The Islamabad Accords - SOON

JD Vance boarded Air Force Two at Joint Base Andrews on Friday morning, heading for a city his government had not, until six weeks ago, considered a serious address in geopolitics. He told reporters before departure that Trump had given the delegation “some pretty clear guidelines” he intended to see through. He did not specify the guidelines. He did not need to. Trump had already posted them on Truth Social: no uranium enrichment, regime change achieved, the Golden Age of the Middle East imminent. Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi spent Friday morning in Tehran telling assembled ambassadors something different: the 10-point plan Tehran submitted is the basis for negotiations, and Iran does not want “a ceasefire that allows the aggressor enemy to rearm.” The two delegations will sit across from each other in Islamabad on Saturday. Both will arrive carrying a victory they have already declared to their own publics, and neither version of that victory is compatible with the other.