Welcome to Talking Fed's one-on-one, deep dive discussions with national figures about the most fascinating and consequential issues defining our culture and shaping our lives.

I'm your host, Harry Littman. I'm thrilled to be speaking

with one of the most knowledgeable and experienced experts in foreign policy and national

security in the country. Jake Sullivan has been in the room where it happens for much of his

incandescent career. Sullivan served as Biden's

national security advisor for all of Biden's term, and back in the Obama administration,

he was one of the key negotiators of the JCPOA nuclear deal, concluded in 2015, the deal that

Trump ripped up. He is now the Kissinger professor of the

practice of statecraft and world order at the Harvard Kennedy School, and along with his former

colleague John Feiner, co-hosts the great new podcast. Everyone, check it out, The Long Game. He is probably the

most gold-plated resume I've ever seen. Did I mention Rhodes Scholar and Supreme Court

clerk, but he somehow managed to remain a down-to-earth guy from Minnesota. Jake Sullivan,

thank you so much for joining Talking Fed's one-on-one, and my apologies to you and our listeners for my froggy throat.

Well, Harry, I just hope you're feeling okay.

And thank you for that very kind introduction.

I want to shoot straight to Iran. We're in this strange war truce in which U.S. strategy seems to be

changing twice a week. What do you make of it overall? And what clues, if any, do you think

we can take from the way both sides seem to be posturing and sending mixed signals about

their appetite for negotiation.

Well, it's interesting. In some ways, it is easier to predict the Iranian side than the Trump

side. The Iranians have made it clear that they are not going to give up entirely their right to enrichment. They're not going to

completely surrender their nuclear program. They're prepared to do a deal, but it has to be a compromise.

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