Maximum Pressure, Minimum Results: Washington’s Iran Reality Check

The United States is again talking to Iran. That simple fact, coming after months of threats, sanctions, and even joint military action with Israel, says more about the limits of Washington’s “maximum pressure” strategy than any official statement.

Maximum pressure and the persistence of the Iranian state

The theory behind “maximum pressure” was straightforward: escalate economic sanctions, isolate the regime diplomatically, threaten and use military force, and the Iranian leadership would either capitulate or collapse. Neither happened. Despite years of sanctions and recent military confrontation, Washington is now back at the negotiating table. According to recent reports, US envoys are preparing for further rounds of talks, even as military deployments continue in the region. The paradox is obvious: coercion has not produced surrender, but rather negotiations with the very regime it was meant to break.

Iranian officials have underscored this reality. President Masoud Pezeshkian said he had instructed diplomats to pursue “fair and equitable negotiations” with the United States, provided they occur “free from threats and unreasonable expectations.” That formulation is telling. Tehran is not presenting itself as a defeated adversary seeking terms; it is negotiating from what it sees as a position of resilience. It is, at the same time, open to possible compromises. This is a pragmatic approach, insofar as Tehran understands that any long-term military confrontation will not necessarily help the regime’s prospects.

Tehran’s approach to the talks is, therefore, transactional rather than defensive. An Iranian diplomat said the country is pursuing an agreement that delivers “economic benefits for both sides,” including potential deals in energy, mining, and aviation. That is not the language of capitulation; it is the language of bargaining.

From Washington’s perspective, the shift to diplomacy is equally revealing. US President Donald Trump recently said that Iran was “seriously talking to us,” adding that “if we can work something out, that would be great, and if we can’t, probably bad things would happen.” Even that statement frames talks as a pragmatic alternative to escalation, not as the outcome of a successful pressure campaign.

Why war remains a risky and unattractive option

If maximum pressure has not achieved its stated goals, it is partly because the alternative—full-scale war—carries enormous risks. The US surely has the capacity to hit Iran. Tehran, on the other hand, can also inflict serious damage. Iran’s leadership has repeatedly warned that any large attack would ignite a regional conflict. Iranian officials say their missile programme is non-negotiable and tied directly to national security. This is not mere rhetoric. US bases across the Gulf, along with critical energy infrastructure, are within reach of Iranian missiles. Iranian commanders have warned that an attack would engulf the entire region, even while stressing they have “no desire to see the outbreak of a regional war.” That warning reflects a strategic reality: a US–Iran conflict would not remain confined to a single battlefield. It would likely spill into Iraq, the Gulf, the Levant, and the Red Sea, threatening shipping lanes and global energy markets.

Washington appears aware of those risks. Even as talks proceed, U.S. officials have been preparing for the possibility of extended operations, underscoring how quickly tensions could escalate. At the same time, Trump has reportedly urged Israel to allow negotiations to continue, signalling that diplomacy is still seen as the safer option. The logic is straightforward. Military escalation carries unpredictable costs, including attacks on US forces, disruption of oil supplies, and the possibility of a wider regional war. Diplomacy, by contrast, offers a chance to cap Iran’s nuclear programme without triggering such risks.

In that sense, the persistence of talks is less a sign of diplomatic optimism than of strategic constraint. Maximum pressure did not produce regime collapse; it produced a stalemate in which war is dangerous and negotiation unavoidable.

Negotiations as mutual political cover

If talks succeed, both sides will likely claim victory. But the more profound effect may be political rather than nuclear. For Washington, even a limited agreement that caps enrichment or significantly reduces stockpiles can be framed as a strategic success. It would allow Trump to claim that his pressure forced Iran back to the table and produced concessions on the nuclear front. For Tehran, however, the political gains could be even more significant. Iranian officials have made clear that any deal must deliver economic relief. Relief of sanctions, renewed energy exports, and access to financial channels would ease the economic pressures that have fueled domestic unrest in recent years. In practical terms, that would help stabilize the regime. Economic breathing room could blunt the impact of protests, restore some fiscal capacity, and allow Tehran to claim that it resisted pressure while securing concessions.

Indeed, Iranian leaders already frame negotiations in those terms. They insist talks must be fair and equitable, free of coercion, and consistent with national interests. Such language is designed for domestic audiences as much as foreign ones. It presents negotiations not as surrender but as a tactical success. The result is a diplomatic paradox. The same talks that Washington presents as proof of pressure working may allow Tehran to claim that pressure failed.

In the end, the logic of the current negotiations is not one of decisive victory for either side. It is the logic of strategic limits. Maximum pressure did not break the Iranian state. War remains too dangerous to pursue. Diplomacy, therefore, becomes the only viable path. And that is the clearest verdict on the policy itself: when even its architects return to the negotiating table with the same regime, the promise of coercion without compromise has already been disproved.

Salman Rafi Sheikh, research analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs

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