The indirect talks between the United States and Iran in Muscat have been presented as a tentative opening. President Donald Trump described them as “very good,” even as he warned that failure would bring “very steep” consequences. That duality captures the problem. These were the first such contacts since Washington briefly joined Israel’s war with Iran last year by striking nuclear facilities–a rupture that hardened distrust and narrowed political room on both sides.
As if to further thicken the plot, Washington announced new measures targeting Iran’s oil exports almost immediately after the Oman session, reinforcing Tehran’s long-running claim that it is asked to negotiate under pressure rather than toward a durable bargain. Iran, for its part, arrived determined to narrow the agenda. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the atmosphere was positive and that both sides agreed to continue, while drawing a bright red line: Tehran will discuss the nuclear programme, and “no other issue” with the United States. Iran has repeatedly rejected bargaining away its missiles or its regional relationships as the price of nuclear restraint, and it has framed sanctions relief as the core deliverable without which any new arrangement would be politically indefensible at home.
That is the structural dilemma. The United States wants a tighter, longer, more enforceable nuclear limitation, and in many American circles, constraints on missiles and proxies as well. Iran wants recognition of its right to enrich, credible sanctions relief, and an inspection framework it can live with. At the same time, Tehran argues that its deterrent posture is a response to the region’s most capable conventional and nuclear power. The same week that officials spoke of diplomacy, Iran’s leadership publicly reiterated that any U.S. attack would draw retaliation against American bases in the region.
For Pakistan, the stakes are not theoretical. We have lived through what so-called contained conflicts do to neighbouring states: refugee surges, militant blowback, sectarian hardening, and economic whiplash that punishes ordinary households long before it troubles strategists. The Soviet war in Afghanistan, followed by decades of militant spillover, reshaped our society in lasting ways. More recently, the so-called war on terror cost Pakistan tens of thousands of lives and hollowed out entire regions.
Islamabad, therefore, has an interest in de-escalation, but wanting the fire out does not put water in your hands. Pakistan would do well to argue quietly, albeit firmly, that any new understandings must be designed to reduce the chance of miscalculation, not simply postpone it. That said, caution is required. Diplomacy that oscillates between talks and coercion risks becoming performative, designed more for domestic signalling than resolution.
The Oman channel deserves protection precisely because it is fragile. Quite expectedly, it will collapse if it becomes another ritual in a familiar cycle of threats, talks, more pressure, and the inevitable breakdown that leaves everyone claiming they tried. *