Iran talks: The real stakes no one is talking about

The peace talks continue between Iran and the U.S, but who actually wants a deal, and what does "winning" even mean for each side? Professor Clionadh Raleigh chats with Bron Mills about the real strategic interests at play: what the US needs, what Iran's leadership can actually accept, and what the regional picture looks like if talks collapse or succeed.

Then: what is the point from here? With negotiations fragile and red lines on all sides, we assess what a credible outcome looks like, and whether one is actually possible.

Beyond Iran, this week's episode covers the full sweep of global flashpoints. Lebanon's fragile recovery and what's driving the latest tensions. Israel's strategic position and the risks of renewed escalation. Colombia's worsening armed conflict and the overlooked violence reshaping the country. The growing threat to critical seabed cable infrastructure, an underreported front in the new era of great power competition. And Ethiopia, where instability continues to deepen with little international attention.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

How could the US come out and say that the deal has been successful?

SPEAKER_02 0:04

But what would a successful deal look like? From the US vantage, it's that it's over, right? From Israel, it's that the support for these militias has been nullified. From the Gulf states, it's also that Iran has been disabled, which is the exact opposite of Iranians' perspectives. The IRGC believes success to be that they retain control over the strait, they retain their nuclear program, they retain the structure of their regime and the oppression of their own populations, and they retain the ability to support these militants.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Conflicts of interest brought to you by ACLED.

SPEAKER_02 0:43

Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Conflicts of Interest. I'm Clean O Raleigh, and I'm here with the lovely Ron Mills on a, on my end, sweltering Monday morning.

SPEAKER_01 0:54

It's cooled down quite a lot since the last time we spoke here. So true to form, England has gone back to being grey and mild. Right. Florida is still grey and oppressive. Well, speaking of things that are pretty unremarkable, Iran is still all over the news, but what we are struggling to get our heads around is anything that's sort of remotely interesting as far as developments go, because it just seems from the outside to be taking on exactly as it was. This was the war that sort of grabbed everybody's attention, was all over the news, the pictures and the bombs, and it was war as people know it and understand it. And so since the ceasefire, they've all gone pretty quiet. There's a lot of digging heels in. What is actually going on, Cleaner? And why is it still something that is all over the news without anything to really say? So it's a really good point.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

So we mentioned last week that the conflict has been in ceasefire mode for longer than it was an active conflict. And that ceasefire mode has not been productive in the sense that there is some sort of a peace agreement to come out of it. There's just kind of back and forth about where people are positioning themselves, the Iranians or the US mainly. They have not moved from those positions, especially Iran, who are being what's referred to as maximalist in its position, in that they see no reason to budge whatsoever. And this is back to the perception that they believe that they have won and that it's just a matter of making the US wait it out and have the pressure points that are unique to the US continue to build. The US has the exact same interpretation, which is that, you know, whether it's the blockade or internal issues, that the pressure on Iran will cause the IRGC to relinquish some of the control that they are exerting over the ceasefire. But neither is true, neither is winning. So at the moment, we have these back and forth skirmishes. Last night it was Kuwait, last week it was UAE, and there's still some engagement between the US and Iran, but yeah, we're nowhere. I will say that the way this has matured is actually quite typical. It's usually a little bit more active, but it's typical. People get very interested in conflicts in the very first few weeks. This one's possibility for going wrong was so enormous that the level of attention matched that. But this feeling of kind of unease and disorder is what we should all get used to. Because this is it for like I would say about 10 years. I don't think this conflict will continue like this for 10 years, but this feeling of there's a large conflict and it's not quite broken out and it's not resolved is something that we should get used to.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

I was going to say about that that 10 years, because will it be over over this as a as a kind of hotspot in the world, or what is it we're looking at? Because Trump has been remarkably confident and outspoken, which I mean obviously so out of character, but he has responded to to critics directly of the war, saying to sit back and relax, because the commentary from what he's calling political hacks is making the negotiations difficult. But he's confident that his deal will all work out well in the end, because according to him, it always does. And I guess that's leaving everybody going, okay, what does that actually mean? What does that look like? Who's gonna win? What does winning look like? There's so little detail, right?

SPEAKER_02 4:21

So a few things there, which is that Trump has acted totally unconcerned about the effect that the Iranian war has had on the US population. And so he does feel quite confident. So he feels quite confident he can continue with this. And the effect on the US, as we mentioned last week, is incredibly small compared to the effect it has on everybody else, you know, the Gulf, Israel, etc. But the way that it's discussed here in the US is gas prices and then the effect on the midterms. Other people have different timelines about whether or not it's going to kind of be a crunch time for them. But he doesn't need to be concerned about either of those, in part because of his position within the presidency, which is that he's not going to have to answer for a lot of this. And some of the by-elections or primaries recently across US states have proven that he still has quite a strong level of control over Republican primaries or Republican elections. And so this isn't having the effect that he might have feared it would have on his overall power within the US. So again, he does not feel the costs. And so if you don't feel the costs, then why not continue this if you feel like it has a better chance of getting you to your end goal? The other thing I would say is that his position on what he referred to as political hacks, what we might refer to as journalists or experts, it's of course of course it's exaggerated, but it's not totally wrong. There is a small cottage industry, not small, large cottage industry in the States, especially, that don't want to analyze this conflict as either we have this type of conflict or we have a different type of conflict. There's some impression that like there was a piece out there that somebody could have brokered. And that's not true. So, for example, just this morning there was an article in the New York Times about how the government of Lebanon was close to getting Hezbolla to disarm. And like that's pure nonsense. It's pure and total nonsense. And yet it's being promoted as we miss this opportunity to disarm Hezbollah, when Hezbollah has zero intention of disarming, right? They can display that in their current actions. And also the Lebanese government has no authority or capabilities to do that. But it's a talking point where I think the political camps in the US really want to promote, and I don't think it does anybody any good.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

So on Lebanon, your favorite, Mr. Macron, he's been in the news today. And he's called for an end to the fighting. Again, the language around calling for an end to the fighting from these unrelated parties in my mind, it always kind of blows my mind. Like, who cares what you say, really? Who's this for? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So he has called for an end to the fighting. Um, and he said that nothing justifies the major escalation underway in Lebanon.

SPEAKER_02 7:10

Do you agree? Does nothing justify it? I mean, the people who use language like, let's not fight about this and let's talk it out are never going to believe that anything justifies any escalation. Something we've discussed previously on the podcast, which is, is conflict ever justified? Is it in fact sometimes the necessary response to either present or future threats? I mean, yes, sometimes it most certainly is, and it's necessary to defend populations and territory and also kind of trajectories of governance that are being threatened. That said, what's happening in Lebanon now is from Israel's perspective, I think, again, the rhetoric in Israel is always like, this is our chance to do it. This was our chance to go into Iran, this was our chance to take care of Hezbollah. And everything is put in these terms, which is that if we don't do this, that's an existential threat to us. And, you know, they have some evidence on their side to suggest that if they don't try to take quite a militant stance against militants, that they will be overrun. There is no opportunity for, I would say, a peace deal with Hezbollah or even with the Lebanese government, some sort of a way to mitigate that threat. So what Israel is doing is a military strategy that is designed to maximize what they can use as leverage against Hezbollah into the future in order to get them to push back up the country or to disarm in certain ways. From the Israeli view, they have massive threats to their homeland constantly from forces that are allied and sometimes coordinated. And in the face of that, none of this looks to be out of bounds in terms of a strategy to deal with it. From Lebanon and Hezbollah's view, which are not the same, but they are saying this is an aggressor. And every time that they move into the country, it further kind of deepens the desire and the possible connection between both Lebanon and Hezbollah. I mean, it's like six of one, half a dozen of the other, about which perspective you take on that. But it would be very surprising if the Hezbollah conflict with Israel ended with a coordinated, peaceful settlement anytime soon, is how I put it. This is in the fighting stage.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

Yeah, because the the concept of what's happening in Lebanon is brought into discussions about the peace talks all the time. But to what extent are Israel actually actively involved in the peace talks that are happening? When you hear about the peace talks, it's it's mainly Trump and Tehran. But then when it comes to one of the sticking points, that's been what's going on in Lebanon. And and I suppose another question is to what extent Trump has any influence on what is going on between Israel and Lebanon?

SPEAKER_02 9:51

So that's a really interesting question, because Israel, from what I understand, is not involved at all in the direct talks, but it is certainly involved in the sense that they are creating a context in which the Iranians can both again maximize their demands by saying, you know, this other context that we have no control over must be included within our peace deal. It indicates, of course, the close relationship between the Iranian regime and Hezbollah, which continues to this day and needs to be reinforced if you're Hezbollah and Iran. So Iran has to come out of this looking like it can resume its support for its proxy militias, whether it's Hezbollah, the Houthis, the Iranian, the Iraqi militias, you know, Hamas. And if it doesn't, it is going to really struggle to resume a position within the Persian Gulf and within the larger region of resilience and dominance to this. But there's absolutely no way that Israel will be convinced that a peace agreement negotiated without it being involved and not really considering its own territorial autonomy is going to work out well. Especially as this is something that I discussed in the newsletter, Trump is forwarding this idea that a rapprochement with Israel between the Gulf states and itself, so normalization of relations is going to be some sort of a big prize from these peace agreements. But there's absolutely no way that the Gulf states are going to quickly normalize with Israel and that is going to keep it safe, either one of them safe. You know, for the Gulf states, normalization with Israel causes domestic problems, a lot of them. For Israel, normalization with the Gulf states is not a substitute for dealing with these extremely present threats around them. Even if those threats are shared with other Gulf states, or everybody can recognize the threat of Hamas and Hezbollah and the Iraqi militias and the Houthis, everybody can know what they look like and how they can manifest. It's not the same to recognize and have to have to deal with.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

So if those relationships remain sort of intact between um Iran and their sort of militia friends, how could the US come out and say that their deal has been successful?

SPEAKER_02 12:06

I mean, they just say it, basically, you know. I mean, I don't think they worry too much about the details. But what would a successful deal look like? And again, it it really depends on what vantage you're standing from. So if you're standing from the US vantage, it's that it's over, right? And that Hegzeth and everybody else lives another day. If you're standing from Israel, it's that the support for these militias has been nullified, but equally, the IRGC more specifically has been disabled, right? If you're standing from the Gulf states, it's also that Iran has been disabled and that the straits are open and they can resume a similar to, let's say, December 2025 existence, but with quite a lot of military assistance to contain Iran and also to go after those militias, which is the exact opposite of Iranian's perspectives, which is that the IRGC believes success to be that they retain control over the strait, they retain their nuclear program, they retain the structure of their regime and the oppression of their own populations, and they retain the ability to support these militants. Now, the problem being at the moment, somewhat wildly, is that Iran is able to not move on its asks, despite the fact that these many strong, many extremely capable states are saying no. And that's in some ways what's what remains so unbelievable about the state of affairs and how it got this way.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah. Because I think to learn the complexity and the the history, if you like, of the IRGC and its build-up, I think is probably for the majority of the population not quite as memorable as nuclear weapons and militia friends. I think like that's kind of it. And so from the general understanding, that's why this thing started in the first place. So the chances of those two things being non-problems moving forward.

SPEAKER_02 14:01

I think those two things will be massive problems moving forward. So nuclear weapons and the straits are the crown jewels of the IRGC's hold over Iran. And neither of them have come to a successful resolution now for the rest of the world, right? So the Iranian power structure as it sits at the moment is dependent on not letting go of either of those two things or exchanging those for massive additional asks on the part of Iran, whether it is a huge amount of money, which will then use both to reinforce its missile program and also to support these militias elsewhere, or continued nuclear threats and control over the strait. Either way, leaving the situation as it is at the moment is its most dangerous, but it does hem in Iran. Iran desperately needs money at the moment. It desperately needs like actual cash. Kind of like a builder in a house. So it needs cash and it's not getting it. And so that's again the point of leverage that I think that Trump and the blockade and some other things are trying to use against Iran. The Israelis believe that if you keep going until December, you'll actually see quite a not a lot of fracturing within the regime. It's hard not to imagine that would happen. The Israelis, of course, have their own timetable, and that is specifically September, when they have an election. The US has their timetable, which may in fact be November, which is the midterms. So I would find it very difficult to think that it's not going to continue like this for quite a while until some of those crunch points come up. It may be that this conflict in Lebanon is enough to get Netanyahu another term, although domestic Israeli politics is so much more complex than whether or not they're involved in this conflict and have some continuance. I can't really say at the moment how it's going to work out for the states because that's it's it's much more short-term than that in the state.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Yeah, no, absolutely. So we've managed to talk quite extensively about this kind of stalemate, but obviously there are just lots of questions in grey areas. I just thought I might grab your thoughts on some other bits going on in the world very, very quickly. So as far as Ethiopia, they head to the polls today. Do you have any immediate thoughts on that? I read that voters in to grey are being excluded. They are.

SPEAKER_02 16:15

I mean, it's a total repeat of a situation that happened in 2020 that, of course, led to the war. I am, admittedly and openly, an Ethio optimist. I love that country. I love it so much. So what's happening there is quite disturbing to people who care about it, and of course, mostly to Ethiopians themselves. But Abi Ahmed, who has been fetid by the international community for quite a while, and then that all came to an abrupt end when Tigray launched conflict activities against the federal government. And in fact, actually, just on that note, right, there was an AFP story last week about this, which was full of, I would say, obtuse and incorrect assertions about the beginning of that war. And so the Western journalists love nothing more than misrepresenting that conflict, as I unfortunately learned during the first one. But just so we're clear, right, the TPLF, which is the kind of regional government of the Tigray area in the north, is quite belligerent in their position towards the federal government led by Abiy Ahmed. Abiy Ahmed, no saint, you know, also quite difficult in the sense that he ushered in a kind of new opening of Ethiopia and then very quickly closed it down again quite brutally, whether it's civil society or journalists or the media. And then there has been a space of continuing conflicts within the region of Oromiyya and also in Amhara, which had been his area of mass support. And we're going to get into that, I think, in a podcast next week. But Ethiopians will vote for the Prosperity Party, which is Abi Ahmed's party, to get back into power. There will be a continuance, and then there will be a preparation for conflict with the TPLF. The TPLF is already preparing. There's a lot of recruitment going on of young people, often forced within Tegray. So again, yet another repeat of what happened in a very brutal and destabilizing war that happened about five and a half, six years ago.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

There's a lot of components to that, isn't there? So picking it up on a on a special episode that focuses on just that later. Yeah. Certainly next week. Then over in Colombia, got some more election staff, election action ticking over, as the far right candidate, as I understand it, has won the first round vote ahead of that election. Elaborate.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

Whenever I think about South American elections, the first thought that comes to my mind is that like everything is always so extreme, right? Everything has to be far right or far left. Moderate candidates don't get a look in in any way, right? But there's a great commenter called Boz on Latin America, and he made this map once, quite a while back, but I'm sure he could remake it again. It wasn't just which countries within Latin America or South America in particular were extreme right or extreme left. They also varied about whether or not they were populist or democratic. And there was all sorts of variations on that theme. So it's almost unpredictable which version of institutional governance gets you extreme candidates, which is typical conversation about institutionalism across the world is, you know, democracies that have this type of character are more likely to lead to extreme candidates, and then there's some sort of negotiation, et cetera, et cetera. In Latin America, it doesn't seem to be like that at all. It seems like it's it's it's assumed that you're going to get an extreme candidate, and then that kind of fits within the institutional structure. It's not determined by it. And all I can say is that these lurches from right to left and these kind of purity contests about whether or not you agree with everything that is Lille is doing in Argentina or you disagree with everything that Lula did in Brazil, it's so destabilizing. Their entire politics seems to be prefaced on destabilizing at least half the country.

SPEAKER_01 19:57

It's a really interesting observation about how the the extreme views just being kind of given because I think we're starting to see more of that across the world, aren't we? Even in the UK, what we previously saw as quite an extreme political party. There has now been a launch of an even more of the same thing. And so maybe yeah, it's it's really interesting.

SPEAKER_02 20:13

I mean, like the last thing you should want is to become a state that does that.

SPEAKER_01 20:17

The last thing I was going to touch on today was the US, UK, and Australia new project about the underwater drones that are looking to defend the sea cables and the the urging of Beijing to be slightly more transparent in what they're up to. For people that are brand new to this story, why is it that the seabed is being called a battlefield?

SPEAKER_02 20:39

So this is kind of an extension of the hybrid cyber conflicts that we've been focusing on a little bit here at Accold. And the infrastructure just in the underwater arena is so vital and so important to many countries' domestic security that it's super important to take it seriously. I mean, I think last week, Braun, you mentioned about the incursion of Russian submarines into European sea space, I guess we would call it. And yeah, that is, you know, I would much prefer this much more rational approach to how to deal with these threats than the space stuff that you sometimes hear about. I was like, oh great, thanks. We're all set in space. That's perfect.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Yeah, it feels a little bit less like a like a movie, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_02 21:21

Yeah. But I mean, I think it's wonderful, right? You know, that relationship has been a little bit fraught because of information sharing and the fact that Britain has no money or desire to somehow defend itself. But you know, we we live in hope, Ron.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

We do. No money and no desire to defend itself. I mean, what a what a glowing reference.

SPEAKER_02 21:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

It's true.

SPEAKER_02 21:42

Well, I think that's all for us today. Come back next week where we're going to discuss Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa a little bit more directly and what it means to be kind of what I would refer to as a second order likely conflict, especially from the Iranian fallout. So with that, thank you very much. Thank you, Braun.

SPEAKER_00 21:59

Thank you. You've been listening to Conflicts of Interest with Professor Cleaner Raleigh, brought to you by ACLED, the world's leading source of political violence and protest data. Subscribe so you never miss an episode and follow us on socials for updates in the meantime.