Michael Morell: US, Iran Can Still De-Escalate After Strikes

The United States and Iran still have the opportunity to de-escalate hostilities in the wake of Tuesday's missile attacks and the U.S. airstrike that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, former CIA acting deputy director Michael Morell said Wednesday, but he expects a terrorist attack against a senior U.S. official will still happen. 

"I think the overt war, from the Iranian perspective, is over," Morell, now a CBS News senior contributor, said on "CBS This Morning." "I think direct attacks from Iran on American forces are over for now, depending on what the president does."

However, the covert war is not over, said Morrell. 

"I still think that down the road we'll see an Iranian terrorist attack against a senior official," said Morell. "I think you can parse their language into two buckets, covert and overt."

Morrell added that he is sure there were no U.S. casualties, despite reporting out of Iran claiming that lives were taken. 

"We would be hearing from the U.S. military if there were casualties, no doubt about it," said Morell. "I would believe what they were telling us. I think what we see in Iran is them saying 'we hit back, and we hit hard, and there were casualties,' and that allows them to de-escalate."

However, he said he also thinks Iran is sending a message that in terms of direct attacks, "this is done for now."

What happens next will depend on President Donald Trump's response, said Morell, conceding that the missile attacks aimed at Iraqi bases where Americans were stationed "fits his red line" that threatened action if Iran attacks American bases or Americans. 

However, Trump's tweet declaring that "all is well" after the strikes suggests that "maybe he wants to de-escalate," said Morell.

"What he has to say this morning will be incredibly important as to the next steps," said Morrell. "We have an opportunity for the president to say they threw their best punch at us and, you know, we took it without any casualties. So, there's an opportunity here for both sides to de-escalate."

However, Morell said he does not think Iran took its best shot against the United States by firing just 15 missiles from its massive arsenal. 

"The small number of missiles is very interesting to me," said Morell. "The Iranians have thousands of missiles. The fact that they only did a dozen signals to me that they wanted to be proportional here, they wanted to send a message they don't want to escalate."

He added that he hopes Trump's cabinet is giving him advice that there remains an opportunity to step back from the "precipice of war," and to "call it even" while looking for an opportunity through an intermediary to say "we came close to a war. It's time to sit down and negotiate what our future relationship would look like."

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