The government in Tehran sees capitulating to Washington’s demands on uranium enrichment and ballistic missiles as riskier to its survival than going to war, analysts say.
A march in Tehran this month marked the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. Iran is facing an economic crisis and a major buildup of U.S. firepower in the Persian Gulf. Credit…
Facing high-stakes brinkmanship as American warships and fighter jets mass off its shores, Iran has refused to concede to President Trump’s demands on its nuclear program and weapons — a stance that has bewildered U.S. officials.
The authoritarian clerics who rule Iran see those concessions — which, in their view, could compromise their core ideology and sovereignty — as a greater threat to their survival than the risk of war.
A dangerous mismatch in perceptions between Iran and the United States is why efforts to negotiate a deal over Iran’s nuclear and military capabilities look increasingly fragile, experts say, and a new regional conflict seems almost inevitable.
“Avoiding war is indeed a high priority, but not at any cost,” said Sasan Karimi, a political scientist at the University of Tehran who served as the deputy vice president for strategy in Iran’s previous government. “At times, a political state — especially an ideological one — may weigh its place in history as heavily as, or even more heavily than, its immediate survival.”
U.S. and Iranian negotiators are struggling to break an impasse over their respective red lines.
The Trump administration says it wants Iran to agree to zero nuclear enrichment to ensure it cannot build a nuclear weapon. U.S. officials have also sometimes insisted on limiting the range of Iran’s ballistic missiles and ending the country’s support for allied militias across the region.
For Iran, which says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only, nuclear enrichment is a right that the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, upholds and that his officials cannot abandon. And Iran sees possessing missiles that can reach as far as Israel as critical for self-defense.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Tehran in 2024, the year he said, “Nuclear energy is not the problem, nor are human rights; America’s problem is with the very existence of the Islamic Republic.”
U.S. and Iranian officials are set to meet in Geneva this Thursday for talks seen as a last-ditch effort to find a compromise before Mr. Trump orders a strike. According to people briefed on internal administration deliberations, the two sides will consider a proposal that offers an off-ramp to war: Allowing Iran a limited nuclear enrichment program for civilian purposes.
Mr. Trump’s administration views Tehran as so weak that it should accept U.S. demands, regional officials have said.
Last June, Iran suffered heavy blows during a 12-day war launched by Israel and briefly joined by U.S. warplanes. That conflict, coupled with biting international sanctions have plunged Iran’s economy deeper into crisis.
In January, authorities used deadly force to crush nationwide protests demanding Ayatollah Khamenei’s ouster. Some smaller protests re-emerged over the weekend, demonstrating how hostile many Iranians are toward their leaders.
On top of that, the government in Tehran is facing a major buildup of U.S. firepower in the Persian Gulf, including two aircraft carrier strike groups, and a massing of reconnaissance and refueling jets across the Middle East.
Mr. Trump’s lead negotiator with Iran, Steve Witkoff, described the president as “curious as to why they haven’t” capitulated, in an interview with Fox News over the weekend.
The vice president, JD Vance, told Fox last week that despite the threat of war, Iranians “are not yet willing to actually acknowledge and work through” the president’s demands.
