Ariel E. Levite
For the United States, Iran, and Israel a negotiated deal is a far better outcome than preventive war or nuclear proliferation.
Several short rounds of US-Iran nuclear negotiations have sufficed to demonstrate that a great deal is not in the cards, certainly not soon. But not all is lost if we consider a creative way to bridge the gap between the negotiating goals all key parties have set for themselves.
President Trump aims for a perfect agreement in which Iran’s nuclear weapons program is fully dismantled—an achievement that eluded President Barack Obama. Such a deal would ensue now only because Trump dared to apply maximum pressure on the Ayatollahs, threatening them with a military attack while also extending them a generous diplomatic hand.
He aims for an accord that would win him a Nobel Peace Prize for averting war and burnish his credentials as the master negotiator and peacemaker. Operationally, he seeks an accord that the Europeans could not claim credit for, one that Congressional hawks would endorse and even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would not dare undermine.
The Iranians, on the other hand, harbor serious misgivings about the United States in general and President Trump in particular as a negotiating partner. Yet, they are now weak militarily, feeble economically, and bereft of their traditional proxies like Hezbollah that would have dissuaded and retaliated against US-Israeli military action.
Accordingly, Iran’s leadership has grudgingly agreed to “indirect negotiations” in order to end the stifling sanctions. Above all, they fear an economic meltdown, an uprising, a war, or normalization with the West that could spell the end of the Islamic regime. Toward these ends, they are determined to preserve Iran’s nuclear option and power projection capabilities like ballistic missiles and regional proxies.
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