TOI Correspondent from Washington: US Vice President JD Vance is arriving in Pakistan on Saturday morning for what is being billed as a concerted diplomatic push to corral Iran and contain a widening conflict that has not gone according to Washington’s script. With a number of US analysts characterising the Trump-and-Netanyahu-led war on Iran as militarily and tactically brilliant but strategically and diplomatically dumb, Vance is tasked with salvaging US gains from a war it has won while losing the peace as Tehran has dug in its heels despite being militarily pulverised.
On the eve of his departure, the US veep struck a calibrated tone that blended caution with conditional engagement. “If the Iranians are willing to negotiate in good faith, we're certainly willing to extend the open hand,” he said. “If they're going to try to play us, then they're going to find that the negotiating team is not that receptive.” It was a formulation that reflected Vance’s long-standing scepticism of war – important for his own political future – even as it signalled firmness in an attempt to walk the fine line between deterrence and diplomacy.
