U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Vienna, Austria, July 2015
Carlos Barria / Reuters

Former President Donald Trump’s Iran policy was an abject failure, applying maximum pressure to minimal benefit. The United States withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and ratcheted up sanctions on Tehran. But far from containing Iran, these actions aggravated the country’s leaders and emboldened them to expand their nuclear enrichment activities. The result was greater regional volatility and a heightened risk of direct conflict between Washington and Tehran.

President Joe Biden knows he must reverse this dangerous downward spiral. In the hope of returning to the agreement that his former boss, President Barack Obama, brokered in 2015, Biden has

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