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First of all, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is not going to sit down for a 20-minute interview with Mike Wallace without explicit permission from the White House, if not actually at the White House's direction. Also, he clearly had been made aware of what to say and what not to say during the interview.

I saw the entire interview. As usual, the MSM (Reuters in this case) ignored the points the Admiral was really making, and pulled a quote out of context that they could use to further their anti-war, anti-US-military cause.

The Admiral was clearly there to present the Administration's position on the Iran situation, i.e., that Iran would be very dangerous with nuclear weapons, and must not be allowed to get them. He also made clear that Iran was not expected to tamely submit, and there would be considerable 'blowback', as he put it, in the middle east and other places around the world. That was the statement Reuters cherry-picked to mention. But there was no backing away from the need to neutralize Iran. He was just making the point that it wouldn't without cost.

He also successfully resisted attempts by Wallace to get him the comment on political or election matters.

All in all an interesting interview, delivered by a very bright man, unquestionably operating under orders from the White House.