Pakistan’s effort to revive the Islamabad U.S.-Iran talks that fell apart over the weekend has largely faced a cool reception from the Trump administration. Nonetheless, if those talks resume, Vice President J.D. Vance has made clear that America is focused on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. As he told Fox News this week, America’s redlines in the negotiation flow from the “fundamental premise” that Iran can never possess an atomic bomb.
This goal is understandable. There is still around 1,000 pounds of highly enriched uranium trapped beneath the rubble of what used to be Iranian nuclear facilities. And even though the war has set Iran’s regime back several years from acquiring an apocalyptic arsenal, the stakes are as high as they get. If Iran gains nuclear weapons, the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism will have acquired a nuclear umbrella to protect its armies and many proxies from retaliation.
All that said, President Donald Trump should aim higher than just another nuclear deal that eventually expires. Trump should also demand that Iran’s regime respect the lives and security of its own citizens.
Iran’s nuclear program (with the exception of an unfinished facility known as Pickaxe Mountain) is almost entirely demolished. It’s possible the regime may seek to rebuild, but that will be an expensive and arduous task for a mafia state that is on its back. In other words, there is time to neutralize, either diplomatically or militarily, the Iranian nuclear threat down the road. A more pressing concern is the regime’s survival and whether it will stay in power through another massacre when and if Iranians take to the streets again, as they did three months ago.
