US-Iran conflict: three experts on how this ends

The US-Iran conflict has lurched into dangerous new territory this week, with fresh American airstrikes on Iranian-backed targets in Yemen and Iraq drawing retaliatory drone fire across the region. Both governments are trading blows with no clear off-ramp in sight. So what does an exit strategy even look like at this point? Three analysts who’ve spent years watching this rivalry gave us their best answers — and none of them are particularly reassuring.

The diplomatic track is thinner than it looks

Trita Parsi, executive vice president at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft in Washington, argues that back-channel communication between Tehran and Washington is more active than either side publicly admits. But he’s skeptical it translates into anything durable. “Both governments are performing for domestic audiences right now,” he said. “That makes compromise feel like capitulation.” Iran’s leadership faces a population exhausted by sanctions. The US faces an election-year political climate where any deal with Tehran gets immediately weaponized. Those two pressures don’t cancel each other out — they compound.

The nuclear file remains the central variable

Karim Sadjadpour at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace points to Iran’s nuclear program as the issue that will ultimately determine whether this ends in negotiation or catastrophe. Tehran has enriched uranium to 60 percent purity — just a technical step away from weapons-grade material. That’s a card Iran plays deliberately, as leverage. But it’s also a tripwire. Israeli officials have privately told American counterparts they won’t tolerate Iran crossing the 90 percent threshold, regardless of what Washington decides. That’s the scenario most likely to transform a manageable confrontation into a genuine war.

That single number — 90 percent — may matter more than any military strike or diplomatic communiqué in the months ahead.

Proxies complicate every off-ramp

Vali Nasr, former senior adviser at the State Department and now a professor at Johns Hopkins, says the proxy network Iran has built across Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen is both its greatest asset and its biggest liability in any negotiation. Washington can’t simply strike a deal with Tehran and expect Hezbollah or the Houthis to stand down. These groups have their own interests, their own funding streams, and their own political constituencies. “Iran created monsters it can’t fully control,” Nasr said. “Any ceasefire has to account for that architecture, and right now nobody has a blueprint.”

What comes next

Most analysts agree that a full-scale war between US forces and Iran remains unlikely in 2024 — but unlikely isn’t the same as impossible. The more probable near-term scenario is a prolonged, grinding shadow conflict: targeted strikes, proxy skirmishes, and economic pressure that bleeds both sides without resolving anything. Diplomatic openings could emerge after the US election in November, when political constraints loosen slightly. Still, without a fundamental shift in either government’s red lines, any talks would be fragile from day one. The exit strategy, if it exists, hasn’t been written yet.