As the conflict between Iran and Israel escalates, United States President Donald Trump’s administration is offering mixed signals about whether it still backs a diplomatic solution to Iran’s nuclear programme.
Publicly, it has backed a negotiated agreement, and US and Iranian negotiators had planned to meet again this week. As recently as Thursday, Trump insisted in a Truth Social post: “We remain committed to a Diplomatic Resolution.”
But 14 hours later as Israel began its attacks on Iran, Trump posted that he had given Iran a 60-day deadline to reach an agreement – and that the deadline had passed. By Sunday, Trump was insisting that “Israel and Iran should make a deal” and they would with his help.
On Monday as Trump prepared to leave the Group of Seven summit in Canada early, his warnings grew more ominous: He posted that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon and “Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!” The US president later denied speculation that he had returned to Washington, DC, early to negotiate a ceasefire, noting that it was for something “much bigger than that”.
Trump’s ambiguous statements have fuelled debate among analysts about the true extent of US involvement and intentions in the Israel-Iran conflict.
Debating Trump’s wink and a nod
Trump has denied any US involvement in the strikes. “The U.S. had nothing to do with the attack on Iran, tonight,” he wrote on Sunday.
Kelsey Davenport, director for nonproliferation policy at the US-based Arms Control Association, said Trump’s messaging had been clear. “I think that President Trump has been very clear in his opposition to the use of military force against Iran while diplomacy was playing out. And reporting suggests that he pushed back against [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” she said.
What’s more likely, Davenport said, is that “Israel was worried that diplomacy would succeed, that it would mean a deal” and “that it did not view [this as] matching its interests and objectives regarding Iran”.
Richard Nephew, a professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, agreed, saying it was Trump’s consistent march towards a deal that troubled Israel.
“I think it is that consistency that’s actually been the thing that’s the problem,” said Nephew, who served as director for Iran at the US National Security Council from 2011 to 2013 under then-President Barack Obama.
But Ali Ansari, a professor of Iranian history at St Andrews University in Scotland, disagreed.
“The US was aware. … Even if the specific timing did surprise them, they must have been aware, so a wink is about right,” he told Al Jazeera.
“At the same time, the US view is that Israel must take the lead and should really do this on their own,” he said.
Could Trump get sucked into the conflict?
Israel is believed to have destroyed the above-ground section of Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz. The facility has enriched uranium to 60 percent purity – far above the 3.67 percent needed for nuclear power but below the 90 percent purity needed for an atomic bomb. Power loss at Natanz as a result of the Israeli strike may have also damaged the underground enrichment section at Natanz, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
But in the IAEA’s assessment, Israel did not damage Iran’s other uranium enrichment plant at Fordow, which is buried inside a mountain and also enriches uranium to 60 percent purity.
“It’s likely that Israel would need US support if it actually wanted to penetrate some of these underground facilities,” Davenport said, pointing to the largest US conventional bomb, the 13,600kg (30,000lb) Massive Ordnance Penetrator.
“[With] repeated strikes with that munition, you could likely damage or destroy some of these facilities,” Davenport said, noting that Washington “has not transferred that bomb to Israel”.
Barbara Slavin, a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center, a US-based think tank, also told Al Jazeera that Israel would need US weapons to complete its stated mission of destroying Iran’s nuclear programme.
Nephew, for one, did not discount the chances of that happening.
“We know that [Trump] likes to be on the side of winners. To the extent that he perceives the Israelis as winners right now, that is the reason why he is maintaining his position and why I think we have a wink [to Israel],” he said.
On Friday, the US flew a large number of midair-refuelling planes to the Middle East and ordered the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz to sail there. On Tuesday, it announced it was sending more warplanes to the region.
Ansari agreed that the initial success of Israel’s attacks could mean that “Trump is tempted to join in just to get some of the glory,” but he thinks this could force Iran to stand down.
“It may well be that the US does join in on an attack on Fordow although I think even the genuine threat of an American attack will bring the Iranians to the table,” Ansari said. “They can concede – with honour – to the United States; they can’t to Israel, though they may have no choice.”
Wary of American involvement, US Senator Tim Kaine introduced a war powers resolution on Monday that would require the US Congress to authorise any military action against Iran.
“It is not in our national security interest to get into a war with Iran unless that war is absolutely necessary to defend the United States,” Kaine said.
Diplomacy vs force
Obama did not believe a military solution was attractive or feasible for Iran’s nuclear programme, and he opted for a diplomatic process that resulted in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2015. That agreement called for the IAEA to monitor all of Iran’s nuclear activities to ensure that uranium enrichment only reached the levels required for energy production.
According to Nephew and Davenport, Trump indirectly fanned the flames of the military option when he pulled the US out of the JCPOA as president in 2018 at Israel’s behest.
Two years later, Iran said it would enrich uranium to 4.5 percent purity, and in 2021, it refined it to 20 percent purity. In 2023, the IAEA said it had found uranium particles at Fordow enriched to 83.7 percent purity.
Trump offered no alternative to the JCPOA during his first presidential term, nor did President Joe Biden after him.
“Setting [the JCPOA] on fire was a direct contribution to where we are today,” Nephew said. Seeking a military path instead of a diplomatic one to curtail a nuclear programme “contributes to a proliferation path”, he said, “because countries say, ‘The only way I can protect myself is if I go down this path.’”
Davenport, an expert on the nuclear and missile programmes of Iran and North Korea, said even the regime change in Tehran that Netanyahu has called for wouldn’t solve the problem.
“Regime change is not an assured nonproliferation strategy,” she said. “We don’t know what would come next in Iran if this regime were to fall. If it were the military seizing control, nuclear weapons might be more likely. But even if it were a more open democratic government, democracies choose to build nuclear weapons too.”
