Beware, Mr. Trump: Iran’s Nuclear Game Has Entered Another Loop of Strategic Deception

–Analysis–

Iran’s nuclear program has entered a new phase in its repetitive cycle of negotiations. Ali Shamkhani, senior political advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, recently tweeted: “Washington has finally accepted, based on the IAEA’s assessment and its own intelligence agencies, that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons. Both sides are determined to stay on the right path of negotiations.”

This past week, speaking during his tour of Gulf states, U.S. President Donald Trump said Tehran had agreed to Washington’s conditions. “I think we’re getting close to maybe doing a deal,” he told reporters.

Regardless of how genuine this optimism may be — on both sides — Shamkhani’s statement reflects a deeper mechanism of deception embedded in Tehran’s grand security strategy. A first clue is his invocation of IAEA reports.

Yes, the Iranian regime is advancing its nuclear weapons ambitions with strategic cunning. It is doing so following two parallel tracks: on one, it avoids the straightforward path to weaponization; while pursuing the alternative route — focused on weapon testing and verifying reliability — that is fraught with technical challenges. Tehran prefers to covertly advance this route under the guise of space research until it reaches a reliable threshold.

A diplomatic tool

For years, Iran has exploited the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as a diplomatic tool to legitimize its nuclear activities, which are intrinsically tied to the regime’s survival. While IAEA reports are generally precise and professionally conducted, Iran manipulates technical configurations prior to inspections to mislead the West. In doing so, the regime uses legal frameworks to pursue unlawful goals.

One notable example occurred in 2001 when the regime, in what amounted to a betrayal of Iran’s national security, deliberately imported second-hand enrichment centrifuges — likely from Pakistan. In 2003, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) conducted environmental sampling at Iran’s enrichment facilities. The analysis detected traces of uranium enriched up to 80% purity—far above the level required for civilian nuclear applications.

While the IAEA did not attribute this directly to Iran’s enrichment activities, Iranian officials claimed the contamination was the result of imported second-hand centrifuges. Nevertheless, the incident raised serious concerns within the international community, as such enrichment levels are consistent with weapons-grade uranium.

Even though the IAEA’s findings were accurate, the contamination was intentionally engineered by Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization to achieve two objectives: first, to distract the West with concerns over secret underground facilities, and second, to divert attention while it completed major surface-level projects like the Isfahan UF6 gas plant, the Natanz enrichment complex, the Arak heavy-water reactor, and the Fordow site.

By fabricating such suspicions, the regime effectively buys time.

Eventually, the IAEA reported that the high-enrichment findings were likely due to contamination rather than actual enrichment efforts within Iran. By fabricating such suspicions, the regime effectively buys time — as the IAEA often requires years to resolve these ambiguities, as seen in reports GOV/2003/75 and GOV/2015/68—and simultaneously exploits the eventual clearance to gain international trust.

A deceptive system

This is precisely why Shamkhani references IAEA reports to portray Tehran’s nuclear activities as peaceful. At its core, the Islamic Republic of Iran operates as a deceptive system. Its tactic of generating artificial crises, then diffusing them to appear cooperative, serves as both a trust-building tool and a way to cast itself as a victim.

The United States must exercise heightened vigilance. Engaging in negotiations with Tehran equates to legitimizing a regime whose foundational DNA is rooted in terrorism and internal repression. Even the strongest nuclear deal would ultimately amount to providing Tehran with time and resources to further its destructive agenda.

Tehran’s ambitions are enmeshed with a broader Kremlin strategy to reshape the Middle East power balance.

Moreover, no nuclear agreement is likely to succeed, because Tehran’s ambitions are enmeshed with a broader Kremlin strategy to reshape the Middle East power balance. In this context, Iran’s nuclear program can be viewed as an extension of Putin’s regional leverage. As I detail in my article, IRI is neither able to align with the West nor to resist it independently.

This may explain the recent four-hour conversation between Mr. Vitekoff and President Putin, which occurred just before the first round of Iran-U.S. talks in Oman. It is reasonable to interpret this timing as the White House recognizing that Tehran’s nuclear card is effectively in Putin’s hands.

Veteran negotiators

Trump and other American officials must understand that the Tehran regime is not part of the solution for Middle East stability — it is the primary source of instability. Disorder is not a byproduct but a core tenet of its ideological governance model. Therefore, real security in the Middle East requires a fundamental regime change in Iran — dismantling the regime’s ideological foundation cloaked in religious garb.

This asymmetry increases the risk of a weak and flawed agreement.

Without this, even the dismantling of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure would be insufficient. In time, decommissioning its military and oil facilities may also become necessary — an exponentially more difficult path.

A major concern is the presence of veteran Iranian negotiators with over two decades of nuclear diplomacy experience, unmatched by their American counterparts. This asymmetry increases the risk of a weak and flawed agreement, a fear shared by experts and the informed public alike.

So far, President Trump’s administration has made clear efforts toward stabilizing the region. But it must realize that its true partner in this endeavor is not the aging leadership of the Islamic Republic — but rather the 80 million Iranians who seek regime change.