Trump Perfects Diplomacy By Making Agreement Impossible

President Donald Trump resumed talks with Iran on Friday while announcing another round of economic penalties, introducing a negotiating framework in which every American proposal arrives with an invoice. Administration officials said the approach preserves every available route to an agreement, provided Tehran selects the route labeled “complete surrender to the opening offer.” Iranian officials were invited to demonstrate good faith by accepting Washington’s position before discussions began, after which both sides could meet to celebrate the productive exchange of identical views.

“Iran is becoming much more reasonable because we keep making everything harder for them, and that is really what diplomacy is about,” Trump said. “Nobody has ever negotiated with this much pressure, this many tariffs and this many beautiful deadlines that can move whenever I want.” The president acknowledged that Tehran had not accepted a deal, which aides cited as proof that the strategy was working everywhere except in the narrow, outdated category of obtaining a deal. Officials said additional restrictions would improve the atmosphere by ensuring Iranian negotiators understood that each unanswered calendar invitation could raise the price of groceries.

White House officials described the doctrine as “maximum diplomacy,” an improvement over conventional diplomacy’s dependence on compromise, predictable terms and allowing the other participant to claim a benefit. Under the revised process, American negotiators present a demand, shorten the deadline and announce that Iran’s failure to agree demonstrates an alarming refusal to negotiate. Any Iranian counterproposal is classified as stalling, while any American change in position is considered strategic flexibility. Trump said the conversations were proceeding beautifully because officials continued having them despite their total inability to produce a shared conclusion. The administration has therefore established that making agreement progressively less possible is the most effective form of negotiation.

* None of the quotes in this article were spoken by an actual person. More info.