Ted Snider
Donald Trump’s
unexpected answer on Sunday to an interviewer’s question has thrown his
administration’s nuclear negotiations with Iran into confusion.
U.S. President
Donald Trump has consistently said that negotiations with Iran over its nuclear
program are limited to preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon: “You
know, it’s not a complicated formula. Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.” But
in an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press, when the interviewer asked Trump, “Is
the goal of these talks limiting Iran’s nuclear program or total
dismantlement?” Trump answered, “Total disarmament.”
There has been
disagreement in the Trump team over, not just the goal of negotiations with
Iran, but, more fundamentally, over negotiating with Iran. National Security
Advisor Mike Waltz advocated for a military path, while Director of National
Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Vice
President JD Vance advocated for caution. Vance urged fully exploring talks
before settling for a military solution. Trump sided with the diplomacy camp,
believing that “we can make a deal without the attack.”
According to
reporting by The Washington Post, Trump fired Waltz as National Security
Advisor because he opposed Trump and “wanted to take U.S. policy in a direction
Trump wasn’t comfortable with because the U.S. hadn’t attempted a diplomatic
solution.” Waltz maintained that “the time was ripe to strike Iran.”
Having agreed
on the diplomatic path, there appeared to be confusion over the goal of
diplomacy. Waltz said that the U.S. is demanding “full dismantlement,” and
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said that “a Trump deal” means “Iran must
stop and eliminate its nuclear enrichment and weaponization program.” But these
statements had been at odds with Trump’s more limited stated goal. Until
Sunday.
If there was a
lack of clarity in America’s goals in negotiating, there was no ambiguity in
Iran’s. Iran wanted a deal that the U.S. couldn’t walk away from, as they
walked away from the previous 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement, and they wanted
negotiations to lead to three things.
The first is
that negotiations have to lead to a cessation of U.S. threats of a military
solution. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian had made it clear that “the
language of threats and coercion is absolutely unacceptable… It is unacceptable
for someone to come along and say, ‘Don’t do this, don’t do that, or else.’ I
won’t come to negotiate with you.”
The second is
that negotiations have to lead the complete lifting of sanctions.
The third is
that, while Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has fully empowered
his team to negotiate, he has placed the firm limit that Iran will not
negotiate “the full dismantling of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.”
The
American-Iranian talks were showing signs of success. Iran called the first
round “constructive” and “respectful.” The U.S. called it “constructive” and
“positive.” The first round led to a second, which led to an agreement to begin
work on a framework for a potential deal and a third round of talks.
Then a flurry
of confusing and contradictory statements made by U.S. officials in the past
few days began to derail the talks.
First, Pete
Hegseth returned to the language of threats. Referring to Yemen’s Houthi
attacking vessels in the Red Sea, Hegseth “warned” Iran, “You know very well
what the U.S. Military is capable of… You will pay the CONSEQUENCE at the time
and place of our choosing.” From Iran’s perspective, what is the point in
negotiating limits on your civilian nuclear program to avoid U.S. bombs if the
U.S. is going to bomb you anyway for another purpose?
Then Trump
returned to the threat of sanctions, posting that “Any Country or person who
buys ANY AMOUNT of OIL or PETROCHEMICALS from Iran will be subject to,
immediately, Secondary Sanctions. They will not be allowed to do business with
the United States of America in any way, shape, or form.”
Following those
two statements, the fourth round of scheduled talks between the U.S. and Iran
were postponed. They were allegedly postponed “[f]or logistical reasons.”
However, a senior Iranian official said that “U.S. sanctions on Iran during the
nuclear talks are not helping the sides to resolve the nuclear dispute through
diplomacy” and that “[d]epending on the U.S. approach, the date of the next
round of talks will be announced.”
Then came the
unexpected threat to future talks. Trump told Meet the Press that the talks are
not negotiating what the Iranians thought they were negotiating. The U.S. he
said, is not negotiating verifiable limits on Iran’s civilian nuclear program,
it is demanding “total dismantlement” of Iran’s nuclear program.
“That’s all
you’ll accept?” the interviewer clarified. “Yeah, that’s all I’d accept,” Trump
confirmed.
The interviewer
then, wrongly, suggested that Trump’s statement was inconsistent with Marco
Rubio, his Secretary of State’s, suggestion that the U.S. “would accept… a
peaceful, civilian nuclear program.”
Trump’s
statement is not inconsistent with Rubio’s, though, because Rubio’s statement
that Iran can have a civilian nuclear program by importing uranium enriched up
to 3.67 percent but no longer by enriching their own, is consistent with
Trump’s statement that Iran would have to dismantle its enrichment capability.
Though Trump’s
statement may not be inconsistent with Rubio’s, it did, at this point, become a
little confused with itself. Trump suggested that Iran has no need of a
civilian nuclear program “to make electricity” because “they have so much oil,
what do they need it for.” Trump then, confusingly repeated his earlier
formulation, saying, “The only thing they can’t have is a nuclear weapon.” He
said, “I think that I would be open to hearing” about a civilian nuclear
program to generate energy before seemingly shutting it down again with the
observation that “civilian energy often leads to military wars.”
The recent U.S.
return to military threats and sanctions are not helping negotiations that
seemed to be on a path to possible success. Trump’s latest remark that Iran has
to fully dismantle its civilian nuclear program and stop all enrichment appears
to take away any motivation for Iran to negotiate. Since Trump has said that
“If they don’t make a deal, there will be bombing,” it is imperative to clarify
the confusion and the positions and get the fourth round of talks back on
schedule.
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