During my time at SERE training (survival, evasion, resistance, and escape)—a program aimed at service members at greater risk of ending up behind enemy lines—the module that simulated captivity in a prisoner-of-war camp presented a Whitman’s Sampler of the sort of sadism and punishment one might expect if one fell into the hands of America’s adversaries.
These encompassed a variety of discomforts and indignities, typically exposing the trainee to each different punishment once—unless the trainee displayed clear fear, pain, or aversion to one or another. In short, if you reveal to your captors the exact thing that would provoke a negative response, they are more likely to employ it to pressure you. No matter how severe something may be, never show the enemy what disturbs you the most.
Though most Americans will never endure SERE-style training, the lesson is broadly applicable: it’s wise not to demonstrate in words or deeds that an adversary has you in a position of leverage, unless you want that leverage to continue to be used. This plain directive seems to have eluded the self-styled master negotiator, who, in both speech and action, signals to the Iranians that, to borrow a favorite phrasing, the one card they hold is the one that produces the pain and discomfort that may push him toward an outcome that is wholly unsatisfactory to end the conflict: threatening to disrupt shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
Operation Epic Fury, launched more than nine weeks ago via a late-night social-media post, has ground to an odd halt. Our forces remain in theater, the combattants’ respective navies block passage through a pivotal waterway, and we are not making progress toward achieving any of the conditions the Trump administration claimed would exist at its conclusion. A war that began with unclear aims has now become unclear in its progress.
Just over a month into the confrontation, and apparently frustrated with Iranian resistance in general and the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz in particular, President Donald Trump issued a sequence of escalatory threats, declaring that he would order the destruction of everything from power infrastructure to Iranian civilization as a whole, and that this level of wholesale carnage could be accomplished in as little as four hours if the Iranian regime refused to meet his demand to open the strait. His initial 48-hour deadline was extended to five days, then to ten days, then to an additional day, and, two hours short of the final—real this time—deadline, the president announced a Pakistani-brokered, two-week ceasefire to allow for talks and negotiations. All of these extensions came with no substantive concessions from the Iranians.
More than three weeks into the two-week ceasefire, which began April 8, the two sides are at an impasse. An initial attempt at in-person talks in Islamabad that weekend proved largely performative and half-hearted, as both sides arrived with lists of non-negotiables likely impossible to overcome through extended talks, and thus unlikely to succeed with an effort in which Vice President J.D. Vance spent more time in transit to and from the meeting site than in Islamabad itself.
The only indications of Iranian eagerness to seek peaceful resolution come from Trump—whose relationship with the truth is questionable—claiming that the Iranians have privately told him they are desperate to yield to each of our demands.
After the failed Islamabad meeting, the Iranians demonstrated no genuine interest in negotiations. In the face of this stance, the administration could have allowed the April 22 deadline, and with it the ceasefire, to lapse. Instead, it displayed an amateurish eagerness, making contradictory statements about Vance’s imminent departure the day before the follow-up negotiations were due. One could imagine Vance moving to and from his motorcade as if performing the hokey pokey with each new pronouncement. Ultimately, he stayed in Washington, and Trump extended the ceasefire.
Even the alternate plan of special envoy Steve Witkoff and presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner leading negotiations last weekend was halted at the last minute, potentially as a face-saving measure when Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi departed Pakistan without any interest in meeting with the American representatives.
While we should not rely on public statements from the Iranians (nor should our government take private ones at face value), the regime has effectively acted in line with the image it wishes to project: Iran’s leaders show no impatience for negotiations, nor do they appear prepared to concede before talks, while simultaneously pressing preconditions on the United States. The only indications of Iranian eagerness to seek peaceful resolution come from Trump—whose relationship with the truth is dubious—claiming that the Iranians have privately told him they are desperate to yield to all of our demands.
That would strain credulity under any circumstances, but especially after the president has issued numerous claims of Iranian surrender or concession over the course of the nine-week conflict, all of which have proven to be demonstrably false. From promising a complete surrender of retained nuclear material, to saying the Iranians would halt ongoing executions, to assurances that the Strait of Hormuz was open as international ships faced attacks, the sad truth is that the American people cannot place stock in anything the White House asserts about Iranian compromise and, in fact, should probably assume the opposite is true in most cases.
Trump is plainly aware that the Iranians, whom he claims to be pressuring to forge a satisfactory resolution, know he is lying. But these statements aren’t meant to influence the Iranian regime; they are meant to try, one more time, to hoodwink the American people—who he never persuaded regarding the necessity of war, who bear the heavier economic burdens, and from whom rising disapproval makes urgent the president’s desire to move past a conflict he believed would be straightforward.
It is true that the United States has done exponentially more damage to Iran’s military than to its own. And it is true that the recently imposed American reciprocal blockade is far more deleterious to Iran than their original one is to the United States. But neither of those may determine the end of the war. Iran seems willing to endure more military damage than our president is willing to inflict and more economic pain than our president is willing to absorb—and this is likely to be the deciding factor.
With each new hyperbolic proclamation of looming violence, every deadline extension rewarded with nothing in return from the Iranians, and all the false claims of Iranian backchannel surrender, Iran’s belief that they can outlast the president is reinforced.
It’s worth recalling the various reasons for war that Trump and his followers have offered and vacillated between. In January, we were to stand up for the Iranian people, yet now there is no discussion of their fate. In February, we were to end Iranian support for its proxy networks, yet the president has pressured Israel to halt strikes on Hezbollah. In March, we were to degrade Iran’s missile and drone systems so they would be fewer than our interceptors in theater, yet the Iranians retain more of these capabilities than previously thought—while we have depleted key stocks of our interceptors and precision-guided missiles.
Meanwhile, the Iranians are not publicly backing down from their maximalist demands, having presented a new 14-point proposal that includes many of the unreasonable conditions they had previously offered in Pakistan, including withdrawal of American forces in theater, substantial reparations, protection for Hezbollah in Lebanon, and some recognition of Iranian control over the Strait. This Iranian proposal would also separate discussions about reopening the Strait from those regarding the disposition of its nuclear weapons program. While the president initially seemed to reject this proposal outright on Friday, by the next day he appeared to be softening to the idea of entertaining portions of the Iranian language. It does not seem likely the White House would agree to all, or even most, of the Iranian demands, but entertaining any of these should be viewed as unacceptable—and even treating them as a starting point for negotiations plays into Iran’s strategic plan.
We have moved from grand proclamations of “unconditional surrender” and telling the Iranian people that “the hour of (their) liberation is at hand” to now sheepishly seeking any agreement, including one that does not liberate the Iranian people, does nothing to diminish Iranian support for its proxies, likely will not end the Iranian ballistic missile program, may not secure the remaining highly enriched uranium, and at best reopens the Strait to a condition less advantageous for the U.S. and the international community than the status quo ante.
The president is now contending with the reality of neither explaining to the American people why the war was necessary nor clarifying its goals, nor pursuing those goals himself. The former has produced domestic pressure to strike a quick deal, while the latter suggests he may be willing to concede substantial terms to secure such an agreement.
Regardless of when or how the conflict began, the United States is currently at war, and it would be better for the United States, its allies, and the world if it ends in an American victory rather than a perceived Iranian victory. Thus far, the means Trump has claimed would secure that victory have proven insufficient, and he should adjust accordingly—generally speaking, this would likely entail a long-term, painful blockade or an escalation of fighting, potentially including ground operations. However, escalation or resumption of hostilities may now be complicated by the president’s assertion to Congress that the war has “terminated”—a short-term political maneuver that could hinder longer-term options under the War Powers Act.
Either path requires him to do two things he has thus far been unwilling or unable to do—explain to the American people the sacrifices and difficulties ahead and why they are warranted, and demonstrate to the Iranian regime that he is prepared to endure them.
