There are multiple reasons for the failure of the US-Iran talks in Islamabad. If the reporting on US President Donald Trump’s Hormuz ambitions is even partly accurate — there are reasons to believe they are — the American insistence that Tehran agree to a “joint venture” with Washington to manage the Strait of Hormuz may have been one. Tehran’s refusal to abandon its nuclear programme could be another.
President Trump may have wanted to close a real estate deal on a waterway he has no business controlling, and that should be free for all nations. Given Trump’s inclinations, Hormuz may have been a bigger roadblock than Iran’s nuclear programme. To be clear, what Washington reportedly wanted from Iran was not merely the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which the whole world wants, but joint control of it.
Think of it as the Venezuela playbook customised for the Persian Gulf. In Caracas, US forces kidnapped the inconvenient leader, made a deal with what remained of President Nicolas Maduro’s regime, and got Venezuelan oil on terms it dictated. In Iran’s case, Khamenei was killed in the February strikes, along with much of the senior leadership in Tehran. The remaining Iranian State is currently the negotiating partner for Washington. What Washington wants is partial American control of the valve through which 20% of the world’s oil flows, which would effectively mean a permanent toll booth on the energy lifeline of India, China, Japan, South Korea, and even its allies in Europe. Such a deal is as unacceptable to Iran, as it should be to India and most other nations. If so, no deal in Islamabad is better than a bad deal.
But before declaring Islamabad talks a complete failure, it is worth remembering why it mattered. To appreciate what the Islamabad talks signified, recall the state of US-Iran relations until two days ago. Consider this. The US and Iran had not held direct, high-level, and high-profile talks since the Islamic Revolution of 1979. The great rivalry triggered by the events of 1979 shaped the geopolitics of West Asia in significant ways. It is this nearly half a century of silence that came to an end in a Serena Hotel conference room in Islamabad, with US Vice President JD Vance and Iranian leader Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf negotiating on behalf of their nations. Even though the talks failed, the fact that they talked is important.
This is still a developing story. Technical teams, according to some accounts, are still talking even as the political delegations have departed. More so, failed talks do not mean an immediate resumption of fighting: The two-week ceasefire is still in place.
To recap, three things broke the Islamabad talks. The first was the nuclear question. Vance has attributed the failed talks to Iran’s unwillingness to make a “long-term commitment” on not developing nuclear weapons. It is useful to keep in mind that the fatwa (religious injunction) against nuclear weapons issued by the former supreme leader of Iran also stands expired with him. So, there is no real guarantee that Tehran will not make nuclear weapons.
The second was Hormuz itself. Iran’s control of the strait, which it weaponised only after the war began, is now its most valuable strategic asset. Giving joint control to Washington would mean handing that asset away permanently in exchange for an end to the war. No Iranian government is likely to find it a good bargain. Tehran knows it is Hormuz that dragged the US to the negotiating table. Hormuz is Tehran’s trump card.
The third was Lebanon, which is a war within this war. Israel has been bombing Lebanon throughout the ceasefire period: Hezbollah targets, civilian infrastructure, and Beirut neighbourhoods, with a death toll of no less than 2,000. From Tehran’s point of view, it made little sense to make peace with Washington while its most important non-State partner, Hezbollah, was being actively degraded. While the US may see its war as separate from Israel’s, Tehran does not. For Trump, Lebanon is a “separate skirmish”; for Tehran, a ceasefire in Beirut is an essential condition for the success of diplomacy.
What broke Islamabad talks, in the end, was not just a bilateral failure but a three-way shadow game. Israel, absent in the talks, was the elephant in the room. Its Beirut campaign functioned as an effective veto over the outcome. The Iranian team could not return to Tehran, Beirut, or its regional partners, having made peace with the US when Hezbollah was being taken apart by Israel. In that sense, the US’s ambiguity about Lebanon was the original sin of Islamabad. By focusing on the fight between Washington and Tehran, Trump was giving Israel a free pass in Lebanon, one that Tehran was always going to find politically untenable.
Netanyahu has little incentive to stop. A US-Iran deal that ends the missile threat to Israel while the Lebanon campaign continues suits Israeli interests. A resumption of the war in the wake of failed talks is also not, from its perspective, a terrible tragedy. Whether or not the talks succeed, Israel would come out on top if Lebanon were not part of the deal. Iran knows that.
If the talks do not resume, the conflict could expand. Beijing has been watching Hormuz closely, considering that its own energy security is at stake. Reports of China moving closer to Iran, possibly offering military support, add a new and dangerous dimension to the equation. If the war resumes, it will draw China further closer to Tehran’s side. That is a pressure point Washington will not be able to ignore indefinitely.
An end to this war, whoever negotiates it, is the only outcome that can serve everyone’s interest. Getting there won’t be easy when only two of three parties involved are negotiating. That’s the bad news from Islamabad. The good news is the talks have failed, but diplomacy is still alive.
Happymon Jacob is distinguished visiting professor, School of Humanities & Social Sciences, Shiv Nadar University, and editor, INDIA’S WORLD magazine. The views expressed are personal
