Brent Sadler, a senior fellow for naval warfare at The Heritage Foundation, said Tuesday that Iran‘s rulers could be engaged in a “good cop-bad cop” scheme aimed at threatening Washington into making concessions in the nuclear talks or face retaliation from Iranian hardliners and the IRGCN. “It could be an effort to try and say, ‘If you don’t deal with the ‘moderate faction,’ you’re going to have to deal with these crazies over here,’” said Mr. Sadler, a retired U.S. Navy captain. At the Pentagon on Tuesday, Defense Department spokesman John Kirby said officials remain troubled by the weekend incident in which IRGCN vessels launched a high-speed charge at the guided-missile submarine U.S.S. Georgia and its protective screen of U.S. Navy and Coast Guard ships.