Trump’s Biggest Concerns In Negotiations With Iran, And They Are Not Just Nuclear

Peloni:  Iran’s ballistic missile threat is too great to ignore, even as it was ignored in today’s meeting in Oman.  The US should respond to Iran’s sense of omnipotence by demonstrating that it is the US which has the ability to make demands in these negotiations, not Iran.

The answer may be simpler and more obvious than most of us have thought. It lies in Iran’s ballistic missile program.

Mudar Zahran | Am Thinker | February 6, 2026

Recently, the United States was expected to hold negotiations with Iran in the Gulf Sultanate of Oman. The Trump administration announced the cancellation of the said talks amid disagreements over Iran’s insistence that the negotiations remain strictly limited to its nuclear program, while Washington wanted to discuss a large array of issues. That disagreement alone raises the question: What issue is Tehran even more reluctant to discuss than its holiest of holy, its nuclear program?

The answer may be simpler and more obvious than most of us have thought. It lies in Iran’s ballistic missile program.

Iran’s missile capability presents a very different kind of strategic challenge, and poses a risk that stretches even beyond the Middle East, as it now possesses a large stock of ballistic missiles. Once launched, those missiles leave the atmosphere into outer space, then re-enter at extremely high speed toward their targets. That flight profile makes interception difficult even for advanced defense systems.

The only system capable of intercepting and destroying ballistic missiles is the United States’ THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense). This system has shown very strong interception capabilities, with only a fraction of misses. Yet Iran has tried to counter this advantage by launching large numbers of missiles simultaneously during its 12-day confrontation with Israel last year. Despite the U.S. having deployed THAAD in Israel, supported by Israeli missile defense systems, some Iranian missiles did get through. The damage, while contained, was painful enough to influence the calculations of both Washington and Israel when it comes to their next big move with Iran, hence shaping the next big confrontation in the region.

The U.S. is taking ballistic missiles very seriously. One Washington source put it bluntly in a private conversation: “Iran has to kiss its ballistic missiles goodbye, or go to war.” A reason for this firm stance may be the fact that Iran is said to have both short- and mid-range ballistic missiles. Should Iran move to the long-range level, possibly with Chinese or North Korean technologies, this would mean that London, for example, could easily be within Iran’s missile reach.

Hence, Washington’s main stipulation concerns the full dismantlement of Iran’s ballistic missile program as the most immediate strategic threat, and the destruction of these systems or their transfer to a verified third party. While there is no confirmation of how many of these Iran possesses, the estimate is that it stocks several thousand ballistic missiles. This poses another challenge regarding concealment and verification. Basically, even if Iran agrees to dismantle the ballistic missile program, it will be a major task to monitor that it actually happens.

At the same time, Iran’s ballistic missile program is not Washington’s only worry. Beyond missiles, the United States continues to push for strict limits on Iran’s nuclear program. The expectation, according to various diplomatic signals, remains a complete prohibition of a nuclear program in any meaningful form. This includes both military and civilian tracks. Any narrowly defined civilian exception would require intrusive, continuous monitoring, including direct U.S. involvement in inspections.

The Trump administration’s key demand is that Iran keep its hands off Iraq and stop supporting the Shiite fundamentalist militias it controls inside Iraq, mainly the notorious al-Hashed al-Shaabi — the Popular Mobilization militia, dubbed the “Shiite ISIS” by many Iraqis.

In this regard, the U.S. is going as far as creating sanctions specifically targeting Iraqi officials and entities linked to Iran, the IRGC, or affiliated militias. These include asset freezes, travel bans, and terrorism-related designations. Iraqi financial institutions that facilitate such networks are at risk of severe penalties, including exclusion from the SWIFT system, a measure that would effectively paralyze Iraq’s banking and trade operations.

Another stipulation relates to human and civil rights inside Iran, aligned with the demands of the Iranian people. This includes an immediate halt to the killing of protesters and dissidents, protection of basic civil liberties, and measurable improvements in human rights conditions.

One thing is certain: this administration appears firmly committed to clipping Iran’s wings. The fact that it is focusing heavily on ballistic missiles indicates that President Trump is focused on significantly curbing Iran’s might, which has been allowed to expand unquestioned by multiple U.S. administrations.

Mudar Adnan Zahran is a Jordanian Palestinian politician living in exile.  He heads the Jordanian Opposition Coalition.  He previously served as an economic specialist and assistant policy coordinator for the U.S. embassy in Amman.  Zahran is a Ph.D. in political science — the Arab-Israeli conflict.