He wrote that diplomacy is effective when grounded in power, and power yields lasting results when consolidated through diplomacy, adding that those who pit the two against each other—or sacrifice one for the sake of the other—understand neither diplomacy nor power.
The book ‘The Power of Negotiation’, authored by Abbas Araghchi—the Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran—has reached its sixth printing, featuring a new introduction.
In the new preface to the book—written in light of current developments and the military aggression by the US and Israel—Araghchi writes: When the first edition of ‘The Power of Negotiation’ was published, my aim was to share the fruits of my years in the diplomatic arena, and to speak of a world where dialogue, bargaining, mutual understanding, and persuasion—rather than war and bloodshed—shape the destiny of nations.
At that time, few could have imagined that, in such a short span, the Islamic Republic of Iran would weather two consecutive wars in less than a year, and that Iranian diplomacy would face the most difficult and perilous conditions in its modern history, he added.
Araghchi said that as I write these lines on the occasion of the book’s sixth printing, we are still living through historic times.
He further wrote the events of the twelve-day and forty-day wars have now become a significant part of the Iranian nation’s historical memory, even as negotiations between Iran and the United States—aimed at reaching an agreement to permanently end the conflict—continue nearly two months after the ceasefire in the forty-day war.
However, a crucial question these days is whether negotiations with the United States are prudent, given that the two previous rounds of talks culminated in war. While this question may appear simple at first glance, it actually presents an inverted version of the truth; those two wars stemmed not from the negotiations themselves, but from the miscalculations of Iran’s adversaries.
At both junctures, what drove the other side to opt for the military option was the perception of a weak Iran that had lost its capacity for effective resistance.
