US and Iran walk a fine line between leverage and war

Each side is believed to be manoeuvring to strengthen negotiating positions despite risk posed by growing tension

Participants display cartoon cut-outs depicting US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a rally marking Al Quds Day in Tehran. EPA

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The approach by US President Donald Trump's second administration to Iran has been a high-stakes exercise in brinkmanship, combining military escalation, economic strangulation and diplomatic manoeuvring in an effort to force Tehran to the negotiating table under new terms.

Mr Trump has been backing his rhetoric with military muscle through continued air strikes against Yemen’s Houthis and the deployment of additional assets in the region. The goal appears twofold: to degrade Iran’s regional proxies while simultaneously conveying that Washington is prepared to take more direct action should Tehran push its nuclear programme beyond a certain threshold.

Iran, in turn, has warned against US provocations, with supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei saying that Tehran will respond to any threats. Mr Khamenei's senior adviser, Ali Larijani, said that Iran would be forced to acquire a nuclear weapon if attacked by the US or its allies.

These exchanges have escalated tension in the already volatile region, devastated by the Gaza war. Yet, even as the disputes grow more heated, analysts believe indirect talks between Washington and Tehran are set to continue, with both sides manoeuvring to strengthen their negotiating positions, despite the risk of miscalculations that could lead to war.

“Talks are very likely to take place, if they aren't already,” Farzan Sabet, managing researcher at the Geneva Graduate Institute, told The National. “Iran, however, has fundamental problems with the way the Trump administration is conducting diplomacy: Tehran insists on focusing talks on the nuclear issue and JCPOA framework, whereas the US seeks to move beyond it and include topics like support for the ‘Axis of Resistance’ network.”

The nuclear deal agreed in 2015 between Iran and world powers, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), aimed to curb Tehran’s nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.

Mr Trump withdrew the US from the agreement during his first term as president. He argued that the deal was flawed and did not address Iran’s ballistic missile programme or regional influence. Following the withdrawal, the US reimposed severe economic sanctions on Iran.

“The Iranian leadership trusts the US even less than before in abiding by any commitments they make in negotiations, and they are loath to enter direct talks while the other side is escalating pressure on the economic and military front,” added Mr Sabet.

It is believed that neither the US nor Iran is interested in military confrontation, each for a different reason.

“The pro-diplomacy camp in Tehran is doing its best to find a way to prevent a worst-case scenario,” Hamidreza Azizi, non-resident fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, told The National. “But the most complicated issue now is how President Trump is going to perceive and respond to the preference for indirect diplomacy. The central question is whether securing a deal and avoiding military confrontation with Iran matter more to President Trump than the public optics of such an agreement.”

Military campaign and strategic posturing

The US military’s campaign against Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthis shows no signs of abating.

A ship fires missiles at an undisclosed location after the US military launched strikes against Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis. Reuters

Suspected US air strikes battered rebel-controlled areas of Yemen this week, with the Houthis saying the attacks killed at least six people across the country. On Thursday, the US struck a car in Saada governorate's Majz district, Al Masirah TV reported, indicating a shift towards targeted assassinations.

Meanwhile, Houthi rebels say they have continued to launch attacks against US warships in the Red Sea, including the aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman, which is carrying out the majority of the strikes on the Houthis.

The Trump administration has linked its air strikes against the Houthis to a broader pressure campaign against Iran, suggesting that the rebels' missile and drone attacks in the Red Sea serve as a proxy battleground in Washington’s confrontation with Tehran.

In a significant military build-up, the Pentagon on Tuesday deployed additional air squadrons and extended the Truman’s mission in the Middle East. Another aircraft carrier, USS Carl Vinson, now in Asia, is on its way to the region.

The Pentagon has also sent at least six nuclear-capable B-2 bombers – 30 per cent of the US Air Force’s stealth bomber fleet – to the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, in another message to Iran.

Observers say that while these deployments highlight Mr Trump’s willingness to act militarily, they do not necessarily signal imminent strikes on Iran. Any such plans would likely be kept highly classified to avoid triggering Iranian countermeasures that could complicate a military campaign.

“President Trump will probably exhaust his other options first, including snapback of sanctions at the UN Security Council, before pivoting to a more serious conflict footing,” said Mr Sabet, adding that prospects for a strike will steadily rise over the course of this year.

Mr Azizi sees that the US military build-up in the region is President Trump's way of pursuing coercive diplomacy – diplomacy backed by military force and a clear demonstration of US power. “The real danger lies, though, in potential miscalculations, which could trigger a larger conflict or even an all-out war, something both parties are clearly trying to avoid.”

Flurry of calls with Arab states

In a phone conversation with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Meshal Al Ahmad Al Sabah said that his country would not allow any act of aggression to be launched from its territory against another country, according to Iran's Mehr News Agency. Kuwait did not confirm this part of the report, although its national news agency said that the call took place.

Mr Pezeshkian also spoke with the Presidents of the UAE and Bahrain. Their call readouts made no mention of military escalation.

While Gulf leaders view Iran’s regional influence with deep suspicion, they are also keenly aware of the potential fallout from a direct military confrontation involving Washington and Tehran.

“Saudi Arabia and its neighbouring Arab states oppose and fear the Islamic Republic's regional influence, but they also fear that in the event of US or Israeli strikes on Iran, the violence could spill over and directly affect them,” Thomas Juneau, associate fellow with the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the UK-based Chatham House think tank, told The National.

“They fear, in particular, that Iran could retaliate against” their interests, he added.

President Trump said the first presidential trip of his second term would likely include visits to Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar as well as additional stops. “It could be next month, maybe a little bit later,” Mr Trump said on Monday in the Oval Office.

Official rhetoric will likely focus on investment and economic partnerships, but behind closed doors, the region’s leaders are expected to exert efforts to de-escalate tensions between the US and Iran, or at least delay an open conflict.

Diplomatic appeal

In a call with the International Atomic Energy Agency director general Rafael Grossi on Tuesday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi urged the agency to intervene over threats issued against his country's nuclear facilities.

Mr Araghchi has reinforced Tehran’s position by emphasising that Iran has remained committed to its 2015 nuclear deal pledge not to seek nuclear weapons.

“10 years after signing the JCPOA – and 7 years after the US unilaterally walked away from it – there is not one shred of proof that Iran has violated this commitment. Even DNI Gabbard recently made this abundantly clear,” Mr Aragchi said in a post on X, referring to the Annual Threat Assessment by the US intelligence community. The report says that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon.

Tehran understands that it will lose in a direct confrontation with either the US or Israel, or both, said Mr Juneau.

“This was clear when Israel attacked Iran directly in April and October 2024,” he added. “On the American side, President Trump has long expressed his scepticism about engaging the US in another war in the Middle East. But this does not mean he will not support future strikes.”