Date: January 9, 1991
Location: The Intercontinental Hotel, Geneva
The world fixed its eyes on the venue. Journalists landed from near and far. The Security Council resolution was unambiguous, demanding Iraq's immediate and complete withdrawal from Kuwait, which it had overrun. The deadline was about to expire. George H. W. Bush gave the ruler of Baghdad one last chance to understand that the world was determined to turn the page on the invasion. Across the Middle East and beyond, the stakes seemed immense. The moment seemed dangerous and an irruption seemed imminent.
US Secretary of State James Baker entered from one side; his Iraqi counterpart Tariq Aziz entered from the other, and they sat down. Journalists pressed for a photo of the two men shaking hands, and it was granted. Aziz offered a faint smile, Baker kept a poker face. Outside, tensions had reached a fever pitch. As the talks dragged on, some speculated that the two ministers had been hashing out the terms of a settlement. The conclusion reached after the seven-hour "historic" meeting was that no agreement was possible. Eight days later, the war to liberate Kuwait would begin.
Date: February 26, 2026
Location: The Omani Consulate, Geneva
Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi sat across the table from Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. The prevailing impression was that the Iranian minister would live up to his reputation as a shrewd negotiator and take a critical factor into account: in the White House is Donald Trump, who had green lit the attack on Iran's nuclear facilities after having, years earlier, given the order to assassinate General Qasem Soleimani near Baghdad Airport.
The optimists were proven wrong. Aziz did not show Baker the flexibility needed to avert war, and neither did Araghchi. In the first meeting, Aziz demanded that every dispute in the region be settled and, having detected the scent of a threat, refused to deliver Bush's letter to Saddam Hussein. In the later episode, Araghchi declined to offer a concession that would allow Trump to claim that he had succeeded in changing Iran's stance. Witkoff says Araghchi failed to show goodwill, boasted of his country's strengths, and even shouted. The meeting failed, and two days later, the American-Israeli campaign on Iran began.
I am fully aware of the differences between the two cases: different eras, different men, and different circumstances. The regime of the "Islamic Revolution" in Iran is nothing like Iraq's “Baath” regime. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has an entirely different conception of the world to that of Saddam Hussein, and Araghchi's Iran is a far cry from Tariq Aziz's Iraq. Something else compelled me to draw the comparison: I was struck, after the Geneva meeting, that a man like Tariq Aziz, with his journalistic and diplomatic background, had failed to help avert war. So I made a point of putting the question to a number of people who had worked with Saddam, including some who served in his palace and had maintained friendships with Aziz. Their answer surprised me: Aziz had had no illusions about the peril Iraq would face if it held its ground, but he could not convince his country's decision-maker to accept this reality, nor speak to him candidly, especially not in meetings of the party's Regional Command.
I also heard from the man listening in on the first phone call after the invasion between King Hussein and the Iraqi president. The Jordanian monarch diplomatically drew Saddam's attention to the gravity of the situation, seemingly hinting that a withdrawal to Iraq's international borders was Saddam's offramp.
Was Araghchi in a similar position to Aziz? Did his fear of accusations of treason or capitulation push the region into the flames that continue to ravage it? Did Iraq pay the price of Saddam's fear that his historic image would be that of a man who had bowed to the demands of the "Great Satan"? And did Iran and the region pay the price of the Supreme Leader's refusal to tarnish his image by abandoning his nuclear dream and agreeing to discuss the range of his missiles and Iran's relationship with its "proxies"?
Some believe that the man in the White House's own obsession with image played a role in triggering this - that after listening to Witkoff, Trump felt the Iranian carpet-weaver was treating him as Iran had his predecessors and that Iran had been trying to undermine his image and that of "America's greatness."
It is not far-fetched to assume that leaders' image complex can impede ceasefire efforts. What will Iran's image be after a ceasefire? Indeed, the very moment the war began, it lost its Supreme Leader and a number of its commanders; since then, it has lost much of its arsenal, factories, and capabilities. Can Mojtaba Khamenei, the new, wounded Supreme Leader, accept the diminished image of himself, his regime, and his country? Can the IRGC tolerate an image of weakness or defeat when they are the backbone of the regime, especially under the new Supreme Leader?
It is too early to speculate about the image of the parties that will emerge from a war that remains wide open. Will a wounded or exhausted Iran conclude that nothing can protect it but a nuclear bomb? What of the other powers in the region, particularly after the Iranian regime committed the sin of attacking states that had refused to join or facilitate the war?
Then there is the question of Israel's image, and that of Benjamin Netanyahu.
He spared Israel the peril of confronting Iran alone. What will become of Netanyahu's own image if Trump chooses to declare victory and withdraw his fleets? How long can the Middle East endure this spectacle of bombers, missiles, drones, and flames engulfing a region whose energy arteries the world cannot live without? When a ceasefire is declared, every party will claim victory. This is the terrible Middle East. All players address losses by doubling down on them.
