Elbridge Colby, the nominee for undersecretary of defense for policy, said at his Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing on Tuesday that he now views a nuclear-armed Iran as an “existential” threat to the United States homeland and said he would provide military options to the administration to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon if necessary.

Colby also sought to distance himself from Michael DiMino, who prompted alarm among supporters of Israel after being named deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East.

Colby’s comments suggest he’s backtracking on his past views that the U.S. could contain a nuclear-armed Iran, and that the consequences of striking Iran to eliminate its nuclear program would be worse than those of Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon, which had raised serious concerns for Senate Republicans. 

But when pressed in detail about his past comments, Colby also tried to justify them by arguing he was merely pushing back against what he viewed as an overly hawkish consensus at the time. And he underscored, later in the hearing, that the Trump administration’s goal is to reach a “trust-but-verify negotiated agreement” with Iran — with a military option available.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), a skeptic of Colby’s nomination, questioned Colby on his views towards Iran, saying he had concerns about Colby’s past comments and that they were inconsistent with the administration’s policy. 

Pressed by Cotton on whether he considers a nuclear-armed Iran to be an “existential danger to us …  not just a ‘severe danger,’ as you said in response to Sen. Gillibrand or a ‘significant one’ as you said in your written answers,” Colby said he agreed.

“Yes, a nuclear-armed Iran — especially, Senator, given that … we know they’ve worked on ICBM-range capabilities and other capabilities that would pose an existential danger to the United States,” Colby said.

He said that it was consistent with his understanding that Iran’s nuclear program poses an immediate danger to Israel and U.S. Arab allies and that Iran would have the capabilities to strike the continental United States within a few years.

Colby agreed, when asked by Cotton, that if diplomacy with Iran fails and the U.S.’ only options are a military strike to prevent Iran from nuclearizing or allowing the nuclear program to proceed and hoping that it can be contained, he would provide the administration with credible military options to eliminate Iran’s nuclear program. 

At his confirmation hearing for a top Pentagon post, @ElbridgeColby said he now views a nuclear-armed Iran as an “existential” threat to the United States homeland and said he would provide military options to the administration to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon if… pic.twitter.com/1EtVQEnQ4u

— Jewish Insider (@J_Insider) March 4, 2025

“I believe we should not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon and if confirmed I would believe it’s my responsibility to provide credible good military options,” he said later, responding to Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK).

Pressed by Sullivan, Colby provided an evasive response about his past accommodationist rhetoric about Iran.

“I would say a lot of what I was arguing against at the time, these conversations 15 years ago, a lot of the opponents I felt had a casual or in some cases even flippant attitude towards the employment of military force,” Colby said. “That’s a lot of what I was arguing against. Was my wording always appropriate, was my precise framing always appropriate? No.”

"Was my wording always appropriate, was my precise framing always appropriate? No."

At his confirmation hearing, @ElbridgeColby responded to questions from @SenDanSullivan about his past statements on Iran having nuclear weapons.

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— Jewish Insider (@J_Insider) March 5, 2025

In an exchange with Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), Colby said that his “advocacy and commentary especially as a public intellectual, if you will, was pushing back against a lot of people who frankly I would say were quite cavalier about the employment of military force.”

He added that the current U.S. leadership “understand that we need to be militarily strong, but also understand the downside risks of the deployment of military force, it needs to be rational.”

In an exchange with @SenRickScott during his confirmation hearing, @ElbridgeColby said his “advocacy and commentary especially as a public intellectual… was pushing back against a lot of people who frankly I would say were quite cavalier about the employment of military force.”… pic.twitter.com/NjjyzgxdET

— Jewish Insider (@J_Insider) March 4, 2025

Colby said he agreed with Cotton that military options must go beyond providing Israel with certain bombs and leaving it to take out the Iranian nuclear program. 

Asked by Cotton if one option could be allowing Israel to use advanced U.S. bombers, refueling tankers and heavy bombs to strike Iran, Colby said, “I wouldn’t want to get ahead of the president on specific decisions, but I think those are the kinds of things that should be absolutely part of the discussion … and those would be the kinds of things that I would raise for the consideration of the secretary of defense and the president.”

Again prompted by Cotton, Colby said that having credible military options on the table could make it easier to achieve a viable nuclear deal with Iran. Cotton, the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, also indicated during his questioning that he’d be open to a nuclear deal with Iran that fully dismantled Iran’s nuclear program. 

Cotton recalled that, in his written answers provided prior to the hearing, Colby had said “the United States should deny Iran from gaining a nuclear weapon.

Outside the hearing room, Vice President J.D. Vance, who introduced Colby, told Jewish Insider that the administration’s policy is “extremely clear, that we cannot tolerate nuclear proliferation, especially in Iran.”

“The president has been very clear he doesn’t want to tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran,” Vance said. “I don’t know what Mr. Colby has written in the past, but I’ll say that every single person that we nominate to a position is going to have at least one thing that they disagree with the president about. That’s okay.”

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the committee’s chairman, began his questioning of Colby by asking about DiMino, underscoring Republican concerns about the top Middle East official and the way that the selection of DiMino — seen as a Colby acolyte in isolationist foreign policy circles — has colored Colby’s confirmation proceedings.

Colby denied he was responsible for hiring DiMino and rejected DiMino’s view that the U.S. does not have any critical interests in the Middle East, saying that is not consistent with the administration’s policy.

“He does not speak for me and I think I have a number of views that differ materially from his, from what I understand, just in public reporting,” Colby said of DiMino.

He similarly distanced himself from Andrew Byers, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for South and Southeast Asia, who has advocated for a dovish approach toward China.

Wicker asked Colby if it was correct that Colby had “made no determination as to whether” either man “would be retained in those positions” — suggesting that they could be fired once he takes office.

“As part of not presuming, my understanding is that I should not be even thinking in that way,” Colby said. “What I would say is that, if confirmed, I would obviously be only one person in a chain …  but what I would commit to you is that anybody in my organization, if I’m confirmed, should be in line with the president’s agenda.”

The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations had urged senators on the committee to question Colby about his views on Iran and about DiMino at his confirmation hearing.

Sullivan told JI after the hearing that he had had “very frank discussions” with Colby ahead of the hearing about Iran and his past views, and said he believed Colby “answered sincerely.”

“When you’re what I would call a public intellectual, when you write a lot over 20 years, there are things that you write about that maybe aren’t always your later views,” Sullivan said.

He added that it was “important”  that Colby addressed his own personal views on the situation and that they are now in line with the administration’s policy. “I don’t want you to say, ‘I support this because the president supports it.’ I want you to say ‘I support this because I personally believe it. That’s very different,” Sullivan said.

But asked whether he’s “happy” with where Colby stands on the Iran issue at this point, Sullivan responded, “I’m not sure happy, but I thought it was a good hearing and an important hearing.”

At other points during the hearing, Colby reiterated his view that the U.S. lacks the capability to fight wars in multiple theaters at the same time, saying that his approach to Iran hinges on the U.S.’ limited capabilities. He repeatedly praised Israel as a “model ally,” and said the U.S. should work to bolster it and Arab allies so that they are better able to counter Iran on their own.

“My view, Senator, just to be very clear, is not that we should ignore the Middle East or that we should totally get out of the Middle East,” he said. “I’m baseline-ing off of the reality that I think all of us, candidly, must baseline off of, which is that we don’t have a multi-war military,” going on to emphasize China’s plans and ambitions to invade Taiwan.

Colby said he’s a “really big fan” of the Abraham Accords, which he described as “part of the solution … if not exclusively so” for countering Iran’s regional ambitions and proxy forces, and said he would support efforts to bring Saudi Arabia into the Abraham Accords and enhance regional military integration and cooperation.

Colby added that the U.S. should “remove the bear hug” that the Biden administration had placed on Israel, attempting to exert control on Israel’s military actions. He praised Israel’s moves against Hezbollah, Iran and Hamas, saying that the results had been strongly in the U.S.’ interest.