In the present…negotiations…between the US and Iran, the US wants

…Iran’s nuclear programs eliminated, regional proxy forces disbanded, and ballistic missiles dismantled. Iran is seen as unlikely to agree to the last point, because it doesn’t have much of an air force and relies on missiles as its main deterrent.

Iran won’t agree to eliminating its nuclear programs, most especially its nuclear weapons development and (future) production programs, either. Nor will it agree, in practice, to disbanding its proxy terrorist entities, no matter how much the mullahs and their negotiating representatives might lie about agreeing to do in any agreement.

The bit about deterrence is what’s important in this post, though. One component of this failure to agree is on the US’ negotiators. Iran has no serious fear of attack by its neighbors, and so no real need of deterrence, since Iran has nothing in the way of resources, either in raw materials or in production output, that any nation might want that can’t be gotten far more cheaply and far more beneficially for both that (those) nation(s) and for Iran through freely achieved trade agreements than from invasion, conquering, and occupation. Not even from putative adversaries like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, or Pakistan. Not even in tit for tat, blood for blood honor vengeance attitudes in the Middle East.

The US needs to make this case directly. President Donald Trump (R) already is hinting at it with his trade deal commentary, but he needs to be bluntly explicit about it.