A2 · Elementary
9 min
diplomacygeopoliticsconflict resolutioninternational relations
The Road to Islamabad: Diplomacy, War, and a Possible Peace
El Camino a Islamabad: Diplomacia, Guerra y la Paz Posible
Iran's foreign minister is touring three nations while the United States sends its most senior negotiators to Islamabad. Fletcher and Octavio dig into the long history between Iran and Washington, and what a possible peace could actually mean.
El ministro de Exteriores de Irán viaja a tres países mientras Estados Unidos envía a sus negociadores más importantes a Islamabad. Fletcher y Octavio exploran la historia entre Irán y Washington, y lo que una paz posible puede significar para el mundo.
8 essential A2-level terms from this episode, with translations and example sentences in Spanish.
| Spanish | English | Example |
|---|---|---|
| ceasefire | alto el fuego | Los dos países quieren un alto el fuego. |
| negociación | negotiation | La negociación es importante para la paz. |
| acuerdo | agreement / deal | Los dos países firman un acuerdo. |
| también | also / too | Irán también quiere una solución. |
| sanciones | sanctions | Estados Unidos pone sanciones a Irán. |
| portaaviones | aircraft carrier | Hay tres portaaviones en el mar. |
| paz | peace | La gente quiere paz, no guerra. |
| neutral | neutral | Omán es un país neutral. |
What I keep coming back to this week is a name: Islamabad.
That's where everything seems to be pointing right now.
Sí.
Yes.
Irán y Estados Unidos hablan en Pakistán.
Iran and the United States are talking in Pakistan.
Es muy importante.
It's very significant.
Right.
So here's what's happening.
Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, is traveling to Pakistan, Russia, and Oman.
And the Americans are sending Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to meet him in Islamabad.
The White House even floated the idea of JD Vance going if things go well.
Kushner es el yerno de Trump.
Kushner is Trump's son-in-law.
Witkoff es amigo de Trump.
Witkoff is Trump's friend.
Son personas de confianza.
They are trusted people.
That's the point, isn't it.
Trump doesn't send career diplomats for the conversations he actually cares about.
He sends family.
He sends people who answer directly to him.
That tells you something about how seriously this is being taken.
Araghchi también viaja a Moscú y a Omán.
Araghchi is also traveling to Moscow and Oman.
¿Por qué estos países?
Why these countries?
Good question and the answer is different for each one.
Russia because Iran and Russia have been close through this whole war, and Tehran needs Moscow's read before it commits to anything.
Oman is the secret channel.
Has been for decades.
Omán es neutral.
Oman is neutral.
Omán habla con todos.
Oman talks to everyone.
Es un país pequeño pero muy útil.
It's a small country but very useful.
Exactly.
When the Obama administration was quietly reaching out to Iran in 2012, 2013, the first real back-channel conversations happened in Muscat.
Omani officials were literally sitting in a room with American and Iranian diplomats who officially didn't know each other existed.
Y después llegó el acuerdo nuclear en 2015.
And then came the nuclear deal in 2015.
El famoso JCPOA.
The famous JCPOA.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, yes.
Iran agrees to limit its nuclear program, the world lifts sanctions, everyone shakes hands.
It was genuinely a moment.
And then Trump walked away from it in 2018, which is one of the reasons we ended up where we are now.
Trump salió del acuerdo.
Trump left the agreement.
Irán continuó con sus programas.
Iran continued with its programs.
La situación empeoró mucho.
The situation got much worse.
And now here we are, years later, and there's a war.
Which brings us to a question I genuinely don't know the answer to: what does a ceasefire actually mean here?
What are they even negotiating?
Hay muchas cosas.
There are many things.
Las bombas, el petróleo, el programa nuclear.
The bombs, the oil, the nuclear program.
No es simple.
It's not simple.
It really isn't.
And the Strait of Hormuz closure complicates everything, because the economic pressure on the world from that alone is enormous.
The natural gas situation in Qatar, the shipping disruptions.
Every day the strait stays closed, the argument for some kind of deal gets stronger.
El estrecho de Ormuz es muy importante.
The Strait of Hormuz is very important.
Mucho petróleo pasa por ahí.
A lot of oil passes through there.
Around twenty percent of the world's oil and something like a third of all liquefied natural gas.
Through a waterway that's, at its narrowest, about thirty-three kilometers wide.
I've been in that region.
The geography is genuinely startling when you see it on a map.
Y ahora hay tres portaaviones americanos en la región.
And now there are three American aircraft carriers in the region.
Tres.
Three.
Es mucho poder militar.
That's a lot of military power.
The last time three American carriers were in the Middle East simultaneously was the buildup to the Iraq invasion in 2003.
I was covering that.
The sheer scale of what you're looking at when you see a carrier group up close, it concentrates the mind.
That's not an accident, having three there now.
Es un mensaje.
It's a message.
Trump dice: tenemos mucho poder.
Trump says: we have a lot of power.
Habla con nosotros.
Talk to us.
Negotiate from strength.
It's classic.
And Araghchi touring three capitals is Iran's version of the same thing.
We have friends too.
We have options.
Don't assume we'll take whatever you offer.
Rusia es importante para Irán.
Russia is important for Iran.
Rusia puede ayudar en las negociaciones.
Russia can help in the negotiations.
And also potentially complicate them.
Russia has an interest in keeping the United States tied down, keeping energy prices elevated, keeping attention away from Ukraine.
A quick clean ceasefire between Iran and the US might not serve Moscow's interests at all.
Sí, es verdad.
Yes, that's true.
Los intereses de Rusia son diferentes.
Russia's interests are different.
No quieren que Estados Unidos gane.
They don't want the United States to win.
Though what 'winning' even means here is worth unpacking.
The Trump administration said talks would move forward if this second round is 'successful.' But Karoline Leavitt is saying that.
Karoline Leavitt is a press secretary.
She's reading what she was handed.
¿Y Vance?
And Vance?
¿Va a viajar realmente a Pakistán?
Is he really going to travel to Pakistan?
That's the carrot, right.
If you perform well in round two, the Vice President himself shows up for round three.
It elevates the status of the talks.
It signals seriousness.
It also, frankly, gives Trump a potential win he can announce.
Trump quiere un acuerdo.
Trump wants a deal.
Los acuerdos son buenos para él políticamente.
Deals are good for him politically.
He does, and that's actually an underrated part of this.
Trump ran partly on ending wars, not starting them.
A war with Iran was never the plan.
The plan was maximum pressure.
But maximum pressure led to an actual shooting war, and now he needs an off-ramp that looks like a victory.
Irán también necesita una salida.
Iran also needs a way out.
La economía de Irán está muy mal.
Iran's economy is in very bad shape.
The Iranian rial has been in freefall for years.
Sanctions have been brutal.
And then you add a war on top of that.
The Iranian public has been suffering economically for a long time before any of this started.
La gente en Irán quiere paz.
People in Iran want peace.
La gente quiere trabajar y comer bien.
People want to work and eat well.
And the government in Tehran knows that.
There's a difference, as there always is, between what a regime says publicly and what the people living under it actually need.
Araghchi isn't some ideologue.
He's a career diplomat.
He knows how the game is played.
También el programa nuclear es un problema grande.
The nuclear program is also a big problem.
¿Qué pasa con el uranio?
What happens with the uranium?
That's the hardest part of any deal.
Iran has enriched uranium to ninety percent, which is weapons-grade.
Walking that back, verifiably, in a way the Iranians accept as not humiliating, while the US can point to it as a win.
That's the knot.
That's been the knot for twenty years.
Veinte años es mucho tiempo.
Twenty years is a long time.
Este problema es muy viejo.
This problem is very old.
George W.
Bush was dealing with it.
Obama spent enormous political capital on it.
Trump walked away from Obama's solution.
And now Trump is trying to solve it again, with a war happening, three carriers in the water, and cryptocurrency sanctions being announced the same week as peace talks.
The contradictions are genuinely hard to hold together.
Las sanciones de criptomonedas son una señal.
The cryptocurrency sanctions are a signal.
Dicen: todavía tenemos presión.
They say: we still have pressure.
Negotiate and squeeze at the same time.
It's a very specific American diplomatic style.
I've covered enough of these to know that it can work, and it can blow everything up.
It depends entirely on whether the people in the room are serious.
¿Y Witkoff y Kushner son personas serias?
And are Witkoff and Kushner serious people?
¿Tienen experiencia?
Do they have experience?
That is, politely, a question that professional diplomats have opinions about.
Witkoff is a real estate developer who brokered the Gaza ceasefire earlier this cycle, which was something.
Kushner has no formal diplomatic training but he's been in these rooms.
Whether that's enough, sitting across from career Iranian diplomats who've been doing this their whole lives, I genuinely don't know.
[chuckle] I hope so.
Yo también espero.
I hope so too.
El mundo necesita menos guerra, más conversación.
The world needs less war, more conversation.
You know, there was something you said a minute ago in Spanish that I want to ask you about, because I don't think I'd have phrased it that way.
You said 'Irán también necesita una salida.' That little word 'también,' dropped right in there.
It's doing a lot of work.
'También' significa 'also' o 'too'.
'También' means 'also' or 'too'.
'Irán también quiere paz.' 'Yo también quiero comer.' Es una palabra pequeña pero muy útil.
'Iran also wants peace.' 'I also want to eat.' It's a small word but very useful.
Right, and in English we'd probably stick 'also' before the verb or 'too' at the end of the sentence.
But in Spanish it seems to move around more freely.
Is there a rule, or do you just feel it?
Lo sientes.
You feel it.
Pero 'también' va después del sujeto.
But 'también' goes after the subject.
'Yo también', 'Irán también', 'tú también'.
'Me too', 'Iran also', 'you too'.
Siempre así.
Always like that.
After the subject.
Got it.
So if I wanted to say 'Fletcher also makes mistakes in Spanish,' which, historically documented, it would be 'Fletcher también comete errores.' Although Octavio, in your case, I suspect you'd say it with more enthusiasm than strictly necessary.
Sí.
Yes.
Fletcher también dice 'embarazado' cuando quiere decir 'avergonzado'.
Fletcher also says 'embarazado' when he means 'embarrassed'.
Es un error clásico.
It's a classic mistake.
[laugh]