Everyone is confused. Here is the pattern they are missing.
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The word I keep hearing from the financial sector clients and geopolitical contacts I advise, people who want to better understand how this administration thinks and how to interpret what is happening in the Middle East, is whiplash.
The situation moves faster than the news itself can keep up with. Diplomatic signals, military posture and negotiating pressure are all shifting in real time, sometimes within hours of each other. That pace creates genuine difficulty in reading what is actually happening versus what appears to be happening.
What appear to outside observers as rapid shifts is actually the administration responding in real time to signals coming at them constantly. Every message that passes through Pakistani intermediaries, every piece of intelligence being collected and weighed and every input from allies shapes the next move. Each decision is made only after all of this information has been carefully weighed and considered, but the direction remains fixed toward a single goal: getting Iran to the table on Trump’s terms. It may look scattered to those watching from the outside, but the objective stays constant. That is the pattern.
The ability to pivot is not weakness. It is how you stay in control when the situation changes faster than the headlines can follow.
President Trump has never been interested in military action as a first resort. That does not mean he is reluctant to use it. He is proud of the United States military and what it has the power to do, and he has demonstrated a willingness to deploy that power. But he has consistently held the view that if a genuine diplomatic solution is available, one that actually addresses his core requirements, it is his responsibility to pursue it before spending American treasure and spilling any blood at all. President Trump said it plainly at a White House event honoring military mothers this week: “They want to make a deal. They want to negotiate. And I think that military mothers want to hear that.” That is not weakness. It is the right instinct for any commander in chief.
The core requirements have not changed. Any agreement that satisfies him must, above all else, eliminate or very significantly reduce the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran. That is the paramount requirement. Everything else follows from it. It must also address, to the extent reasonably practicable, the missile and drone threat to Israel and to our Arab Gulf allies. And it must open the Strait of Hormuz freely and without any form of Iranian control. These thresholds, I believe, have not moved. I certainly hope they have not. Notably, they do not include regime change. As much as President Trump feels for the Iranian people, who have suffered for decades under a tyrannical regime, and as much as he would welcome new leadership that could lead them toward a better future, regime change is not realistically achievable right now.
What appears to have changed is that intermediaries, Pakistan among them, have brought word that Iran may be willing to put the points of a potential agreement on paper. Not a final deal. A memorandum of understanding. President Trump’s own words: “Great Progress has been made toward a Complete and Final Agreement with Representatives of Iran.”
The pause is not capitulation. It is not President Trump’s fear. It is not a response to media criticism. And while some will connect it to gas prices and the approaching midterm elections, I do not believe that is what is driving this. What it is, is a high-stakes decision made under pressure, pressure that President Trump himself has been applying to Iran, not the other way around.
In my career, I have worked on deals worth billions of dollars and spent three years as a diplomat in one of the world’s most complicated conflict zones. Complex, multi-party, high-stakes negotiations do not work the way the media wants them to. You test first. You put a framework on paper. You find out whether the people across from you actually have the authority to make commitments. That last point matters here. There are real questions about who in the Iranian leadership is actually empowered to close a deal. The internal disarray in Tehran adds time and uncertainty to every step, not because President Trump is being played, but because the other side of the table keeps shifting.
President Trump’s hammer is still raised. The economic chokehold, the blockade of Iranian ports, remains in full force. The full weight of military force still hangs over Iran’s head. The pause is conditional, and Iran has no reason to believe otherwise.
Something has shifted, even if in a small way. Iran is not where it was two years ago, or even three weeks ago. The combination of Operation Epic Fury, the economic strangulation of the blockade, and sustained military pressure has pushed Iran closer to President Trump’s position than it has ever been. Not nearly close enough. Still quite far. But the direction of movement is real.
On something this complicated, a regime that has spent decades building leverage through proxies, enrichment and strategic patience, there is no overnight resolution. What there is, is a president working it step by step, who refuses to let anyone play games indefinitely, and who has made clear that if diplomacy cannot deliver what he needs, other options remain available and he will use them.
Watch what happens next. If a memorandum of understanding emerges, watch what it contains. Watch whether Iran’s commitments meet the threshold. Watch what President Trump does if no memo materializes soon, if what Iran will sign is too weak to mean anything, if the negotiators across the table lack the actual authority to bind their government or if Iran strikes out again while all of this is in motion.
Is it unsettling to watch? Yes. Confusing? Absolutely. Frustrating? For many people, deeply so. But that is real life. The question is not whether the path is comfortable. The question is whether it is working.
That answer is still being written.
Jason D. Greenblatt was the White House Middle East envoy in the first Trump administration. He is the author of In the Path of Abraham: How Donald Trump Made Peace in the Middle East—and How to Stop Joe Biden From Unmaking It, the founder of Abraham Venture LLC and publishes the Substack “How to Watch a War” and “How to Watch Trump.” Follow him on X: @GreenblattJD.
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