Answering the Question of Iran

Earlier this week, the U.S. special representative for Iran said Washington would keep putting additional pressure on Iran in the days and weeks ahead. He also said that Iran had reached a moment where it recognized it could not indefinitely withstand such pressure and would have to either sign a new nuclear deal with Washington or abandon its regional strategy – that is, using proxies to carve out a sphere of influence to the Mediterranean Sea. The U.S. and Iran spar verbally all the time – and sometimes violently – but there’s reason to believe there’s bite behind Washington’s barks, and that tensions may soon intensify again. The U.S. wants to reduce its global military footprint, especially in the Middle East, as it pivots to the Indo-Pacific. The ideal outcome would be a light security presence in certain hotspots that can be quickly scaled up in case of emergency. Though Washington has already done much in that regard, Iran’s presence in Iraq complicates the withdrawal. The U.S. doesn’t want to leave a country it has been at war with for nearly 20 years just to see Iran gain more political and security control there than it already had. Tehran’s nuclear […]