After two months of conflict, neither a deadly bombing campaign nor a blockade on exports has forced Tehran to make the concessions the Trump administration is seeking.
The campaign has intensified in recent weeks, targeting Irans oil exports and financial networks while a naval blockade has disrupted shipments through the , a critical artery for global energy flows. U.S. officials argue the combination of military pressure and economic isolation is intended to weaken Irans capabilities and force it back to the negotiating table on more favorable terms.
While the U.S. has killed Irans Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and dozens of top military and political figures, the regime itself remains intact. His son, Mojtaba Khamenei, was selected to succeed him, and leadership remains firmly hardline.
Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator and fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, said the administration may have misjudged the type of negotiating partner it would face.
“Trump was looking for an Iranian Delcy Rodriguez,” he told Fox News Digital. “More likely, he’s going to end up with an Iranian Kim Jong Un.”
He expressed doubt that any decisive victory was possible while the current Iranian regime remained in power.
“And we do not have the capacity to remove the regime.”
The standoff increasingly has become a test of whether U.S. pressure can be converted into political concessions â or whether it is instead being diluted through workarounds, institutional resilience and competing constraints.
So far, analysts say, Iran has proven more capable of absorbing and rerouting pressure than Washington has been able to translate it into durable gains.
On Monday, Iran floated a proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for relief from the blockade, while deferring negotiations on more contentious issues.
But analysts caution that such proposals do not address the core dispute and may not even mean the same thing to both sides.
“What the Iranians mean by opening the straits, and what Trump means, may be two different sorts of things,” Miller said.
At the center of the standoff is Irans nuclear program, where the gap between the two sides remains wide. The Trump administration has pushed for Iran to eliminate its uranium enrichment capability entirely, while Iran insists that enrichment is a sovereign right and non-negotiable â leaving little room for compromise.
That divide continues to block a broader agreement, even as both sides explore more limited steps to reduce immediate tensions.
“Its almost unimaginable that this administration and the Iranian leadership are willing to make the kinds of concessions that would allow this administration to walk away with a win,” Miller said.
“Iranians are willing to give concessions, but Trump is looking for capitulation,” said Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft think tank. “And you can’t get a country to capitulate unless you have defeated them.”
Instead of folding under pressure, Iran largely has responded by adapting.Â
Despite the blockade, Iran has continued to move at least some oil through workaround methods, including sanctioned vessels, smaller ports and alternative routing strategies, even as overall exports have come under strain.
Those efforts have expanded in recent weeks. Reports indicate Iran is exploring overland shipments, including potential rail exports to , while vessels have increasingly rerouted through Iranian territorial waters or controlled shipping corridors to bypass restrictions.
“The United States successfully closes off one avenue for them, and slowly but surely they are finding workarounds,” Parsi said.
The financial impact of the campaign has been significant, even if uneven. Estimates vary, but some analysts put Irans potential losses from the blockade at roughly $400 million per day, largely
