Vance said the US "could not get to a situation where the Iranians were willing to accept our terms". Halting Iran's nuclear capabilities had been a "core goal" that wasn't reached.

This is somewhat puzzling, though. The Administration has repeatedly insisted that we have already accomplished all of the objectives for the war. That's the basis for their claim we had already won. Except this was our main objective.

Granted, the list of objectives has varied over time, especially at the beginning of the war. The Administration eventually settled on a list of four. That list of four wasn't always consistent for a while, either. But the list always included some variant of, "Iran will never get a nuclear weapon."

But that's the puzzle. If the war was successful in achieving that goal, if we've accomplished all our war objectives....why do we need to insist that Iran do anything? Why do we need to get them to give assurances that they would not seek to obtain or develop a nuclear weapon in the future? How can that be one of the "core goals" of the negotiations, if the military operation was a success?

It sounds far more like the Administration is being forced to confront the main criticism against this adventure from the start - you can't bomb Iran into not being able to get a nuclear weapon. You can't stop them from getting a nuke going forward just by blowing up stuff from a distance, no matter how much stuff you blow up. This objective was never achievable with the type of air operation they contemplated, barring getting super-lucky and having the regime collapse and be replaced by one that didn't want to pursue a nuclear program.

If we're having to negotiate to get them to voluntarily abandon their nuclear program, that sure sounds like we have failed to already achieve that objective on our own. Or am I missing something?