2026-02-16T07:37:12+00:00
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Shafaq News
For more than two decades, negotiations
between the United States and Iran have followed a familiar cycle: escalation,
talks, temporary calm, then renewed confrontation. Despite repeated diplomatic
efforts, in Baghdad, Geneva, Vienna, Doha, and most recently Muscat, lasting
breakthroughs have remained elusive.
The latest Oman talks may also fit
squarely within this pattern. The persistent failure of these negotiations is
not rooted in poor diplomacy or lack of channels, but in deeper structural
contradictions that repeatedly undermine any progress. At the core of the
impasse lies a basic mismatch in how Washington and Tehran define the problem.
Washington approaches negotiations with Iran as a “comprehensive security
challenge.”
Over time, US demands have expanded well
beyond the nuclear file to include Iran’s ballistic missile program, its support
for armed groups across Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, and, increasingly, its
internal governance and human rights record. From the American perspective,
these issues are “interconnected” and cannot be meaningfully separated.
Iran, by contrast, views negotiations
almost exclusively through the lens of sanctions relief. Iranian officials
insist that talks focus solely on the nuclear program, arguing that missiles,
regional alliances, and domestic politics fall under national sovereignty and
defensive necessity.
This divergence means both sides often
enter negotiations with incompatible agendas, reducing talks to crisis
management rather than conflict resolution. Iran’s leverage does not primarily
rest on its nuclear program, but on capabilities it consistently refuses to
negotiate: its missile arsenal and its regional network of allied armed groups.
Iran possesses one of the largest ballistic missile inventories in the Middle
East, while its regional partners have demonstrated the ability to strike US assets
and allies across multiple theaters since 2019. These tools form the backbone
of Tehran’s deterrence strategy. From Iran’s perspective, surrendering them in
exchange for sanctions relief -which can be reversed- would amount to strategic
disarmament.
Read more: US-Israel threats to Iran: can mediators avert 2025 war?
The calculus explains why Iranian
negotiators may have consistently rejected efforts to “broaden” talks. Even
when agreements are reached, they suffer from a credibility deficit. The 2015
nuclear agreement demonstrated that Iran could meet technical obligations: IAEA
monitoring confirmed compliance for nearly three years. Yet the US withdrawal
in 2018 reinforced Tehran’s belief that American commitments are subject to
electoral cycles, not binding state policy. The asymmetry is central and seen
when Iran is repeatedly asked to make long-term, technically irreversible
concessions, while sanctions relief remains politically reversible in
Washington. This experience has hardened Iran’s negotiating posture,
particularly as US sanctions now number in the thousands, affecting banking,
energy exports, shipping, and currency access. Both sides have
institutionalized escalation as a negotiating tool. Iran has responded to
diplomatic pressure by raising uranium enrichment levels, from the JCPOA cap of
3.67% to levels exceeding 60%, while also regional tensions rise through its
allied groups. The United States, meanwhile, has relied on economic sanctions,
military deployments, and explicit threats to extract concessions. Over time,
this dynamic has normalized brinkmanship.
Talks are often triggered not by trust,
but by fear of uncontrolled escalation. Once immediate pressure subsides,
incentives to compromise fade. Recent military strikes in the 12-day June 2025
war and explicit threats have further complicated diplomacy. Talks conducted
under the shadow of force rarely produce flexibility. Instead, they strengthen
hardliners, narrow political space for compromise, and frame negotiations as
acts of resistance rather than problem-solving. In Iran’s case, external
pressure has reinforced the narrative that “deterrence, not accommodation,
guarantees survival.” This framing limits political room for compromise and
turns negotiations into symbols of resistance rather than instruments of
resolution.
Confrontation itself serves domestic
political purposes on both sides. In Washington, a hard line on Iran signals
resolve to allies and voters. In Tehran, sustained external hostility helps
justify internal controls, deflect economic grievances, and consolidate power
within security institutions. Periods of heightened tension often coincide with
greater political influence for security bodies inside Iran.
Peace, by contrast, removes a useful
external adversary and introduces domestic political risk. US–Iran talks rarely
fail because diplomacy is insufficient. They fail because the underlying
conflict remains strategically useful and structurally unresolved. The only
period of genuine progress came when negotiations were narrowly focused,
regional issues were deferred, and sanctions relief was clearly defined. Absent
a fundamental shift -either a willingness by Iran to negotiate its broader
power or an ability by the United States to offer lasting economic
normalization- talks will continue to manage tension rather than resolve it. In
this sense, recurring negotiations are mechanisms designed to prevent
confrontation from spiraling out of control, not signs of imminent peace.
Read more: US, Israel, and Iran step up military readiness as regional tensions grow
Written and edited by Shafaq News staff.
