As the third round of negotiations between the US, the world powers and Iran were expected to restart on Tuesday, two seemingly contradictory trends clouded the future.
However, underlying the contradictions, a deal is forming, but the ambiguity has more to do with timing than with the final result.
The contradictions are that every external event – no matter how extreme – seems to be unable to phase the Biden administration’s march forward toward a return to the 2015 nuclear deal.
However, at the same time, no matter how much closer the US seems to get to a deal, diplomatic officials keep tossing out the phrase “a long way to go” in terms of consummating anything.
A major external event was an operation on April 11, reportedly by the Mossad, sabotaging the Islamic Republic’s most important nuclear facility, at Natanz, and potentially causing a delay of several months toward their uranium-enrichment efforts. This could have given Washington leverage.
Tehran’s jump to 60% uranium enrichment on April 15 could have given the US pause about continuing negotiations until this extreme violation was stopped.
Monday’s leak of Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif making a variety of provocative statements undermining himself, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, former US secretary of state John Kerry and Russia was another case in point. It could have led to demands for clarifications about whether the negotiators in Vienna have authority to make a deal.
Yet, in responding to crisis after crisis, the US State Department has brushed off anything in its path.
US diplomatic officials might express “concern” or “regret” about the Natanz sabotage and the 60% enrichment, or refuse to acknowledge the veracity of the report about Zarif, but their basic message is that the US has an unshakable strategy and goal.
It is this kind of rugged and single-minded messaging that has placed top Israeli officials into a mild despair that the current delegation visiting the US, Mossad Director Yossi Cohen and National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat, has any hope of moving the Biden team’s views.
The deal seems all but done. Except it is not.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines raised eyebrows months ago when they used virtually identical wording that a deal with Iran was “a long ways” off.
Fast-forward three months, and US State Department Spokesman Ned Price was speaking to reporters on Monday about Rob Malley returning to Vienna to negotiate with Iran.
US, EU and Russian officials recently all said major progress had been made in the second round of talks and that the bargaining was moving from general principles toward nailing down details.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was the most optimistic, saying up to 70% of the details had already been resolved.
Yet, on Monday, Price said there was still “a long way to go” to reach a deal.
“A long way to go” in January was one thing, but the same phrase being used when there are only three weeks until Iran’s May 21 deadline of potentially ending cooperation with the IAEA is another thing.
Add in that Iranian elections are set for June 18, and “a long way” sounds like the US does not want a deal until after those elections.
This would turn on its head the conventional wisdom that the Biden administration is trying to save Rouhani and his pragmatists with a last-minute deal to boost their performance in the elections.
In this scenario, Biden’s team just wanted progress to set the stage for a deal with the post-June 18 Iranian president, whoever it might be.
They might have thought that at least progress might tamp down the motivation for Iran to undertake provocative actions as Biden focuses mostly on the coronavirus and other domestic issues.
Alternatively, there is no contradiction, conventional wisdom has been correct that Biden’s team will cut a deal before June 18, and when US officials say “a long way to go,” they are referring to a final deal, not an interim one.
The schedule might look like an interim deal in the coming weeks and a final deal in late 2021 or even deep into 2022, which would be “a long way to go.”
One way or another, the coming weeks will resolve what the Biden team’s plan has been regarding the Islamic Republic.