JD Vance dispatched to negotiate Iran peace with few cards to play | US-Israel war on Iran
When J.D. Vance arrives in Islamabad to negotiate a peace deal with Iran, his first high-profile assignment in the war appears to be a poisoned chalice.
Vance, a vocal opponent of US wars in the Middle East who has remained silent since the start of the current military campaign, will now face Iranian negotiators emboldened by their new control of the Strait of Hormuz and their resilience in the face of the largest US-Israeli offensive in history. Vance’s presence in the talks as vice president would make this the highest-level meeting since the 1979 Iranian revolution.
Vance’s mission is simple enough: to bridge the gap between a rhetorical truce and a more lasting peace under grave danger. But Vance will face a difficult choice in Islamabad: either make significant US concessions to Iran to maintain the ceasefire and negotiate the opening of the Strait of Hormuz, or personally support a return to war that is unpopular with the American public and effectively break off negotiations.
The results could have a significant impact on his expected presidential run in 2028; here his Maga credentials are already being questioned for failing to present a stronger opposition to the war. Vance entered office calling for a more measured foreign policy and an end to the United States’ endless wars in the Middle East; but the negotiations could lead him further into the largest US intervention in the region since the beginning of the Iraq war.
It is doubtful whether negotiations will even begin. Israel’s major attacks on Lebanon and the apparent bait-and-switch over the country’s inclusion in the ceasefire have angered the Iranian leadership. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iranian parliament speaker and chief negotiator, said the US should also ensure the “release of Iran’s blocked assets”; this was a condition of the negotiations that the United States did not publicly accept.
“These two issues need to be met before negotiations begin,” Ghalibaf said on Friday, less than 24 hours after talks began in Islamabad.
These words may have been the first salvo in a grueling experience for Vance. Negotiators in Tehran are known for a long-winded, relentless approach to reaching a deal that Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, once called a “market style” meaning “constant and tireless bargaining.” This will be their first chance in history to put a sitting US vice president under serious pressure to agree to this treatment.
Before boarding Air Force Two for Pakistan on Friday, Vance said his negotiating team had received “clear” instructions from Donald Trump on the negotiations, adding: “Let’s see where this goes.”
“As the President of the United States has said, if the Iranians are willing to negotiate in good faith, we are certainly willing to extend an open hand,” Vance told reporters. “If they try to play us, they will find that the negotiating team is not that understanding.”
However, before the meeting, former US negotiators with Iran said that Tehran’s acquisition of control of the Strait of Hormuz gave this government a new and powerful weapon in negotiations with Washington. Even though the United States has withdrawn from the table in Islamabad, it cannot guarantee the free flow of maritime traffic from the Persian Gulf, leaving Tehran with significant leverage over the White House as fuel shortages and a supply chain crisis could rattle the global economy this summer.
Vance’s deployment to Islamabad follows a trip to Hungary to support the country’s autocratic leader Viktor Orbán in elections he looks likely to lose on Sunday; He ended his 16 years in power and dealt a blow to one of Maga’s key international outposts as part of the right-wing International backed by Vance.
Hungarians lobbied for Trump’s visit but instead accepted Vance, who lacks the president’s star power and has been questioned for traveling to Europe for a campaign rally while the U.S. administration is entrenched in the conflict in Iran.
From the beginning, Vance had been left out of the administration’s messaging about the war in Iran. While Trump’s war team was meeting in a makeshift situation room in Florida (some called it War-a-Lago), Vance called from the situation room at the White House, where he was joined by national intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard, another key anti-war voice in the Trump administration. Defense secretary Pete Hegseth has held regular televised briefings on the conflict, and secretary of state Marco Rubio has been a more open supporter of the war than Vance.
“I would say he’s a little different from me philosophically,” Trump said of Vance’s feelings about the war. “I think he was less enthusiastic about going, but he was pretty enthusiastic. But I felt like it was something we had to do. I didn’t think we had a choice.”
Now Vance is assigned to end the war he reportedly doesn’t want. But his return to the spotlight will be fraught with risks.
