The U.S. should know its limits!

The Supreme and Wise Leader of the Islamic Revolution recently pointed to valuable observations about the enemies’ approach to nuclear negotiations with Iran and emphasized: “Negotiations with the United States are not only of no benefit but, in the current circumstances, also harmful to the country. The American side has dug its heels in and says Iran must not have enrichment — that means we should let the country’s great achievements go up in smoke and be destroyed; the proud nation of Iran will spit in the face of the utterer of that phrase.”

These unequivocal and frank statements draw a clear line under the incorrect and childish assumptions about the “necessity of conciliation with the enemy.” It should be noted that from each word and sentence of the Supreme Leader one can derive a dominant foreign-policy proposition: the “principle of negating submission.”

When the enemies, during previous rounds of negotiations, resorted to bombing Iran and targeted our nuclear sites, talking about negotiating with them again amounts to nothing but a retreat and a grave mistake. More importantly, the enemies brazenly call for “zero percent enrichment” and “the curtailment of Iran’s missile capabilities.” These red lines are not negotiable or even open to discussion at any table. The Islamic Iran has clearly defined the limits of the enemy’s speech and conduct (if they truly intend a deal), and it will never transgress this framework.

The fact is that the situation today differs from 2015 (the time of the JCPOA), because the perfidious Western side has twice made strategic and calculational blunders: the United States once officially withdrew from the nuclear deal and trampled its commitments; and on another occasion White House officials, during indirect talks in Muscat, reportedly gave a green light to the vile and wretched Zionist regime for an attack on our sacred and pure soil.

It did not end there. The U.S. side completed its irreparable and strategic error by bombing Natanz and Fordow. In such circumstances, it would be better for Trump and White House officials to observe limits in their strategy, conduct, and rhetoric toward our dear country; otherwise, Washington will incur damages and costs so great that even the deluded president of that country will be unable to calculate them.

The desperation and bewilderment of American officials — led by Donald Trump — in the face of the power, logic, and high standing of the Islamic system and the Iranian nation are more palpable than ever. Since assuming office, Donald Trump has placed worn-out levers such as the “redefinition of a maximum-pressure strategy” and “military action against Iran” on the agenda, intending, as he put it, to unsheathe the sword against the Islamic Republic.

However, the Supreme Leader’s clear and decisive positions rejecting negotiations with the United States struck at and demolished the brazen plot of the sworn enemy of the Iranian nation. Trump’s contradictory rhetoric — simultaneously invoking keywords like direct talks, indirect talks, military attack, and so on — reflects the strategic and cognitive confusion governing the White House and U.S. foreign-policy apparatus. As long as this confusion prevails in the White House, Washington will not be at the negotiating table in any meaningful way.

Admission of past mistakes and their rectification, recognition of Iran’s inherent nuclear rights — including the right to enrich uranium on Iranian soil — and the voluntary abandonment of the strategy of “maximally containing Iran” are among the preconditions that, if the other side were to commit to them (which is highly unlikely), Iran could then consider further options and make a final decision based on its national interests.