The Trump administration will enter direct nuclear negotiations with Iran this weekend in Oman with a seemingly endless list of high-stakes questions in play, starting with whether the U.S. will push for the full dismantlement of Iran’s plutonium production and uranium enrichment programs or accept something short of that.
Should the Trump administration roll back Iran’s ballistic missile program? Is Tehran’s financial support for terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah and the Yemen-based Houthi rebels on the table? Or its provision of drones to Russia for its war in Ukraine?
Could the White House aim for a deal so sweeping, perhaps with highly lucrative financial incentives through the lifting of sanctions and potential U.S. investment in Iran, that it could chip away at Tehran’s deepening military and economic alignment with Russia, China and North Korea as part of the “axis of authoritarians?”
Foreign policy analysts are split on what kind of agreement President Trump can secure, how aggressive he should be with his goals and whether engaging with Tehran’s theocratic regime is worthwhile. So far, little is in the way of a clear framework guiding the negotiations other than this core principle: The administration insists Iran cannot and will not acquire a nuclear bomb.
For Mr. Trump personally, it’s another opportunity for the kind of outside-the-box diplomacy he relishes. No matter how thorny the issue or how distasteful the actors on the other side of the table, the president has repeatedly demonstrated a willingness to talk with adversaries and shown a belief that he, more than any other leader in the free world, can make monumental deals on the most complex and dangerous of geopolitical playing fields.
In a best-case scenario this time, some specialists say, Mr. Trump must accept a limited deal that constrains Iran’s nuclear program but keeps some economic sanctions in place because Tehran will likely be unwilling to end its material support for terrorist groups.
“I would leave missiles out but try to maximize restraints on all nuclear activities permanently in exchange for lifting of most sanctions,” said Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow and director of research in foreign policy at the Brookings Institution.
“It would be ideal to limit [or] stop terrorism, but that may be a bridge too far. Hence, there is a likely need to retain some sanctions even in a very good deal on the nukes,” he told The Washington Times.
It’s not clear what the talks will involve. Mr. Trump has said his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, will meet face-to-face with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.
“A lot of people say, ‘Oh, maybe you’re going through surrogates or you’re not dealing directly. You’re dealing through other countries.’ No, we’re dealing with them directly,” Mr. Trump said earlier this week.
Iranian officials have said they would prefer indirect talks, likely involving an Omani delegation acting as go-betweens for the U.S. and Iranian sides. The White House reportedly is considering postponing the talks if Tehran doesn’t agree to direct, face-to-face negotiations.
The Trump administration is flexing its muscles. The Treasury on Wednesday announced fresh economic sanctions targeting five entities and one individual that procure or manufacture technologies related to Iran’s nuclear program, the administration said.
How far to push?
Mr. Trump has made clear his desire to solve major crises through dealmaking with Iran and in talks with other U.S. adversaries such as North Korea and Russia. He kick-started negotiations with Iran by sending a March letter directly to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
It was a remarkable step by historical and personal standards. The U.S. hasn’t had direct diplomatic relations with Iran since 1980. During Mr. Trump’s first term, the two countries nearly went to all-out war after a U.S. airstrike killed Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and a key figure in Iran’s “axis of resistance,” its network of deadly proxy groups across the Middle East.
To justify this round of diplomatic outreach, Mr. Trump will need to show a much stronger deal than the one struck by President Obama, the 2015 pact known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA.
During his first term, Mr. Trump pulled the U.S. out of that agreement. He argued that it did not go far enough to rein in Iran’s nuclear program, left open pathways for Iran to acquire a bomb and did not address Tehran’s decades-long support for terrorist groups targeting the U.S. and Israel, among other deficiencies.
Since then, Iran has expanded its support for terrorist groups, including Hamas, which attacked Israel in 2023, and Yemen’s Houthi rebels, who have targeted commercial and U.S. military ships in the Red Sea over the past 18 months.
Tehran also is accelerating its nuclear program. Analysts generally agree that Iran is racing ahead with its uranium enrichment efforts to the point that it could build a nuclear weapon in a matter of days.
Iran’s ballistic missile program also has drastically expanded. It is now believed to have more than 3,000 weapons.
All those elements could be on the table. Some scholars argue that the U.S. should insist that Iran end its military support for Russia and immediately stop any nuclear and missile cooperation with China, Russia, North Korea and other U.S. adversaries.
In a recent comprehensive analysis, researchers at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies argued that Iran’s access to nuclear fuel should be all but eliminated and that the International Atomic Energy Agency must have unprecedented access to the country.
“Iran must allow the full, permanent, and verifiable dismantlement, export, or in-place destruction of its uranium, plutonium, and heavy water production assets and associated equipment; verified strict limitations on the import of reactor fuel to run permitted research reactors; required export of spent reactor fuel; the permanent and verifiable prohibition on Iran’s reconstitution of uranium conversion and enrichment and plutonium production and reprocessing capabilities; and permanent IAEA monitoring of Iran’s uranium mines, mills, and ore processing facilities and activities,” reads the analysis, written by FDD senior fellow Orde Kittrie, Iran program senior director Behnam Ben Taleblu and nonproliferation and biodefense program deputy director Andrea Stricker.
