Experts warn Iran’s nuclear double-talk designed to buy time, undermine US pressure

Senior Iranian officials are threatening to ramp up the country's atomic programme arsenic the Trump medication weighs a imaginable onslaught against the authorities if Tehran does not travel to the array for negotiations.

"The president should beryllium making the authorities sweat, axenic and simple," Behnam Ben Taleblu, an Iran adept and elder chap astatine the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Fox News Digital.

"This tin beryllium done with strict enforcement of maximum unit sanctions, and a targeted run against authorities assets successful the portion - Yemen being a bully illustration now. Washington volition besides request to adhd a captious 3rd constituent to its different economical and subject unit policy. Maximum enactment for the Iranian people."

IRAN'S KHAMENEI WARNS OF ‘STRONG BLOW’ AS TRUMP THREATENS TO DROP BOMBS, PUTIN SILENT ON US IRE

An Iranian subject motortruck carries surface-to-air missiles past a representation of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a parade connected the juncture of the country's yearly service time connected April 18, 2018 successful Tehran, Iran. (ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images)

Lisa Daftari, a Middle East adept and editor-in-chief astatine The Foreign Desk, told Fox News Digital that portion diplomacy often demands negotiation, extending immoderate connection to Iran’s regime, adjacent symbolically, risks legitimizing a authorities that has spent decades terrorizing its ain radical and backing proxies similar Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah.

"This authorities thrives connected defiance, not dialogue. That has not changed. For implicit 4 decades, the mullahs person understood lone 1 language: might," Daftari said.

President Donald Trump told reporters connected Air Force One connected Thursday that it would beryllium amended if the U.S. had nonstop talks with Iran.

"I deliberation it goes faster, and you tin recognize the different broadside a batch amended than if you spell done intermediaries," Trump said. "They wanted to usage intermediaries. I don’t deliberation that’s needfully existent anymore. I deliberation they’re concerned. I deliberation they consciousness vulnerable, and I don’t privation them to consciousness that way."

Trump besides threatened to weaponry Iran and enforce secondary sanctions connected Iranian lipid if it did not travel to the bargaining array implicit its atomic program. Although the president said helium preferred to marque a deal, Trump did not regularisation retired a subject option.
 

Iranians protestation 22-year-old Mahsa Amini's decease aft she was detained by the morality police, successful Tehran, Iran, connected Sept. 20, 2022. (AP Photo/Middle East Images, File)

"It volition beryllium bombing the likes of which they person ne'er seen before," President Trump told NBC News past weekend.

The U.S. expanded its deterrence efforts successful the region, deploying further squadrons of combatant jets, bombers, and predator drones to reenforce antiaircraft air-support capabilities. The U.S. is besides sending the USS Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group to the portion to articulation USS Harry S. Truman, which has been successful the Middle East to combat against the Houthi's successful Yemen.

Iran’s ultimate leader, Ali Khamenei, responded with threats of his ain and said that Iran would respond "decisively and immediately" to immoderate menace issued by the U.S. Iran is inactive floating the thought of indirect talks, thing the medication is reportedly considering.

WALTZ TELLS IRAN TO GIVE UP NUCLEAR PROGRAM OR 'THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES'

A subject motortruck carries a rocket past a representation of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during an yearly subject parade. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/GettyImages)

Taleblu said, "Tehran's counteroffer of indirect talks is the regime’s mode of rejecting Trump portion leaving the doorway unfastened for talks that tin beryllium utilized arsenic a shield against a imaginable preemptive attack."

The president sent a missive to Khamenei expressing involvement successful making a woody connected the atomic issue. While expanding its subject beingness successful the region, reports bespeak that the Trump medication is considering indirect talks with Iran to curb the enlargement of its atomic programme and debar a nonstop confrontation.

Experts and observers of the portion pass that Iran has utilized negotiating arsenic a delaying maneuver successful the past and pass the Trump medication against entering into talks that mightiness further embolden Iran.

"The Trump medication should enforce afloat unit connected the authorities successful Iran fixed however anemic the authorities has go successful the past respective years. Indirect talks are the regime’s strategy of buying clip truthful it tin unrecorded to combat different day," Alireza Nader, an autarkic expert successful Washington, D.C., and adept connected Iran, told Fox News Digital.

Nader’s proposal to Trump is to enactment the radical of Iran and argued that the authorities is overmuch weaker than it appears.

"President Trump truly wants a deal. Iran has a accidental present to spell backmost and negotiate, support its civilian atomic programme but marque concessions astir its size and the duration of a deal," Alex Vatanka, elder chap astatine the Middle East Institute, told Fox News Digital.

"Trump is successful a ascendant position. Republicans successful Congress fearfulness him. Nothing tin halt him—at slightest for now. But powerfulness is fickle. The longer he’s successful the White House, the much susceptible helium whitethorn become. Iran shouldn’t hold for that," Vatanka added.

PRESIDENT TRUMP CAN STOP IRAN'S MARCH TO NUCLEAR WEAPONS: 'RE-ESTABLISH CREDIBLE MILITARY THREAT', REPORT SAYS

Houthi subject spokesperson Yahya Sarea attends a rally held by protesters, chiefly Houthi supporters, to amusement enactment for Lebanon's Hezbollah and Palestinians successful the Gaza Strip, successful Sanaa, Yemen, connected Nov. 22, 2024. (REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah)

In an interrogation with Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies podcast, "The Iran Breakdown," erstwhile Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said that eventually, Israel volition onslaught Iran's atomic facility, with oregon without the United States, due to the fact that determination is nary different choice, according to Lapid.

Ali Larijani, an advisor to the ultimate leader, said successful an interrogation that though Iran does not question a atomic weapon, Tehran volition person nary prime but to physique a atomic limb if the U.S. oregon Israel onslaught Iran.

The International Atomic Energy Agency reported successful February that Iran has accelerated its atomic programme and has enriched uranium adjacent to weapons-grade levels. 

Danielle Pletka, elder chap successful Foreign and Defense Policy Studies astatine the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), told Fox News Digital that having further subject assets successful the Middle East is dependable argumentation fixed the threats that the U.S. and its allies look successful the region.

For Pletka, the question is, what is the Trump medication looking for?

"A woody successful which the Iranians bash not afloat get escaped of their atomic weapons program? If so, the president sets the United States up for the hazard that Barack Obama inflicted connected our allies and ourselves – simply delaying the Iranian atomic programme to a aboriginal date," Pletka told Fox News Digital.

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, left, and President Donald Trump. (Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz/File Photo)

Pletka said it is unusual that President Trump seems to envision a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)-like deal, and that has prompted a batch of disapproval connected Capitol Hill. 

Trump primitively withdrew from JCPOA, besides known arsenic the Iran atomic deal, during his archetypal word successful 2018 and reapplied harsh economical sanctions. The Biden medication had initially looked astatine re-engaging with Iran connected the atomic contented upon taking office, but on-again-off-again talks went nowhere, analyzable by Iran’s home authorities and its relation successful supporting its panic groups successful the region.

The different hazard that the president runs, according to AEI’s Pletka, is being perceived arsenic a insubstantial tiger.

"He threatened Hamas with bombing that helium ne'er delivered. Now he’s threatening Iran with subject action. But does helium truly mean it? Or is helium conscionable blowing blistery air?" she said.

CLICK TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Pletka said, "There is an tremendous magnitude of uncertainty astir the president’s intentions, and that uncertainty is an accidental for the Iranians to exploit."

The Middle East Institute’s Vatanka said helium believed that Trump could assertion a imaginable triumph helium tin merchantability astatine location and accidental helium got a amended woody than President Obama did with the JCPOA, if Iran were to hold to permanently support its enrichment level to a debased level, dissimilar the expiration dates included successful the JCPOA.