U.S. Ambassador Tom Barrack to CNN: Iran a 'wounded lion,' America a caretaker, not a guarantor

U.S. Ambassador to Türkiye Tom Barrack, who is also Washington's special envoy for Syria and Iraq, joined CNN's Becky Anderson by video link from Washington for the network's Global Perspectives event in Doha on Oct. 29, five days before the U.S. midterm elections. Excerpts:

'We're not leaving. We're just saying we're not going to own it'

What do you believe the greatest risk of miscalculation is in the days ahead?

"I think the greatest risk of miscalculation is the unintended consequences of a mistake."

"The Ottoman Empire was a security guarantor. It left. The Brits came in. They were a security guarantor. They left. We're here. We're not leaving. We're just saying we're not going to own it anymore. We need participation from the region."

The 'wounded lion'

Should we interpret Washington's acknowledgment and support for the fact that three of its closest regional partners met with Iranian officials in Tehran without U.S. participation?

"Support is a big word... But I think it's clear that our policy is to support the regional alliances, to take the majority of the responsibility, and that helps us. That is his plan."

"Look, the region is saying: America, you're eventually going to go home. One way or the other, we know you're going to go home, and we're going to be left with this wounded lion. We've had this relationship forever. And the Persian relationship in the Gulf has gone through many iterations. They can handle it. They can figure out what their regional alliances are."

The Mecca pact, the Abraham Accords and Egypt

You would see the Mecca Pact in alignment, to a degree, with the extension of the Abraham Accords. Do you believe that wish of the president's is realistic at this point?

"I do. You have 14 million Jews in the world. You have 1.6 billion Muslims. About the same amount of Christians. Eventually, this tapestry has to come into a coordination with each other."

Explaining why Egypt stayed out of the defense pact signed by Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, he said: "Egypt is out of the Mecca Agreement. Why? Because it already has a treaty with Israel. It already has a security agreement with Greece." On Iran he added: "There's no imminent threat of nuclear. The region will figure out how to handle the Straits. The adversary has been the IRGC, not the Iranian people."

'Greater Israel' and 'Ottoman Empire 2.0'

Barrack said "the path is not a greater Israel," calling the idea "an illusion."

Benjamin Netanyahu himself has perpetuated that idea of a greater Israel, and so have officials from his administration. You accept that?

"I do. Look, if you wake up in Istanbul, you pick up the papers and you read every morning, the greater Israel fabric goes from Vienna to the Maldives. If you wake up in Tel Aviv, you see the Ottoman Empire 2.0. So a lot of this is politics rather than substance."

'No useless noise' on strikes

Will that take short, sharp action by the U.S. at this point? Because that's the plan on the table, we're told.

"I think you can be sure of one thing, that there's no useless noise. The use of kinetic action is taken so seriously by everybody in this administration, including the president. So giving every option for that not to happen is what you see taking place in front of you."

"The U.S. can't solve everything," he added.

Cover photo: Barrack at Incirlik Air Base, July 2025. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Koby Saunders, via Wikimedia Commons (public domain). Video: CNN.