{"id":47146,"date":"2026-04-10T15:04:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T15:04:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=47146"},"modified":"2026-04-10T15:04:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T15:04:26","slug":"from-critic-to-negotiator-jd-vance-to-spearhead-us-efforts-in-iran-ceasefire-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=47146","title":{"rendered":"From critic to negotiator: JD Vance to spearhead US efforts in Iran ceasefire talks"},"content":{"rendered":"
It was a war JD Vance never wanted. Now the United States vice president has been tasked with ending it. Vance headed\u00a0to Pakistan today\u00a0with orders from President Donald Trump to turn the shaky Iran ceasefire into a lasting peace deal.<\/p>\n

For the 41-year-old Vance, who has kept a notably low profile during the Middle East conflict, it will be one of the biggest moments of his career.<\/p>\n

But the man widely regarded as a leading contender in the 2028 US presidential election will face huge challenges too when talks begin Saturday in Islamabad.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot think of a case where the vice president ran formal negotiations like this,\u201d Aaron Wolf Mannes, a lecturer at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy and an expert on the American vice presidency\u2019s role in foreign policy, told AFP.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is high risk, high reward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vance built his political brand as an avowed anti-interventionist who wanted to keep America out of any more foreign wars, such as\u00a0in Iraq,\u00a0where he served as a US Marine.<\/p>\n

That has made for a difficult balancing act after Trump launched the Iran war on February 28.<\/p>\n

Vance has publicly backed the conflict but has kept out of the limelight.<\/p>\n

When the ceasefire was announced, Vance happened to be far away in Hungary, supporting Prime Minister Viktor Orban\u2019s electoral campaign.<\/p>\n

Read More: JD Vance hopeful of ‘positive’ outcome as he departs for US-Iran talks in Islamabad<\/p>\n

The New York Times reported this week that in discussions behind closed doors in the weeks before the war, Vance argued against military action, saying it could cause regional chaos and split Trump\u2019s MAGA coalition.<\/p>\n

But Vance now suddenly finds himself as Trump\u2019s diplomatic closer for an Iran deal.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy key role was, I sat on the phone a lot,\u201d Vance told reporters as he left Hungary this week. \u201cI answered a lot of phone calls. I made a lot of phone calls. And again, I\u2019m happy about where we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Announcing the Islamabad talks this week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Vance played a \u201cvery significant and a key role in this since the very beginning\u201d.<\/p>\n

Not always diplomatic<\/p>\n

Vance will be accompanied by special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump\u2019s son-in-law Jared Kushner as he becomes the first US vice president to visit Pakistan since Joe Biden in 2011.<\/p>\n

The White House said Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Witkoff and Kushner \u201chave always been collaborating on these issues\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe president is optimistic that a deal can be reached that can lead to lasting peace in the Middle East,\u201d Principal Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly said in a statement to AFP.<\/p>\n

One theory is that the Iranians may view Vance as a more likely partner for diplomacy, given his widely reported opposition to the war and general doubts about US interventionism.<\/p>\n

After Tehran expressed fury over Israel\u2019s continued attacks on Lebanese cities despite the ceasefire deal, Vance appeared to take a softer tone, saying there may have been a \u201clegitimate misunderstanding\u201d from Iran that Lebanon would be included.<\/p>\n

He hasn\u2019t always been so diplomatic.<\/p>\n

A long-term sceptic of support for Ukraine, Vance notoriously kicked off the Oval Office row between Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky in February 2025.<\/p>\n

And for the ambitious Vance, a soon-to-be father of four and Catholic convert, politics is always in the background.<\/p>\n

Since Trump\u2019s return to power, Vance has been unusually prominent in a tough job that is simultaneously one heartbeat away from the presidency yet also, in the words of one former vice president, \u201cnot worth a bucket of warm spit\u201d.<\/p>\n

His crucial role in the Iran talks comes against the backdrop of a looming potential battle with Rubio to be the Republican heir to Trump in two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf he can get something that papers it over without dealing with real issues, that\u2019s probably enough,\u201d said Mannes.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut if nothing good comes of this, it raises questions about his competence, which is not going to help him electorally. And of course Rubio\u2019s right there as a potential rival for 2028.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was a war JD Vance never wanted. Now the United States vice president has been tasked with ending it. Vance headed\u00a0to Pakistan today\u00a0with orders from President Donald Trump to turn the shaky Iran ceasefire into a lasting peace deal. For the 41-year-old Vance, who has kept a notably low profile during the Middle East […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47146","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47146\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}