-Analysis-
The end of Joe Biden’s presidency is just days away, after four years of making a key foreign policy priority the opening of dialogue with Iran’s regime and reviving the 2015 nuclear pact. As events have shown, especially since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, the Democrats failed in their goal of curbing Middle East tensions by sitting down and talking with the Islamic Republic of Iran, which was itself a chief source and fomenter of those tensions.
It certainly wasn’t for lack of goodwill toward a regime that has consistently, and vociferously, voiced its hostility toward the United States, Israel and the West for more than four decades. Just six months into the Biden presidency, there was even talk of delisting the Iranian Revolutionary Guards as international terrorists.
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President Joe Biden and his team turned a blind eye to Iran’s sanctions-skirting, making little effort in any case to enforce the oil sanctions imposed on Iran. Wherever they could, with the excuse of freeing hostages held in Iran or somewhere, or avoiding some would-be “escalation,” they made concessions to the mullahs and the Revolutionary Guards — to little avail as far as their objectives were concerned. Because all this merely emboldened the Tehran regime and its regional proxies to pass into offensive mode. One of them launched its brazen attack on Israel in October 2023 while soon afterwards, the Tehran regime itself launched two unprecedented, even foolhardy missile waves toward Israeli territory.
Certainly, the Biden administration was a blessing for the Islamic Republic. In spite of the regime’s fierce repression of a nationwide revolt in late 2022, and sending guns and money to regional militias — and drones to Russia — and conniving in hit-and-run attacks on U.S. forces stationed in the region, the administration still let it smuggle oil and gas to keep itself afloat. It was even opposed to any talk of military action against the regime.
Today, this regime is grappling with a range of domestic, foreign, economic and financial challenges, and must soon deal with its ‘resurrected’ nemesis, incoming President Donald Trump. Not for nothing given its present weakness, it is reported to have sought contacts with Trump aides, though broadly neutral channels like Oman or Japan.
Revenge for Suleimani?
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also stated on January 3, while traveling to China, that Iran was ready for unconditional talks concerning its contested nuclear program — a decades-long headache for the West. He told Chinese television Iran was willing to return to the ‘formula’ of the first nuclear pact, ditched by the first Trump administration, involving allowing verifications of its program in return for an end to economic sanctions.
The regime needs to talk to the Trump administration
Iran, he said, would take the necessary decisions based on the Trump administration’s conduct, once in office. The diplomatic channel would not in any case close regarding its nuclear program, he stated.
Clearly, the regime needs to talk to the Trump administration, though it is not yet clear how Trump will treat it. Ali Larijani, a senior foreign-policy aide to the Supreme leader Ali Khamanei, indirectly sent him a message, speaking to a local channel in late November. In so many words, he said, Iran would forego the nuclear bomb if America accepted its conditions.
Inside Iran there is also uncertainty: while some fervent regime hands and Revolutionary Guards want Trump punished for ordering the slaying of the senior guards general Qasem Suleimani in 2020, other establishment figures are saying the regime must talk with the Americans. The very conservative Kayhan newspaper in Tehran, reputed to mouth the Leader’s own opinions, has meanwhile warned that “America’s aim in any negotiations is to restrain Iran, not lift sanctions.”
Trigger mechanism
In late 2024, as Western states hardened their stances and upped pressures over Iran’s program, the regime began revving up its uranium enrichment activities at two sites. This suggests both sides may be heading toward the “trigger mechanism” foreseen in the 2015 pact, which could take Iran’s dossier to the UN Security Council and reimpose all UN sanctions imposed on Iran before 2015.
Araghchi warned that would surely “redirect” Iran toward a nuclear bomb, though the bigger menace of sanctions was for Iran’s semi-comatose economy.
Observers can only speculate for now how Trump and the Iranian regime will resume their fraught relations. Will the second Trump administration give it weeks or months, before taking drastic action? Will it seek the harshest conditions for a deal Tehran cannot refuse?
The regime is weakened but always flexible.
As for Tehran, can it still play its usual cards to threaten and blackmail the West, like using its proxies to strike at targets, kidnappings and phony arrests or the threat of more and faster enrichment? Can it do any of these in the aftermath of recent Israeli strikes?
Diplomatic window
Certain observers believe the Trump administration may allow a six to nine-month diplomatic window, recalling how the first administration ditched the 2015 pact after 17 months of trying to “talk sense” into the regime.
The Iranian regime is weakened but as always, flexible. Its refusal to go to war with Israel as it proceeded to pummel Hamas and Hezbollah is just one example of its ability to keep a low profile, when it has to.
Trump is not the only unpredictable element.
It is a past master at buying time, exploiting Western reluctance to act against it — and soon perhaps, Trump’s aversion to military operations and his reputed unpredictability. Is it hoping the threat of ‘maximum pressure’ will simply dissipate in time, like the promise of ending the Ukraine war overnight?
But Trump is not the only unpredictable element. There is also Israel under Benjamn Netanyahu, loath to see the mullahs take the West for another ride, and millions of exasperated Iranians, who may not tolerate another administration’s worth of beatings, hangings and widespread poverty and despair.
