose by the administration was that they were going to prevent attacks on Americans. But I think, if you ask the question now, is it more or less likely that there will be attacks on Americans, I think it's much more likely.

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The replacement for Soleimani is basically a clone, somebody who is a hard-liner, who has worked with Soleimani for 20-some-odd years.

And so, while Soleimani may have been plotting attacks, and probably was, it's now a certainty that there will be attacks in revenge for his killing.

The other unintended consequence here is, you saw the chanting in the streets of Tehran. This has emboldened the hard-liners. Iran is like any other country. There's a mixture of opinion. There are hard- liners that never want to talk to America at all, "Death to America."

But there are moderates and younger people who do like the West and who would talk to us.

I think what this does is, it lessens the voices of anybody that wants moderation or diplomacy. And even the Iranians will not be able to approach us on diplomacy until there's revenge, until there's adequate revenge to satiate the people who want some kind of revenge.

And this is sad. I mean, the death of Soleimani, I think, is the death of diplomacy with Iran. I don't see an off-ramp. I don't see a way out of this.

BLITZER: So, did the president make a major mistake?

PAUL: I think that he got bad advice.

I think that, basically, even though he let John Bolton go, this is John Bolton. John Bolton is clapping and jumping up and down and rubbing his hands together, because this is what he wanted, to take a dramatic action, to kill one of their main leaders.

But the thing is, is, it's going to have unintended consequences. And, really, as part of this whole recipe, the administration, mainly at John Bolton's behest, tore up the Iran agreement, placed a significant and severe embargo on Iran, and then killed one of their major generals.

Nobody in their right mind would actually think that that would lead to negotiation. So, when Secretary of State Pompeo is out there saying, well, maximum pressure, our goal is to get them back to the negotiating table, no naive child would believe that.

You would have to be brain-dead to believe that we tear up the agreement, we put an embargo on you, and we kill your major general, and they're just going to crawl back to the table and say, what do you want, America?

I mean, military escalation is really what you would predict with this. I think most people who were thinking about this would have predicted that everything they have done with regard to Iran is leading now to this military escalation.

And I want to be careful that nothing justifies their military action, but it is predictable, given what path we have chosen.

BLITZER: "The Washington Post" is reporting that the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, first raised the idea of killing Soleimani to President Trump months ago.

Do you accept Secretary Pompeo's claim that the strike was meant to thwart what he has described as an imminent attack?

PAUL: You know, I don't want to question his motives. So I want to give him the benefit of the doubt that his motives are good, that he wanted to stop attacks.

But foreign policy is a little more complicated that. You also have to think, it's not just about vengeance.

You know, one senator said he was an evil bastard, so we killed him.

Well, that's what grade school children -- that's the way they think. You have to think a little bit beyond that. And you have to think, well, what happens next?

And I think what happens next is now an inevitability that there will be, not just one, but multiple escalations of this on the part of Iran, and that there is no foreseeable off-ramp, because they have been given this killing of their general that, in order to save face, they're going to have to do tit for tat. That will be their response.

And none of this justifies it, but that's what's going to happen.

BLITZER: Would you vote, Senator, to restrain the president's military action against Iran in a new war powers resolution?

PAUL: I spoke with Senator Kaine on the floor a few minutes ago, and we're looking at his resolution.

I, in general, have always supported that a declaration of war is necessary. I think killing a country's major general is an act of war. I don't think you can get away with saying it's imminent. They have been complaining for years about Soleimani.

I mean, most of the killings that are attributed to him, I think, are from the Iraq War 10 years ago or longer. And so I think saying this is imminent and saying they don't need the permission of Congress goes against the traditions of our Constitution.

And whether it's been a Republican president or a Democrat president, I have been a stickler that the way to make war rare is to make it where you have to actually vote on it in Congress, and then it has to be overwhelming.

And there have been times. When we were attacked on 9/11, virtually everybody voted to go after those who attacked us. Same way with Pearl Harbor. But this is sort of a different situation, where no one's really proposing all-out war.

What we're proposing is something that will fester and go on and on in drips and drabs of intermittent violence for decades, if not generations.

And I see no end to this and no real success to this, what -- what has happened.

BLITZER: Senator Rand Paul, thanks so much for joining us.

PAUL: Thank you.

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